Kenya Savannah Classic R1

Kenya Savannah Classic 2021 R1
March 18-21
Karen Country Club, Nairobi, Kenya
€1,000,000
Round 2, Round 3, Round 4

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Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

Justin Harding picked up exactly where he left off at Karen Country Club as the South African carded a seven under par 64 to move into a share of the first round lead at the Kenya Savannah Classic supported by Absa, just two days after his triumph at the Magical Kenya Open presented by Absa.

Kenya Savannah Classic 2021 R1

“It’s quite different, to be fair. We are playing the same golf course so my strategy stays the same – front foot forward and see if we can keep doing what we were doing last week. I played pretty good again, solid.”

The 35-year-old claimed his second European Tour title in Nairobi on Sunday, breaking the lowest winning score record at Kenya’s historic national open with a 21 under par total, and he equalled his lowest round of last week with an opening 64 in the second of the back-to-back tournaments at the same venue.

Kenya Savannah Classic 2021 R1

“I played here in 2019 as well. Then I wasn’t able, with technology, to knock it on the par fours. It’s changed a little bit. Then I play back and leave myself a wedge in my hand, I don’t like the draw off the tee, especially with the wind blowing off the left. Then a couple of the others set up nicely. On 15 I learned my lesson Friday afternoon, I hit one in the bush and I’ve hit three wood ever since. It’s the type of golf course where you don’t have to birdie every hole, but if you execute your plans you have a hell of a lot of birdie chances – so play the tough holes properly.”

“It’s always easy when you’re playing well. Don’t ask me where it came from. I’m playing solid and finally rolling a couple of putts in. Ultimately just keeping it in play and trying to keep the bogeys off the card – there was a silly one on 16 but was happy enough to make a birdie on 17.”

Kenya Savannah Classic 2021 R1

Harding has already won back-to-back events in his career, on the Sunshine Tour in 2018, and he will be looking to become the first player to win consecutive European Tour events since Justin Rose won the WGC-HSBC Champions and Turkish Airlines Open in consecutive weeks in 2017.

Joost Luiten, meanwhile, drew on some fond memories of his very first Challenge Tour appearance at Karen Country Club, as he joined Harding – along with Spain’s Alejandro Cañizares and Frenchman Clément Sordet – at the top of the leaderboard.

“Seven under is a really good score around here,” said Luiten. “No bogeys on the card is always a good thing and seven birdies. I had a couple more chances but I’m very happy with seven under and it’s a good position for the rest of the week.

“I got an invite to play here 15 years ago on the Challenge Tour, from Daan Slooter who had a Challenge Tour event in the Netherlands so he had some invites and he gave me one. It was my first year as a pro and I finished tenth that week. That’s all that I can remember, I made a birdie down the last to finish tenth and that got me into the next tournament.

“I finished third in the next one and that got me into the next tournament and I won that one! For me, it was a perfect start to my Challenge Tour career. I got my chance with a wildcard invite and I took it. I have really good memories of this place.

“I’m really looking forward to the rest of the week. Hopefully I can just hit the ball as I did today and stay out of trouble and make sure to hole some putts and that’s always a good thing if you do that in golf.”

