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Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open Halfway Hut: Martin Trainer leads, Scottie Scheffler fires

News, stats, quotes and social media after two days at Memorial Park Golf Course in Texas.

The second round remains incomplete after two days of action at the Hewlett Packard Enterprise Open.
The delayed start to the first round at Memorial Park, and the limited daylight, has made it difficult to catch up, but the tournament should be fine completing all four rounds by Sunday evening.
Friday witnessed big moves from the golfers who played lots of golf.
Those players who completed their first laps in the morning and then headed out for the second circuit dominate the leaderboard: only four of the top 15 have holes to complete in round two.

Martin Trainer signed for a first round 65 early in the morning and then repeated the score to grab the lead on 10-under 130.

He leads Kevin Tway (67-64) by one, Jason Kokrak is chasing them hard. He's on 8-under through 29 holes; he opened with a 68 and is currently 6-under for the second round. Adam Long (66-67) is alone in fourth on 7-under.

Kramer Hickok, Adam Schenck and Scottie Scheffler share fifth on 6-under 134 and the latter made a spectacular move after opening with a lacklustre 72 - in fact, he took just 62 blows on Friday afternoon.

Among those missing the cut are Brooks Koepka, who helped renovate the course, Tyrrell Hatton and Lee Westwood.

Stats

The first three in last year's first visit to Memorial Park all finished top six for Strokes Gained Tee to Green and the leader in that category finished tied seventh.
Trainer current ranks second, Tway eighth, Kokrak 31st and Long 18th.

Value bet

Keith Mitchell will return to the course on Saturday morning looking to first two putt the 13th from 28-feet and then make headway on the leaders.
He's tied eighth on 5-under, 2-under for his second round, and he ranks fifth for SG T2G.

Quotes

A look at what the leaders said on Friday.

Martin Trainer (-10, 65)

"Winning is never easy. I was able to win in Puerto Rico a couple years ago, which is huge. I think just knowing that I can do it is half the battle. So the other half is going to comedown to actually executing, but it's nice to know that I have done it before and so it is a possibility for me.
"Last week I hit the ball really well for the first time in a long time and I just didn't putt very well. So I figured if I could somehow do both those at the same time, which to be fair, every single player says that every single week, but for me it had been such a long time coming that, you know, it really was a grind for a long time.
"So now to finally be able to put it together I think is, you know, it's not easy, but you have to hope that this is the week."

Kevin Tway (-9, 64)

"I like it. It's a good course. It pays to be long and straight out here and if you're in the fairway you can get at some holes. The greens are very good, so I enjoy it.
"The greens are big, so if you hit them, you've got some crazy putts, but as long as you can get semi close to the hole, they're good surfaces, you can make some putts.
"It plays like Oklahoma golf where I'm from. It's more same kind of fairways, same kind of wind, so I'm comfortable in these conditions."

Jason Kokrak (-8 thru 11)

"When you do have a close birdie look, you've got to take advantage. There's some pins out here that are pretty nasty if you do miss, so playing away from the pin on occasion, which I don't normally do. My caddie, D-Rob, is telling me where to hit it and I'm trying to listen to him.
"I actually was not really playing that well in the practice round on Tuesday. My swing coach is flying in Sunday to do a little work and be with me next week. Nonetheless, I think we got a few things straightened out and the putter's warm."

Scottie Scheffler (-6, 62)

"I started hitting some fairways. Yesterday I was playing out of the rough most of the time, so it was just nice getting the ball out there in play, give myself some opportunities.

"This golf course can be pretty challenging from the Bermuda rough and you've got to hit the ball in play. If you're hitting it in the rough to elevated greens, you can't hold because you're hitting knucklers out of the rough.
"It's a challenging golf course. I really appreciate that. I feel I get a little tired of playing the golf courses where you've got to shoot 20-something under to win. Out here maybe winning in the mid teens, high teens, whatever it is, that's nice."

Social

Putting Trainer's position into perspective.
In it goes.
Sizzling Scheffler.

READ MORE: AVIV Dubai Championship Halfway Hut: Antoine Rozner leads again as Tommy Fleetwood lurks

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