Seher grabs lead, Gaurika and Kriti chase hard in 8th leg of Hero WPGT

Seher Atwal.

Khel Today Bureau 

Hosur, Tamil Nadu: Seher Atwal grabbed a last hole birdie and with it the sole lead in the eighth leg of the Hero Women’s Pro Golf Tour 2023 at the Clover Greens. Seher, who trailed overnight leader Gaurika Bishnoi (68-70) by one shot is now one ahead with rounds of 69-68 and a total of 137.

Rookie Kriti Chowhan showed that she is settling into pro golf with a fine round of 5-under 67, which was the best card of the day, and moved to third, up from overnight tied seventh place. Kriti has cards of 72-67.

Hitaashee Bakshi turned in a consistent card with 2-under 70 after a first round 71 to be Tied-fourth at 141 alongside amateur Keerthana Rajiv (71-70), while another amateur Saanvi Somu (71-71) is sixth as the top six are under par for 36 holes. Just two shots separate the top three players and three others are within five of the leader to set up a tight finish.

Amateurs continued to do well as Anvitha Narender (74-71) was seventh and Ayushi Dutta (73-73) was tied eighth alongside Rishika Muralidhar (74-72) and Jasmine Shekar (72-74).

Seher got off to a blazing start with birdies on first and second and added further gains on the Par-3 fourth and Par-4 seventh and was 4-under 32 for the front nine. She ran up a string of pars from 10^th to 16^th, before dropping her first shot of the day on Par-5 17^th. She quickly made up with a birdie on 18^th for a card of 68.

Gaurika Bishnoi.

Gaurika had a super run of three birdies in a row from ninth to 11^th and had two other birdies on the first and 18^th. Her three dropped shots came on the third, 12^th and 14^th for a day’s score of 2-under 70.

Kriti Chowhan’s 67 was most impressive with four birdies on the front nine and three on the back nine. She gave away shots on fourth and the 18^th.

Among other big names in the field, Sneha Singh, twice winner this season, was Tied-11^th with 73-74 and Tvesa Malik (76-72) was Tied-13th.

In the final round, both Seher and Gaurika are looking for their second win of the season, while Kriti seeks the first win of her professional career. Seher won the first leg of the year and Gaurika triumphed in the sixth leg.

The cut fell at 9-over 153 and 25 players made the final round.

Tee times for Round 3 of the Leg 8 on the Hero Women’s Pro Golf Tour 2023 at Clover Greens, Hosur, Tamil Nadu

1. 8:00 am: Geetika Ahuja 153, Agrima Manral 152;
2. 8:10 am: Gauri Karhade 152, Anisha Agarwalla 151;
3. 8:20 am: Durga Nittur 151, Khushi Khanijau 151, Ravjot K Dosanjh 151;

4  8:30 am: Snigdha Goswami 150, Rhea Purvi Saravanan 150, Neha Tripathi 149;

5. 8:40 am: Shweta Mansingh 149, Ananya Datar 148, Tvesa Malik 148;
6. 8:55 am: Sneha Singh 147, Rhea Jha 147, Jasmine Shekar 146;
7. 9:05 am: Ayushi Dutta (A) 146, Rishika Muralidhar 146, Anvitha Narender (A) 145;
8. 9:15 am: Saanvi Somu (A) 142, Keerthana Rajeev (A) 141, Hitaashee Bakshi 141;
9. 9:25 am: Kriti Chowhan 139, Gaurika Bishnoi 138, Seher Atwal 137.