Bayron top pick anew in ICTSI Riviera

JAY Bayron opens his bid for a second straight championship today when the Philippine Golf Tour’s ICTSI Riviera Classic tees off at the complex’s challenging Langer layout in Silang, Cavite.

After turning back a much tougher field in the Asian Development Tour’s Aboitiz Invitational last week, Bayron is, hands-down, listed as the player to beat in the 72-hole championship, with Antonio Lascuña being his chief rival.

Lascuña, the owner of four championships this season, finished fourth last week and is raring to start his chase for a fifth title and pad his lead in the Order of Merit race.

Bayron, the 37-year-old former caddy of President Duterte at Apo Golf in the late 1990s, won by a shot over long-hitting Malaysian Gavin Green at Wack Wack East for his first win this season.

“I just hope to play as well this week,” Bayron said in Filipino. “I have been contending very well the whole year.”

The Langer layout, a testy par-71, can be a brutal course depending on the conditions.

And with rains pounding Luzon practically since the weekend, Langer will definitely play much longer, with the winds making it doubly difficult.

Former PH Open champions Cassius Casas and Elmer Salvador are also entered together with former leg winners led by Charles Hong, the veteran Mars Pucay and Jonel Ababa.