Arevalo, del Rosario fall way off with wild cards

MANILA, Philippines — In moving day, Abby Arevalo and Pauline del Rosario slipped big-time, ending up with wild rounds that all but crushed their drive for the Q-Series.

Arevalo and del Rosario found the Bobcat course of the Plantation Golf and Country Club a lot tougher than it was Friday that saw them keep their respective bids in the LPGA and Symetra Tour Qualifying Tournament Stage II in Venice, Florida going with 72 and 73, respectively, as the former stumbled with a poor start and finish in a late tee-off and limped with a 77 and the latter failed to cash in on an early stint and hobbled with a slew of bogeys and wound up with a 78 Saturday. 

Arevalo closed out the way she started on No.10 – with triple bogeys – as she tripped with a five-over card that pulled her down from joint 38th to a share of 96th with a four-over 220 aggregate, six strokes off the projected cutoff score for the Q-Series.

Worse was del Rosario, who failed to recovere from a wayward drive that led to a double-bogey on the par-5 No. 3. She also continued to grope for her putting touch, making two three-putts and finishing with bogeys on Nos. 4, 5, 8, 14 and 17 against a lone birdie on No. 16.

“My shot-making was a bit off and made two three-putts,” rued del Rosario, who drove into the hazard on the third hole. She limped with a 78 and tumbled from a share of 45th to tied 121st with 222.

That leaves the ICTSI-backed duo with nothing but to shoot in the low 60s back at the Bobcat course in Sunday’s final round although they would also need to hope that those in the hunt would wobble for them to revive their slim hopes to advance to the third and final phase of the gruelling elims leading to LPGA Tour cards next year.

But most of the contenders for the Top 45 plus ties flourished in moving day with Chinese Ruonin Yin hanging tough with a 69 at Bobcat to stay at the helm at 203 while first day leader Pauline Roussin-Bouchard of France bounced back in pursuit of low medal honors with a 67 for a 204.

It was indeed a pair of sorry stints for the Pinay campaigners, who had looked forward to mounting their respective charge in the third round after holding their ground and staying in the cutoff circle after 36 holes.

But Arevalo, whose strong rebound from an erratic start Friday put her back in the mix with that gutsy even par card, triple-bogeyed No. 10 from where she teed off and spent the rest of the long day trying to regain the form that anchored her strong performance in the first two rounds.

She did fight back with birdies on Nos. 14 and 17 but dropped two strokes on the par-5 third hole and after a birdie-bogey-birdie roll from No. 5, she holed out with another triple-bogey on the par-5 ninth and wound up with a five-over card in one of the late flights.

Despite her early tee-off at the front, del Rosario sputtered and dropped two shots on No. 3 and never regained her touch, rhythm and poise. She bogeyed the next two holes and yielded another stroke on the eighth to make the turn with a 41.