Plenty of positives on tour for Connor Syme

At last week’s Gran Canaria Lopesan Open, the 25-year-old recorded a top five finish as he again found himself in contention on the final day.

His cause was helped greatly with a career low 61 on Friday – ten shots better than his opening 18 holes.

He followed that up with a magnificent 62 on Saturday.

That put him right in the mix for Sunday but, sadly, neither he, or a handful of other players, were able to bite into eventual winner Garrick Higgo’s lead.

South African Higgo gave nothing away on the final day with Connor’s 68 seeing him settle in a tie for fifth.

The has tour moved on to this week’s event, the Tenerife Open, and Connor believes he’s going there in fine shape after his performance last weekend.

He said: “I’ve been playing very well to be honest, it was a bit of a surprise to start so slowly in the first round.

"I had a lot of in between yardages and with these firm greens you need to be stopping it pretty fast with a bit of spin.

"I didn’t feel as if I did too much different the next day when I shot such a good score.

"It was very low and nice to back it up with another low one.

“Eight under after two rounds was OK, from one extreme to another in terms of the scores, but the ball doesn’t know how many under you are on any given day."

Connor’s top five helped hoist him to 50th on the Race to Dubai rankings ahead of this weekend tournament, which teed of on Thursday morning.

Also inside the top 50 is Calum Hill from Kinross, who went about his business quietly at the weekend.

Four rounds, all in the 60s, helped Calum to a place inside the top 30 and now sees his Race to Dubai ranking sit at 24.

The 26-year-old started his campaign with a 68 before following it up with three lower rounds of 66, 66 and 67.

It all remains incredibly healthy for both local European Tour pros who are now finding themselves competing at the top end of the leaderboard week after week.

Following this week’s event the tour remains in Tenerife for the Canary Islands Championship.