Bob Hope Chrysler Classic round two: Fortune smiles on Justin Leonard

So far there’s everything to like with what Justin Leonard is doing, although fate is playing its part. It was pretty calm at Silver Rock when he played what is proving the most challenging of the four courses, especially to someone who struggles for length as he does. Then when the wind kicked up Thursday he found himself at La Quinta, as he said afterwards “probably the golf course that you want to be on a windy day".

This decade he has never played the course better than Thursday’s 64 - his previous best was as a 67 in 2003 when the course average was actually marginally lower than round two’s 70.5. Things will probably be slightly tougher for him at PGA West Friday, but the key test will be how he fares on the Classic course over the last two days. That’s the one he has struggled to beat in the past. Again fate might leap in to help, with the wind looking like behaving itself through the weekend; certainly there seems no danger of a repeat of last year’s Sunday howler.

Having said that, I agree with those on the forums who think a price of less than 5 for Leonard with three rounds still to go is too low. He’s not exactly surrounded by the golfing elite, but they’re no numpties either and the two leaders, D J Trahan and Robert Gamez, are posting very handy stats - like Leonard they’re top 10 for putting and finding greens. No doubt a few others will spring out of the pack to upset the apple cart as well. Long way still to go.