Honolulu’s Alex Ching is tied for 30th halfway through the PGA Tour Latinoamerica’s first qualifying tournament, at Country Club La Planicie in Lima, Peru. Ching opened with an adventurous 2-over-par 74 Tuesday and followed up with a 70 Wednesday, moving up 20 places.
His first round included triple- and double-bogeys on the front nine and two eagles on the back. Wednesday he had five birdies and three bogeys.
The qualifier ends Friday. The top 20 from a field of 105 players from 16 countries get playing privileges on the second-year tour. The 2013 schedule has 15 $150,000 events, in nine countries between March and December.
The top five on the Latinoamerica tour earn playing status on next year’s Web.com Tour. Players ranked 6-10 on the season-ending Order of Merit will be exempt to play the final stage of the Web.com Tour’s 2014 Qualifying Tournament.
Ching, an All-American at San Diego, turned pro last summer. He played four events on the tour at the end of last year, winning $9,000. He was fifth at the Olivos Golf Classic Copa Personal in December, after leading the first three rounds. Ching finished the season ranked 51st on the Order of Merit, one spot and 13 cents outside the top 50, who got their cards for 2013.
Hara leads Pearl qualifers
Kyosuke Hara, a freshman at reigning state champion Moanalua High School, was medalist at Tuesday’s Hawaii Pearl Open qualifying. Hara fired a 5-under-par 67 at Pearl Country Club, earning the first of 31 slots given out for this weekend’s tournament. He was 4 under on the back nine.
Pros Ryan Acosta, Tyler Brewington and Kalani Kia‘aina tied for second at 69. Two women from Japan qualified, joining Ayaka Kaneko, Eimi Koga and Nicole Sakamoto in the field. Professional Yuka Kuriyama and amateur Reika Usui both shot 75.
The cut came at 76 or better, with five tying for the last two positions. The tie was broken by matching cards from No. 18 back and Brittany Fan got the first alternate position.
