Wondering what one was doing at 14 years, six months and six days is something to which many would respond with a blush. To that question, Lev Grinberg can answer that he was making the cut of a DP World Tour tournament for the first time. And that is what the Ukrainian has done, at that age, in the Soudal Open that is being played these days at the Rinkven International Golf Course in Antwerp, Belgium. With this data, Grinberg is the second youngest player in the history of the tour (formerly the European Tour) to make a cut, just 18 days behind China’s Guan Tianlang, who entered the 2013 Augusta Masters weekend aged 14 years, five months and 18 days.
Grinberg, who is playing as an amateur and thanks to a tournament invitation, knows the course like the back of his hand, as It is where he has been trained golfistically speaking. Son of an elite badminton player, started playing golf in kyiv at the age of five, though he quickly moved to Belgium, where he soon added several wins in junior championships. In recent years, Grinberg has spent a lot of time in Florida, developing his game and lowering his handicap (it is now +3.7).
Far from just having passed the cut, the Ukrainian marches with -3 on his card, five strokes behind leaders Horsfield, Schmid and Whitnell. After a first day of 70 shots, one under par, Grinberg did not have the best start on Friday, but three birdies in the final nine holes certified his return of 69 shots. Not satisfied with playing at the weekend, the amateur has set himself the goal “Be in the top 10 of the tournament”, as he himself commented at the end of the day (in which, by the way, he was the last player to leave the putting green). “On Saturday and Sunday I have to do the same as these days, play golf and feel like I’m in a round with my friends,” added Grinberg. For his part, Nacho Elvira and Jorge Campillo are the best placed Spaniards in Belgium with -6, two from the lead.
