Aman Raj shoots 9-under to lead IGPL Jaipur

Jaipur, Oct 23 (PTI) Aman Raj carded an impressive 9-under 61 to lead the chart after day one of the IGPL Invitational Jaipur here on Thursday.

Aman Raj now leads Shat Mishra (62) by one-over and Kartik Singh (63) by two-over at the Par 70 Ram Bagh Golf Club.

On a day of low scores, 29 players shot under-par and another eight returned even par cards. Udayan Mane, who is making his IGPL debut, opened with a 5-under and was tied-fifth with Samarth Dwivedi, Trishul Chinnappa and the experienced Sachin Baisoya.

Lavanya Jadon at 2-under 68 was the leading woman pro in tied-16th place, while the next best woman pro was Ananya Garg (69) at tied-23.

Lavanya had four birdies against two bogeys, while Ananya had three birdies against two bogeys.

The 30-year-old Aman, a regular Asian Tour player and a multiple winner on the Indian Tour, showed all his experience gathered while winning in this course in 2018 and 2023.

Teeing off from the third hole in the shotgun start being used on the IGPL Tour, Aman had a none-too-happy beginning with a bogey.

He quickly repaired the damage with birdies on the fourth and the fifth. After a breather with a par on the sixth, his continued his birdie run.

Birdies on the seventh and the eighth saw him get to 3-under for the round. He picked up the pace again from the 12th with a birdie.

Aman then produced a hat-trick of birdies from the 14th to the 16th and added one more on the 18th.

In terms of the front and back nines of the course, Aman had five birdies and one bogey on the front nine, while he had five birdies on the back nine.

Having started on the third with a bogey, he made up with 10 birdies over the next 17 holes for a brilliant start to the week.

An ecstatic Aman said, "Even though I started with a bogey but then made a birdie on the next one and then nine more on the remainder of the course." On his recovery and return to form, he added, "The first four months in the initial part of the year were hard and finally after a lot of physiotherapy and rehab it is slowly coming back on track." Young Kartik, who has been the biggest find of the fledgling IGPL Tour, showed that he will continue to make a bid for his first title as he shot 7-under 63. PTI UNG AH AH