News

Morning 9: Francesco! | Rory on why Rory isn’t winning | Ernie Els is totally over the Masters

Published

5 years ago

Mar 11, 2019

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt ([email protected])

March 11, 2019

Good Monday morning, golf fans. Congratulations to Michelle Wie and Jonnie West (son of Jerry and Director of Basketball Operations for the Golden State Warriors) on their engagement!

1. Francesco!

In this first start as a Callaway staffer, playing a full bag of the company’s wares, Francesco Molinari followed up an uninspired Saturday 73 with a blistering final-round 64 to race from the middle of the pack to the fore. If you think the reigning Champion Golfer of the Year is happy, imagine how they’re feeling in Carlsbad!

Reuters report…“The British Open champion enjoyed his “best putting day ever” which he capped off by sinking a 45-foot birdie at the difficult par-four 18th at Bay Hill in Orlando.”

“The usually low-key Italian raised his arm in the air to hail his final putt, the longest he has holed on the PGA Tour this year.”

“Molinari posted a 12-under 276 total and, after a two-hour wait in the clubhouse, celebrated his third PGA Tour victory when none of the overnight frontrunners could match his total.”

Full piece.

2. Why isn’t Rory winning?

That’s the question many are asking and Bob Harig addresses in his ESPN column after McIlroy yet again failed to get the job done when playing in the final group.

Harig writes…”For whatever reason, McIlroy is not getting it done in final rounds, Sunday the most glaring example. Certainly you can’t expect him to rally to victory every time he is in the final group, but this was the fourth time in those nine events he has been within one of the lead and failed to win.”

“I’ve had to tell myself [to have] patience at times,’‘ McIlroy said. “It’s just letting that golf come out when it matters most. And that’s when you need to almost take your foot off the gas and just let it happen. And that’s obviously easier said than done.”

“If anything, McIlroy is slowing down rather than barging through, a plight that is more pronounced when you are an acclaimed four-time major champion with but a single victory over the past 30 months.”

Full piece.

3. Ernie Els is done with the Masters…in every sense of the word

The Big Easy hasn’t played in the Masters since 2017, and it sounds like he’s more than fine with that fact.

Per the Washington Post’s Mark Cannizzaro, here’s a bit of what Els had to say.

“To be honest with you, I won’t miss the place,” Els told The Post on Friday after shooting a second-round 75 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill to stand at 2-over to miss the cut by one shot. “I had enough of it – especially the last five years I played it terribly.”

And this…”When a thing stings you it keeps stinging you,’‘ Els said. “When it gives to you it keeps on giving. I’ve seen that with Gary Player. I’ve seen it with Jack [Nicklaus]. I’ve got a love-hate relationship with the place. It was always almost like a curse to me. It was not a romantic deal to me. It was a f-king nightmare for the most part.

And this “…you start disliking the place when you shouldn’t. I try to keep my honor for the golf course and the people, because the members are great and the course is actually great. But it just doesn’t want to give me anything and then I was finally like, ‘You know what? That’s fine. Let’s move on.’

Full piece.

4. Meanwhile, in Doha…

EuropeanTour.com report: “Justin Harding birdied three of his last four holes to claim a first European Tour win at the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters.”

“The South African arrived at Doha Golf Club without full playing privileges after finishing third on last season’s Asian Tour but now has his breakthrough in his 54th European Tour start.”

“Harding made three early birdies to share the lead but his chance looked to have gone as he made two bogeys and South Korea’s Jinho Choi signed for a brilliant 64 to set the clubhouse target at 11 under.”

Full piece.

5. Tait: Gender pay disparity looms large in Europe

The Golfweek writer highlighted the gulf between men and women playing professional golf in Europe.

“Meg MacLaren successfully defended the Ladies European Tour’s Women’s New South Wales Open just outside the Australian capital Canberra. The former Florida International player earned $15,853 for the victory. First place this week in the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters was worth $291,660.”

“Total prize money in Qatar, a weak-field European Tour event, was $1.75 million. The Women’s NSW Open carried a total prize fund of just under $106,000. Yes, it’s a bottom-of-the-food-chain LET event, but prize money for average LET events isn’t exactly eye-watering. Run-of-the-mill events average about $285,000.”

Full piece.

6. 30-day sentence

Architect Keith Foster was sentenced to 30 days in jail for selling products derived from endangered animals.

From Rachel Weiner at the Washington Post…”Foster is, in the words of his attorney, a “world-renowned golf architecture” designer. He also ran the Outpost antique shop in Middleburg, Va., as a charity operation, donating the profits.”

