The Florida swing sings

It was a score which would have graced any captain's prize. So, it was hardly surprising that Larry Bowdria finished on the winning team when contributing a three-under-par 68 gross - net 59 - in the Murphy's Irish Open Pro-Am at Druids Glen yesterday.

Nor was it a surprise to learn that it happened to be the second-best score of his career, given that Bowdria plays off nine. "I was once down to four," said the 54year-old retired American entrepreneur, who is a member of the Palm Beach Polo Club in Florida, where Fred Couples is among his colleagues.

The winning team, with a stunning, best two-ball score of 96 Stableford points, was led by another American, John Finlayson, who plays on the Nike Tour. He is competing here this week on a sponsor's invitation and, as it happened, his score of 74 yesterday was six strokes higher than that of his amateur partner.

The other two members of the team were 14-handicapper Bob Reynolds, also from the US where he is a member of the Forest Hills club in St Louis, Missouri, and Jim Kane, a 17-handicap member of the host club. Their involvement stemmed from an association, direct or otherwise, with Lucent Technologies, co-sponsors of the Irish Open.

A measure of their dominance was that they finished no fewer than 11 strokes ahead of the second-placed team from P J Carroll and Co, led by Smurfit European Open champion Mathias Gronberg.

Bowdria, whose best previous score was a 66 at his home club, had only one serious piece of good fortune, where he chipped into the hole for a birdie at the difficult, par-four sixth. In halves of 32 and 36, the only bogeys on his card were at the 13th and 15th, but these were more than offset by birdies at the three long holes, the fifth, 11th and 16th, and at the par-four sixth and ninth.

Scoring was tight for the minor placings. But there was no joy on this occasion for the cross-party line-up of politicians Charlie McCreevey, Enda Kenny and Bobby Molloy. In a marked slide from previous prominence, they had to be content with 15th place on 80 points in the company of English professional Peter Mitchell.

Leading teams: 96 - J Finlayson (£866) with L Bowdria (9), B Reynolds (14), J Kane (17); 85 - M Gronberg (£708) with L Crowley, E Trant, B Aylmer; 84 - S Webster (£590) with J Ryan, J O'Brien, L McCormac; 83 - M-A Jimenez with E Werner, B Grubbs, D Dilger (on countback from); D Robertson with D O'Mahoney, P Congdon, R Hayden; I Garrido with K Pearce, J Heindel, C Fisher; 81 - T Bjorn with T Finan, J O'Sullivan, S Diviney (on countback); J Moseley with A Murphy, S Decaro, G Conrad; R Claydon with M Fingleton, R Sherriff, J P McDowell; P McGinley with J Osborne, N Browne, T Cleary.

Live coverage of the Murphy Irish Open with up-to-the-minute score updates will be provided throughout the tournament by SportsExtra@ireland.com and can be accessed at www.ireland.com/ sports/golf/.