By Daniel Rapaport
Here’s the thing about the Plantation Course at Kapalua: It’s designed for wind. It’s a resort course, and its fairways are runway-wide to make them playable for Joe Average even when the wind starts whipping.

Only problem: There’s been virtually none of it to speak of at this week’s Sentry Tournament of Champions. And when a course designed for wind has none, and you have a field with nine of the top 10 players in the world … well, you’re in for an absolute birdie fest. Your four-under 69s are cute and all—remember, par 73 this week—but they’re simply not going to cut it.

MORE: Justin Thomas uses homophobic slur and apologizes

Alas, Harris English and Ryan Palmer hold the 54-hole lead at 21-under par. Yes, 21. There is absolutely a chance someone gets to 30 under on Sunday, which is always fun. Here are five takeaways ahead of what’s sure to be an entertaining, if envy-inducing, Sunday afternoon/evening of golf watching. We should know by now, but Maui’s beauty is somehow still jarring every single time this tournament rolls around. Enjoy it.

If you’re there, might as well win

English and Palmer shouldn’t be here. Not in normal years, anyway. As the name suggests, this tournament is supposed to be only for those players who won a tournament in the year prior. But with the COVID-shortened season, the folks in Ponte Vedra decided to loosen the rules and invite anyone who made the Tour Championship, as well as those who won. There are 16 guys in the field this week who did not win a PGA Tour event since last year’s Sentry, and two of them happen to be leading the tournament.

Harris English walks on the fourth green during the third round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions. Gregory Shamus

Neither English nor Palmer won last year, but both had arguably the best seasons of their respective careers to get to East Lake. They’re now both in position to score the biggest win of their career. English, the 36-hole leader, kept the pedal firmly on the metal with his second eight-under 65 of the week, while Palmer fared a shot better with a 64—which was made official after a rules official decided he did not intend to improve his lie when, on the ninth hole, Palmer kicked a divot while a duffed chip was still rolling. If you saw the video, it’s clear: no harm, no foul.

After speaking to officials and coming out of the scoring trailer, Palmer told Golf Channel, “In disgust I kicked a divot. The ball was five feet away from me where it ended up stopping. There was no intention of me trying to help my ball because the ball wasn’t going to end up close to where I was at.”

Speaking of English

Your casual golf fan might not know who he is, but the big man from Georgia has been playing at a top-10 level since the post-COVID restart, No, seriously. Since the RBC Heritage, the second event back, he has 11 top-25s and five top-10s in 14 starts, including a solo second at the Northern Trust and a T-6 at the U.S. Open. A win here—his first since 2013—would move him close to the top 20 in the World Rankings, which is exactly where he belongs. At 31, he looks to be something of a late bloomer—but he’s certainly booming, and he’s absolutely a threat to make this year’s Ryder Cup team. A victory on Sunday would go a long, long way toward making that a reality. Unfortunately, his last swing of the day was his worse, a hooked long iron on 18 that missed left, the one place you can’t miss on that hole.

Nice to see you, Collin

A fun stat that circulated after Collin Morikawa won the PGA Championship was that he had as many major championships (1) as he did missed cuts (1) as a professional. He promptly missed the weekend in three of his next five starts and has been generally disappointing since Harding Park, at least by the elevated standards he earned himself with that victory. He has just two top-10s in his nine events since: a T-7 in the gross division of the 30-man Tour Championship, and a T-10 at the European Tour’s DP World Tour Championship.

And yet, all those so-so runs of form fade into the oblivion so long as you keep winning. He’s in a great spot to pick up win No. 4 in his first 19 months as a pro after a second straight eight-under 65. He was one over through six on Thursday, which means the 23-year-old is 21 under over his last 48 holes. Wasn’t a math major, but that’s a very good pace.

New clothes, same guy

= Jon Rahm walks off the 18th tee during the third round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions. Gregory Shamus

Going from TaylorMade to Callaway wasn’t the only switch world No. 2 Jon Rahm made as 2020 turned into 2021—he also switched from Adidas apparel to Travis Mathew, which is owned by Callway. So he’s in new clothes, but he has not lost one ounce of the on-course fire he’s known for. During the midst of a so-so round of 69, Rahm missed a six-footer for birdie and was, uh, not happy. We’d print his exact words, but this is a family site, so you can watch the video if you please.

