Bengaluru golfer S Chikkarangappa shot a tidy four-under 67 in the first round to figure in Top-10 of the Asia-Pacific Diamond Cup here today.
Chikka, who has two Asian Development Tour titles but is still searching for his maiden Asian Tour title, had three birdies in his last six holes including the 18th.
He had just one bogey on fourth, besides two other birdies on second and fifth.
Chikka was five shots behind Japan's Tadahiro Takayama, who had a great day with the putter as he signed for a stunning nine-under-par 62. He led by two shots.
As for the other Indians, they had a very modest start.
Rahil Gangjee (70) at tied-39th, and SSP Chawrasia and Rashid Khan at even par 71 in tied-53rd were decent starters.
Chiragh Kumar (72) was tied-72nd, Jeev Milkha Singh (73) was tied-92nd, while Jyoti Randhawa, Gaganjeet Bhullar and Shubhankar Sharma carded 76 each and were tied-119th.
Khalin Joshi (78) was tied-130th.
Chikka, who was pleased with his round, said, "It was a good round. It's good to be playing well again after a very long time. The season's been quite a bit of up and down for me so I have been looking for a good start. I managed to get off to a good start today.
"I went back to my old way of putting and I managed to putt well today. I gained a lot of confidence from the way I putted today as well. Also with my driver, I made some changes to the shaft and it's working very well now."
Leader Takayama, a five-time winner on the local circuit, fired 10 birdies against a bogey to stay atop the leaderboard while Korea's KT Kim, a two-time winner of the tournament in 2010 and 2015, lurks in second place following a 64.
Thai Pavit Tangkamolprasert's calculated game plan paid off when he returned with a 65 to trail by three shots in third place alongside Ryuji Masaoka of Japan at the 150 million (approximately USD 1.37 million) event.
Satoshi Kodaira of Japan, Younghan Song of Korea and South African Jbe Kruger shared fifth place after carding identical rounds of 66 at the event co-sanctioned by the Asian Tour and the JGTO.
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