News

Memorial Tournament Preview

The furrowed bunkers are back, that can mean only one thing it’s time for Jack Nicklaus’s Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club.

Published

19 years ago

May 30, 2007

K Vakamudi

Memorial Tournament Born thirty-two years ago out of Jack Nicklaus’s desire to bring a Masters caliber tournament to his hometown of Columbus, Ohio, the Memorial has quickly become one of the most popular tournaments on the PGA Tour. The 105 player invitational field is one of the strongest of the year with all top ten in the World Golf Rankings participating. However the strong field is not the only topic of discussion on the Memorial. The infamous furrowed bunkers are also returning to Memorial as Jack tries to make bunkers true hazards again.

Last year much of the talk about the Memorial centered around the improvised bunker rakes Jack brought in for the tournament. The specially devised rakes have tines every two inches, with every other tine missing. This creates furrows in the bunkers where the ball can nestle down in in the sand making clean contact a dicey proposition. Last year the announcement of the new bunkers rankled many of the players in the field. Defending champion Carl Pettersson commented, "The bunkers were very difficult. If you missed it on the short side, it was almost impossible to get it close." However, overall the 2006 sand save statistics didn’t bear much difference when compared with other tournaments. This year they have created a new term for the furrows, now officially dubbed "rough-raking." Along with a change in title, minor modifications have also been made to the rakes to make the conditions more consistent, Jack Nicklaus said, "This year we’re consistent with the size, and we really — I don’t think the players are going to find it to be a big hazard. . . It puts a little ripple in the sand. Can you get a bad lie? Yeah, you’d be pretty hard pressed, though."

Bunker Rake

With Phil Mickelson’s convincing win at The PLAYERS Championship combined with his move to swing coach Butch Harmon he is riding quite a bit of momentum into the tournament and is a heavy favorite. Although Tiger Woods has not played up to his high standards recently, his three wins at the Memorial (1999, 2000, 2001) combined with his pension for playing well in difficult tournaments means we can likely expect his name near the top of the leaderboard on Sunday. Last year Carl Pettersson won the event by two shots, and has taken a realistic method towards preparing for his title defense, "I’m going to try to approach it just like I would any other tournament, try to go in there and do as well as I can and see what happens." A bit of a dark horse candidate for this week is Masters champion Zach Johnson. Johnson was runner up here last year and has won twice already on Tour this year including the AT&T Classic two weeks ago. In 12 starts this year, Johnson has not missed a single cut.

You can catch TV coverage of the Memorial at the following times:
Thursday: 3:00-6:00 PM EST Golf Channel
Friday: 3:00-6:00 PM EST Golf Channel
Saturday: 12:30-2:30 EST Golf Channel / 3:00-6:00 EST CBS
Sunday: 12:00-239 EST Golf Channel / 2:30-6:00 EST CBS

News

Why TaylorMade is moving to 2-year product cycle for its drivers

Published

2 hours ago

May 15, 2026

Alistair Cameron

TaylorMade Golf Company announced Friday a revamped release cycle for drivers. Starting with Qi4D, the company will transition from annual to biennial launches, a significant change from its previous business model. The company told us it made the decision for three reasons: current product success, reassuring product improvement to the consumer, and better fitting capabilities than ever before.

Firstly, it’s a move that TaylorMade has been pursuing for several years, but one that has been brought forward by up to a year.

“Qi4D being off to an incredible start, not only on tour, but in the market, in the eyes of consumers, in the 3rd party reviews, I mean, everything has been firing and all cylinders,”Brian Bazzel, Vice President at TaylorMade Golf Company, told GolfWRX. “I would say it’s allowed us to sort of consider making this move maybe even a year earlier than we were considering doing it.”

Despite Qi4D’s success both on tour and with the consumer, the ability to create such a leap in lineups is becoming more marginal. With that, TaylorMade has both listened to the consumer and seen can to validate the customer’s purchase for newer equipment.