Safe to say Rahm isn’t a fan of metal spikes ? pic.twitter.com/wkW1niZxrp

— The Fried Egg (@the_fried_egg) January 10, 2021

We feel obligated to note that PGA Tour players are now able to tap-down spike marks, and have been since the beginning of 2019, but that’s neither here nor there. Here’s to hoping Rahm never loses that passion, because it makes him who he is, and this game can use every character it can get.

A U.S. Open, this is not

We never expected this week to bring up memories of Winged Foot, but the lack of wind has not helped matters. Only two of the 42 players in the field failed to break par on Saturday. Eighteen players shot five under or better. Simply put, a windless Kapalua does not have any defence against the world’s best players. It would be a problem if this were every week on the PGA Tour, but it’s not every week, so sit back and enjoy the views and the birdies. It’s easier that way.

The post With no wind, winner might shoot 30 under in Tournament of Champions appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

The heights of golf, however, he’s not hesitant to scale.

Wolff is just seven months into his professional career, so there’s much for him still to learn and much for us to learn about him. But one thing we already know of the two-time collegiate All-American is that despite his age—at 20 he was the youngest player in the field at the just-completed Sentry Tournament of Champions—and the unorthodox swing, he has a few important things figured out.

After shooting an even-par 73 at the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort on Sunday, Wolff finished T-12 with a seven-under 285. He wasn’t at all disappointed in his closing effort on a breezy day along the west Maui mountains, rallying from some early mistakes that led to making the turn two over par.

“I felt like I was pretty patient out there,” said Wolff, the second-youngest ever to compete, after Jordan Spieth, in the winner’s only PGA Tour event. “I didn’t have a lot of putts drop, but you know, with how windy it was, it was hard to make anything, so I was kind of surprised how low the scores were, to be honest,” he said. “I knew it was gettable with not a lot of wind, but I was pretty pleased with how I played … and I finished even par in 25 to 35 mph winds.”

Career-wise Wolff has had the wind at his back, but that is mostly by design. The California native has taken every next step carefully and with calculating efficiency. He didn’t turn professional last June because he was in a hurry to play on the PGA Tour, even though that has been his goal for a long time. He made sure he was prepared. And that he felt prepared.

“My dream was always to be a PGA Tour player,” Wolff said. “I was realistic with myself, even in high school I was playing really good and was nationally ranked as a junior golfer, but it’s still so hard. I was always realistic, like, ‘I’m going to put in the work and I don’t want to look back and be like, I could have worked harder and regret it.’

“I kind of just did what Tiger Woods did,” Wolff added. “I never really moved up in age groups [as a kid]. I just wanted to dominate the one I was in. … I would make sure that I wasn’t just a fluke, I would want to win and learn how to win. And then you move up.”

Wolff played just two seasons for Oklahoma State. As a freshman in 2018 he helped the Cowboys win the NCAA Division I title. In his sophomore season, he won six times, including the NCAA individual title at the Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark. The Cowboys, however, lost in the semifinals of the team competition. Wolff figured there wasn’t much left to do collegiately. It was time to move up again.

“Once I got into college, that kind of sparked me that I can actually do this and can play against the best at each level, so if I just keep on improving and working hard, I don’t see why I can’t play against the best at the highest level,” he said.

Wolff hits his first official shot of 2020 at the Sentry Tournament Of Champions. (Cliff Hawkins/Getty Images)

Wolff quickly proved he could play against the best at the highest level, winning in just his third start as a professional at the 3M Open in Minnesota in early July.

Clearly, he had a good grasp of his own learning curve. And he still does. That’s significant.

Wolff, whose next start is at The American Express next week in Palm Springs, Calif., won’t panic into thinking he has more to prove in 2020 or has to win again to validate his maiden victory. Ranked 98th in the world, Wolff is assessing his progress not by high finishes, but rather by a high-gloss finish to his game.

The plan is simple: improve, just as he did in college.

“I do have a lot of confidence, internally, in my game, but I don’t show it. But I want to walk on the tee like Brooks [Koepka] does where he just looks like he knows he’s the best player. Rory [McIlroy] walks that way. You can tell that they think they’re the man,” Wolff said. “Right now, though, I just want to feel like I’m getting better. If I’m honest with myself, I feel like if I got better and I know I got better, then that’s a successful season. I’m not going to say that if I had two wins this year but I finish, whatever on the FedEx [Cup] and drop [back], and I look at all my stats and they’re down, then I know it wasn’t really a good year. I just had two good weeks. You look at the best players, they’re consistent. They’re up there week after week after week.”

