Cool construction with lots more to explore! Newer players, this may be the easiest PhD solve you can get - don't be shied away by the high stepcount. The actual optimization is quite straightforward, although it does require some sneaky observations.
I knew exactly where the 62 path was going to come from but the structure of this level messed with my head. Took me forever to find the 62 despite knowing what it'd look like
5 tries. Not really seeing the 6 points; there's one trick (maybe two, depending on how you think about it), and everything else is quite filler, with several variants in different areas all leading to same counts.
Edit: clear 3000 :) This is probably not a real GM but I will take it for now. Took me longer to see the 2-cut than it did the first time around so gave an extra star back.