“But he turned his feel-good hobby into a criminal operation by smuggling blades, bags and decorative mounts made from endangered species.”

“Foster imported about $136,000 worth of products made from illegal endangered wildlife, including sea turtle, hippopotamus, swan and ivory, according to court records. He also imported porcupine quills, African game mounts, ostrich pieces, deer antlers and other animal parts without following regulations.”

Full piece.

7. Death of the hazard

Excellent stuff from David Normoyle, writing for Golfweek, an an unacknowledged casualty.

He begins…”Looking back on the first two months of the new year, everyone in golf has had something to say about the far-reaching changes to the Rules of Golf. But what in these new rules, beyond the unseemly social media tiffs about dropping or alignment, has to do with architecture and course design yet which nobody seems to be talking about?”

“The modernization efforts by the U.S. Golf Association and R&A have been lauded and criticized, depending whom you ask, but little attention has been paid to the fact that on Jan. 1, for the first time since the original rules were put in play on April 2, 1744, by The Gentlemen Golfers at Leith Links near Edinburgh, Scotland, the word “hazard” no longer appears in golf’s rulebook.”

Full piece.

8. Triplett’s seventh

Not to be forgotten, on the elder statesmen’s circuit, Kirk Triplett won the Hoag Classic in playoff fashion

AP Report...”Kirk Triplett made a 12-foot eagle putt on the second hole of a playoff with Woody Austin on Sunday to win the Hoag Classic for his seventh PGA Tour Champions victory.”

“The 56-year-old Triplett forced the playoff with a similar left-to-right breaker for birdie on the par-5 18th, then matched Austin with a par on their first extra trip down the tree-lined hole.”

“It was the exact same putt I had the first time through,” Triplett said. Full piece.

Interestingly, on the equipment front, and more specifically, in non-white golf ball news, Triplett gamed the new Optic Yellow Titleist Pro V1 en route to victory, making him the first player to win with the non-white variety of the ball.

9. Lefty at The Players?

The tweet from @PhilMickelson: Hanging with Steve Loy and Glenn Cohen while practicing at TPC. The course here is in spectacular shape with very little rough, much like Augusta! If I remember correctly, the week before I won at Pebble I missed the cut. Just saying…”

After all but swearing off the event earlier this year, Phil Mickelson may be changing his tune. (For context: the left-hander [who hit one shot right-handed from outside an out-of-bounds fence] missed the cut at Bay Hill).

Could we see Phil teeing it up in Ponta Vedra Beach?

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News

SuperStroke acquires Lamkin Grips

Published

20 hours ago

May 6, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

SuperStroke announced today its purchase of 100-year-old grip maker Lamkin Grips, citing the company’s “heritage of innovation and quality.”

“It is with pride and great gratitude that we announce Lamkin, a golf club grip brand with a 100-year history of breakthrough design and trusted products, is now a part of the SuperStroke brand,” says SuperStroke CEO Dean Dingman. “We have always had the utmost respect for how the Lamkin family has put the needs and benefits of the golfer first in their grip designs. If there is a grip company that is most aligned with SuperStroke’s commitment to uncompromised research, design, and development to put the most useful performance tools in the hands of golfers, Lamkin has been that brand. It is an honor to bring Lamkin’s wealth of product innovation into the SuperStroke family.”

Elver B. Lamkin founded the company in 1925 and produced golf’s first leather grips. The company had been family-owned and operated since that point, producing a wide array of styles, such as the iconic Crossline.

According to a press release, “The acquisition of Lamkin grows and diversifies SuperStroke’s proven and popular array of grip offerings with technology grounded in providing golfers optimal feel and performance through cutting-edge design and use of materials, surface texture and shape.”

CEO Bob Lamkin will stay on as a board member and will continue to be involved with the company.

“SuperStroke has become one of the most proven, well-operated, and pioneering brands in golf grips and we could not be more confident that the Lamkin legacy, brand, and technology is in the best of hands to continue to innovate and lead under the guidance of Dean Dingman and his remarkably capable team,” Lamkin said.

Related: Check out our 2014 conversation with Bob Lamkin, here: Bob Lamkin on the wrap grip reborn, 90 years of history

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Tour Rundown: Pendrith, Otaegui, Longbella, and Dunlap soar

Published

21 hours ago

May 6, 2024

Ronald Montesano

Take it from a fellow who coaches high school golf in metro Toronto: there’s plenty of great golf played in the land of the maple leaf. All the greats have designed courses over the USA border: Colt, Whitman, Ross, Coore, Mackenzie, Doak, as well as the greatest of the land, Stanley Thompson. I’m partial to him, because he wore my middle name with grandeur. Enough about the architecture, because this week’s Tour Rundown begins with a newly-minted, Canadian champion on the PGA Tour. Something else that the great white north is known for, is weather. It impacted play on three of the world’s tours, forcing final-round cancellations on two of them.