These next few weeks will be fun for Wolff, as he’ll stay in California and practice out of Sherwood Country Club, where he has an honorary membership. He’ll also hang out with family and friends in between playing every West Coast event except the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

In addition to being a good player, Wolff wants to grow the game. He wants to help make it a cooler sport. When he was younger, he didn’t always feel like a cool kid because he played golf, something fellow California native Xander Schauffele also admitted to at Kapalua. At 20, and an exempt tour player, Wolff is more inclined to—and capable of—connecting with junior players and fans.

“Golf is a great game, and you know, it is a gentleman’s game and so many people play it, but I’m trying to get more kids and make it more fun instead of, you know, being looked at as kind of like a country club sport,” he said. “I want it to be a more popular sport. Golf can reach such a broad spectrum, but it’s just not quite there yet.”

Wolff isn’t quite there yet, either, but he’s not worried. He’s just working on one day being the man. That would be the height of success.

The post Matthew Wolff’s refreshing approach to managing expectations in 2020 appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Dave Shedloski
KAPALUA, Hawaii — Don’t call the upgraded Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort a renovation or a redesign, even though either of those descriptive terms would suffice.

“The word we like to use is refinement,” said Ben Crenshaw, who with his design partner Bill Coore came in after the completion of the Sentry Tournament of Champions last January and began the task of revitalizing—there’s another appropriate word for it—their initial creation that opened in 1991.

Whatever you call it, the Plantation Course, re-grassed tee to green in a proven durable strain of Bermudagrass called Celebration and given an end-to-end facelift, will be a notably different test for the 34 players committed to competing in this week’s Sentry Tournament of Champions, which starts Thursday.

“I like it a lot,” said Dustin Johnson, who broke the dawn on Dec. 26 as the first player in the field to get in a practice round, “but it’s definitely harder. It’s a lot more difficult.”

That was the mission—at least one of them—with which the Crenshaw and Coore team was charged as they worked with the Troon Development, headed by Alex Nakajima, general manager of Kapalua golf and tennis, and Mark Rolfing, the NBC and Golf Channel broadcaster who was part of the original Plantation Course development group. The PGA Tour also wanted to see the course play with more versatility, and to do that, the greens had to be “calmed down,” in Crenshaw’s words and recontoured to allow for more pin positions.

The most evident green refinements come at holes 6, 10 and 13, where the slopes were so pronounced only one side of the putting surface could be used to cut holes. The upshot of achieving that aim was the creation of distinct tiers.

RELATED: Tiger Woods won’t play Sentry Tournament of Champions, but the field has Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas and Dustin Johnson

Some greens also were expanded while others, like at the par-4 seventh and the par-5 15th, were reduced in size.

“The course is even more of a second-shot golf course than it was before,” said Rolfing, who watched closely from the time work started on Feb. 11 until the course reopened on Nov. 23. “There are more shelf areas. The PGA Tour wanted more hole locations. The greens were softened and you have some flatter areas, but those transitions are more severe. That puts a real premium on shot-making like it was more in the earlier days. There’s more strategy than before. You can’t just bomb it off every tee, either, because you want to set up that second shot.”

The changes came in on budget, at $12.5 million, and on time, “and we did it in Hawaii,” Nakajima said proudly with a wide grin. “To shut the course down for that period of time showed a huge commitment from ownership, but I think the results speak for themselves. We did what we set out to do.”

Most of the cost of the project was due to material and the transportation of it, namely 33,000 tons of sand, brought in on three barges from Oahu. The majority of it was used as the new base for the greens, but elsewhere there were deposits onto some fairway in the landing areas while three new teeing grounds were added at Nos. 3, 9 and 10, bringing the par-73 course to 7,596 yards.

At the third hole, Johnson, who has won twice at Kapalua, in 2013 and 2018, was used to hitting wedge into the green. A tee 40 yards farther back establishes a landing area that is slightly uphill. As a result, Johnson needed a 6-iron to reach the putting surface, and that was in the face of a mere half-club wind. Thirty yards added to the short, uphill par-4 10th should yield a similar effect.

New landforms in several other landing areas will yield similar results. New fairways bunkers at Nos. 5 and 16 and the movement of other bunkers closer to the preferred lines of play also present additional challenge off the tee. The process of bringing back a more natural, or ragged, look to a number of other bunkers was begun but remains ongoing.

“I think the course will play largely the same, but with a few nuances to make it quite a bit more interesting,” said Crenshaw, who arrives in Maui on Thursday to watch the proceedings in person. “It’s a challenge taking your own design and modifying it, but we’re proud of the changes.”

