JOOST Luiten hit a stunning albatross to claim a one-shot lead after two rounds of the Andalucia Valderrama Masters.
The Dutchman holed his second shot at the par-five 11th to wow the galleries and take a giant step towards the leaderboard summit, where he sits on six under par.
That moment turned the 31-year-old’s round on its head, and wiped out three of the four bogeys he made en route to a one-under 70.
Luiten had finished second at last year’s Open de Espana at the same venue and reached the halfway stage a stroke ahead of tournament host Sergio Garcia, Englishman Robert Rock and Scott Jamieson of Scotland.
Conditions made scoring tougher than on day one, with Rock also one under for the day and Garcia shooting a level-par 71. Jamieson’s 68, containing five birdies and two bogeys, was therefore good enough to catapult him into the reckoning.
Welshman Jamie Donaldson went one better, signing for a best-of-day four under, though he was still four off the lead after a slow start on Thursday.
Andrew Johnson, who edged Luiten in the 2016 Open de Espana, joined Donaldson in a six-strong group on two under.
Luiten told the European Tour’s official website: “I’m happy with the way I played. I finished second, (here), I like this place.
“Hopefully we can have a good weekend and we can win here but there’s a lot of golf to be played and we just need to focus on tomorrow and have another good round,” Luiten added.
“I think it will play a bit shorter off the tee, it will be a bit harder maybe to hit the fairways if they’re going to run off but it’s still fairly soft, you can still be aggressive into the pins but you’ve got to hit the fairways and that’s the gameplan for the weekend.
“I think 10 under will be a good number.”
World No 5 and the big home hope Jon Rahm missed the cut, finishing seven over after 36 disappointing holes in what was his first professional tournament on home soil.
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