France’s Matthieu Pavon, who has played the Muscat course at the NBO Oman Open five times on the Challenge Tour, fired a second-round 65 to reach 11-under and lead the European Tour event by two strokes at the end of 36 holes on Friday.
He leads England’s Matthew Southgate by two strokes.
“It’s a lot of good memories that help,” Pavon said. “When you play bad on some courses and you are going back the next year or you have some bad memories, here is just the opposite. I just have so many good memories so I’ll just try to surf on them.
“I’m feeling good in my game, very happy right now so I’ll just take it easy and we will see what happens. I really enjoyed every part of my game today. Everything was really consistent and solid, I played a lot of good shots, holed a few really good putts so everything was just perfect today.”
He got out to a great start, birdying #3, #5, #6 and #8 on the front nine. He added a birdie on the 10th to give him the lead.
England’s Paul Waring, Southgate’s co-leader on Day One, and fellow Brit Chris Wood, are tied for third and three strokes back at 8-under.
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