Lawrie finds run of form

Peter Lawrie shot up the leaderboard in the space of an extraordinary two holes during the second round of the Omega Hong Kong Open at Fanling.

The 28-year-old, teetering on the projected cut line of one under when he arrived on the eighth tee, holed a five iron from 191 yards for a hole-in-one to move immediately to three under.

Unluckily for him, the sponsors’ hole-in-one prize – a Mercedes Benz SLK300 - applies only to aces recorded at the 15th hole.

But Lawrie wasn’t finished there, and he holed an 18-foot putt at the very next hole – the 524-yard par-five ninth – for a second consecutive eagle to complete an outward half of 30.

In the space of just two holes Lawrie had bettered his playing partner Stephen Lindskog’s score by six shots – the Swede bogeyed both the eighth and ninth - but more importantly had ensured a place for the weekend as he went on to sign for a four-under 65 and a five-under halfway total of 133.

The second day at the Hong Kong Golf Club saw none of the rain of the first and a good deal more humidity, and the improvement in conditions seemed to inspire the players into shooting some of the low numbers that had been expected from the start.

Over the par-69, 6,466-yard course five players jointly held the lead on nine under midway through Friday’s play.

Norwegian Henrik Bjornstad, second behind Jose Maria Olazabal last year, swept to six under after just eight holes and finished with a seven-under 62 to be one of the quintet on 129.

The others were last week’s BMW Taiwan Open runner-up Jyoti Randhawa, who also shot 62, Zimbabwean Tony Johnstone, and Swedish duo Marten Olander and Klas Eriksson.

A shot behind on eight under lay Frenchman Thomas Levet, who lost out in a play-off to Ernie Els at this year’s Open championship at Muirfield, and American Clay Devers.

England’s Nick Faldo, one of the afternoon starters, was again finding the going tough after his opening one-under 68.

After bogeying the short second, he hit back with a birdie at the next but fell back into the pack on level par with a dropped shot at the sixth.

Spaniard Olazabal, who won last year’s tournament in dramatic fashion when he birdied each of the last three holes, was faring only marginally better.

Beginning the day on level par, he also bogeyed the second but looked to be putting something of a run together with birdies on the fourth and sixth to move to one under.