Dutchman Joost Luiten finished top of the leaderboard at the end of day 2 at the Andalucía Valderrama Masters, one shot ahead of host, Masters champion and overnight leader Sergio Garcia, thanks in part to a stunning albatross.
Joost Luiten on the 18th green Warren Little (Getty Images)
Luiten's albatross on the 11th hole helped him get to six under for two rounds with Garcia, Scotland's Scott Jamieson and Englishman Robert Rock just behind.
Luiten happy with second day at Valderrama
The 31-year-old, a six-time champion on the European Tour, was second over the same Valderrama layout 12 months ago at the Spanish Open.
Leaderboard
Leading second-round scores from the European Tour's Andalucia Valderrama Masters at Valderrama Golf Club in Spain on Friday (par 71; GBR/IRL unless stated):
136 - Joost Luiten (NED) 66 70
137 - Robert Rock 67 70, Sergio Garcia (ESP) 66 71, Scott Jamieson 69 68
138 - Ben Evans 69 69
139 - Ricardo Gouveia (POR) 69 70, Oliver Wilson 69 70
140 - Andrew Johnston 69 71, Anders Hansen (DEN) 70 70, Jamie Donaldson 73 67, Paul Peterson (USA) 68 72, Pablo Larrazabal (ESP) 67 73, Edoardo Molinari (ITA) 69 71
141 - Richard Bland 70 71, Raphael Jacquelin (FRA) 71 70
142 - Daniel Willett 70 72, Daniel Brooks 70 72, Robert Dinwiddie 71 71, Martin Kaymer (GER) 70 72, Sebastian Soderberg (SWE) 73 69, Richard Finch 69 73, Shane Lowry 72 70, Alejandro Canizares (ESP) 72 70, Austin Connelly (CAN) 73 69, Alfie Plant 70 72, Adrian Otaegui (ESP) 71 71
"I'm happy with the way I played," Luiten told europeantour.com. "I finished second last year, I like this place.
"Hopefully we can have a good weekend and we can win here but there's a lot of golf to be played and we just need to focus on tomorrow and have another good round."
Luiten's big moment came on the 11th when he holed his second with a four iron from 227 yards for the second albatross of his European Tour career.
