Patience a virtue as Purcell heads Irish challenge at The K Club
Conor Purcell. Credit ©INPHO/Bryan Keane
Patience is a virtue in golf but while keeping it on the Challenge Tour can be a major test, it was a virtue that paid off for the home contingent in the opening round of the €250,000 Irish Challenge at The K Club.
With Joel Girrbach firing an eight-under 64 in one of the first groups of the day on the Palmer South Course to set a blistering pace, it would have been tempting to lose the head early after a slow start.
The 29-year-old Swiss star ended the day at the top of the leaderboard but six of the 22-strong Irish contingent broke par with Portmarnock's Conor Purcell tied for second after a 65 and Kinsale's John Murphy nicely placed in a tie for fifth after a six-under 66.
While Holywood's Tom McKibbin double-bogeyed the 18th after snap hooking his tee shot into water, his 67 left him tied for 10th.
“Seven birdies for 17 holes is pretty nice,” McKibbin said, shrugging off his finish.
The Island's Paul McBride, West Waterford's Gary Hurley and amateur Robert Moran from Castle also played superbly to post four-under 68s for a share of 15th.
And while Mallow's James Sugrue holed little in a level par 72, he was just a shot outside the cut mark alongside Gavin Moynihan and Ruaidhri McGee and confident at making a run early in round two with another windless day forecast at the Straffan venue.
"When you turn up and see eight-under on the board, it adds to the pressure a little bit and you expect a lot of yourself going out," Murphy said after mixing seven birdies with just one bogey in his 66. "But I did a really good job of staying patient out there and I took my chances and I'm happy.
"I know I'm in a really good place so it's a matter of letting it happen as opposed to forcing it."
Purcell chipped in for birdie at the 18th to turn in two-under, then birdied the third and fourth and followed a momentum-saving par save from nine feet at the fifth with a birdie at the sixth and an eagle three at the par-five seventh, where he hit a two-hybrid to 25 feet.
“I made a couple of nice saves and I chipped in on the 18th, my ninth for birdie after going long,” Purcell said. “The eagle on seven was big. It’s not a tee-shot I fancy and I’ve been having a few tee-shots that have cost me penalty shots recently so I kept those mistakes off the card today and got up and down when I had to.”
It was the par save at the fifth that was key for Purcell.
“I had a basic wedge shot from 90 yards and I nearly fluffed it in the bunker, so it’s just little things like that keep the train going.”
Staying patient is a challenge for Hurley but with his confidence slowly returning thanks to the work he has done with performance coach Ed Coughlan, the West Waterford man was able to shrug off two closing bogeys.
"I'm separating the shot outcome, anything to do with where the ball is finishing," Hurley said. "I'm reflecting on my process rather than reflecting on what's happening with the ball.
"I bogeyed the last two holes but it doesn't really matter, it's not that important in the grand scheme of what I'm doing. I was engaged in every shot completely for however many shots I played those last few holes in."
Asked what the old Gary Hurley might have said after a bogey-bogey finish, he said: "He might've said he was having such a good day and now it's not.
"But you could flip it around, finish birdie, birdie and shoot four-under and you'd be a different person so why do you choose to be despondent when you finish bogey, bogey?
"You don't know what's there tomorrow, what's there over the next few days or few weeks. You don't know, so we just engage in what we're doing.”
On a tour where the margin between success and failure is so fine, Hurley knows he must be mentally strong and by embracing the Coughlan method, he’s starting to see results.
"I've been making huge strides with that,” said Hurley, who won on the Alps Tour earlier this season and has an excellent chance of securing one of five Challenge Tour cards via that tour with the DP World Tour Q-School still to come.
"I still have a long way to go but it's changed me completely on the course. I'm a different person on the golf course. I think I'm a little bit of a different person off the golf course as well.
"A bit more chilled, bit more relaxed, less anxiety-ridden which is great. But all those nerves are still there, they don't go away.
"I just choose to accept them for what they are and I choose my own narrative on the course: What I want to be, how I want to think, what I want to do. And that's pretty much what I changed.”
McBride has struggled to put results on the board this year but after finishing in the top 20 on the Alps Tour in Rome last week and with Coughlan again helping him with the mental game, he was pleased with his start.
“I’ve struggled the last while but I played well last week in Italy,” he said. “I made a lot of mistakes but I played well and I feel like my game is coming around. It was nice to come back home and relax and go out and play a course I know. I played well today. I had the speed of the greens which made a huge difference out there.
“I hold a few putts and my pace all day was really really good. I‘ve done a bit of work with Ed [Coughlan] for the last eight or nine months but it wouldn’t be as hands-on as he would be will be with a few other players. He has certainly helped me a lot.”
On playing his way out of a slump, he said: “It’s frustrating but it is what it is. You just have to work your way out of it. That’s what I’ve done before and I’m starting to feel that way now. That’s golf, it’s so fickle. One minute you think you’re the best player in the world or the next minute you feel like a 10 handicapper. I was happy the last two weeks it was nice to bring in a good score today.”
