Defending champion Tom McKibbin is hoping history will repeat itself after putting himself in a strong position heading into the weekend at the European Open.
The Northern Irishman entered the final two rounds at Green Eagle Golf Courses 12 months ago one shot behind at five under and while his own score is one shot better off this season, he will find himself at least three back with 36 holes to play.
The Porsche Nord Course is a very different proposition this year, with heavy rain both before and during the event making a layout that was already a 7,458-yard par-73 play extremely long.
But McKibbin is ready for the challenge and in confident mood after opening with rounds of 69-71.
"I’m looking forward to the weekend because I’m in a good position on the leaderboard," he said. "Last year has given me confidence where I played well in the final rounds and hopefully I can do the same again over the next couple of days.
"The course is playing a lot longer and a lot softer than last year. I’m hitting a lot of long-irons into the greens and some of the greens are generating a lot of back spin which is hard to predict."
McKibbin was five shots behind after round one and a double-bogey on his opening hole on Friday after finding the trees threatened to derail his defence entirely.
He responded with four birdies, however, and was pleased with his performance on a testing day.
"The rain and wind we had earlier in the day made it especially tricky," he said.
"It was a very good day. It was obviously not the start I wanted with a double-bogey but I battled back very nicely with some sensible golf and I got rewarded for that."
