England’s Tom Whitehouse produced an outstanding second round of six under par 66 over San Roque Club’s New Course to surge to the top of The European Tour Qualifying School’s Final Stage leaderboard, establishing a two stroke lead over his closest challenger, his fellow countryman Robert Rock.
By taking the lead and putting himself in pole position to obtain one of the 30 European Tour cards on offer at San Roque, Whitehouse has gone some way to vindicating his decision to tee up at the Final Stage.
The 25 year old had considered not playing in Spain this week after taking 17th place on the final European Challenge Tour Rankings three weeks ago.
Those players who finished in positions 16 to 20 on the final Challenge Tour Rankings already have a European Tour card for next season, but they will be ranked behind the top 30 players (and ties) from this week’s Final Stage. Whitehouse had considered settling for a place behind the successful Qualifying School graduates until he realised that he could guarantee him more Tour starts in 2006 with a winning performance at San Roque.
He went some way to achieving that during the second round, birdieing the first three holes of the New Course to make a perfect start to his day, which he supplemented with a further three birdies to post an impressive 66 and move ahead of Rock, who posted a second consecutive 69 to lie two shots off the pace.
Another Englishman, David Griffiths, is in joint third place after a second round 68 over the New Course moved him alongside the Old Course’s best players of the day – South African Louis Oosthuizen and Beniot Teilleria of France.
At four under par, first round leader Anders Sjöstrand remains very much in contention despite a second round of two over. The Swede is alongside his compatriot, Johan Skold, the 2001 Qualifying School winner.
With 72 holes of this year’s Final Stage remaining, Whitehouse is the man to catch. The Englishman has had success at the Qualifying School on the past having taken the 22nd card in 2003 and he is hoping that experience will stand him in good stead for the next four rounds of his career.
“I played well today – didn’t make one bogey today and only made one yesterday so it was very steady really. It feels a bit different coming here already having secured a category 11 card for next year and it’s not such a stressful week because of that. That has helped me as I have been more relaxed and just getting on with it. I am sure over six rounds I will have a testing time but I haven’t yet. When it comes I’ve got to deal with it as best I can.
“I didn’t decide to come here until the last day. I spoke to Sue Lloyd who does the entries for The Tour and she said that if I came here and got in the top ten or something it would be worth maybe two or three starts at the start of the year which I wouldn’t get with the card I won on the Challenge Tour. I know it doesn’t sound a lot, but it could potentially be huge. I thought I would come here and if I didn’t do any good I still have that category and if I do that’s brilliant for me, but there is a long way to go though.”
Fellow Midlander Rock had chances coming in to match Whitehouse but settled for a second 69.
“It is all going to plan at the moment,” he said. “It’s nice to see your name second after two rounds but then you realise you still have another tournament to play so it doesn’t mean much. There is a long way to go yet.”
