Bradley pupil Chappell threatens magical mark

As the eyes of the golf world were on Paul Goydos attempting to enter the PGA Tour record book at the John Deere Classic with his 59, a pupil of Sunset Beach, N.C., instructor Nick Bradley was threatening the number himself on the Nationwide Tour.
Kevin Chappell posted the lowest Nationwide round of the year relative to par with an 11-under 61 at the Ford Wayne Gretzky Classic in Canada. The 24-year-old former NCAA champion and college player of the year at UCLA narrowly missed birdie putts on two of his last four holes to break the magical 60 barrier. Goydos' 59 was 12 shots under par.
Starting on the 10th tee at the Raven Golf Club at Lora Bay in Thornbury, Ontario, Chappell reeled off eight birdies in the first nine holes (all but the par-3 15th). The Fresno, Calif. native parred the first three on his final nine, birdied the next two, then made one more birdie on No. 8 and had no bogies on his card. Though he obviously made his share of putts, he lipped out a 5-footer on No. 6 and hit the lip with a quick 10-footer on the ninth.
“On my back nine I shot 3-under par but it kind of feels like I shot over par. That can happen when you shoot 8-under on your opening nine holes,” Chappell said. “. . . . “The thought of shooting 59 obviously crosses your mind but the goal isn’t to shoot 59, it’s to win the golf tournament. We still have a long way to go to accomplish that but it’s nice to start off with a clean scorecard while keeping the foot on the gas pedal.”

The lowest 18-hole score in Nationwide Tour history is 59: Notah Begay III (1998), Doug Dunakey (1998) and Jason Gore (2005). Goydos' 59 joined Al Geiberger (1977), Chip Beck (1991) and David Duval (1999) in the PGA TOUR record book.