Back-to-back birdies for Shane Lowry! This one comes at the par-three 14th, reward for knocking his tee shot to eight feet. He’s -2, and on Sky Sports, Dame Laura Davies points out that Lowry won’t be at all fazed by these conditions, having grown up playing in the occasional breeze in Ireland. The wind is picking up.
Anirban Lahiri – who led this year’s Players after three rounds and ended the week one shot and one place behind the winner Cam Smith – became a father last weekend. High on life, the 30-year-old from India has just sent his tee shot at the 214-year par-three 6th straight at the flag. One bounce and it’s…well, not in, but teetering on the edge of the hole. So close to a hole-in-one to wet the baby’s head! He’ll move to +4 and everything helps when you’re trying to survive the cut.
Shane Lowry wasn’t the happiest yesterday evening, effing and jeffing as he needlessly whistled a shot into water on the par-five 13th. He still scrambled his par, though, and ended up signing for a level-par 70. Now the same hole has given something back: birdie that brings the 2019 Open champion into red figures. He’s -1.
Local lad Talor Gooch won his first PGA Tour event earlier this season, at the RSM Classic. The 30-year-old Okie is also finding his feet in the majors, having survived the cut at last year’s PGA and Open, and tied for 14th at the Masters last month. He shot a very respectable 69 yesterday evening, and is following it up this morning, making birdie at the monster par-five 5th (660 yards today) and moving up to -2.
Speaking of movers and shakers (which we were, sort of) there’s been some early action at the top of the leaderboard. The 2017 champion Justin Thomas played the back nine in 32 strokes last night, so he has already proven he can do this in difficult conditions. He’s flown out of the traps this morning, sticking his second to him at 10 to six feet and making the birdie. He’s now just one off Rory McIlroy’s lead.
-5: McIlroy
-4: Thomas (3*), Hoge, Zalatoris
-3: Ancer, Kuchar
The wind has prompted the PGA into action. They haven’t felt their mowers over the greens today, for fear of likes moving balls and making putting a lottery. This is usually more of a problem at the Open – if memory served the wind caused havoc on the greens at Sandwich in 2011 and St Andrews in 2015 – but here we all are. By way of further illustration, the official Twitter feed posted this:
Just a quick preview… 🌬#PGAChamp pic.twitter.com/ZuiDmL31A6
— PGA Championship (@PGAChampionship) May 20, 2022
n”,”url”:”https://twitter.com/PGAChampionship/status/1527638901766115328″,”id”:”1527638901766115328″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”: false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”51f7e8c5-3719-477b-b685-6248d0880841″}}”/>
weather report
As forecast, it’s going to be a tempestuous 24 hours in Tulsa. This morning will see the field battered by tastes of up to 40 mph, with consistent winds of 20 to 25 mph. Come the afternoon, the second wave of starters will be pleased to feel the wind drop – an average of ten to 15 mph with likes no higher than 20 mph – but they will have to deal with cooler temperatures, showers, and possibly even thunderstorms. Will everyone get round today? It’s by no means certain, with “severe” storms expected during the evening, featuring more strong winds, hail and heavy rain. Buckle up!
Preamble
A long day awaits us as the players jostle into position ahead of tomorrow’s Moving Day. Hustle Friday? Needs some work, but nice Van McCoy earworm. Anyway, high winds, plus the Damoclesian threat of the cut, means this one could stretch out. A lot of drama, glee, excitement and heartache awaits us. Here’s how the top of the leaderboard looks after the first round…
-5: McIlroy
-4: Hoge, Zalatoris
-3: Ancer, Kuchar, Thomas
-2: Riley, Na, Smith, Schauffele, Pereira, Kirk, Niemann, Herbert, Fitzpatrick
-1: Hossler, Reed, Pieters, Cink, Finau, Burmester, Wise, Kizzire, Simpson, Lee, Gooch
E: Steele, Molinari, Woodland, Fox, Hovland, Hatton, Homa, MacIntyre, Noren, Henley, Lowry
… and here’s when everyone takes to the course. It’s on!
