24th May, Busan: 2017 South East Asian Games Masters silver medallist, Tannya Roumimper of Indonesia topped the second block of Squad D to advance to the final round of the 2018 PBA-WBT Busan Cup International Bowling Tournament.

2017 World Bowling Tour champion, Anthony Simonsen of Austin, Texas got off the second block with a stunning 266 to leapfrog into the lead from an overnight eighth position. Overnight leader and Korean amateur, Choi Wooseop of Daegu slipped to second despite a decent start with 223.

The 21-year-old American continued to lead the field with another superb 227 in his seventh game but found Roumimper hot on his heels, just 5 pins adrift. Choi suffered a lowly 188 to drop out of contention.

Simonsen lost the lead after rolling 207 in the eighth game. Roumimper knocked down a higher 247 to take over the running and moving ahead by 43 pins.

But Roumimper ended the block and the qualifying round with 224 to clinch the win with 2351. Simonsen settled for second with 2334 while Kim Seonjeong of Seoul City team finished third with 2283. Choi took fourth position with 2281 followed by KPBA's Lee Doheon completing the top 5 with 2273.

The cut at 11th position went to KPBA's Seo Jeonghwan with 2206. Another KPBA pro, Jeong Taehwa missed the cut by 5 pins despite ending with a strong 223 in his final game. The last and final Squad C, which will commence shortly this evening, will end the two blocks of qualifying for the four squads.

The top 11 from each of the four squads totalling 44 finalists will make the cut for the final round on May 26. They will bowl 6 games from scratch to determine the top 4 advancing to the Stepladder shootout finals.

The Stepladder finals will be held at two specially constructed lanes at the outdoor Arena @ Busan Metropolitan City complex and will be telecast LIVE by SBS Sports, Korea.

Photos by Terence Yaw in Busan, Korea.