Talbott turns it around at Gog Magog

Mark Talbott staged an excellent recovery to win the Titleist & FootJoy PGA Professional Championship East qualifying event at Gog Magog Golf Club.

Talbott, of Southend's Thorpe Hall Golf Club, carded a five-under-par round of 67 at the Cambridge venue to win by one shot ahead of James Scade of Little Channels.

But Talbott had to fight back after a double bogey at the third hole.

He followed that up with six more birdies to the two he had already made to qualify with ease and top the leaderboard.

Talbott will join 12 other qualifiers for the £78,000 grand final which is being held at at Luttrellstown Castle Golf Club near Dublin between June 13-16.

And he admitted he quickly made sure his problems at the third hole were simply a blip.

"I don't know what happened really, I had one bad tee shot and ended up in all sorts of trouble,"he explained.

"I had a one putt for that seven in the end so I was actually quite happy waking off the green with the score I made.

"But I've been playing quite well recently, I knew the key around there was to keep it in play, if you drive it well you get lots of chances. The back nine went well but it's all about qualifying."

Talbott had reached the last two finals and is aiming for an improvement at Luttrellstown.

"My first experience of the final was Burnham & Berrow and it was pretty brutal in the wind, it didn't suit my game that sort of links course," he said.

"Last year I played The Oxfordshire and started quite nicely. It lost my driving in the last couple of rounds, I had some cricket scores, hopefully I can keep it going over all four days this year. The course in Ireland looks good, it'll be my first playing over there."

But Talbott say he almost did not play at Gog Magog.

"The qualifier clashed with one of our regional Order of Merit events, I was umming and arring over whether I should enter or not.

"But they've changed the format for the Order of Merit in our region with the best three out of four computing so I could play in the end. It isn't a bad as I thought it would be."