Southwoods off to a rousing start in Fil-Am golf

A pumped-up Manila Southwoods came away with 121 points to jumpstart its bid for an eighth title in the Fil-Championship Flight Wednesday in the 60th Fil-Am Men’s Golf Invitational in Baguio City. Former national mainstays Vince Lauron and Jun Jun Plana led the way for Southwoods with 31 and 30, respectively. Chepe Dulay, also a veteran junior golf campaigner, and Wolen Superal contributed 30 apiece in the event played at the tough par-61 layout of Baguio Country Club. They hold a 13-point lead over Forest Hills-Nicklaus and Camp Aguinaldo, which produced 108s.

“BCC is not an easy course. You have to be patient, bogeys are given at huwag magpilit," said Plana, who has been with Southwoods since it started joining the Fil-Am 12 years ago. Peter Young birdied the last hole en route to 31 points to lead Forest Hills. Ronnie Littaua had 30, Edgar Lee 27 and Migs Garcia 20. Aguinaldo was paced by Ricky Velasco who submitted 32 points while Ricky delos Santos made 28, Rudy Amata contributed 26, and Edmund Yee added 22. Five shots further down was Mizuno, which had 103 on the strength of Justin Limjap’s 33 — a three-over-par 64 in regulation and the day’s best score at the BCC. Over at Camp John Hay, Philippine Navy GC's Jaime Beach fired a one-over 70 for 35 points to tow the team to a 126 aggregate in the Am Championship flight and open a seven-point advantage over Team JF. Mardelino Mirales shot a 32, Pedro Bendiola, Jr. accounted for 31 and Brixton Aw had a 28 for the Navymen. Team JF was led by Belem Arancon who submitted 31 points for the team’s 119 points, two shots ahead of Matikas which got 30 points from Dennis Canoy. – Adrian Flores, GMANews.TV