News

Morning 9: Tiger’s predicament | A world No. 1 is back in action | Bryson breaks Augusta? Not so much….

Published

3 years ago

Nov 19, 2020

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt

Email me at [email protected]; and find me on Twitter and Instagram.

November 19, 2020

Good Thursday morning, golf fans.

1. Tiger’s predicament, motivation

ESPN’s Bob Harig…”Woods is caught between the need to play more tournament rounds and the knowledge that if he overdoes it, he will be ineffective. Same for practice. He needs to work on his game. Hitting too many balls, however, becomes a physical issue for which he would then pay a price.”

“In the aftermath of his finish Sunday, in a situation where such a question is awkward, I attempted to ask Woods about his motivation at this point, given his body of work and the struggles he faces.”

“Well, there are days when mentally I just — it’s hard to push than others just because physically it’s just — my body has moments where it just doesn’t work like it used to,” he said. “No matter how hard I try, things just don’t work the way they used to, and no matter how much I push and ask of this body, it just doesn’t work at times.

“Yes, it is more difficult than others to be motivated at times. Because things just ache and have to deal with things that I’ve never had to deal with before.”

Full piece.

2. No. 1 back in action

Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols…”Jin Young Ko is back on tour and looking for the nearest Korean market. The World No. 1 learned to cook during her prolonged break from the LPGA and is in need of several spices to whip up evening meals. The inaugural Pelican Women’s Championship marks Ko’s first start on the LPGA in 2020. She played in six events on the Korean LPGA this season, carding four top 10s.”

“I had been (to) cooking class and meditation, work out, practice a lot,” said Ko of her time off. “I have to cook more Korean food in U.S., so I went to the cooking class, and then I got a lot of things like menus, Korean menus, so I (cooked) this morning, last night too.”

Full piece.

3. Tiger & Andy

Golf.com’s Nick Piastowski…“Before I teed off, he kind of came up and embraced me and said, ‘Let’s go do this thing,’’’ Ogletree said Sunday. “I think that’s one thing I’ll never forget. I was pretty nervous on the 1st hole. I didn’t really know what I was going to say to him. He just came up, smiling, laughing, whatever, and that just kind of settled me down.”

…”The thought of playing with Woods had made him nervous. The actual playing with Woods took it away. Ogletree had watched Tiger Woods on TV, he had watched the Masters on TV, and he had watched Tiger Woods at the Masters on TV. And yet, here Woods was, wanting to know what it was like spending Wednesday night in the Crow’s Nest at Augusta National, a privilege given to just the amateurs…”

Full piece.

4. Earnings GOAT

Golf.com’s Zephyr Melton… “Tiger Woods has been among the most successful athletes of all-time. And with that success has come money — a lot of it.

“According to Forbes, since Tiger turned pro in 1996, he’s made around $1.5 billion in endorsements, appearance fees and course design fees. Add to that the more than $120 million he’s made on the course and we can estimate that Tiger has earned somewhere in the neighborhood of $1.6 billion in his career.”

“And though Tiger has entered the twilight of his golf career, there is still plenty of cash left to be made for the 44-year-old. In fact, according to a recent report from New York-based financial firm Duff and Phelps, Tiger’s projected future earnings ranks higher than all but two golfers.”

Full piece.

5. Like riding a bike: Robert Damron to tee it up again

Golfweek’s Eamon Lynch…”The last round Robert Damron played on the PGA Tour came at the Sanderson Farms Championship in July 2013, a 75 that led to a missed cut. A month later, he played his last competitive round anywhere. That was in the Kentucky Open, when his driver yips finally became too much to bear. “The first drive I hit was a horrible yip out to the right. The second hole was a pull hook into the weeds,” Damron recalled. “After that round I called my wife and said, ‘I’m done. I’m never competing again. We’ll find something else to do.’”

“That something else eventually led to television. After a 15-year Tour career—during which he won the 2001 Byron Nelson Classic, lost a playoff in the same event three years later to Sergio Garcia, and banked more than $6 million—Damron is now an analyst on Golf Channel’s Morning Drive and a course reporter for PGA Tour Live. This week, the 48-year-old plays his first tournament since quitting in Kentucky seven years ago when he competes at the TaylorMade Pebble Beach Invitational, which draws pros from the PGA, LPGA and senior tours. And Damron admits he’s frightened about what might happen.”

