Marcus Armitage carded eight birdies in ten holes to race into a two-stroke lead after the opening round of the FedEx Open de France.
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The birdie blitz in the middle of his round powered Armitage to an opening seven under par 64 at Golf de Saint-Nom-La-Bretèche, Paris, with home favourite Julien Guerrier and Australia’s Min Woo Lee his nearest challengers on five under par.
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The Englishman birdied the second and though he gave the shot straight back, he hit his approach to two feet at the sixth to kick-start an extraordinary run of scoring.
He birdied the eighth and ninth for a front nine of 33 – three under – and extended that run to six birdies in a row, with pinpoint approaches to the tenth and 13th and putts from 18 and 13 feet at the 11th and 12th.
Another 12-footer followed at the 15th and despite an untidy bogey at the 17th, he ended the day two clear of Australian Lee and Frenchman Guerrier, who holed out for par from the greenside bunker at the par three 18th to continue his momentum into Friday’s second round.
Guerrier’s compatriot Ugo Coussaud sits in a seven-way tie for fourth on four under with German Maximilian Kieffer, Swedes Marcus Kinhult and Jens Dantorp, Japan’s Keita Nakajima, Spaniard Jorge Campillo and Sam Bairstow, from England.
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Spain’s Pablo Ereno, playing in just his fourth DP World Tour event, made a hole in one at the 153-yard seventh hole, with his ace counting as one of 13 eagles carded on day one in France, which will result in 13 trees being planted as part of the tournament’s Eagles for Good initiative, in collaboration with FedEx and the Arbor Day Foundation.
Player quotes
Marcus Armitage: I was hitting it pretty close and just the putts started to drop. I think I one-putted every green for that space of holes.
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You do [get momentum] with a putter. Once you see a few go in, you get on a run, and you know, then you just feel like you’re just moving the putter and picking it out of the hole.
You definitely feel it with the putter. Sometimes you get it with your irons and driver becomes automatic, but mainly the putter, you get a lot of momentum with it.