An entire inventory of the alterations to each hole takes up two typewritten pages. In many subtle ways it’s a new course introduced along a familiar tract of land atop the west Maui mountains. In other ways, its original soul was restored. For instance, the introduction of the new grass will ensure a faster playing surface that will bring back movement of the ball along the ground, a feature that will surely help the resort player while adding yet more strategy and options for tournament golfers.

“I think the course has gotten its life back, gotten its energy back,” Rolfing said. “We’ve created a number of new shot values. I think we’re still going to have some great scoring out there, but they’re going to have to work harder to get it. I think it’s a better golf course. The work done was really spectacular.”

Xander Schauffele shot an 11-under 62 in the final round to win the 2019 Tournament of Champions. If someone can equal that course record this time around, they’ll have earned it.

The post The Plantation Course at Kapalua stiffened up for the PGA Tour’s 2020 opener appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
Winless during the 2017-’18 PGA Tour season, Marc Leishman had yet to qualify for the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Maui the first week of January. But on Sunday, the 34-year-old Aussie shot a seven-under 65 at the CIMB Classic in Malaysia to close out a five-stroke victory and earn a place into the winners-only event.

It turns out, however, that Leishman had a hunch he’d find his way into the event. After closing out a five-stroke triumph at the CIMB Classic, Leishman confessed that he had already booked his trip to Hawaii.

“I was actually talking to my wife about that two weeks ago, and we booked flights to go back to Australia and had to book sort of return ones back to America, and I just booked them for Maui, thinking that I’ll either be playing in the tournament or we’ll go for a vacation there,” Leishman said. “Now I’ll be playing a golf tournament. I know Audrey will be very excited, as my kids will be.”

RELATED: Leishman’s CIMB Classic triumph a good sign for the Presidents Cup Internationals

Twice before Leishman has played at the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort, finishing T-23 in 2013 and T-7 last January.

Leishman said he considered Hawaii one of his favourite places in the world, so if his bet on himself failed, it wasn’t the worst outcome.

“To be able to play two weeks there at two of my favourite golf tournaments is certainly something to look forward to.”

EIGHT birdies in the final round to clinch the @CIMBClassic.@MarcLeish‘s Sunday in less than five minutes: pic.twitter.com/WNPiof8XQ7

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) October 14, 2018

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By Christopher Powers
It was the Dustin Johnson show on Sunday at the Sentry Tournament of Champions, and no one else stood a chance. The World No. 1 lapped the field, cruising to a final-round eight-under 65, the low round of the tournament, eight strokes clear of next closest competitor at 24-under 268. It’s the 17th victory of his PGA Tour career, and his second at Kapalua.

Johnson, 33, began running away early, posting a four-under 32 on the front nine of the Plantation Course and opening up a six-shot lead. It was clear from the start that there was no way he was going to allow a repeat of his final round of the WGC-HSBC Champions.

“After China, where I struggled a bit on Sunday, I didn’t want that to happen again,” he said. “Even when I made the turn and I think I was at 20 under, I told myself my goal was to get it to 25 [under]. I just kept the pedal down making the turn and played really well again on the backside, too.”

He did flinch, if for a brief moment, at the par-3 11th, making his only bogey of the round from a greenside bunker. That was quickly forgotten when he hit an enormous drive at the 433-yard par-4 12th to within tap in range for eagle for the second straight day. From there he added birdies at 14, 15 and 16 to win by eight, giving him a PGA Tour victory in 11 straight seasons, making him one of 10 players to accomplish the streak.

Jon Rahm’s four-under 69 wouldn’t be enough, but it earned him a solo second finish in his first appearance at the Tournament of Champions. It’s his 11th finish inside the top five in just 37 starts on the PGA Tour and is expected to move him up from No. 4 spot to No. 3 on the World Ranking.

Playing alongside Johnson in the final group was Brian Harman, who posted a one-under 72 to finish in solo third. He’s now finished eighth or better in all four starts of his 2017-’18 campaign.

Hideki Matsuyama, Pat Perez and Rickie Fowler tied for fourth at 14-under 278. Matsuyama’s bogey-free seven-under 66 was his low round of the week, featuring five birdies and an eagle. Perez posted a four-under 69, one better than Fowler’s three-under 70. All three of them have now finished inside the top 5 in each of their last two appearances at Kapalua.

