• “The pair managed six-under rounds of 66 as Tiger Woods was one of those to struggle in windy conditions.”

• “The 15-time Major champion closed with a bogey and double bogey to slip to level par for his opening round.”

• “England’s Justin Rose is one of four players three shots off the lead and one behind second-placed Chez Reavie.”

Full piece.

• “I didn’t putt that well today, but my short game was great and I drove it really well,” Woods said. “Just hit a couple poor iron shots that cost me a few shots. Got myself kind of right there in the mix and then bad shots on 17, 18.”

• “Playing for the first time since his October victory at the Zozo Championship in Japan, Woods simply appeared a bit off, not giving himself very many birdie opportunities, bogeying two par-5s and struggling on a particularly windy day in the Bahamas.”

• “But after playing the front nine in 2 over par, he rebounded by playing a five-hole stretch in 5 under par, including chipping in for an eagle at the par-5 15th hole. That got him to 2 under par, only to give it back on the last two holes.”

Full piece.

• “While Woods doesn’t say he regrets pushing his body to extremes, he does expect more injuries in golf as more strive for power.”

• “There’s going to be added wear and tear on different parts of the body that traditionally there hasn’t been…”Now people are doing PiYos, Olympic lifts, all the different things because they know how important ground is to create power,” Woods said of modern swings that emphasize rotation over the old reverse C moves of the 1970s. “Now you’re going to start to see, I’m sure, some wear and tear injuries that traditionally hasn’t been the case. We’ll see how that goes.”

Full piece.

• …”As Gary Woodland and Rickie Fowler debuted different versions of the turtle-infused line, the field’s other Puma player was not quite ready to embrace the golfing turtle.”

• “It’s an awesome collection,” Bryson DeChambeau said as The Man Out Front trailed him in a quick course departure following an opening 76. “They had the turtle one …” he said, and before the Forecaddie could ask if it would make his repertoire.

• “That’s not going to happen,” DeChambeau said.

• “Leaney had six birdies and a bogey in his round at TPC Scottsdale in Arizona.”

• “Todd Fischer, who also shot a second-round 66, joins Paul Stankowski an Frank Esposito in second. All four golfers have shot in the 60s in the first two rounds.”

Full piece.

Full piece.

• “I just don’t want to go over there,” Woods told ESPN. “It’s a long way.”

• …”I understand the politics behind it,” Woods said Tuesday of the controversy. “But also the game of golf can help heal a lot of that, too. It can help grow it. And also a lot of top players are going to be playing there that particular week.

• “It’s traditionally not a golf hotbed, the Middle East. But it has grown quite a bit. I remember going to Dubai for my very first time and seeing maybe two or three buildings in the skyline. Now there is a New York City skyline. Again, golf has grown. There were only a few courses when I went to Dubai and now they’re everywhere. Same with Abu Dhabi, and maybe eventually in Saudi Arabia.”

Full piece.

• “The gains haven’t been limited to his gym routine or sudden beefiness, either. The 26-year-old five-time PGA Tour winner says he has picked up 12 mph of ball speed – up to 185 – and another 6 mph in clubhead speed in recent weeks. During a breezy pro-am round at the Hero World Challenge on Tuesday, he blasted a few drives north of 350 yards.”

• “More distance,” DeChambeau said when asked what prompted him to pack on the pounds. “People are gonna say what they’re going to say.”

Full piece.

• …”They’re custom-made,” Reed told PGATOUR.COM. “We made them with a company. We worked for 12-14 months on them and we finally got them to where I feel like we need them to be.”

• “While the irons are listed on the USGA Conforming Clubs List as being manufactured by Emery JPN Co., that doesn’t necessarily mean Emery is the company who designed the irons, it’s just the company’s facility they were manufactured in.”

• “Phoenix Open chairman Tim Woods said he’s not concerned about a “mass exodus” of tour players forgoing the event, which is traditionally played on Super Bowl weekend, in exchange for the seven-figure appearance fee that comes with playing in Saudi Arabia.”

• “It’s on our radar,” Woods said at the tournament’s Tee-Off Luncheon at Chase Field on Tuesday. “We’re actively exploring ways to fight back against it and will continue to do so. But I’m not concerned that it’s going to be a negative ultimately.”

Full piece.

• He writes…”I was fortunate enough to have exclusive access to one of the earliest sessions, in February 2019, at Woods’ home course at Medalist Golf Club in Hobe Sound, Fla. Having attended a similar testing session with Woods and Nike in 2003, I was eager to see if his approach had changed. As it turned out, it had remained pretty much intact, with an emphasis on short-game performance, flight windows and spin rates.”

• “Five white boxes of prototype balls were presented to Woods. All of them without Bridgestone’s branding except for assorted Sharpie marks so Bridgestone’s staff, including Andrew Troutner, the company’s R&D test-site manager, could tell which ball was which. According to Elliot Mellow, Bridgestone’s marketing manager, each of the balls Woods was testing had a variation of the company’s urethane cover material, meaning there should be noticeable differences in feel and performance.”

Full piece.

• “Last winter, after I compiled the list of nominees for Golf Digest’s 2019 Best New Courses survey, I privately handicapped the chances of each course, just for my amusement. I gave long odds to Gil Hanse’s entry in the private category, Ohoopee Match Club, an exclusive course in rural Georgia designed to cater to match play, with a total of 22 holes in two routings. Though it sounded like a fascinating concept, I figured that because our evaluation criteria seems tailored toward stroke-play competition, panelists would struggle to fit our square pegs into Ohoopee’s offbeat golf holes.

