Joe Dean, Thorbjørn Olesen and Jesper Svensson share the first round lead at the FedEx Open de France after carding six-under-par rounds of 65, while Tom McKibbin is in touch after a 69.
The Holywood man is looking to secure one of 10 PGA Tour cards on offer for the highest non exempt players on the Race to Dubai rankings, but even though he’s just four off the lead, a bunched scoreboard sees him tied for 34th and projected to drop one place to 16th in the rankings.
Three birdies and a solitary bogey were a solid return, but he’ll be disappointed not to have birdied any of the three par-5s at Le Golf National which played easier than usual after almost 80 millimetres of rain fell on Wednesday, causing ground staff to work through the night to make the course playable.
Englishman Dean, making his first appearance at this venue, posted the early clubhouse lead after carding four birdies and an eagle, admitting he hadn’t played the back nine before today.
“Good, stress-free golf,” is how Dean described his first round. “Tried keeping it in the fairways. The rough is quite juicy out there so fairway golf is pretty key. Just hit it in the fairway to be able to control the ball. It’s been great. Hopefully another three days of that and we’ll see what happens.
“We sort of sat down at dinner (yesterday) and just looked through the book and most of the tee shots, sort of straightforward. It wasn’t too much to just rock up this morning and sort of go from there. The ball is not really bouncing anywhere.”
He was then joined at the top of the leaderboard by Olesen, who has fond memories of the Albatross Course as a member of Thomas Bjørn’s victorious 2018 Ryder Cup side. The Dane was one under par after playing the back nine, but then reeled off four consecutive birdies from the first before adding a seventh gain of the day on the par four seventh hole.
“All in all it’s just a great golf course,” said Olesen. “I don’t think there’s one bad golf hole on it. It asks a lot of questions from you. But if you are really on your game, you have a lot of birdie chances, and you saw that, for example, at the Olympics and for the Ryder Cup here, it was really exciting. I think it’s just a great golf course, and I really enjoy playing here.”
Svensson, currently ninth on the Race to Dubai Rankings in partnership with Rolex, made a late charge in the afternoon as he made four gains in a row from the par five 14th to move into a share of first place.
Adrien Saddier is the leading Frenchman after 18 holes, carding a five under par 66 to share fourth with Ukrainian amateur Lev Grinberg, Denmark’s Nicolai Højgaard, Yannik Paul of Germany and Paraguayan Fabrizio Zanotti.