Of the top 60 and ties that have made the cut at this Volvo Golf Champions only 3 players shot over par 72 and I have posted 17 who are within 3 shots of the lead and eight players are separated by a single shot as the field has torched this Colin Montgomerie designed course at the Royal Golf Club in the Kingdom of Bahrain.
4 are tied for the lead at -11 Edoardo Molinari 65, Raphael Jacquelin 65, Miguel Angel Jimenez 65, and Peter Hanson 67.
Jimenez, lost it for a moment, snapped his putter in two and still made birdies at 15,16 and 17 using his lob wedge to putt with.
Molinari, starting on the 10th, birdied his first 6 holes out in 30 back in 35 and by the way his brother Francesco is at -9 69, just 2 shots back
Darren Clarke is so determined to improve his putting, that he has made up his mind to sink 100 putts from 4 feet and under before he leaves the putting green every evening. It is paying off, he is T5 69 65 just a shot back
Still with the greens running at only 9 on the stimp meter and the cut falling to -2 the stroke average for the field is 71 and for the top 30 guys just 68.5..
T1 MOLINARI, Edoardo* -11 18 -7 68 65 - - 133
T1 JACQUELIN, Raphaël* -11 18 -7 68 65 - - 133
T1 JIMÉNEZ, Miguel Angel -11 18 -7 68 65 - - 133
T1 HANSON, Peter -11 18 -5 66 67 - - 133
T5 KINGSTON, James* -10 18 -5 67 67 - - 134
T5 GALLACHER, Stephen* -10 18 -8 70 64 - - 134
T5 CLARKE, Darren -10 18 -7 69 65 - - 134
T5 CASEY, Paul -10 18 -5 67 67 - - 134
T9 MOLINARI, Francesco* -9 18 -3 66 69 - - 135
T9 EDFORS, Johan -9 18 -1 64 71 - - 135
T11 HANSEN, Anders* -8 18 -4 68 68 - - 136
T11 STORM, Graeme* -8 18 -2 66 70 - - 136
T11 GONZALEZ, Ricardo -8 18 -7 71 65 - - 136
T11 GARCIA, Sergio -8 18 -3 67 69 - - 136
T11 QUIROS, Alvaro -8 18 -3 67 69 - - 136
T11 KARLSSON, Robert -8 18 -5 69 67 - - 136
T11 WEBSTER, Steve* -8 18 -4 68 68 - - 136
PGA Tour
Play is just under way at the Farmers Insurance Open at the 2 courses (North and tougher South) at Torrey Pines in San Diego and all 5 of our Canucks are off within this hour, all of them except Stephen Ames are on the South course.
For all you Tiger watchers he is off at 10am local time.. 1pm est.
Watch here for updates as the day unfolds but before it does I see that John Daly cut loose with the media after his 67 yesterday, slamming the Hope and the Pheonix Open for not giving him a sponsors exemption vowing never to play there again.
Now I am always rooting for JD, it's taken him a long time to grow up. I will say that I have reported and written countless times where he has been invited to play at an event where he has shot 75 then packed it in with an 88, missed the cut, made some half assed excuse before heading off to the sponsor's tent for a belly full of beer. The old addage is 'what goes around, comes around" ...
Here's part of that report..
Daly, a two-time major champion, has not won in seven years and has not had full PGA Tour status since 2006. He has been relying on sponsor exemptions or his status as a past champion. He already received two exemptions this year, to the Sony Open and to the Farmers Insurance Open, where he opened with a 67 on Thursday at Torrey Pines.
Daly was talking about his schedule for the year and that he hopes to get into the minimum 15 events. Without prompting, he went after two tournaments that didn't invite him.
“I'll tell you this — I'll never go back to the Hope, and I'll never go back to Phoenix, no matter what happens,” Daly said. “I won't even send letters anymore.”
Daly said he was bothered because the tournaments owed him for his past support.
“I'm just saying that if you look at my past, everything the Thunderbirds (at the Phoenix Open) have ever wanted me to do for 17, 16 years, I'm sure I did it for them,” he said. “I helped celebrities go to the Hope. I went to their parties and did everything for them.
“That's the kind of stuff that we all want our young players to do out there to help tournaments, and I felt like I did my part.
“It hurt me for those two tournaments not to give me spots,” he said. “So I'll go to Europe on those weeks.”
Most tournaments are allowed four exemptions they can give to any player, and there is competition for those spots each week. Daly was awarded an exemption to the Sony Open over Tom Lehman, Brad Faxon and Tadd Fujikawa, a crowd favourite in Honolulu.
Most players who get exemptions are expected to attend an additional pro-am or a cocktail party to support the sponsors.
When he first lost his card, Daly had so many offers to play that he had to turn down some invitations. That was in 2007. He has not finished higher than 188th on the PGA Tour money list since then.
Unlike some other players who have lost their cards and returned to Q-school to try to earn back full privileges — such as Billy Mayfair and David Duval — Daly has not tried the six-round tournament.
“I don't think right now I need to,” Daly said. “I feel my majors will still hopefully get me in 15 events each year. If not, I'll think about it. But for me to go to Q-school is just tough. I feel I don't really need to go that route yet because of the European Tour.”
Daly has European Tour privileges through his 1995 British Open win. He plans to go to the Qatar Masters next week, and somehow get in enough European events for full membership.
Bryan Angus
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