By Kent Gray
Talk about keeping it in the family. Just hours after his U.S. Open winning brother Brooks Koepka grabbed the first round lead at the WGC-HSBC Champions in Shanghai, little bro Chase snared a share of the $350,000 Ras Al Khaimah 2017 Golf Challenge lead.

Chase rattled off five birdies in a four-under 68 at Al Hamra G.C. to join overnight leader Jurrian van der Vaart (France) atop the leaderboard through 36-holes of the European Challenge Tour’s penultimate stop of 2017.

“I heard about Brooks’ round in China so I just wanted to make sure I made a birdie on the last hole to make sure I’m on top of the leaderboard as well!” Chase told EuropeanTour.com 

Related: Brooks Koepka leads WGC-HSBC Champions after 64 in Shanghai

“It’s a good day to be a golfer called Koepka, but there’s not too many bad days to be a Koepka! Certainly not this year anyway.”

Making it look easy

5 birdies dropped for @ChaseKoepka today as he moved to 10 under and into the #RAKGolfChallenge lead pic.twitter.com/JoVJzpvf72

— Challenge Tour (@Challenge_Tour) October 26, 2017

Brooks’ path to his maiden major at Erin Hills in June came via the Challenge Tour with the American winning four times before graduating to the European Tour in 2013. Chase has had five top-5 finishes in this year’s Road to Oman so is guaranteed to emulate his older brother by making it to the main tour and could do it with even more style as victory in RAK would give him a shot at the Challenge Tour title at next week’s €420,000 NBO Golf Classic Grand Final at Almouj Golf in Muscat.

“I’d love to top the rankings,” the 23 year said. “I think in order to do that I’ll need to win one of these last two events so that’s my goal. It’s been a great year anyway but if I can hopefully play well this weekend, I might be able to get that first win.”

Chase came close to winning the Challenge Tour’s “major”, the Kazakhstan Open last month, only to be pipped in a playoff by current order-of-merit leader, Tapio Pulkkanen. The Finnish golfer was in a share of 41st place at Al Hamra overnight.

“I’d love to win,” Chase, sixth in the moneylist entering RAK, continued. ” I was really looking forward to possibly getting that first victory in Kazakhstan – I actually didn’t get off to the greatest of starts there but I found my way into a play-off and it just didn’t quite happen. I feel like my game has been great for a while now. I missed the cut two weeks ago but I actually felt probably the best I’ve felt all season going into that week, which was quite strange.

“Then last week I thought I played my best golf of the year and I finished 20th, that’s just the way golf works I guess. This week, nothing’s really changed, I’m still playing really good golf and now the scores are there too.”

The post “It’s a good day to be a golfer called Koepka” appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Kent Gray
With his trademark plus fours and penchant for extravagant colours to match, Joel Sjöholm doesn’t exactly present as a golfer looking to fly under the radar. But that is exactly what the 32-year-old Chile-born Swede is hoping for as he eyes a return to the Middle East this month for the final fortnight of the Challenge Tour season.

Sjöholm is on the cusp of a return to the European Tour for the first time since 2013 after capturing his maiden professional title, July’s Italian Challenge Open, after nearly 10 years in the play for your mortgage ranks.

A beloved character in the UAE where he was once attached to Atlantis, The Palm Dubai, Sjöholm must finish inside the top 15 on the Challenge Tour money list to secure a main tour card for 2017-18. He is currently  19th after worryingly slipping eight spots following a missed cut at the Kazakhstan Open and nearly repeating the unwanted weekend off at the Challenge de Espana where he finished T-63 and banked just €560. But he plans to play the remaining four events of the season, two of them in China. before returning to the UAE for the 2nd Ras Al Khaimah 2017 Golf Challenge (Oct. 25-28) and the season-deciding NBO Golf Classic Grand Final at Almouj Golf in Muscat (Nov. 1-4)

The normally media-friendly former Georgia State University star initially declined overtures for an interview for our October issue, politely promising full disclosure only once the potentially career reviving season is done. He relented slightly, or more accurately had his arm-twisted to front a wider media gathering at Jumeirah Golf Estates on Sunday, but was again economical with his crystal-ball gazing.

“I need to dig deep to get back on the European Tour and until I get there I don’t really want to talk too much about it,” Sjöholm told Golf Digest Middle East before elaborating on Sunday. “I want it so much but I just have to be careful not to want it too much, not to get too far ahead of myself.”

Sjöholm said he was still lerning how to be more ruthless when he gets into position down the “stretch on the back nine Sunday”. A key part of that process has been learning to be more focused on and off the course as he admitted he had failed to live up to his own high expectations as a “golfer or a person”. Indeed, he admitted he had “never really regarded myself as a professional golfer” despite a decade in the pro ranks.

“I want to be more cocky on the course and more humble off it. It’s a narrow line for me.”

The desire not to jinx anything is understandable after a run of lean years bouncing between the tours. Sjöholm has career earnings in excess of €1.1 million in Europe but nearly €840,000 was banked in a three year run on the main tour from 2011, including his career best collect of €412, 376 in 2012 headlined by enjoyed four top 10s, one of them a €185,185 payday for a T-4 finish at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship.

The €48,000 Sjöholm won in Sardina in July was certainly a timely boost, eclipsing in one cheque the prize-money he’d earned in six of his previous seven years on the Challenge Tour.

But it’s more what the win did psychologically, not to mention on the Race to Oman standings where he lept 93 places up to fifth at the time. The now world No. 485 had missed three successive cuts leading into Is Molas Resort but closed with a 65 to overcame a two shot deficit and win by four from overnight leader Neil Bradley (Scotland) and Chase Koepka, the younger brother of U.S. Open champion Brooks.

Often typical of a player bouncing around tours, Sjöholm only got into the Italian event on a sponsors invite.

“It feels amazing,” he said afterwards. “I never thought when I was 10 years old that I would have to wait until I was 32 before I earned my first victory as a professional. It is close to being the best thing that has ever happened to me. Obviously having children and getting married will always be the most special thing, but this is pretty incredible.”

So to, we suspect, will be the interview when Sjöholm hopefully boomerangs back on the European Tour. The dictaphone is poised.

Sjoholm with the European Tour’s Middle East Director Nick Tarratt.

The post European Tour hopeful Joel Sjöholm determined to let his game do the talking in RAK and Muscat appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.