If it can be secured in June, why wait until October. That’s the mindset of a Joel Moscatel (-12) who wants to secure his card for next season on the DP World Tour as soon as possible. The Catalan player is eager to earn full rights in the continental first division for the first time, and he demonstrated this again on the third day of the Le Vaudreuil Golf Challenge.
He was the best at Golf PGA France. Round of 66 strokes to get to the top of the table and go out tomorrow alongside Will Besseling (-11) in the star match in search of his second victory of the season. Joel is proving week after week what he’s made of. He is the leader alongside the Dutchman after securing seven birdies and a solitary bogey. They will both start with a two-stroke lead over Jeff Guan (-10), a 19-year-old Australian, the German Marc Hammer (-10) and the English George Mason (-10). Moscatel wants to be the first Spaniard in history to win this tournament, which has been held since 2013 and boasts great champions like Ryan Fox, Marcel Siem or Aaron Rai.
With a victory tomorrow, the 25-year-old player would add 870 points to the annual circuit ranking and would virtually ensure his promotion to the DP World Tour at the end of the season. In addition, he would leave the option of adding a third victory and ascending immediately at any time of the year. The same situation is faced by John Parry and Rasmus Neergard Pettersen. It’s worth insisting that this is the first season he has a full Challenge card and tomorrow he can start saying goodbye to the category.
If he doesn’t win, a second place would also leave it on a silver platter as he would be on 770 points on the Road to Mallorca. He would hardly have to add up throughout the second half of the season to guarantee full rights. Last year the last card that gave the right to go up to the DP World Tour was achieved with 840 points.
Another Spaniard, Quim Vidal (-8), will also go out tomorrow with chances of victory. He is only four strokes behind Joel after handing in a card of 70 strokes. He ends the moving day within the top 10. If he doesn’t finally win, it will be important to finish as high as possible and thus add a good booty for the Road to Mallorca, where he is currently beyond 80th place.
Javi Sainz (-5), however, has lost ground on the third day. The Biscayan has made nine consecutive cuts playing very solid, but on weekends he doesn’t find his game. In the last eight tournaments, he has a cumulative par in the final two rounds, today he has added a card with the same result and moves away to 24th place. Tomorrow he will try to reverse the situation and sneak into a top ten that is three strokes away.
The one who has known how to take advantage of the moving day has been Borja Virto (-7) who has been one of the best today with a round of five under par. He came close to the top positions with a -7 on the day but two bogeys at the end of the round have penalized the Navarrese. Borja is left with the positive of having nailed golf for 14 holes. He is only one stroke away from the top ten and a round like today’s would earn him a large number of points. Finally, Lucas Vacarisas (-3) has finished the third day of the tournament within the top 40 of the tournament after having won two strokes on the course. Tomorrow he will seek to continue with the climb on the day that Joel Moscatel can secure his promotion to the DP World Tour.
