Sven Strüver showed his liking once again for mountainous layouts by taking the lead in the Madeira Islands Open BPI – Portugal at Santo da Serra.
The German’s last European Tour victory was a decade ago in the mountains of Switzerland when he claimed the 1998 European Masters at Crans-sur-Sierre and he gave another virtuoso performance in the hilltops of Madeira to grab pole position.
The 40 year old carded an excellent six under par 66 to grab a one shot lead over South African Hennie Otto with four players – Swedes Peter Gustafsson and Fredrik Widmark and Frenchmen Grégory Bourdy and Michael Lorenzo-Vera – a further shot adrift.
“I got ahead of myself a little bit at the end and struggled to save par on a couple of occasions,” he said. “It shouldn’t really happen but on the other hand I haven’t been in this position for a long time even though I was in the last group in South Africa this year (the Joburg Open), I hadn’t been there for ten years.
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