PGTI Meet: Karan Pratap Singh claims maiden victory
Chandigarh, April 15
Karan Pratap Singh (22) from Faridabad prevailed in a tight finish to claim his maiden victory, on the concluding day of the PGTI Players Championship at Chandigarh Golf Club. The in-form Pratap followed his career-best runner-up finish in Noida last week where he had lost in a playoff.
Pratap (70-70-68-70), lying two shots off the lead in second place at the start of the day, posted a resolute 2-under 70 on Day 4 to tally 10-under 278 for the week that kept his nearest rivals at bay and helped him triumph by one shot. Om Prakash Chouhan (72-70-69-68) of Mhow and Arjun Sharma (71-68-70-70) of Greater Noida were joint runners-up at matching totals of 9-under 279.
Pratap had an action-packed front-nine where he made four birdies and three bogeys. His 30-feet birdie conversion on the third and a perfect 9-Iron tee shot on the eighth, where he narrowly missed a hole-in-one, were his standout moments on the front-nine.
Pratap kept himself in contention on a busy leaderboard with a birdie and bogey till the 15th. He finally broke away from the pack by making a quality chip-putt for birdie on the 17th. He made another great chip-putt, this time for par, after missing the green on the 18th to come home the champion.
Pratap, who turned professional in 2019, took home the winner’s cheque worth Rs 15 lakh to climb from sixth to third place in the PGTI rankings as his season’s earnings moved to Rs 33,34,463.
“It was great to finally get the job done, especially after coming so close and losing out in the playoff last week. The turning point for me today was the birdie on the eighth hole where I nearly made a hole-in-one. There was a two-shot swing in my favour on the eighth as I sank a birdie there while Jamal dropped a bogey,” said Pratap.
Seasoned Chouhan, a contender for most part of the final day, mixed six birdies and two bogeys to shoot the day’s best score of 68. Chouhan moved up six spots from his overnight tied-8th position. Chouhan, a winner last month, further extended his lead in the TATA Steel PGTI Rankings as a result of his joint runner-up finish. His season’s earnings now stand at Rs 52,52,650.
Arjun Sharma had a slow start with a solitary bogey on the front-nine before he raced into contention with three birdies on the back-nine. Sharma, runner-up on the PGTI last year, missed out on a birdie opportunity on the 18th to end the week in tied second. Delhi’s Kapil Kumar (71) and Bangladesh’s Jamal Hossain (74) finished tied-4th at 8-under 280. Jairaj Singh Sandhu (72) and Harendra Gupta (73) were two Chandigarh golfers who finished inside the top-10 as both secured tied-6th place at 6-under 282.
