ROYAL TROON (UK), Aug 20: The Indian trioka of Aditi Ashok, Tvesa Malik and Diksha Dagar struggled in brutal and tough conditions at the Royal Troon like the majority of the field on the opening day of the AIG Women’s British Open here.
Persistent and strong winds, which at times blew real hard with gusts of 40 miles per hour, made it difficult to play most shots through the air.
As a result Aditi (78), Tvesa (79) and Diksha (7-over at 13th) were way down and would need strong second rounds to make the weekend.
It is likely that the cut will come around six or seven-over or even more, but the conditions are expected to be difficult even on Friday.
Only one player, German Sophia Popov (70) shot an under-par round on the opening day here.
The three Indians among them had just one birdie and it came from debutant Tvesa on the par-4 13th.
Aditi, playing her 15th Major, had two bogeys and one double bogey on the front nine and three bogeys on the back nine in her card of seven-over 78 without a single birdie.
Playing her maiden Major, Tvesa had a tough front nine with a six-over 42 that included bogeys on second and fifth and double bogeys on third and ninth.
On the back nine, however, Tvesa played more confidently though she had another double bogey on 12th and a bogey on the closing 18th. In between she had her only birdie on the Par-4 13th.
Diksha had a worse time with a bogey-bogey-double bogey start on the first three holes and she added three more bogeys on fifth, seventh and ninth and was 7-over through 13 holes and still looking for her first birdie of the tournament.
The scoring was so tough that only German Sophia Popov came into the clubhouse with an under-par round of one-under 70.
Nelly Korda, who shot one-over 72, said it was so brutal that she had a tough time walking over the first few holes.
The gusting winds of up to 40mph were there from the start at 6:30am BST when Dame Laura Davies, playing her 40th Women’s Open teed off with Alena Sharp and amateur Olivia Mehaffey. While Sharp played even par, Mehaffey shot 6-over and Davies carded nine-over. (PTI)
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