Branden Grace Off to Flying Start in the HSBC Champions

Yesterday the first round of the WGC-HSBC Champions went underway, where the golfers are competing in the second event of the season ending Final Series.

The leaderboard is currently being topped by Branden Grace, who could be in with a shot of claiming his 3rd European Tour victory this season.

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Grace had a bogey-free first round of 63 after nine birdies, which led him to have a one shot lead over three players in Shanghai.

Five shots behind the lead are Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth on -4, who are both looking to regain their former World number one title, which will be possible for Spieth if he has a top 10 finish.

The world number three Rory McIlroy has been suffering from food poisoning this week, so he claims to be happy with his opening round of 68.

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Talking to BBC Sport he said: “I had not been out of bed for basically 48 hours, so I was really stiff.”  He went on to say, “I needed to loosen up quite a lot, but when I got out there I felt pretty good”.

Danny Willet is also in the running at -5, and is hopeful of knocking McIlroy off top spot in the rankings in the Race to Dubai, as well as still being in contention to end the year as European number one.

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This week could be a game changer in both the World and in the European Tour rankings, and we will see how it unravels throughout the week.

Cover Photo via @BrandenGrace Twitter