Sports News
Karlsson and Jeev Milka Singh on Top at PGA
As expected, Oakland Hills grudgingly gave up subpar scores in the opening round of the 90th PGA Championship on Thursday.
But “The Monster,” as Ben Hogan called the long and difficult course, refused to let anyone pull away.
Retief Goosen, a player with a game built for difficult layouts, birdied three of the first four holes but bogeys on Nos. 8 and 9 dropped him into a tie for the lead at 2 under midway through his round.
Robert Karlsson and Jeev Milkha Singh were the clubhouse leaders with 2-under 68s on a breezy and temperate day at the old country club in the suburbs of Detroit.
Still on the course at 2 under were Charlie Wi, Brian Gay and Andres Romero. Among those at 1 under and yet to finish the round was two-time defending British Open champion Padraig Harrington, trying to become the first European player to win the PGA Championship in 78 years.
With two-time defending champion Tiger Woods recovering from knee surgery back home in Florida, few expected anyone to run away with the tournament. But that became an impossibility when gusting winds and sunshine dried out the already fast greens, making them about as easy to putt on as a basketball court.
Sergio Garcia, the Spaniard chasing his first major championship, shot a 69 and then pronounced he was “thrilled” with it. Lee Westwood labored to a 77 and said he was happy to break 80.
The co-leaders in the clubhouse both played early in the day, before the winds picked up and before the greens got crispy. There was a brief shower around 4:30 p.m. that didn’t interrupt play.
Karlsson, a 6-foot-5 Swede who is the only player to place in the top 10 of all three previous majors this year, was in one of the first groups off the tee. He double-bogeyed the par-4 opening hole, but righted himself by birdieing the next three. He got to 4 under with a birdie at 11 and then had consecutive bogeys before limping home with his 68.
He felt the wind pick up as he putted out on the final hole and promptly said, “There’s not going to be many scores under par. Definitely not in the afternoon.”
Karlsson used to try too hard rather than taking what the golf course would give him.
“I couldn’t see how my golf was good enough to get around these kinds of golf courses,” he said. “I tried to play it too difficult and for a while I just saw big rough and I couldn’t play.”
Singh, no relation to the three-time major champion Vijay Singh of Fiji, is playing in his second PGA Championship. He tied for 25th at the Masters earlier this year.
“The most important thing to learn at a major championship is to stay patient, because they are going to test your patience,” said Singh, the son of an Olympic sprinter who competed for India in 1960. “You’re going to get some bad breaks, you’re going to hit some shots in the rough and you sometimes can’t get it out. I think the key is to stay patient.”
Vijay Singh, who won last week’s tournament at Firestone, was 4 over through 10 holes.
After Ben Curtis caught Goosen at 3 under with a birdie on his 10th hole, he fell back with a bogey on the next hole.
Goosen has two U.S. Open titles but has never played well at the PGA—he’s only cracked the top 20 once, when he tied for sixth in 2005 at Baltusrol. He held the lead for most of his round until the late bogeys on the front nine.
Curtis pulled off one of the great rags-to-riches victories in golf history. He was ranked No. 396 in the world and playing in his first major championship when he won the 2003 British Open at Royal St. George’s.
On a day when even the leaders had to overcome multiple bogeys, Curtis was bogey-free through his first 10 holes.
The same could not be said for a couple of other American favorites.
Anthony Kim and Jim Furyk each climbed into a tie for the lead, only to fall back with late bogeys. Furyk bogeyed his final three holes to finish at 1 over. Kim got to 2 under but closed with two bogeys and had a 70.
Sean O’Hair also had a piece of the lead and ended up with a 69, where he was tied with Garcia, Billy Mayfair and Ken Duke.
In the clubhouse at 70 were Kim, Ryan Moore, Rod Pampling and Phil Mickelson, who bogeyed the first two holes before regrouping to get under par. He then failed to get up and down from the rough around the par-3 ninth—his 18th hole of the day—and had to settle for a bogey.
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