PGA Tour Valspar Championship leaderboard https://www.pgatour.com/competition/2018/valspar-championship/leaderboard.html
The wind was swirling all around the tight Copperhead course at Innisbrook making scoring very difficult. As a result only 27 players broke par (71), the average score was 72.86 at this 2018 Valspar Championship.
Corey Connors shot a 71 in Monday qualifying and was waiting to see if that was good enough when his cell phone rang and he was told he was in as an alternative.
The recent graduate from the Canadian National Team program promptly went out and shot the round of the day -4 67, didn't make a bogey until his last hole, on a day when bogey's were the norm and par was your friend.
He had this to say about the National Team program. "They’re helping out some younger guys trying to get some more guys out on the PGA TOUR. That program has been amazing in the development and given me so many opportunities to train and get better. The resources that they have are awesome"
He leads by a shot going into today's play over Nick Watney, Whee Kim and Kelly Kraft. Only three other players scored under 70.
As always Tiger got all the attention, heck the Golf Channel shamelessly showed him practising putting for 30 minutes.
He scrambled well, shot -1 70 which included 5 birdies and had this to say about the course and the conditions. "This is a tough golf course. Not too often in Florida do you find elevation. Great driving golf course. I asked Henrik, ‘What do you around this golf course when there’s no wind here?’ He said it’s still a hell of a test. We can all see that.”
So we have a Canadian leading and a Canadian defending, which is a pretty damn good lead story even with a certain Mr. Woods playing.
Adam Hadwin shot E 71. Mackenzie Hughes and Nick Taylor shot +2 73’s and Ben Silverman who isn't in top form yet had a +4 75.
Scoring soared in the wind, Jordan Spieth the 9-1 favourite and the 2015 champion shot a +5 76. Rory McIlroy +3 74 as did Henrik Stenson.
The weather forecast is for a cool (by Florida standards) relatively calm sunny day (10km/h at the most) so I expect scoring to improve considerably. Tough windy weather always sorts the players out with the best finding a way to cope. Calm conditions let everyone in, so you'll see a lot more red on the scoreboard come this evening.
Bryan Angus
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