It was an odd week in the golf world. The LPGA and the Korn Ferry were on a break, and only 13/15 of the rounds slated, were played. In the end, we have four champions to recognize, so let’s not delay any longer with minutiae about the game that we love. Let’s run it all down with this week’s Tour Rundown.

PGA Tour: TP takes TS at Byron’s place

The 1980s was a decade when a Canadian emergence was anticipated on the PGA Tour. It failed to materialize, but a path was carved for the next generation. Mike Weir captured the Masters in 2003, but no other countrymen joined him in his quest for PGA Tour conquest. 2024 may herald the long-awaited arrival of a Canadian squad of tour winners. Over the past few years, we’ve seen Nick Taylor break the fifty-plus year dearth of homebred champions at the Canadian Open, and players like Adam Hadwin, Corey Conners, Adam Svennson, and Mackenzie Hughes have etched their names into the PGA Tour’s annals of winners.

This week, Taylor Pendrith joined his mates with a one-shot win at TPC Craig Ranch, the home of the Byron Nelson Classic. Pendrith took a lead into the final round and, while the USA’s Jake Knapp faltered, held on for the slimmest of victories. Sweden’s Alex Noren posted six-under 65 on Sunday to move into third position, at 21-under par. Ben Kohles, a Texan, looked to break through for his first win in his home state. He took the lead from Pendrith at the 71st hole, on the strength of a second-consecutive birdie.

With victory in site, Kohles found a way to make bogey at the last, without submerging in the fronting water. His second shot was greenside, but he could not move his third to the putting surface. His fourth was five feet from par and a playoff, but his fifth failed to drop. Meanwhile, Pendrith was on the froghair in two, and calmly took two putts from 40 feet, for birdie. When Kohles missed for par, Pendrith had, at last, a PGA Tour title.

360° and in!

A nervy par save by @TaylorPendrith to remain one back as he seeks his first PGA TOUR victory @CJByronNelson. pic.twitter.com/LVFXUSidSg

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 5, 2024

DP World Tour: China Open in Otaegui’s hands after canceled day four

It wasn’t the fourth round that was canceled in Shenzhen, but the third. Rains came on Saturday to Hidden Grace Golf Club, ensuring that momentum would cease. Sunday would instead be akin to a motorsports restart, with no sense of who might claim victory. Sebastian Soderberg, the hottest golfer on the Asian Swing, held the lead, but he would slip to a 72 on Sunday, and tie for third with Paul Waring and Joel Girrbach. Italy’s Guido Migliozzi completed play in 67 strokes on day three, moving one shot past the triumvirate, to 17-under par.

It was Spain’s Adrian Otaegui who persevered the best and played the purest. Otaegui was clean on the day, with seven birdies for 65. Even when Migliozzi ceased the lead at the 10th, Otaegui remained calm. With everything on the line, Migliozzi made bogey at the par-five 17th, as his principal competitor finished in birdie. To the Italian’s credit, he bounced back with birdie at the last, to claim solo second. The victory was Otaegui’s fifth on the DP World Tour, and first since October of 2022.

.@adrianotaegui birdies the 16th to tie the lead at -17 ?#VolvoChinaOpen pic.twitter.com/p4tfE5DRJa

— DP World Tour (@DPWorldTour) May 5, 2024

PGA Tour Americas: Quito’s rains gift title to Longbella

Across the world, superintendents and their staffs will do anything to prepare a course for play. Even after fierce, nightime rains, the Quito TG Club greeted the first four groups on Sunday. The rains worsened after 7 am, however, and the tour was forced to abort the final round of play. With scores reverting to Saturday’s numbers, Thomas Longbella’s one-shot advantage over Gunn Yang turned into a Tour Americas victory.

64 held the opening-day lead, and Longbella was not far off, with 66. Yang jumped to the top on day two, following a67 with 66. He posted 68 on day three, and anticipated a fierce, final-round duel for the title. As for Longbella, he fought off a ninth-hole bogey on Saturday with six birdies and a 17th-hole eagle. That rare bird proved to be the winning stroke, allowing Longbella to edge past Yang, and secure ultimate victory.

