A two-stroke penalty for hitting the wrong ball put the skids under a spirited comeback from Michael Sims as the Bermuda number one finished even par at the Nationwide Tour BMW Charity Pro-Am to miss the cut by just one shot on Saturday.

Having fired a five-over par 76 in round one, Sims responded magnificently on Friday in Greenville, South Carolina with a four-under 67 to finish the day one-over for the tournament and in with a strong chance of making the day-three cut.

But having sunk a 30-foot birdie putt on the par-five 17th on Saturday (after starting on the back nine) to go one-under for the round, Sims discovered to his horror after retrieving the ball from the hole that it belonged to somebody else.

"It was a Pro-Am so the course was incredibly crowded and somebody from the group in front somehow hit the ball I had driven," said a clearly angry and frustrated Sims yesterday.

"I didn't check what I thought was my ball on the fairway, I just assumed it was mine and hit it. I then knocked in a 30-foot birdie putt but then I realised as I was walking off the green that the ball wasn't mine.

"Obviously it was very upsetting, it basically cost me the chance of making the cut. I hit the ball really well all day and was very happy with the way I played, but that bogey on 17 I think made the difference."

Sims' final round at The Cliffs golf resort included a total of five birdies and four bogeys, and despite the disappointment missing his eighth cut in ten events on the Tour, Sims could at least reflect with some hope on the quality of his latter two rounds following Thursday's nightmare.

"I hit the ball horribly on Thursday for some reason, but I went to the range afterwards and I think managed to sort a few things out," he said.

"I came back the next day and didn't hit the ball much better to be honest, but I made a lot of putts in the second round which kind of took the pressure off the rest of my game and helped me to shoot a decent number.

"And yesterday (Saturday) like I said I played really well, but what can you do? I'm happy that I played better but it's incredibly frustrating and I'm not happy about what happened.

"But I feel as if I'm not far off putting it all together and it's just a matter of being patient. Hopefully at some point it will come good."

Sims now heads off to play at the $600,000 Melwood Prince George's County Open in Maryland, starting on Thursday.

The former Bermuda Open champion is 181st on the Tour money list out of more than 250 players with a total of $2,807 from ten events.

[bul] Bermuda's other professional golfer Eric West also missed the cut last week at the Canadian Tour's $125,000 Iberostar Riviera Maya Open in Matalan, Mexico.

The 23-year-old former UC Berkeley college student shot rounds of 76 and 83 on the 7,121-yard Playa Paraiso Golf Club course to finish the tournament at 15-over par.

Over the last month, the young pro has played in a Canadian Tour tournament every week, making the cut once at the Riviera Nayarit Classic in Puerto Vallarta and finishing 60th.

"I am excited about making my first cut on the Canadian Tour," he wrote in a recent e-mail.

"In general though staying away from the big number has been my problem. I am making a lot of birdies but also making too many careless errors."