Moran helped GB&I win the St Andrews Trophy last week and he felt he might have gone lower having missed a string of chances on the greens.
“I hit the ball really nicely but I just putted terribly,” Moran said after covering the back in level par and the front in four-under. “I was a bit scrappy on the front nine and I hit it lovely on the back but I was pretty poor on the greens.”
He plans to enter Q-School as an amateur and remain an amateur next year unless he secures a DP World Tour card or a strong enough Challenge Tour card to plan a schedule around.
Making a living on tour remains the goal for most.
Hugh Foley plans to take the leap next year but after winning the North and South of Ireland titles in back-to-back weeks, he was clearly far from his best physically and mentally and hit the wall, carding an 82 to prop up the 156-man field.
Irish Challenge, Palmer South, The K Club (Par 72)
1st rd:
64 J Girrbach (Sui),
65 C Purcell (Irl), S Mazzoli (Ita), G Stal (Fra),
66 D Germishuys (RSA), J Murphy (Irl), J Ko (Fra), C Ross (Sco), T Clements (Eng),
67 N Kimsey (Eng), M Orrin (Eng), a Saddier (Fra), T McKibbin (Nir), H Ellis (Eng),
68 P McBride (Irl), R Moran (Am) (Irl), L Van Meijel (Ned), P Mejow (Ger), V Garcia Broto (Esp), S Del Val (Esp), G Hurley (Irl), R Kaminski (RSA), O Farrell (Eng), J Long (Eng),
69 J De Bruyn (Ger), T Strydom (RSA), J Rutherford (Eng), R Evans (Eng), J Sainz (Esp), D Ravetto (Fra), M Morugan (Esp), R Petersson (Swe), C Mivis (Bel), M Manassero (Ita), M Iten (Sui), J Gumberg (USA),
70 L Robinson (Eng), D Boote (Wal), E Lipparelli (Ita), S Gros (Fra), A Knappe (Ger), I Cantero Gutierrez (Esp), M Wiegele (Aut), M Decottignies-Lafon (Fra), P Moolman (RSA), J McDonald (Sco), A Hietala (Fin),
71 N Kristensen (Den), R Sciot-Siegrist (Fra), B Poke (Den), M Gradecki (Pol), A Del Rey (Esp), B Neil (Sco), J Quesne (Fra), B Schmidt (Eng), L Lilliedahl (Swe), W Enefer (Eng), G Boyd (Eng), L Ruuska (Fin), M Herrmann (Ger), M Galiano Aguilar (Esp), E Cuartero Blanco (Esp), T Plumb (Eng), R Dinwiddie (Eng), J Lando Casanova (Fra), V Bjorlow (Den), T Bessa (Por),
72 D Foos (Ger), J Sugrue (Irl), R McGee (Irl), C Sordet (Fra), D Erickson (USA), G Moynihan (Irl), C Blomstrand (Swe), P Margolis (Fra), C Thornton (Eng), C Griffiths (Eng), J Garcia (Esp), F Palson (Swe), S Tiley (Eng), V Lopes (Por),
73 C Fyfe (Sco), J Yates (Irl), E Di Nitto (Ita), R Mullarney (Irl), M Simonsen (Den), P Baek (Den), E Bertheussen (Nor), R Wattel (Fra), P Pineau (Fra), C Gugler (Am) (Sui), W Porter (Sco), J Sandborg (Swe), T Sloman (Eng), P Langfors (Swe), D McElroy (Nir), V Riu (Fra), S Broadhurst (Eng), L Jerling (RSA), Y Van Doren (Bel), D Bradbury (Eng), R Foley (Sui), L Schuepbach (Sui),
74 R Clarke (Irl), M McClean (Nir), G Kristjansson (Isl), K Johannessen (Nor), D Brown (Eng), E Rousaud (Esp), F Mruzek (Cze), A Eineving (Swe), O Gillberg (Swe), J Wikstrom (Swe), M Lindberg (Swe), B Ritthammer (Ger), U Coussaud (Fra), S Fernandez (Esp), C Berardo (Fra), B Virto (Esp),
75 G Bloor (Eng), T Vahlenkamp (Ger), R Van West (Ned), G King (Eng), M Penge (Eng), N Fenwick (Sco), H Smith (Am) (Eng), C Worsdall (Eng), B Moore (Eng), M Power (Am) (Irl), C O'Rourke (Irl), T Gouveia (Por), N McCarthy (Eng), J Hagborg Asp (Swe),
76 M Young (Irl), B Petursson (Isl), J Floydd (Eng), a Zemmer (Ita), L Grehan (Irl), E Marin (Esp), G Tadiotto (Bel),
77 M Cea (Ita), R Dawson (Irl), S Petersen (Swe), C Feldborg Nielsen (Swe), V Meyer (Ger), M Rottluff (Ger), B Rusch (Sui), C Williams (Irl), I Saulo (Fin),
78 L Donnelly (Irl), M Waite (Eng),
79 A Curbishley (Eng), J Vecchi Fossa (Ita), A De Bondt (Bel),
81 A Esmatges (Esp),
82 H Foley (Am) (Irl).
