Defending champion Rasmus Højgaard was clinging on to a share of the lead when the second round of the weather-affected 2024 Danish Golf Championship was suspended at Lübker Golf Resort on Friday evening.
That will be music to the ears of Tom McKibbin who went from outside the cut mark to in contention with a fine round of 67 to climb to one-under-par.
Teeing off from the 10th the 21-year-old opened with a birdie and went on a run of bogey, bogey, birdie, birdie before a superb back nine of 33 with birdies on 1, 3 and 5 lifted him into the top-35 on what is a bunched leaderboard.
Højgaard began the day with a two-shot advantage at the top of the leaderboard and stretched his lead to three strokes following back-to-back birdies on the front nine.
But as heavy rain and strong winds battered the course throughout Friday afternoon, things unravelled for home favourite Højgaard, with three bogeys in four holes from the eighth dropping him to five under par and into a five-way share of the lead.
And Højgaard will have work to do to avoid slipping further down the leaderboard when play resumes at 08:00 local time on Saturday, as he faced a 20-foot par putt on the 12th green when the hooter sounded due to high winds at 16:57.
Fellow Dane Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen, Norway’s Kristoffer Reitan and Frenchman Adrien Saddier were safely in the clubhouse on five under, with France’s Frederic LaCroix the other co-leader after ten holes of his second round.
Romain Langasque and Andrew Wilson were one shot off the lead at the start of their back nines, while five others were already in the clubhouse on four under.
Neergaard-Petersen, who leads the European Challenge Tour Rankings after winning twice this year, and Reitan each made six birdies and a single bogey in their 66s, while Saddier mixed four birdies with two bogeys in his 69.
Morning starter Neergaard-Petersen praised his home crowds for braving the weather.
He said: “It’s been fun. Great crowds, even when the weather hasn’t been that good – typical Danish summer.
“But it’s been awesome. Playing some solid golf. Thought today I started making some putts and I was able to make a lot more birdies and put together a good round.
“It’s such a test mentally. You’ve got to stay locked in pretty much for the whole round. There’s not really any holes where you can breathe and relax a bit.
“On pretty much any hole out here with these conditions, there’s a big number out there. You’ve got to stay locked in and stay true to the game plan and accept there will be some shots that may catch a gust and end up in a spot where you don’t want to be, you’ve just got to deal with it.
“I felt like when I got going on my last nine holes today I was feeding off the crowd. Great energy out there once you make a couple of putts.”
Reitan felt his 66 represented one of his best ever rounds due to the tricky conditions.
He said: “Today it was really tough out there but I managed to navigate my way around. It might be one of the best rounds of my life, honestly, with the conditions.
“You can have great course management and not hit the shots. But today I hit the shots even though conditions were really tough, so I was extremely pleased with that.”
Saddier said: “I quite like the test. You have to play with the conditions and forget the technical side of things. You try and shape the ball like you want to and just survive.”
The cut is projected to fall at one-over and Gary Hurley will miss it at six-over-par.