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Sergio Garcia finished the second round of the JBWere Australian Masters signing for a round of 65 at The Victoria Club in Melbourne - improving on his opening day 73 – with a total of six birdies either side of the turn and no shots lost on day two.
Garcia moved up to fourth place on his own on 4 under – albeit six off the leader Adam Bland – claiming it is too early to consider it a turnaround in his fortunes.
Undoubtedly he is right given it is only his third tournament with the first on his home course in mid-October at the Club de Campo del Mediterráneo for the CASTELLÓ MASTERS Costa Azahar, where he missed the cut after a two month break.
In recent months much of Garcia's time had been assigned off the course following the PGA Championship at Whistling Straits to when he decided to take a complete break from the game – except for the non-playing role at the Ryder Cup.
His involvement in the Ryder Cup at The Celtic Manor, as a fourth Vice-captain, helped maintain an unbroken link with the competition since he first played in 1999 in Brookline and throughout the week the involvement brought a smile back to his face on the golf course. Not least when Graeme McDowell secured the trophy on the seventeenth green.
In playing terms though his return has been more measured and appearances in Castellon ended early, which he followed by the Pro-Am at the OKI Castellon Senior Tour Championship a few weeks later. In that light the option to play in Australia may not have been appealing but based on his golf at Valderrama a two weeks ago the trip to Melbourne shows his love for the game maybe coming back - slowly.
At the Andalucia Valderrama Masters he finished tenth even if the scores were a little inconsistent - 70, 73, 69 and a final day 76 on the card – in what were universally agreed to be testing conditions. On the Saturday night though Garcia was one under – five shots off the joint leaders Gareth Maybin and Graeme McDowell – confident after his two under par round that he had a chance.
In the end he shot five over par on the Sunday to finish tenth tempering his view somewhat in Melbourne – even after a second round 65. Sergio Garcia sums it up best himself when speaking after his round.
"Well, it was windy this morning so it was what it was. It's good to be back in the Media Centre. It feels like a home in here for a while."
"I am happy about my round. It's just, I guess, a little bit funny. It's the way it sums up my golf game at the moment. Some rounds are spectacular and some rounds are not that great. Anyway, we are trying to get back into it, so slowly, I guess. We will be okay."
"What comes to mind is in these similar conditions as today at Valderrama I played unbelievable. I played probably as good as today. Unfortunately, I just putted pretty poorly. Instead of winning the tournament which I probably had a chance the way I hit the ball in the conditions on Sunday I wound up finishing 10th."
When asked had he turned the "corner"?
"I think that's going too far ahead. I think that it's slowly getting better but I can go out there
tomorrow and shoot 75 and we wouldn't be here because I wouldn't come here. All the assumptions and everything could be totally different. I'm just taking it slowly. I'm just taking the positives out of everything. I'm trying to make sure that rounds like yesterday don't affect me which I try, obviously."
"Don't get me wrong, I am trying to shoot the best score I can but making sure that a bad round doesn't get to me too much. So I guess that helps me come in today and come in a better mood and probably play a little better."
