The inaugural edition of the Kolkata Classic Golf Championship got off to an exciting start at the Royal Calcutta Golf Club (RCGC) as there was a four-way tie for the first round lead at four-under-68.
The host city of Kolkata was well-represented at the top of the leaderboard by the Rolex Ranking leader Feroz Ali Mollah. The others sharing the lead with Feroz were Gurgaon's Shubhankar Sharma, currently second in the Rolex Ranking, Noida's Amardip Sinh Malik and Abhishek Jha of Bengaluru.
The leading quartet, were one stroke ahead of Kolkata's Indrajit Bhalotia, Gurgaon's Manu Gandas and Om Prakash Chouhan of Mhow who were all in joint fifth.
Kolkata's SSP Chawrasia, who won the Indian Open last Sunday, had a slow start to the week as he carded a three-over-75 to be tied 56th.
Shubhankar Sharma, winner of the PGTI's second event of the season in Bengaluru, was on a roll when he made six birdies on his first 11 holes which included four birdies on the trot from the 13th to the 16th. Sharma was then pushed back after he dropped three shots on the fifth and sixth.
However, the Asian Tour rookie salvaged a stroke with a closing birdie on the ninth.
The 19-year-old Shubhankar said, "I'm shooting better scores and getting more consistent with each passing event. Today again I was looking good for a low number but the two errors on my second-nine cost me a few shots. I couldn't recover from the bunker slope on the sixth where I ended up with a double-bogey. But it was still nice to end the day with a birdie".
Pre-tournament favourite SSP Chawrasia made three birdies but also had four bogeys and a double-bogey during his opening round of 75.
