HEATHER MacRae hopes less fuss will be made of her gender and more attention paid to her golf when she attempts to make the cut in the Scottish PGA Championship at Gleneagles in 2010 after she signed for 81 and the 12 over par total of 156 over the PGA Centenary.
The first woman since Meg Farquhar in 1933 to tee up in the Tartan Tour's flagship event, MacRae attracted widespread media attention in Perthshire and admitted she found all the hoopla unsettling.
"I've learned a lot, I'll definitely be back and
hopefully people will see that today was just a bad day for me," she insisted. "I couldn't really have scored any worse. Hopefully, next year I can come out and compete in the tournament rather than have all the hype of being the first lady in 76 years to play here.
"In saying that, I've enjoyed all the hype. It's not something I'm used to and will learn from it. Next year I hope to play well and this will help me to handle it. I'm playing in a few other (Tartan Tour] events, including the Callaway at Craigielaw in July. I have to play with the men, so I'm not going to stop here."
After running up ten bogeys yesterday and relishing a solitary birdie, MacRae added: "I hit it good off the tee. It was frustrating because I was on the fairways most of the time but just didn't hit good shots into the greens. I didn't have anything worse than a bogey and I kept my head up, kept fighting, but didn't get any breaks and it wasn't to be.
"I hit a few iron shots heavy and one or two which were offline. Conditions were not too bad, though it was windy. I just found it frustrating to hit so many fairways when there were other guys out there looking for balls.
"I'm back in the shop at Gullane for 6.45am and there will be a lot of people around for the men's open asking how I got on. I do like my job, because it means I can step away from the golf course rather than sitting at home and wondering what I was doing. At the end of the day I work full time and this is what I do in my spare time."
In the interests of fairness, it should also be noted her brother, Andrew, bounced back with 75, six shots fewer than his sister, but couldn't undo all the damage of his 84 in the first round.
The leader after 36 holes, Jonathan Lomas, the Derbyshire golfer who has called Alloway home for the past ten years, has given himself a chance of becoming the first Englishman since Mark Seymour in 1934 to win the Scottish Professional title. A former European Tour player who finished in a share of 11th with Tom Watson and Greg Norman when the Open was last held at Turnberry in 1994, Lomas signed for a second round of 70 to post six under par.
Looking forward to going back to the Ailsa if he can make it through local final qualifying next month – he's a member at Turnberry – the 41-year-old reeled off three consecutive birdies between the 16th and the 18th. He got up and down for 4 from a greenside bunker on the par 5, hit an 8 iron to 20 feet on the par 3 and chipped and putted for another birdie on the last.
Lomas added: "I'm playing a lot and would love to qualify for the Open. I'm exempt into Glasgow Gailes and will also have a go at Tour school. I'm in a good position for the weekend and would love to win my first Tartan Tour event, especially the Scottish Championship."
Lomas led by a stroke from Craig Lee, two from Mark King and three from Lindsay Mann and Andrew Oldcorn. Twenty five years after finishing runner-up in the Scottish PGA at Dalmahoy to Ian Young, Oldcorn followed an opening 71 with 70 and is handily placed. Gordon Law, who recovered from an opening 76 to sign for 67, the low round of the tournament so far, might have been even better placed than one under had he not missed three putts from inside six feet.
• Scottish rookie Vikki Laing had a hole in one at the third in a great opening round of four under par 68 and was tied for third place in the AIB Ladies' Irish Open at Portmarnock.
The Musselburgh golfer had four birdies to set alongside the spectacular eagle and she was just a shot behind the two leaders, France's Julie Greciet and the Swede Maria Hjorth.
The full article contains 801 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
