Lucas Herbert continues strong 2025 in Japan
Lucas Herbert in action during round two – image courtesy of Asian Tour
Despite his significant success in LIV Golf and other events over the past few months, Lucas Herbert was perhaps unfairly overlooked by the PGA of America when it came to inclusion in the field for next week’s PGA Championship. Still, he has put that behind him with an outstanding start to the Asian Tour’s International Series Japan event in Chiba Prefecture.
At the halfway stage, Herbert has a one shot lead over Korea’s Younghan Song and Japan’s Shunya Takehasu in the US2 million event being played at the Caledonian Golf Club outside of Tokyo but it is not the margin of lead but the manner in which Herbert has played the opening 36 holes that has been so impressive.
Through seven holes of his opening round on Thursday, Herbert was 7 under par with five birdies and an eagle and although the momentum slowed a little, his round of 62 that day had him in the lead by two and when he added three early birdies on day two, it appeared as if he might well spreadeagle the field.
The balance of round two however, would be a mixture of five birdies, four bogeys, and a double bogey to finish with a 2 under 69 and the lead when he finished his morning round.
No-one was able to catch the 29 year old as the day wore on and so he will take the lead into the weekend as he looks to add to his already significant earnings in 2025 having finished once runner-up and 4th on two occasions in seven starts in LIV Golf events and has earnings close to US$5 million.
Amongst Herbert’s five wins internationally is a previous win in Japan at the ISPS Handa Championship in 2023 while still playing the DP World Tour so success in Japan is not new to him, and given the brilliance of his play to date this week another is a strong possibility.
NSW’s Travis Smyth and New Zealand’s Nick Voke are the next best of the Australasian brigade in a share of 7th place and four shots from Herbert’s lead.
