Rory McIlroy (Northern Ireland), the world’s No. 1 in men’s golf, showed confidence by saying, “I am the best player in the world” ahead of this year’s first PGA tour tournament, and lost his pride from the first day.
In the first round of the PGA Tour WM Phoenix Open (total prize money of $20 million) held at TPC Scottsdale (par 71), Arizona, USA on the 10th (Korean time), McIlroy took two birdies, but poured out four bogeys and broke 2 over par. I wrote 73 strokes.
McIlroy, who is on the rise with four wins in the last seven tournaments he has participated in, was caught in the changeable weather on this day. Frost early in the morning delayed the start of the game, and strong winds of up to 40 km per hour blew, forcing McIlroy and the morning group players to struggle. McIlroy expressed regret, saying, “The direction of the wind blowing from a 90-degree angle kept changing slightly throughout the game. I thought I had a perfect shot, but it went over the green 20 yards. I was fooled by the wind all day.”
McIlroy hit a driver shot of up to 366 yards and an average of 329.9 yards that day, but the fairway hit rate was only 28.57% and the ‘green hit rate’ to catch birdie opportunities was only 55.56%. All figures are below average. The number of strokes gained by driver shot was -0.012, ranking 52nd among players, and the number of strokes gained by iron was -1.537, falling to 69th place. Also, missing the green 8 times and making 28 putts was a performance that was not like ‘World’s No. 1’. 온라인바카라
On this afternoon, as many as 67 players in the group could not finish the game due to the sunset, so they had to play the rest of the game ahead of the second round.
World No. 3 Jon Rahm (Spain) took the lead by reducing 3 strokes until the 13th hole, and Scotty Scheffler (USA), who is world No. 2 and tasted his “first win in his life” in the tournament last year, played 11 holes and scored 1 reduced the stroke.
Im Seong-jae tied for 19th with a 1-under 70 stroke. Im Seong-jae was sluggish with 1 birdie and 2 bogeys until the 10th hole, but caught an eagle on the 15th hole (par 5) and caught birdies in a row on the 16th hole (par 3) and 17th hole (par 4). He regretted losing one stroke on the 18th hole (par 4).