Viraj Madappa and Rashid Khan held their nerves to qualify for this year's Asian Games in Hangzhou, after a tough five-round trial meet at the KGA course, which ended on Saturday.
Madappa, who shot each of his five rounds under par with cards of 66-68-71-69-67 pipped Rashid as four best rounds were counted in which he was found to be two strokes ahead. Out of his five rounds, Madappa's third round of 71 was discarded, while in the case of Rashid (68-73-67-66-71), the second round of 1-over was discarded. That left Madappa with a total of 18-under 270, while Rashid's total was 16-under 272.
In the women's section, amateur Avani Prashanth continued her impressive run shooting a steady final round of 1-under 71 and finished ahead of Jahanvi Bakshi, who after four identical cards of 69, shot 70 on the final day.
Avani's total of four best rounds was 14-under 274, while Jahanvi's four best rounds added up to 12-under 276. Hitaashee Bakshi, whose 66 was the best final round card, had the third best total of 6-under 282 for four rounds.
Sixteen golfers competed for two berths in the men's section and 11 for the women's section.
Anirban Lahiri, Shubhankar Sharma, Aditi Ashok and Tvesa Malik were given direct berths for the Asiad by virtue of being the top two ranked Indians. The Asian Games are scheduled to be held in Hangzhou, China from September 10 to 25.
