Olazabal trails McGrane by two shots

Jose Maria Olazabal fully justified his decision to play in the modest Turespana Mallorca Classic, instead of taking a week off, by carding a four-under-par 66 on Thursday.

That left the Spaniard only two strokes off the opening round lead, sharing second place behind Damien McGrane of Ireland. Belgian Didier De Vooght also carded 66 to tie second spot.

Olazabal is hoping to enhance his Volvo Masters chances by playing in the event co-sanctioned with the Challenge Tour and received a confidence-booster with a faultless round containing four birdies.

The double-U.S. Masters champion, 60th on the European money-list, with only the top 60 qualifying for the Volvo Masters in two weeks' time, enjoyed his best form for some time.

"My irons were better today than for a long time and my misses were not big misses like they have often been this year, and I hit quite a few good irons for a change," said Olazabal, who has described his season as "like walking to Calvary."

"Obviously to score like that you need the putter working and today it did, when that has also been another part of my game that's not been good."

Having wrapped up his U.S. Tour year Olazabal has this week and next week's Madrid Open to ensure he gets into the lucrative end-of-season event at Valderrama.

He played on Thursday with two last week's winner in the Netherlands, Dutchman Maarten Lafeber, who shot a 68, and Lee Westwood, who posted a 72.

Westwood began badly, double-bogeying his opening hole, the 10th, with two penalty shots.

"It doesn't help when you're looking for a quick start," said the winner of two of his last five events to end nearly three years in the wilderness and move to number five in Europe.

Leader McGrane, 142nd on the order of merit, holed out with an eight-iron with his second shot from 147 yards at the par-four 14th.

Argentine Daniel Vancsik got away to an even worse start than Westwood when he ran up a septuple-bogey 12 on the 10th after hitting three drives out of bounds.

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