A good start is half the work but it was the finish that left a bad taste in the mouth for Brandon Robinson Thompson and Irish duo Pádraig Harrington and Conor Purcell in the Bapco Energies Bahrain Championship.

The Englishman (32) threatened to card just the second 59 in DP World Tour history only to bogey the last to open with a course-record 11-under 61 in the oil-rich Gulf state.

Needing a birdie three at the 18th to match Oliver Fisher, who shot the only sub-60 round recorded on the European circuit so far, the Isle of Wight man bogeyed the last after going long with his approach from a fairway bunker.

“I didn’t really picture it this morning when it was raining and there were forecasts of super-strong winds,” said the leader, who took advantage of the best of the early conditions, sandwiching three birdies between eagle threes at the third and ninth to turn in 29 before following four birdies in a row from the 12th with another at the 17th.

“Very happy to get off to the start I did. Bogeying the last leaves a little bit of a sour taste in my mouth, but I holed my fair share.”

His 61 was good enough for a three-shot lead over fellow Englishman Callum Tarren (64) as Pablo Larrazabal, Martin Couvra, Richie Ramsay and Tapio Pulkkanen shot 66s to share third.

Scores

Veteran Harrington (53) and rookie Purcell (27) were on track to finish the day amongst the leaders, but another could keep up the pace in difficult conditions.

Harrington reeled off five birdies and just one bogey to turn in 32. But he lost confidence on the greens and shot 39 coming home, driving out of bounds at the par-five 14th for the second of three back-nine bogeys en route to a 71 that left him tied for 52nd with Purcell.

Like Harrington, the Portmarnock man (27) got off to a hot start and birdied the 11th, 13th and 14th to move to three under after just five holes. But he played the remainder in two-over, three-putting three times on his homeward nine.

It was a similar tale for all the Irish bar Max Kennedy in the HotelPlanner Tour’s MyGolfLife Open hosted by Pecanwood Estate in South Africa.

The Royal Dublin rookie shot a bogey-free, four-under 68 to share 45th with Galway’s Liam Nolan, who made seven birdies in a sensational nine-hole stretch from the fourth to get to seven-under.

Building on last week’s third-place finish in the SDC Championship, Nolan was challenging for the lead before he followed a bogey four at the 13th with a double-bogey five at the 17th and slipped back into the pack.

Last week’s winner, Daniel van Tonder, made an eagle and eight birdies in a 10-under 62 to lead by two shots from Greece’s Peter Karmis on a low-scoring day in Hartbeespoort.

Jonathan Caldwell’s 69 left him outside the projected cut mark in 62nd while Castle’s Robert Moran and Ballymena’s Dermot McElroy made too many errors and shot 76s to sit near the back of the field.