Golf: Jazz shares his tune-up secret

Satay and carrot cake were part of the "secret" recipe that propelled defending champion Jazz Janewattananond to the top of the SMBC Singapore Open leaderboard yesterday.

The Thai, who won four Asian Tour titles last year to clinch the Order of Merit, fired a six-under 65 at the Sentosa Golf Club to claim the halfway lead at 10-under 132.

He was one ahead of South Korean Kim Joo-hyung (66) and Filipino Miguel Tabuena (65).

Said Jazz: "(Singapore) is like home because I have so many friends here. Every night so far I've been having dinner with them... last night (it was) Lau Pa Sat. Every hawker centre, I'll go.

"(I had) satay last night and carrot cake - that's the secret."

Olympic champion Justin Rose, who at world No. 9 is the highest-ranked in the field, signed for a 66 and was joint-fourth on 134 alongside American Matt Kuchar (68).

Jazz could be the first to retain his Singapore Open title since Australian star Adam Scott, who won in 2005 and 2006.

But the 24-year-old said: "There are still two more days and anything can happen. There are a lot of good players here. Kuchar is behind, Rose is within reach, so I just have to stick to my plan.

"Everyone's going to bring their A-game this weekend, you just have to start bringing yours as well."

Though he felt he had a shaky start, he eventually found his form.

After bogeying the par-three second, he picked up shots at the par-five fourth, par-three eighth, par-four ninth to make the turn at two under. He then birdied the par-four 12th, 13th and 16th, and par-five 18th.

"This course seems to suit me and I'm really happy to be back here playing the course that I feel comfortable on," he added.

"I'm just going to try to hit it better than this... yesterday I hit better but today I putted better so I'll try to combine it, try to hit and put well."

Jazz missed the fairway seven times yesterday but needed just 28 putts in his second round - two fewer than Thursday, when he found 13 of 18 fairways.

Kuchar, who was in the lead after a sunny morning session, was also pleased with his performance.

The 41-year-old told the media: "I felt good, I felt comfortable hitting the ball around here and really hope to continue it.

"I'm awfully pleased to be eight under through the two rounds and (would) certainly be happy to have a weekend that's similar to the first two rounds.

"I've done a good job of staying out of trouble, although I've had a double bogey in each round (the par-four 13th in the opening round and the par-four fifth yesterday). I'd like to eliminate that going forward but it's really been good, steady golf and I surely hope to continue the good golf."

Amateur James Leow, the SEA Games champion, Koh Deng Shan and Low Wee Jin are Singapore's highest-placed golfers at the US$1 million (S$1.35 million) tournament. They are joint-53rd on one-over 143 after carding 73, 72 and 73 respectively.

With the projected one-over cut, the trio will have to wait to see if they will feature over the weekend. Four players will resume their second round this morning after play was suspended due to darkness.

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SMBC S'PORE OPEN

Day 3: StarHub Ch204, noon