“Every year we grind away, it takes us a couple years to actually make the product from the time we start,” Bazzel added. “To get those little improvements, the differences are becoming a little bit smaller, a little bit harder for consumers to see.”

By changing to a two-year cycle, Bazzel believes that consumers will be able to see more of a justification to upgrade to something better.

“We’re at this point where we believe the right recipe, not only for us internally, but for consumers, is to give us a, give us a little bit more time, no lack of intensity, we’re gonna continue to, like, push hard,” Bazzel said. “But with that push for an extended period of time, we know we can deliver something that’s going to be even more meaningful or more valuable. to that consumer.”

Finally, Bazzel deems that the extended time between launches will line up better with the fitting capabilities of the product.

“Allowing our fitters to get comfortable with it and practically how to enhance performance with golfers with it, that takes some time as well.”Bazzel noted. “And I think this is going to allow those fitters to get a little bit more comfortable with it as well. That’s great.”

Outside of the consumer, and just as important for TaylorMade, is the tour feedback that it has received.

“The adoption level is not maybe as rapid as it has been and we were very transparent last year with Qi35 on tour,” Bazzel said. “We’re seeing guys hang on to their gamers for previous years. This year, we’ve got incredible adoption of Qi4D, but not 100% across the board, we know.

“There’s this appetite of, ‘I’ve got it dialed. I’ve got all reps on that driver. I’ve got it in a lot of different conditions for an extended period of time, and I want to kind of play that out a little bit longer.'”

For example, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler still plays the Qi10, a two-year-old generation of the TaylorMade driver. With the added time between cycles, Bazzel believes tour pros will have more time to build confidence in the switch, and that it will translate to consumers.

With TaylorMade’s transition to two-year releases, it leaves just two major OEMs with yearly launches – Callaway and Cobra.

News

WITB Time Machine: Phil Mickelson’s winning WITB, 2021 PGA Championship

Published

2 days ago

May 13, 2026

GolfWRX Staff

Phil Mickelson made history at the 2021 PGA Championship on Kiawah Island’s Ocean Course. At 50, he became the oldest player to win a major, breaking Julius Boros’s record. Starting the final round with a slim lead, Lefty faced tough competition from Brooks Koepka and Louis Oosthuizen. He pulled ahead with key birdies and a standout 366-yard drive on the 16th hole. Finishing 6 under par and two shots ahead, Mickelson claimed his sixth major and second PGA Championship. Many saw his win as an inspiring comeback, showing that experience and determination can still lead to victory in professional golf — and, sometimes, age is just a number.

Driver: Callaway Epic Speed Triple Diamond (6 degrees @5.5 , green dot cog)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 6 X (47.9 inches)

2-wood: TaylorMade “Original One” Mini Driver (11.5 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 7 X

4-wood (Sunday only): Callaway Mavrik Sub Zero (16.5 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Blue 8 X

Irons: Callaway X Forged UT (16) (Thursday-Saturday), Callaway X21 UT Proto (19 degrees @20.5, 25), Callaway Apex MB ‘21 (small groove) (6-PW)
Shafts: (16) MCA MMT 105 TX, KBS Tour V 125 S+

Wedges: Callaway PM Grind ’19 “Raw” (52-12@50, 55-12, 60-10)
Shafts: KBS Tour V 125 S+

Putter: Odyssey Milled Blade “Phil Mickelson”
Grip: SuperStroke Pistol GT Tour

Ball: Callaway Chrome Soft X (Triple Track)

Grips: Golf Pride MCC

More photos of Phil Mickelson’s WITB here.

News

2026 PGA Championship betting odds

Published

3 days ago

May 12, 2026

Gianni Magliocco

Scottie Scheffler leads the betting ahead of the second major championship of the year, with the World Number One a +345 favorite to get his hands on a second PGA Championship.

Rory McIlroy who won the Masters back in April is a +800 shot to complete half of the calendar slam at Aronimink Golf Club this week, while Jordan Spieth can be backed at +5900 to become a career grand slam winner.

Here is the full betting board for the 2026 PGA Championship courtesy of DraftKings.