.@TBalla21 eagles 17, shoots 65 on Saturday to take a one-shot lead into the final round of the KIA Open. pic.twitter.com/TTOL2LxSdh

— PGA TOUR Americas (@PGATOURAmericas) May 4, 2024

PGA Tour Champions: Dunlap survives Saturday stumble for win

Scott Dunlap did not finish Saturday as well as he might have liked. After beginning play near Houston with 65, Dunlap made two bogeys in his final found holes on day two, to finish at nine-under par. Hot on his heels was Joe Durant, owner of a March 2024 win on PGA Tour Champions. Just behind Durant was Stuart Appleby, perhaps vibing from his Sunday 59 at Greenbrier on this day in 2010. Neither would have a chance to track Dunlap down.

The rains that have forced emergency responders into action, to save hundreds of lives in the metro Houston area, ended hopes for a third day of play at The Woodlands. Dunlap had won once previously on Tour Champions, in 2014 in Washington state. Ten years later, Dunlap was the fortunate recipient of a canceled final round, and his two days of play were enough to earn him TC victory number two.

Off the green? No worries for @ScottDu12500063

8-under solo leader @InsperityInvtnl pic.twitter.com/hoj5OujL5C

— PGA TOUR Champions (@ChampionsTour) May 4, 2024

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News

Morning 9: Pendrith’s maiden Tour win | Morikawa back with former coach | Brooks victorious

Published

22 hours ago

May 6, 2024

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt with Gianni Magliocco.

For comments: [email protected]

Good Monday morning, golf fans, as the PGA Tour gives us yet another breakthrough winner.

1. Pendrith wins first PGA Tour title

AP Report…”Taylor Pendrith took advantage of Ben Kohles’ final-hole meltdown to win the CJ Cup Byron Nelson on Sunday for his first PGA Tour title.”

“Kohles overtook Pendrith with birdies on Nos. 16 and 17 for a one-shot lead then bogeyed the 18th after hitting his second shot into greenside rough. After having to chip twice from the rough and already looking stunned, Kohles missed a 6-foot putt that would have forced a playoff.”

“Pendrith two-putted for birdie on the 18th, holing a 3-footer for a 4-under 67 and 23-under 261 total at the TPC Craig Ranch. The 32-year-old Canadian won in his 74th career PGA Tour start.”

Full piece.

2. Koepka takes LIV title in Singapore

S.I.’s Bob Harig…”Brooks Koepka became the first player to win four times as part of the LIV Golf League, shooting a final-round 68 at Sentosa Golf Club in Singapore on Sunday to beat Cam Smith and Marc Leishman by two strokes.”

“His timing wasn’t bad, either.”

“A few days after offering concern about his game in light of a poor Masters performance, Koepka stepped up and won the LIV Golf Singapore even to give himself a boost heading into the defense of his PGA Championship title in two weeks.”

“The year’s second major begins on May 16.”

Full piece.

3. Otaegui wins Volvo China

AP report…”Adrian Otaegui overturned a five-shot deficit to win the Volvo China Open on Sunday, the Spaniard’s fifth tour title.”

“Otaegui had been trailing the in-form Sebastian Söderberg after Friday’s round – Saturday’s was cancelled because of thunder and lightning – and he shot 7-under 65 in his final round to win by one shot from Guido Migliozzi, who finished runner up with a 67.”

Full piece.

4. ICYMI: Teen Kim makes the cut

Guardian report…”English teenager Kris Kim became the youngest player to make the cut on the PGA Tour in 11 years after a birdie at the last saw him get through to the weekend of the CJ Cup Byron Nelson in Texas with a shot to spare.”

“Amateur Kim, the son of former LPGA player Ji-Hyun Suh, made a second-round four-under-par 67, which included a run of five birdies and one bogey over his front nine.”

“At 16 years and seven months he became the youngest player to make the cut on tour since 14-year-old Guan Tianlang at the 2013 Masters, and, according to the PGA Tour, the fifth youngest in history.”

Full piece.

5. Winner in a rainout

AP report…”Scott Dunlap was declared the 36-hole winner of the Insperity Invitational when rain washed the final round Sunday, giving Dunlap his first PGA Tour Champions title in nearly 10 years.”

“Devastating rain in the Houston area previously washed out the opening round Friday. Players managed to play 36 holes on Saturday, and Dunlap posted a 2-under 70 to take a one-shot lead over Joe Durant and Stuart Appleby.”

“That proved to be the winning score when rain soaked The Woodlands Country Club. It was the second 36-hole event in the last three weeks on the PGA Tour Champions because of weather. The other was in the Dallas area.”