Lam leads stars as rain halts first round of Barclays Singapore Open

11/14/2008

Chih Bing Lam upstaged the big names to take a first-round lead at the $5 million Barclays Singapore Open on Thursday in a bid to become the first local player to win the tournament.

Lam birdied three of the final four holes to finish with a 4-under 67 and the clubhouse lead over Australia's Marcus Both (68) in an opening round delayed by lightning. Play was halted because of darkness with almost half the field unable to finish their opening rounds.

South Africa's Ernie Els, who lost this tournament in a playoff in 2006 before missing the cut last year, was 3 under after 14 holes when play was called off, leaving him tied for second on the leaderboard with Both, England's Oliver Wilson and India's Digvijay Singh.

Phil Mickelson, who lost his No. 2 ranking to Spain's Sergio Garcia last week, shot 73 and is six strokes off the pace in the star-studded Asian Tour event. He recovered after bogeys on four of the first six holes and was tied with Darren Clarke.

Leaderboard – Round 1:

1. Ernie Els                            SAF  66 - 5
2. Chih Bing Lam                   SIN  67 - 4
3. Marcus Both                      AUS  68 - 3
4. Nick Redfern                      ENG  69 - 2
    Simon Dyson                     ENG  69 - 2
    Kyung-tae Kim                  KOR  69 - 2
    Keith Hotŕne                      SAF  69 - 2
9. S.S.P. Chowrasia                IND  70 - 1
    Rory McIlroy                      NIR  70 - 1
    Richard Moir                      AUS  70 - 1
    Chapchai Nirat                   THA  70 - 1
    Mitchell Brown                   AUS  70 - 1
    K.J. Choi                          KOR  70 - 1
    Digvijay Singh                   IND  70 - 1
    Chris Rodgers                   ENG  70 - 1
    Markus Brier                     AUT  70 - 1
    Charlie Wi                        KOR  70 - 1
    Liang-wei Zhang               CHN  70 - 1

Source: AP, Asia Tour