Full piece.

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6. Breaking Augusta? It didn’t exactly happen for Bryson…

Golf Channel’s Ryan Lavner…”For all the breathless speculation about whether Bryson would break Augusta, he couldn’t even beat the oldest and shortest-hitting player in the field. Despite giving up an average of nearly 65 yards off the tee, Bernhard Langer not only handled DeChambeau in their head-to-head final-round matchup (71-73), but he clipped him by a shot where it mattered most: on the final leaderboard. The 63-year-old Langer tied for 29th.”

“Even though I’m bombing it by him, he’s still playing better than me,” DeChambeau said. “It doesn’t matter. That’s the cool part about the golf of golf. You can shoot a score whatever way you want.”

“By the end of the week DeChambeau looked exhausted, not just because he was feeling unwell but in part because of the intense pressure of the pre-Masters buildup. (Some of that stress was no doubt self-inflicted, after boasting, as the pre-tournament favorite, that Augusta was a par-67 for him. If true, he shot 18 over.)”

Full Piece

7. Musings from the Masters

Terry Koehler for GolfWRX with some observations on the action from Augusta National…”Bunkers are too easy for these guys. The best example of that was DJ on the second hole. Faced with a delicate pitch over a bunker from a tight lie, he chunks it in the bunker. Then he blasts out to two feet or so to save par. These guys are amazing from the bunkers, hitting it close more often than not it seems. Maybe it’s time to remove rakes or something to make bunkers the hazards architects designed them to be, before the invention of the sand wedge.”

“But they are amazing short game wizards. Watching the best players in the world get up and down from nowhere, time and again, is impressive. The chip that Sungjae Im hit from behind the green on 15 was brilliant. But we saw it time and again from the entire field. The key is that they are all skilled enough to hit a vast array of shots with just the right trajectory and spin, and land the ball very close to the exact spot required. Maybe we should all spend the vast majority of our practice time hitting chips and pitches of all kinds…”

“Long and middle iron play is almost a relic of a bygone era. You just do not see these guys hitting those clubs very often. Even “Par 5s” are often reached with a short iron nowadays. We are long past the days of Hogan’s famous 1-iron at Merion or Johnny Miller’s precise dismantling of Oakmont in 1973, when he hit 5-iron or longer to at least 13 or 14 greens, and only let the ball get above the hole twice.”

Full Piece

8. Sea Island pros having success under Parsons

PGATour.com’s Sean Martin with the profile…”Justin Parsons was a teenager living in Northern Ireland when he took a test offered in the book, “Eight Traits of a Champion Golfer.” This questionnaire promised to recommend a career based on Parsons’ strengths and passions. Parsons, like many young men, had aspirations of playing professional golf. The examination recommended a different path.”

“It said, ‘You really enjoy the idea of movement and how movement works, and you would be a much better coach than you ever would be a player,” Parsons recalled recently. “I remember thinking, ‘Oh my goodness, this is kind of dampening my aspirations.’ But at the same time, I’ve always enjoyed people, trying to figure out how people tick and how to get the best out of them.”

“He’s done that this year, helping several PGA TOUR players either reach new heights or find success after several tough seasons. He’s had a quick impact since arriving at the Sea Island Resort, host of this week’s The RSM Classic, last year. Before that, he spent several years teaching in Dubai and on the European Tour. His current stable of students includes Gary Woodland, Louis Oosthuizen and Will Gordon, as well as Sea Island residents Harris English, Michael Thompson and Brian Harman.”

Full Piece

9. Two more pros positive for COVID-19

Golf Digest’s Brian Wacker…”Two more players have tested positive for COVID-19 at this week’s RSM Classic at Sea Island Golf Club in St. Simons Island, Ga.”

“The PGA Tour announced on Wednesday that Henrik Norlander and Kramer Hickok both received a positive test result for the coronavirus during pre-tournament screening and have withdrawn from the tournament.”

Full Piece

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News

SuperStroke acquires Lamkin Grips

Published

11 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

12 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

13 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.”