Kenya Savannah Classic 2021 R1

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Pos.	Player	To Par	R1
T1	Justin Harding	-7	64
T1	Joost Luiten *	-7	64
T1	Alejandro Cañizares *	-7	64
T1	Clement Sordet	-7	64
T5	Marcus Armitage	-6	65
T5	Jonathan Caldwell *	-6	65
T5	David Drysdale *	-6	65
T5	Darren Fichardt	-6	65
T5	Mathiam Keyser *	-6	65
T5	Ross McGowan *	-6	65
T5	Cormac Sharvin *	-6	65
T5	Daniel van Tonder *	-6	65
T13	Emilio Cuartero Blanco	-5	66
T13	Gonzalo Fernandez-Castaño *	-5	66
T13	Scott Hend	-5	66
T13	Sam Horsfield	-5	66
T13	Jazz Janewattananond	-5	66
T13	Liam Johnston	-5	66
T13	Niklas Lemke	-5	66
T13	Matthieu Pavon	-5	66
T13	Matthias Schwab	-5	66
T13	Robin Sciot-Siegrist	-5	66
T13	Lee Slattery	-5	66
T13	Julian Suri *	-5	66
T13	David Wakhu	-5	66
T26	Maverick Antcliff	-4	67
T26	Nino Bertasio	-4	67
T26	Wil Besseling *	-4	67
T26	Ashley Chesters *	-4	67
T26	Victor Dubuisson *	-4	67
T26	Rhys Enoch	-4	67
T26	Jens Fahrbring	-4	67
T26	Calum Hill *	-4	67
T26	Masahiro Kawamura	-4	67
T26	Romain Langasque	-4	67
T26	Carlos Pigem	-4	67
T26	Marcel Schneider *	-4	67
T26	Jack Senior *	-4	67
T26	Toby Tree *	-4	67
T26	Scott Vincent	-4	67
T41	Steven Brown *	-3	68
T41	Jorge Campillo	-3	68
T41	Ben Evans	-3	68
T41	Craig Howie *	-3	68
T41	Daan Huizing	-3	68
T41	Maximilian Kieffer *	-3	68
T41	Sihwan Kim *	-3	68
T41	Tae Hee Lee *	-3	68
T41	Jose-Filipe Lima	-3	68
T41	Adrian Otaegui	-3	68
T41	Ricardo Santos *	-3	68
T41	Sebastian Soderberg	-3	68
T41	Lars van Meijel *	-3	68
T54	Lucas Bjerregaard	-2	69
T54	Dean Burmester	-2	69
T54	John Catlin *	-2	69
T54	Aaron Cockerill *	-2	69
T54	Lorenzo Gagli	-2	69
T54	Kurt Kitayama *	-2	69
T54	Alexander Levy *	-2	69
T54	Hurly Long (a)	-2	69
T54	Garrick Porteous	-2	69
T54	Kristoffer Reitan *	-2	69
T54	Jayden Schaper *	-2	69
T54	Shubhankar Sharma *	-2	69
T66	Gaganjeet Bhullar	-1	70
T66	George Coetzee *	-1	70
T66	Dave Coupland	-1	70
T66	Ewen Ferguson *	-1	70
T66	Sebastian Garcia Rodriguez *	-1	70
T66	Julien Guerrier *	-1	70
T66	David Howell	-1	70
T66	Jacques Kruyswijk	-1	70
T66	Joakim Lagergren	-1	70
T66	Francesco Laporta	-1	70
T66	Richard Mansell (a)	-1	70
T66	James Morrison	-1	70
T66	Benjamin Poke *	-1	70
T66	Aaron Rai	-1	70
T66	JC Ritchie	-1	70
T66	Robin Roussel	-1	70
T66	Lorenzo Scalise *	-1	70
T66	Martin Simonsen *	-1	70
T66	Johannes Veerman	-1	70
T66	Nicolai Von Dellingshausen *	-1	70
T66	Dale Whitnell	-1	70
T66	Darius van Driel *	-1	70
T88	Pep Angles *	E	71
T88	Riz Charania *	E	71
T88	Louis De Jager *	E	71
T88	Oliver Farr *	E	71
T88	David Law	E	71
T88	Richard McEvoy *	E	71
T88	Adrian Meronk *	E	71
T88	Samuel Njoroge Chege *	E	71
T88	Chris Paisley	E	71
T88	Alvaro Quiros	E	71
T88	Richie Ramsay *	E	71
T88	Jordan Smith *	E	71
T88	Greg Snow	E	71
T88	Connor Syme *	E	71
T88	Romain Wattel *	E	71
T88	Oliver Wilson	E	71
T104	Jamie Donaldson	1	72
T104	Grant Forrest	1	72
T104	Garrick Higgo	1	72
T104	Dismas Indiza Anyonyi	1	72
T104	Tyler Koivisto *	1	72
T104	Ondrej Lieser (a) *	1	72
T104	Jastas Madoya Asena *	1	72
T104	Mohit Mediratta	1	72
T104	Kyong-Jun Moon	1	72
T104	Gavin Moynihan	1	72
T104	Wilco Nienaber *	1	72
T104	Bernd Ritthammer *	1	72
T104	Adrien Saddier *	1	72
T104	Jaydeep Singh Sandhu	1	72
T104	Joel Stalter *	1	72
T119	Adel Balala	2	73
T119	Eirik Tage Johansen	2	73
T119	Anton Karlsson	2	73
T119	Thriston Lawrence *	2	73
T119	Guido Migliozzi *	2	73
T119	Isaac Ogolla Makokha *	2	73
T119	Damien Perrier *	2	73
T119	Tapio Pulkkanen *	2	73
T119	Matthew Southgate *	2	73
T119	Cj Wangai	2	73
T119	Daniel Young (a)	2	73
T130	Richard Bland *	3	74
T130	Yi Keun Chang	3	74
T130	Matt Ford	3	74
T130	Gavin Kyle Green *	3	74
T130	Søren Kjeldsen	3	74
T130	Edoardo Molinari	3	74
T130	Andrew Oche Odoh	3	74
T137	SSP Chawrasia	4	75
T137	Robson Chinhoi *	4	75
T137	Oliver Fisher	4	75
T137	Michael Karanga	4	75
T137	Rikard Karlberg *	4	75
T137	Zander Lombard *	4	75
T143	Ooko Erick Obura *	5	76
T143	Pedro Figueiredo *	5	76
T143	Nicolai Højgaard	5	76
T143	Edwin Inana Asuza *	5	76
T143	Phillip Kasozi *	5	76
T143	Haydn Porteous	5	76
T149	Simon Ngige Mburu *	6	77
T149	Max Schmitt	6	77
T151	Njoroge Njonge Kibugu *	7	78
T151	Mathew Omondi	7	78
153	Matthew Baldwin *	9	80
T154	Deo Akope *	11	82
T154	Taimur Malik *	11	82
W/D	Mathew Wahome	E
* Player started on the back nine