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Zalatoris inspiring McBride to scale the highest peaks

Paul McBride (left) with his friend and Masters runner-up Will Zalatoris ahead of the 2017 Walker Cup at Los Angeles Country Club. Expand

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Paul McBride (left) with his friend and Masters runner-up Will Zalatoris ahead of the 2017 Walker Cup at Los Angeles Country Club.

Paul McBride (left) with his friend and Masters runner-up Will Zalatoris ahead of the 2017 Walker Cup at Los Angeles Country Club.

Paul McBride (left) with his friend and Masters runner-up Will Zalatoris ahead of the 2017 Walker Cup at Los Angeles Country Club.

Brian Keogh

Paul McBride might have lost out in a five-way playoff for the Alps Tour’s Antognolla Alps Open but he’s inspired to keep chasing his tour dream after seeing his former Wake Forest team-mate Will Zalatoris finish second in the Masters. 

The Dubliner (25) closed with a six-under 65 at Antognolla Golf near Perugia in Italy to make a play-off on nine-under, but he had to settle for €2,635 as Italy’s Stefano Mazzoli made nine-footer for birdie at the first extra hole.

“It was weird watching Will at Augusta because I know him so well and spent four years of my life with him,” said McBride, who’s working hard with Neil Manchip to bring his putting up to the brilliance of his long game. “It’s hard to explain how good he is. He’s just special. But it’s definitely nice to see the players you played with doing well because having played with them, you know you’re not that far away.

“There is a small gap between lower tour golf and main tour golf, and it’s still a gap that needs to be bridged. But I feel I am getting to the place I want to be out there.”

Scoring was red-hot in the Tenerife Open, where Jonathan Caldwell shot a bogey-free, three-under 68 to lead the Irish challenge on eight-under-par at Golf Costa Adeje.

He was tied for 20th, eight shots behind Germany’s Nicolai Von Dellingshausen, who shot 62 to open up a three-shot lead over Pep Angles on 16-under par.

Niall Kearney made the four-under cut on the mark after a 69, but debutant Tom McKibbin missed out by two shots after a brace of 70s with Paul Dunne and Cormac Sharvin two-over after rounds of 72 and 71.

“The standard is incredible, really,” said McKibbin (18), who will get a chance to play the course again when it hosts next week’s Canary Islands Championship. “You can’t be off at all.”

Meanwhile, Graeme McDowell added a 73 to an opening 74 to miss the cut on five-over in the Valspar Championship at Innisbrook Resort, where Lucas Glover (65) and Max Homa (68) held the early halfway lead on eight-under.

At the Challenge Tour’s Cape Town Open, Gavin Moynihan ended a run of 18 missed cuts in a row after a 74 left him nine shots behind France’s Jeong-weon Ko and South Africa’s Jacques Blaauw on level-par.

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