• “…Needless to say, Ohoopee Match Club has won in the balloting. It’s Golf Digest’s Best New Private Course of 2019, finishing ahead of The Summit Club, a Tom Fazio design in Las Vegas. TPC Colorado, an Art Schaupeter design in Berthoud, north of Denver, finished third, and Pete Dye’s final full design, Links at Perry Cabin in St. Michaels, Md., is fourth. In fifth place is Aberdeen Golf & Country Club in Boynton Beach, Fla., a design by Jim Fazio, Tom’s brother, that replaces a controversial layout by Desmond Muirhead.”

Full piece.

• Golfweek’s Forecaddie…”Current World No. 3 Jon Rahm became engaged to longtime college girlfriend Kelley Cahill in August of 2018, and now the Hero World Challenge defending champion has finally cleared space on his calendar to marry Cahill in the coming weeks.”

• “…Asked by GolfChannel.com’s Brentley Romine what part of his wedding day he’s most looking forward to, Rahm’s expression changed and he paused briefly.”

• “Part of the day?” he said. “What part, I mean, it’s pretty self explanatory, right?”

• “Madsen had a three-shot lead after three rounds at Aloha Golf Club in Marbella, Spain. She holed out for eagle at the par-4 ninth and was still two shots ahead at the start of the back nine. She was down to a one-shot lead on the 18th tee.”

• “Madsen made a double-bogey there after dumping her drive left in the water. It was her third double-bogey in a final-round 74.”

• “Van Dam played to her length and placed her tee shot in the middle of the fairway with a 4-iron. She won with a seemingly easy par for a final-round 70 and a 13-under total. She said she didn’t expect to see Madsen’s final hole unfold the way it did.”

Full piece.

• “As Alex Myers notes, Phil Mickelson has made 30 Phoenix Open starts, including 27 in a row, but the ASU great will end that run this year to play the second ever European Tour event in Saudi Arabia. The event is the brainchild of Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, attempting to westernize the image of Saudi Arabia while regularly attacking journalists, including arresting more just last week on top of likely ordering the Jamal Koshaggi murder and dismemberment.”

• “I am really looking forward to playing in Saudi Arabia in January,”  Mickelson told the Saudi Gazette. “I watched Dustin win the title last  year and thought the course looked like an interesting challenge. Having  so many talented players on show also made it look like a much more established tournament than one in its inaugural year. I have enjoyed my  previous visits to the Middle East and am looking forward to playing in a new country and doing my bit to grow the game in the Kingdom.”

• @PhilMickelson: Given that I turn 50 this year, there’s a good chance I’ve played my last Phoenix Open. We’ll see.

• @brianmflaherty: You’re better than taking the money grab from a corrupt regime.  Come on, Phil.

• @PhilMickelson: After turning down opportunities to go to the Middle East for many years, I’m excited to go play and see a place in the world I’ve never been. I understand those who are upset or disappointed. You’ll be ok. I’m excited to experience this for the first time.

Full piece.

• “I think it is. I think it is,” Woods said Monday morning on Golf Channel’s Morning Drive. “Obviously I have to do everything right like I did at Augusta and I have to have all of the pieces come together.”

• …Woods trailed on the leaderboard heading into the final round at Augusta, and with four holes to go there were still five golfers – four of whom have won majors – tied for the lead.

• “I was, what, 14-1 when either leading outright or tied for the lead going into Sunday [at a major]?” Woods said on Morning Drive. “I finally broke that snide and came from behind. Who knows if I can come from behind [again]? I’ve done it different ways.

• “I’ve won tournaments in different ways and I finally have won a major and done that in different ways,” Woods said. “So, who knows what the future holds?”

Full piece.

Full piece.

• “Now ranked seventh in the world, playing again this week for the first time since winning his 82nd PGA Tour title at the Zozo Championship in October, Woods gets back to work with the other 10 members of the Presidents Cup team he will captain just over a week from now in Australia.”

• “And therein lies the next question for Woods, who will not only play competitive golf in consecutive weeks for one of the rare times this year, but he also has hosting duties this week in the Bahamas, captain duties next week at Royal Melbourne and duties of simply the everyday issues of being … Tiger Woods.”

• “The last time Woods played consecutive weeks didn’t go so well. And it really wasn’t all that much golf. Woods withdrew following the first round of the Northern Trust in early August, citing an oblique injury. The following week he competed in the BMW Championship — he played just nine holes in the pro-am — and tied for 37th to end his season and miss qualifying for the Tour Championship.”

Full piece.

• “LaCava visited Woods recently at his South Florida home for some promotional work and they decided it would be a good time to see how it all transpired. “We spoke about the conversations we had over each shot,” Woods said Monday at Albany Golf Club, where he is playing in the Hero World Challenge that begins Wednesday. “Some of our friends and family who were there were like, “Oh my God, you guys really talked about that?’

• “But that’s what we were talking about, that’s what was going on. We were running through all the scenarios, Joe looking at the (score)boards, I am looking at the boards. We were trying to figure out what was going on; who birdied what, who was making a move.”

Full piece.