Starting at hole 1
13:00 Brandon Bingaman, Talor Gooch, Ryosuke Kinoshita (Jpn)
13:11 Tim Feenstra, Anirban Lahiri (Ind), Kyoung-Hoon Lee (Kor)
13:22 Rich Beem, Alex Cejka (Ger), Jesse Mueller
13:33 Seamus Power (Irl), Russell Knox (Sco), Scott Stallings
13:44 Christiaan Bezuidenhout (Rsa), Corey Conners (Can), Jason Kokrak
13:55 Keegan Bradley, Martin Kaymer (Ger), Marc Leishman (Aus)
14:06 Cameron Champ, Russell Henley, Zach Johnson
14:17 Branden Grace (Rsa), Webb Simpson, Henrik Stenson (Swe)
14:28 JJ Spaun, Sepp Straka (Aut), Adam Schenk
14:39 Joo-Hyung Kim (Kor), Keith Mitchell, Matthew Wolff
14:50 Lucas Herbert (Aus), Austin Hurt, Chad Ramey
15:01 Tyler Collet, Chan Kim, Maverick McNealy
15:12 Paul Dickinson, Patton Kizzire, Luke List,
18:30 Robert MacIntyre (Sco), Alexander Noren (Swe), Ryan Palmer
18:41 Adria Arnaus (Spa), Colin Inglis, Jinichiro Kozuma (Jpn)
18:52 Michael Block, Mackenzie Hughes (Can), Sadom Kaewkanjana (Tha)
19:03 Tony Finau, Hideki Matsuyama (Jpn), Xander Schauffele
19:14 Denny McCarthy, Tyrrell Hatton (Eng), Max Homa
19:25 Viktor Hovland (Nor), Cameron Smith (Aus), Will Zalatoris
19:36 Rory McIlroy (NIrl), Jordan Spieth, Tiger Woods
19:47 Patrick Reed, Justin Rose (Eng), Bubba Watson
19:58 Lucas Glover, Kevin Na, Daniel van Tonder (Rsa)
8:09 p.m. Sam Burns, Davis Riley, Cameron Young
20:20 Francesco Molinari (Ita), Lee Westwood (Eng), Gary Woodland
20:31 Oliver Bekker (RSA), Brian Harman, Ryan Vermeer
20:42 Laurie Canter (Eng), Lanto Griffin, Dylan Newman
Starting at hole 10
13:05 Ryan Brehm, Min-Woo Lee (Aus), Wyatt Worthington II
13:16 Justin Harding (Rsa), Nicolai Hoejgaard (Den), Sean McCarty
13:27 Adam Hadwin (Can), Hudson Swafford, Cameron Tringale
13:38 Brooks Koepka, Shane Lowry (Irl), Adam Scott (Aus)
1:49 p.m. Patrick Cantlay, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas
14:00 Jason Day (Aus), Rickie Fowler, Harold Varner III
14:11 Collin Morikawa, Jon Rahm (Spa), Scottie Scheffler
14:22 Daniel Berger, Louis Oosthuizen (Rsa), Ian Poulter (Eng)
14:33 Tommy Fleetwood (Eng), Billy Horschel, Kevin Kisner
14:44 Matthew Fitzpatrick (Eng), Sergio Garcia (Spa), Charl Schwartzel (Rsa)
14:55 Harry Higgs, Joaquin Niemann (Chi), Erik van Rooyen (Rsa)
15:06 Alex Beach, Jhonattan Vegas (Come), Bernd Wiesberger (Aut)
15:17 Jared Jones, Aaron Wise, Joel Dahman
18:25 John Daly, Shaun Michel, Yong-Eun Yang (Kor)
18:36 Matthew Borchert, Takumi Kanaya (Jpn), Troy Merritt
18:47 Dean Burmester (RSA), Chris Kirk, Kyle Mendoza
18:58 Sam Horsfield (Eng), Nic Ishee, Guillermo Mito Pereira (Chi)
19:09 Shaun Norris (Rsa), Carlos Ortiz (Mex), Kevin Streelman
19:20 Cameron Davis (Aus), Rikuya Hoshino (Jpn), Matt Kuchar
19:31 Stewart Cink, Jason Dufner, Padraig Harrington (Irl)
19:42 Abraham Ancer (Mex), Thomas Pieters (Bel), Kramer Hickok
19:53 Richard Bland (Eng), Garrick Higgo (Rsa), Matt Jones (Aus)
20:04 Tom Hoge, Si Woo Kim (Kor), Beau Hossler
20:15 Ryan Fox (Nzl), Pablo Larrazabal (Spa), Shawn Warren
20:26 Yuki Inamori (Jpn), Sebastian Munoz (Col), Zac Oakley
20:37 Bio Kim (Kor), Casey Pyne, Brendan Steele
www.theguardian.com
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism