Coby Carruhers in action in Abu Dhabi.  Photo courtesy of Getty Images

COBY Carruthers (Jordan Springs) made the most of an invit-a-tion from the Emir-ates Golf Fed-er-a-tion (EGF), shooting a sensational bogey-free eight-under-par 62 to hold the tournament lead in the Abu Dhabi Chal-lenge after the open-ing round at Al Ain Eques-trian, Shoot-ing & Golf Club in the Al Ain Region.

The 21-year-old won the inaug-ural UAE Cup at the same course in Octo-ber 2024 as an ama-teur. That win earned him a place in last year’s Abu Dhabi Chal-lenge and at Asian Tour Q School, and  returned this week as a pro-fes-sional, tak-ing up one of the 30 places alloc-ated to the EGF.

Among the late starters, Car-ruth-ers made the most of calmer afternoon con-di-tions. He picked up a shot at the dif-fi-cult second, bird-ied the driv-able par-four fourth and added another at the sev-enth to turn in 32. He came home in 30 with bird-ies at the 11th, 12th, 14th, 16th and the par-five 18th. The last of them took him one clear of Bel-gium’s James Meyer de Beco, who had earlier set the club-house tar-get. Car-ruth-ers missed only one fair-way and two greens all day.

“I got off to a nice start. I holed a good birdie put on the second and just kept it in play off the tee,” said Car-ruth-ers. “I think I missed one fair-way today and two greens, and I know it’s super import-ant to stay out of the rough here.

“Everything was quite solid. I drove it well, I holed a few solid -put-ts and I just kep-t -giv-ing my-self chances, and that’s what you’ve got to do around here.

“A couple of years ago I won the UAE Cup, and the EGF have been nice enough to invite me the last two years, which has been really nice. That’s how I got in the field.”

Day Two was a tougher outing, with Carruthers shooting 74 to drop down the leaderboard, then shooting a two-under-par 68 on Day Three and a par-70 on Day Four to finish the tournament at a respectable six-under-par in a tie for 33rd.