Kathmandu, March 27:

Nepali professional golfer Sachin Bhattarai carded an impressive tally of 33 stableford points to lead his team of Laxman Pun, YD Kwon and Tendi Sherpa to a win the Standard Chartered Pro-Am at the Le Meridien Gokarna Forest Golf Resort and Spa today. The winning team scored 108 points.

The team of Rajan Thapa Magar (pro), along with Tashi Sherpa, BN Rai and Hari Bahadur Rai, finished runners-up with 104 points while the team of Faridel Atral (pro), LP Gurung, Lt Gen KN Thapa and Gautam Saymi, finished third with 102. Magar and Atral contributed 35 and 30 respectively to the team’s total.

The event was played on a Team Stableford Format where the total of the two best individual amateur scores on 7/8 handicap plus the professional’s card comprised the team score. The maximum handicap for men was 24 and 36 for women. In the ‘Gross Individual Stableford’ category, Indira Lamchhane carded 32 stableford points to win the title while Nar Kumar Limbu stole the limelight with a win in the’ Net Individual Stableford’ category with 40 points.

Anirudha Fogla won the ‘Closest to the Pin’ award at the Hole No 10 while the ‘Longest Drive’ award went to Tashi Ghale at the Hole No 18. Navin Manandhar of Standard Chartered sank a magnificent 20 feet putt to win the ‘Left Handed Monster Putting Competition’ while Nepal Cricket Association President Binay Raj Pandey finished second after his ball came to rest just half a foot from the pin.

Sujit Mundul, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank, Harsh Dar, MD of Surya Nepal Pvt Ltd, Prem Sachdev, Chairman of Le Meridian Gokarna Golf Resort and Spa and Pradeep Kumar Shrestha, President of Nepal Golf Association gave away the prizes.

The Surya Nepal Masters 2007 will tee off on Wednesday at the same venue.