Cazoo Classic R1

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1
August 12-15
London Golf Club, Ash, Kent, England
€1,250,000
Round 2, Round 3, Round 4

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

England’s Richard Bland carded an opening 65 to take the lead of the Cazoo Classic at London Golf Club.

He produced seven birdies, three of them back-to-back from the 10th and remained bogey free to reach 7-under.

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1

Bland has had a remarkable year, becoming a first time winner on Tour in his 478th attempt at the Betfred British Masters in May and the oldest player in history to hold the 36 hole lead at the U.S. Open Championship in June.

He is playing for the first time since the Open Championship at Royal St. George’s where he hit the opening tee shot and finished T67.

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1

“Pretty much all of it was good today, I just felt like it was a continuation from where I left off before my break. I was driving the ball great, hitting some nice iron shots in and I didn’t really hole that much to be honest.”

He is currently ranked 17th in the Race to Dubai and hoping to stay in the top 30 to earn his place in the WGC-HSBC Champions and next year’s Open Championship at St Andrews.

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1

“I want to get to the WGC-HSBC at the end of the year and a big goal of mine would be to get to The Open next year at St Andrews. I’ve never played an Open at St Andrews and to play the 150th edition there – not sure I want to hit the first tee shot again, although I wouldn’t mind it there, it’s a bit wider than it was at Royal St George’s.

“To play that one would be very special. But I just want to keep doing what I’m doing and that’s worked for me, keep that going into next year because I plan to go to the Champions Tour next year, so that’s starting to come onto my radar.

“So I just want to stay as competitive as I possibly can up to that point and if I keep doing what I’m doing then that’ll be the case.”

Tied behind him at 6-under are his countrymen Jordan Smith and Dale Whitnell, as well as Americans Sean Crocker and Sihwan Kim.

“It’s been good, I just putted really well today,” said Kim. “I had some bad tee shots but recovered pretty well and after a break on number one, I was able to recoup and make some birdies out there

“It’s a nice course, a little soft but I just had to control the spin a little bit and the greens got a little bumpy so I had no expectation with the putting.

“I just got my tee shots under control a little bit and my putting has been really good the last few weeks so I’m hoping that’ll keep going.”

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1

Lucas Bjerregaard of Denmark, France’s Joël Stalter and Swede Niklas Lemke are tied in sixth place at 5-under.

“I did have a nice day,” said Bjerregaard. “I got myself into a bit of trouble a couple of times but luckily I got out of it and I’m very pleased with the round today, it’s nice to continue some of the good stuff from last week.

“I hit a terrible drive at 16, found it luckily, hit a really good shot out of there which rolled just over the green, didn’t hit a great chip shot and then thought I’d missed the putt right and it caught the edge and went in. I think that sums up my day pretty well.

“It was nice to get off to a good start and there was lots of good in there – it wasn’t all like 16. So it’s nice, I’m not complaining. It’s a lot more fun playing like this than the way I have been playing lately.”

