Home advantage played its part for Nick Drane over a windswept Whittlebury Park near Towcester in the PGA Midland Region qualifying round of Britain and Ireland's flagship event for young professionals.
Drane, a first-year assistant at the club, who lives in Chackmore, near Milton Keynes, beat the wind to card a one-under 71 and led the17 qualifiers who'll contest the 54-hole final of the Powerade PGA Assistants' Championship in association with FootJoy at The London Club in Kent in August.
"The conditions were really tough", said the 26-year-old who attended university in Georgia, USA. "It blows a lot round this area but it was extra wild today."
Drane's start, over what's known as the 1905 nine-hole layout, was hardly encouraging; he dropped three shots in the first three holes, but a chip-in from the edge of the green at the 430-yard eighth for a birdie, followed by another gain at the next righted the ship, and further birdies at the 11th and 18th, both par-fives, cemented his recovery.
John-Paul Banbury (Moor Hall) finished a stroke behind Drane. A second-year assistant with head pro Cameron Clark at the Sutton Coldfield club, Banbury had an adventurous front nine, bookending three successive dropped shots from the sixth with birdies at the fourth and ninth.
A more orderly inward half saw him card a birdie at the long 11th, plus eight highly commendable pars over the windblown Royal Whittlewood nine-hole circuit.