Yesterday's Irish PGA Championship pro-am at The European Club was mostly a get-to-know-you trip for most of the professionals before the real thing begins today and making the best of the outing was Michael Collins.
The Mallow Driving Range pro posted a level par 71 with four birdies sprinkled over his card. With back-to-back birdies at eight and nine, the Cork man turned in one-under-par 34 and went two-under when he reduced the long 13th hole to four blows.
However, a poor finish of bogey-bogey left Collins, one of the morning starters, waiting right until darkness fell before being declared the winner. He finished one stroke ahead of Robert Giles and Damian Mooney.
Padráig Harrington will bemoan a triple-bogey seven at the seventh hole as he carded a 73 - those three lost shots costing him top of the leaderboard.
Harrington put a ball out-of-bounds at the 449-yards seventh and then three-stabbed the green, as well.
That left him turning in three-over-38 before he covered the back nine in one-under-35, making birdie three at the 12th hole and eight pars.
Carlow's Ian Kerr led in the winning team of Ciarán Clarke (8), Peadar Flynn (14) and Phil Dillon (16). They combined to card 86 points.