Phuket: South Korea's Kim Joo-Hyung fired a flawless five-under-par 65 to take pole position at the halfway stage of the Singha Laguna Phuket Open yesterday.
The 16-year-old Kim holds a two-shot advantage with his two-day total of 10-under-par 130 at the two-million-baht Asian Development Tour (ADT) event co-sanctioned by the All Thailand Golf Tour (ATGT).
Thai duo Chinnarat Phadungsil and Sadom Kaewkanjana carded rounds of 64 and 66 respectively to sit in second place with Indonesia's Danny Masrin (69) at the award-winning Laguna Golf Phuket.
Overnight leader Nattawat Suvajanakorn (71) of Thailand was among five players in tied-fifth while defending champion and countryman Varanyu Rattanaphiboonkij battled to a 74 for tied-89th and missed the cut.
Starting the round three shots off the pace, Kim made a fast charge with three consecutive birdies thanks to his solid iron-play.
He went on to grab birdies on holes 13 and 14 before capping off a bogey-free round and move atop the leaderboard.
"It was a really good round today, I started off well with three straight birdies but then it started to get windier in the afternoon and I was scrambling in the middle of my round.
"I am striking my irons well and all my birdies were inside 10 feet. I still feel good about how I played but obviously there is a lot of golf left to play so my position right now doesn't matter that much," said the Korean, who only missed three greens.
Chinnarat, a three-time Asian Tour winner, took advantage of his hot putter to trade seven birdies against one bogey and put himself in contention.