Cazoo Classic 2021 R1

Pos.	Player	To Par	R1
1	Richard Bland	-7	65
T2	Sean Crocker	-6	66
T2	Sihwan Kim	-6	66
T2	Jordan Smith	-6	66
T2	Dale Whitnell	-6	66
T6	Lucas Bjerregaard	-5	67
T6	Niklas Lemke	-5	67
T6	Joel Stalter	-5	67
T9	Maverick Antcliff	-4	68
T9	John Catlin	-4	68
T9	David Drysdale	-4	68
T9	Matt Ford	-4	68
T9	Calum Hill	-4	68
T9	Niall Kearney	-4	68
T9	Maximilian Kieffer	-4	68
T9	Marcus Kinhult	-4	68
T9	Mikko Korhonen	-4	68
T9	Bernd Wiesberger	-4	68
T9	Daniel Young (a)	-4	68
T20	Wil Besseling	-3	69
T20	Dave Coupland	-3	69
T20	Rhys Enoch	-3	69
T20	Gonzalo Fernandez-Castaño	-3	69
T20	Lorenzo Gagli	-3	69
T20	Joachim B. Hansen	-3	69
T20	Paul Peterson	-3	69
T20	Robert Rock	-3	69
T20	Clement Sordet	-3	69
T20	Toby Tree	-3	69
T20	Daniel van Tonder	-3	69
T31	Jonathan Caldwell	-2	70
T31	Ashley Chesters	-2	70
T31	Aaron Cockerill	-2	70
T31	Matthew Cort	-2	70
T31	Ben Evans	-2	70
T31	Berry Henson	-2	70
T31	Anton Karlsson	-2	70
T31	Alexander Levy	-2	70
T31	James Morrison	-2	70
T31	Victor Perez	-2	70
T31	Richie Ramsay	-2	70
T31	Robin Sciot-Siegrist	-2	70
T31	Shubhankar Sharma	-2	70
T31	Callum Shinkwin	-2	70
T31	Marcel Siem	-2	70
T31	Matthew Southgate	-2	70
T31	Justin Walters	-2	70
T31	Marc Warren	-2	70
T31	Suradit Yongcharoenchai	-2	70
T31	Darius van Driel	-2	70
T51	Matthew Baldwin	-1	71
T51	Steven Brown	-1	71
T51	Jorge Campillo	-1	71
T51	Laurie Canter	-1	71
T51	Ryan Fox	-1	71
T51	Rasmus Højgaard	-1	71
T51	Janne Kaske	-1	71
T51	Masahiro Kawamura	-1	71
T51	Eddie Pepperell	-1	71
T51	Garrick Porteous	-1	71
T51	Kalle Samooja	-1	71
T51	Cormac Sharvin	-1	71
T51	Paul Waring	-1	71
T64	Yi Keun Chang	E	72
T64	Jamie Donaldson	E	72
T64	Bryce Easton	E	72
T64	Philip Eriksson	E	72
T64	Stephen Gallacher	E	72
T64	Sebastian Garcia Rodriguez	E	72
T64	Josh Geary	E	72
T64	Benjamin Hebert	E	72
T64	Nicolai Højgaard	E	72
T64	David Law	E	72
T64	Deyen Lawson	E	72
T64	Ross McGowan	E	72
T64	Vincent Norrman	E	72
T64	Matthieu Pavon	E	72
T64	Benjamin Poke	E	72
T64	Alvaro Quiros	E	72
T64	Jonathan Thomson	E	72
T64	Steven Tiley	E	72
T64	Sami Valimaki	E	72
T64	Oliver Wilson	E	72
T64	Jordan Wrisdale	E	72
T85	Pep Angles	+1	73
T85	Gaganjeet Bhullar	+1	73
T85	Emilio Cuartero Blanco	+1	73
T85	Louis De Jager	+1	73
T85	Bradley Dredge	+1	73
T85	Chase Hanna	+1	73
T85	Rob Harris	+1	73
T85	David Horsey	+1	73
T85	David Howell	+1	73
T85	Matthew Jordan	+1	73
T85	Damien Perrier	+1	73
T85	Carlos Pigem	+1	73
T85	Liam Robinson	+1	73
T85	Euan Walker (a)	+1	73
T85	Jeff Winther	+1	73
T85	Lars van Meijel	+1	73
T101	Alejandro Cañizares	+2	74
T101	David Dixon	+2	74
T101	Pedro Figueiredo	+2	74
T101	Tyler Koivisto	+2	74
T101	Bryden Macpherson	+2	74
T101	Thorbjørn Olesen	+2	74
T101	Alfie Plant	+2	74
T101	Kristoffer Reitan	+2	74
T101	Adrien Saddier	+2	74
T101	Ricardo Santos	+2	74
T101	Marcel Schneider	+2	74
T101	Lee Slattery	+2	74
T101	Andy Sullivan	+2	74
T101	Julian Suri	+2	74
T115	SSP Chawrasia	+3	75
T115	Oliver Farr	+3	75
T115	Daniel Hillier	+3	75
T115	Jake McLeod	+3	75
T115	Pontus Nyholm	+3	75
T115	Wade Ormsby	+3	75
T115	Chris Paisley	+3	75
T115	Jack Senior	+3	75
T115	Laird Shepherd (a)	+3	75
T115	Gary Stal	+3	75
T115	Brandon Stone	+3	75
T115	Thomas Thurloway (a)	+3	75
T127	Ross Fisher	+4	76
T127	Daniel Gavins	+4	76
T127	Scott Hend	+4	76
T127	Shiv Kapur	+4	76
T127	Wilco Nienaber	+4	76
T127	Adrien Pendaries	+4	76
T127	Jesper Sandborg	+4	76
T127	Ajeetesh Sandhu	+4	76
T135	Oliver Fisher	+5	77
T135	Haotong Li	+5	77
T135	Richard McEvoy	+5	77
T135	Chris Wood	+5	77
T139	Gavin Green	+6	78
T139	Aron Zemmer	+6	78
141	Tom Gandy	8	80
142	Haydn Porteous	9	81
143	Jack Cope	11	83
RETD	Paul Dunne	+6