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Cantabrian pair lead New Zealand Amateur

Posted by: on 22 October 2020

Courtesy of NZ Golf

Canterbury is well represented up the top of the leaderboard after the first round of the 118th New Zealand Amateur Championship held at poverty Bay Golf Club. Hororata’s Dominic Brettkelly and Rangiora’s Momoka Kobori both sit atop of the standing after the first of two rounds of qualifying for the matchplay. Brettkelly fired a flawless round of seven-under 65 to sit two shots clear of Zachary May, Tyler Wood, and Jayden Ford. Teeing off the first, Brettkelly quickly got into his work. He made birdie at the first and made two more at the fifth and nineth to make the turn in three-under par. He then made back-to-back birdies to start his back nine at the 10th and 11th and did the same at the 13th and 14th to get to seven-under for the day.

He says it was a solid day at the office. “I got off to a steady start. I birdied both of the par 5’s and played very conservatively off the tees. I just tried to play smart golf, it’s not the best round I’ve ever played but it was tactically pretty good. “I hit a couple of really nice shots in close and added them up at the end,” Brettkelly says. He says he’s made leaps and strides mentally coming into the week. “I’ve been struggling mentally on and off the course for a few years and in the last three or four months I’ve started to feel my golf game and my confidence start to come back. It’s nice to get a good round and it’s been feeling decent in the last few events, but this is the best I’ve felt mentally.”

His fellow Cantabrian Momoka Kobori has continued her impressive form of late, carding a four-under 68 to lead the women’s side of the draw after day one. Kobori is in a rich vein of form of late and hasn’t had a problem riding her good momentum into the countries most prestigious amateur championship. She also began the day off the first tee and opened with a birdie to immediately get on the front foot. She backed that up with birdies at the fifth, seventh and eighth before making a bogey at the nineth to make the turn in three-under. Kobori added a further birdie to her card at the 12th and signed for 68.

She says all aspects of her game are coming together nicely. “I managed to keep the ball in play pretty much the whole day and I hit lots of greens and holed a few putts. The whole day went pretty smoothly which was nice. “Everything seems to be coming together really nicely at the moment. It can be hard to get every aspect of the game to come together all at once and I’m happy there isn’t an aspect of my game that is underperforming at the moment. It feels really good,” Kobori explains. She says the key to the week will be to not get ahead of herself, and take each shot as it comes. “I just want to continue playing my own game and control all of the things that I can control. I’ve tried to play with that mindset over the last few events and I’ll do the same this week.” “I’m looking forward to getting back underway tomorrow and hopefully the weekend as well. I haven’t played in a matchplay competition in a long time so I’m really looking forward to that.”

The top 32 men and top 16 women qualify for the matchplay after the second round of qualifying tomorrow. Play gets underway from 7.30am.

New Zealand Men’s Amateur tournament page, click HERE

New Zealand Women’s Amateur tournament page, click HERE

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