India's Khalin Joshi endured a mixed round as he carded one-under 71 to stay in contention but slipped from tied second to sole fourth at the midway stage of The Bali National Golf Championship here today.
Joshi is now six-under 136 and three shots behind the new leader Australian Jake Stirling, who stayed patient in the windy conditions to snatch the halfway stage lead with a five-under-par 67. He is now nine-under 133.
Meanwhile, two other Indians Himmat Rai (69) and Chiragh Kumar (69) made a smart move up to tied 12 and tied 16th at two-under 142 and one-under 143 respectively. However, Shubhankar Sharma (77) missed the cut, which fell at four-over 148. Sharma was six-over 150.
Joshi had a subdued front nine with one birdie and one bogey, but on back nine, he had three birdies against two bogeys for a 71.
Himmat Rai, who is going through a lean patch, started on 10th and his first nine had just one bogey and one birdie. On his second nine, he birdied three times between second and fourth and then one each of bogey and birdie for his 69. Chiragh had four birdies against one bogey in his 69.
Stirling, who won his first ADT title earlier in June, had four birdies and a 40-foot chip-in for eagle.
"I can understand why the scores are a little bit high but I managed to keep the ball low and stay patient on the greens. I started to hit it a bit lower and that kind of game suits this golf course. That's one of the reasons why I'm right up there," Stirling said later.
Hsieh Chi-hsien of Chinese Taipei and Matthew Giles of Australia posted a 70 and 69 respectively to share second place one ahead of Joshi.
Overnight leader Gyeongjun Lee of Korea slipped down the leaderboard following a 75.
Since it was inaugurated in 2010, the ADT has grown from five events in the first year to a record 22 tournaments in 2015. The ADT will continue to reward the top-five finishers on the Order of Merit at the end of this season with Asian Tour cards for 2016.