Finishing in a tie for seventh at 13-under 279 were Marc Leishman and Jhonattan Vegas. Jordan Spieth came in one shot behind them at 12-under 280 after firing a final-round four-under 69.

The post Dustin Johnson wins Sentry Tournament of Champions by eight shots for 17th PGA Tour title appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

In past years, his absence from the winners-only tournament generated considerable discussion, usually tinged with disappointment. Woods won this event at the Plantation Course at Kapalua in 2000, when he defeated Ernie Els in a playoff and kicked off one of the most dominant seasons in golf’s modern era. But the 2005 edition was his last, even as he continued to qualify while adding to a career victory total on the PGA Tour that stands at 79, second all-time behind Sam Snead.

This week, it’s not his absence but his impending return to golf after an extended sabbatical that has his fellow players talking as they ponder a season that could be perhaps vastly more intriguing should Woods remain healthy and play a full schedule. The last time that occurred was 2013, when he won five times and received the Jack Nicklaus Award for Player of the Year.

Coming off a fourth back surgery, Woods appeared fit and his game offered promise when he appeared last month in the Hero World Challenge. He exhibited power off the tee, and although the competitive rust was apparent, his swing was sound, and he showed an ability to score. After casual rounds with Woods at The Medalist in Jupiter, Fla., fellow players like Rickie Fowler have been effusive in complimenting his progress.

Young players like Fowler (right) are anxious to compete against a fully healthy Tiger. (Photo by Ryan Young/Getty Images)

Granted, there was high anticipation at this time last year when Woods was attempting a comeback. Based on the aforementioned evidence, there is a genuine belief that this time Woods, who recently turned 42, is ready to legitimately rejoin the competitive fray against a generation of talented young players who have blossomed in his absence.

The most prominent of that group, Jordan Spieth, who is the only player other than Woods with 10 tour wins before the age of 24, injected Woods into his assessment of the tantalizing season ahead, remarking that “it’s a pretty special time to be a part of professional golf.

“I think this year, 2018, the unknowns are very exciting right now,” said Spieth, ranked No. 2 in the world behind Dustin Johnson. “I think with the amount of depth and talent at a younger age mixed with the guys in their 30s that are playing … No. 1 in the world, D.J., what is he, 32 or something? [Johnson is 33.] Some other phenomenal players that you would call maybe in their prime, right now. And then, obviously, the major question, which is, what’s it going to be like with Tiger coming back?”

Entertaining without a doubt, just like the Hero World Challenge, where Woods briefly had a share of the lead in the second round.

“Because of the way that the Hero went and the confidence that he’s talking with, the place that he’s at in life right now, I think he’s in the best position he’s been in in a few years to come back and be a regular out here competing,” Spieth said. “So that I would call the forefront of the excitement in golf right now.”

Other players at Kapalua, all winners of 2017 tour events, said a season with Woods might be among the most memorable in quite some time. Whether he plays well or poorly, an overlay of Woods’ comeback story on the narrative of each tournament he enters will intensify interest both inside and outside the ropes.

“I think this year is more special with Tiger, if he can play fairly often and play well,” Bryson DeChambeau said. “He’ll make everything a little more interesting. It will be fun to watch what he can do.”

“It’s going to be great for the young guys to say they played in a tournament with Tiger,” said Billy Horschel. “No disrespect to Arnold or Jack, but has anyone ever moved the needle like Tiger does? I wasn’t around then, but I would think not. So when we get this chance to play with Tiger, it’s special. It’s going to feel special, especially when it looked like he might not play very much again.”

Tiger during the third round of the 2017 Hero World Challenge. (JD Cuban)

One of the young guard, Wesley Bryan, remembers just how special it felt to be in the field at last year’s Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines, the only PGA Tour event in which Woods appeared before he had to shut down his season with further back trouble.

“I just know what it was like last year in the one event he did get to play in and how different that felt from every other event,” Bryan said. “There was so much more electricity in the air. A lot more fans. You could feel that vibe. It will be exciting for all of us young guys to have that experience more often and get to see him play.”

Marc Leishman doesn’t just want to see Woods play. The Aussie wants to see the former No. 1 and 14-time major winner excel.

“I hope he plays well this year because you want to test yourself against the best players in the world, and he’s certainly one of the best of all-time,” Leishman said. “If he comes back and plays the way he can, I don’t think there’s any reason why he’s not going to win again. It wouldn’t surprise me if he went back to his old self, the way he’s swinging it, what I saw of him in the Bahamas.

“I don’t think there’s one player on tour who isn’t excited about him coming back.”

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