Borja Martín is still waiting alone on the bench of the Spanish players who have passed the first stage of the DP World Tour School. The two tournaments of the second week have been a miss. Water. The one who came closest to advancing was Alejandro Alonso (+3). Specifically, he was just one shot away at the Belgian course of Hulencurt. Painful. The same thing happened to Manu Morugán a week ago.
Alonso is not advancing, but at least the mystery regarding his nationality has been resolved. In contact with Ten Golf, the young player trained at Loyola Marymount University, confessed that he has two passports, the Mexican one, where he was born, and the Spanish one through his grandparents. Thus, this week at the European school, he decided to compete under the Spanish flag. He informed the DP World Tour of this, which is why he has the Spanish flag in the classification.
He was very close to adding another Spaniard to the cause. It really slipped away from him in the final stretch. He made a birdie on the 10th hole to get to +2, a score that ultimately was just enough to reach the 18th place and the classification. From there, he made five consecutive pars, a crushing bogey on the 16th, and still left himself two birdie chances on the 17th and 18th to get into the second stage, but he didn’t convert them. A shame.
In any case, Alonso already has his card secured for the Mexican Professional Tour, a circuit that adds official points for the world golf ranking. He obtained the card last June, shortly after turning professional.
The other two Spaniards who made the cut at Hulencurt also did not achieve the goal. Pablo Alperi (+5) and Josep María Serra (+8) finished three and six shots behind, respectively. Alperi fought with a good start of two under in the first nine holes, but a sequence of bogey and double bogey on holes 3 and 4 took him out of the battle. Serra had a bad day at the office. The winner of the School at Hulencurt was the American Grant Haefner (-8), 27 years old.
Among those who have managed to advance to the second stage are the young Slovenians Jaka Babnik and Leon Car, both 19 years old. The latter is still an amateur.
Meanwhile, in Huddersfield no Spaniard succeeded. Only Thomas Artigas played and he missed the cut. The winner at this venue dominated by the English was Joseph Pagdin (-11).
