China’s Chen Guxin followed up on his share of second place in Vietnam on Thursday, taking control of the second round of the BRG Open Golf Championship from the front with a five-under-par total of 67. He leads by one shot after a run of seven birdies and just two dropped shots.

Oscar Zetterwall of Sweden trails by one shot at BRG Da Nang Golf Resort after posting 68 with just a single bogey on his card for solo second, followed by Lloyd Jefferson Go of the Philippines who carded a second score of 69.

Oscar Zetterwall

Chen, who broke his driver yesterday and had to finish his round with only a 3-wood, was glad to have the big club back in the bag today. “Absolutely needed it today, for example on hole 5, a par 4 but it’s pretty long, I had to use a driver and hybrid to reach the green.”

“I feel pretty good with the way I played today,” he said after his round. “I started well with pars but in the middle I tried to make the green in two but it went right into the the water.”

“On the back nine, my putting was pretty good. I’m feeling good about my score, five under has put me in a pretty good place. The difference today was the wind, I had a morning tee time and the wind comes in later so I had a lot of chances to put it in a good place for putting.”

“Tomorrow I will be trying to stay calm. Some fairways are pretty narrow and it’s easy to hit it out of bounds or into the water. You have to stay calm around here.”

William Harrold

The English pair of William Harold and Matt Killen hold fourth and fifth spots respectively in the US$75,000 event, Killen making up ground with six birdies and two dropped shots after his even-par 72 yesterday. Harrold carded a bogey-free score of 70.

Four players make up the remainder of the top ten, led by Singapore’s Gregory Foo with a second round score of 71 to match his result on day one, ahead of Thailand’s Chanat Sakulpolphaisan (70) and the experienced Choo Tze Huang who improved his first round score by four shots.

Sweden’s Calle Strandberg was unable to improve on his overnight score, carding three bogeys on his front nine before making up some ground with four birdies on the back nine.

Indonesia’s Naraajie E. Ramadhanputra, with one win already this season at the OB Golf Invitational in June, was able to improve on his first round score by three strokes, his round only marred by a dropped shot on the final hole.