Greater NOIDA: English professional Marc Warren, who is back in India for the Avantha Masters for the third year running set the tone for the 2013 edition by steering his team to a win in the Pro-Am that preceded the main event, which begins on Thursday.
Warren, who has won twice each on the European Tour and European Challenge Tour, had as his teammates, VK Garg, Sandeep Kumar and Inderjit Singh. Together they totaled 28-under and won by one stroke over the team led by India pro, Chiragh Kumar. Chiragh’s teammates were JS Naurath, Anil Khachi and Col R Akhouri. Jyoti Randhawa with his teammates Shubhodip Pal, Dushyant Sud and Sanjay Kailash were third.
Cricketer Nikhil Chopra hit the longest Drive on Hole 15 and it measured 320 yards, while on Hole 7, Sujit Nagrath was nearest to the pin at just one foot seven inches, while Piyush Tiwari was three feet away.
In the afternoon Pro-Am Rahil Gangjee took his team Papa CJ, Col Narendra Singh and Ravi Puri to victory with a huge score of 28-under. They were followed by Mukesh Kumar’s team of Suneer Jain, Prithvi Raj Bijlani and Major Ashish Dube, and the third placed team was the one led by pro Andy Sullivan, who had Brig Harry Dhillon, Capt Gypsy Chowdhury and Nikhil Mehra.