GRAEME STORM'S third Open Championship ended almost as badly as his first after he suffered further frustrations on the Carnoustie links course where he made his Open debut in 1999.

But the Hartlepool golfer has vowed to forget about his nightmare and recapture his best form in the coming weeks.

Eight years after shooting 82-79 at the challenging venue to miss the cut with a 19-over-par total, Storm battled through a similarly woeful two days on the east coast of Scotland.

He hoped Thursday's 78 would be as bad as it got but it got even worse yesterday.

Storm, who actually made one of the finest birdies of the day at the first, ended up entering the clubhouse with an 80 - leaving him 16 over for the tournament.

It was not exactly what he had in mind when he qualified by winning the French Open a little over a month ago and, after surveying what went wrong, he will be looking to the future.

Storm said: "I'm very disappointed, it could have been a great week for me. Instead it's been a week to forget.

"I'm taking a couple of days off and then I'm going to Germany because it's a big tournament. I see no reason why I can't get back to the form I showed when winning in France.

"The problems were much the same. I couldn't put my game together despite spending three hours on the range on Thursday. The score doesn't really reflect the way I played but it doesn't matter."

After opening with a perfect drive on the first to the left of the fairway, Storm's stunning second shot from 120 yards left him with a short putt for birdie.

But after making his first bogey of the day at the fourth, things steadily got worse for the 29-year-old.

Two holes later he took three out of a bunker to end up with a double bogey on the 578-yard par five.

And, after making a second birdie on the short par 3 at eight, Storm lost his game completely on the back nine.

He drove into the bunker at ten, then landed in the drink on his way to a triple bogey.

Two pars followed but Storm ended dreadfully; bogey, par, bogey, par and bogey at the 17th.

To make matters worse, on the 18th where he took a seven on Thursday after suffering in the Barry Burn, his approach ended up in the grandstand.

By the time he had been handed his ball from a spectator and putted away for the final time in the Open 2007, he had finished with a double bogey and a second round score of nine over par.