Little or nothing has changed at the top of the leaderboard at the Soudal Open, compared to the results of the morning session, once the first round of the tournament was completed. The Spaniard Ángel Ayora (-6), the Dutchman Joost Luiten (-6), and the Canadian Aaron Cockerill (-6) continue to co-lead with their respective rounds of 65 strokes at the Rinkven International Golf Club in Antwerp, achieved precisely in the first session of play.
This is in terms of the pure and simple leaderboard in the most relevant section, the top, but really things always happen throughout an entire afternoon session of play. Marco Penge (-5), for example, after winning in China recently and closing a good PGA Championship last week, has positioned himself at the top from the start, so he will need to be watched closely. And Martin Couvra (+2), the young Frenchman and recent winner in Turkey, has not been able to beat the course. It will be interesting to see if he can make the cut tomorrow, which could go up to -2.
It also happened that Ángel Hidalgo (-3) signed a card of 68 strokes. It’s a good result, but at first glance, it doesn’t seem overwhelming or worthy of special mention, as it didn’t even get him into the top ten of the tournament… But there are seemingly insignificant details that might not be so: the matter takes on slightly more relevance if we realise that it is, by far, the best start for the Andalusian player in all of 2025. In fact, until now, he hadn’t managed to shoot below seventy strokes on any Thursday in a year in which he has yet to shine, following his brilliant and successful end to 2024.
Could something be changing? The player prefers to take it with some caution. “I hadn’t thought of this as the best start of the year, to be honest, but it’s true that it was a tidy round. Anyway, tomorrow I’ll have to do it again if I want to put myself in a good position for the weekend. The truth is it hasn’t been exactly a dream start to the year, but well, now the tour is in Europe, and let’s hope this is the first of many good rounds,” he told Tengolf.
Hidalgo adds two more details that may have influenced today’s result. “It’s a course I like, and I felt comfortable hitting with a new driver I put in the bag this week.” Indeed, Ángel had already achieved solid results on this course: he was 15th in 2022, again 15th in 2023, and 22nd in 2024.
Nacho Elvira (-1), defending the title this week in Belgium, and Iván Cantero (-1) have also managed to beat the course, while Rafa Cabrera Bello (PAR), who was four under at the midpoint of his round, and Alfredo García Heredia (PAR) have signed for par. Meanwhile, Pablo Larrazábal (+1) and Eugenio López Chacarra (+1) will have to work even harder tomorrow to make it to the weekend.
