Adam Bland may hold an imposing break over much of the rest of the field at the halfway stage of the JBWere Masters but he is adamant that any of the 62 players left in the tournament can win over the weekend.
Bland's strong short game has come to the fore over the first two days at Victoria Golf Club, helping him to scores of 65 and 67 for a total of 10 under and a two-shot lead over fellow Aussie Andre Stolz.
Significantly he has a five-shot buffer over third-placed Daniel Gaunt, a six-shot lead over Spaniard Sergio Garcia and a whopping nine-shot advantage over world No.2 and tournament drawcard Tiger Woods.
Despite that gap, the 28-year-old knows that the wild weather predicted over the weekend could see a very spacious leaderboard change dramatically over the next two days.
"Anyone who makes the cut can win. If we get bad conditions and I play bad or someone plays good, this just closes the gap and all of a sudden people are overtaking other people," he said after Friday's round.
However, despite being wary of how quickly things can change, Bland said his confidence is riding high after backing an excellent round on Thursday with another one 24 hours later.
"It was very important for me (to back it up from the opening day). My confidence wasn't really sky high coming into this, so if I had have gone out there and shot a big number then I would have probably just been back where I was. So it was good to get through those tough conditions and just grind away and get it done today," he said.
Holding such a lofty position midway through one of Australia's biggest tournament has Bland, who will fly to the US on Sunday night to try and qualify through the gruelling PGA Tour Q-School, thinking about creating some history.
"I really couldn't explain what a victory here would mean to me," he said of a victory on Sunday. "It would be unbelievable for me. This would be my breakthrough and hopefully I could build bigger things from this. It would be awesome if I could keep this lead."
Bland will play in the final group on Saturday with Stolz, who says he isn't as concerned with the quality of the opponents, such as Woods and Garcia, as he is with the quality of this course.
"This course is what we have to beat first. I believe this is the toughest course on the sandbelt and the reason I say that is that there's less birdies on offer on this golf course," Stolz said.
"This is a great golf course and I love coming here but there's not as many birdie holes besides 18 and one. They are the only ones where you are annoyed if you don't make birdie. There's so many tough holes out there."