Phil Mickelson is set to defend his title at the week WGC-CA Championship, the second World Golf Championships tournament of the year.Mickelson went 26 tries without winning a WGC event before defeating Nick Watney by one shot in 2009. It didn`t take long for him to win his second, capturing the HSBC Champions in Shanghai in November, the event`s first year as part of the WGC series.
“The course has one of the best finishing holes in the world of golf, and continuously ranks among the toughest holes each year on tour.
” – Brett Ogle PGA Golf Show
Mickelson is making his first World Golf Championships appearance for 2010, having skipped the Accenture Match Play due to family commitments.
The field will consist of 64 of the world`s best players from 19 countries, with seven representing Australia. Of those who qualified for the tournament, only Tiger Woods and Ryo Ishikawa are not competing.
Ishikawa, who won his first Japan Golf Tour event as a 15-year-old amateur, will be graduating from his high school. At 18, I guess he has his whole life ahead of him to win Majors and continue to be one of the best players in the world. Good on him.
It was great to see Vijay Singh back near the top of the leaderboard in the Honda classic, and he usually plays well at Doral. We came through at the same time in the 80s and he`s a good friend of mine. I know he has had a rough background in his early years, but he has worked so hard to get to where he is today and I respect that.
A fit Singh is quite a pleasant change from a recent stretch in which he posted just three top-10 finishes in 25 starts. His troubles began early in 2009 when he underwent arthroscopic knee surgery, returned to the tour too soon and ended up with a bad back to go along with a sore knee. He eventually required a second knee surgery in December. Look out for him!
The TPC Blue Monster at Doral was originally designed by Dick Wilson and Robert von Hagge in 1961, but in 1996 had a massive revamp with the PGA Tour calling on legend Raymond Floyd to add some teeth to the famed layout. Then in 2003 they added a further 150 metres to its overall length, and today reads an imposing 6537 metres from the back.
I played a couple of tournaments there when I was on the US Tour in the 90s, and the thing that grabbed me the most about the track was its fairness from tee to green. It`s as flat as a tack and water comes into play on quite a few holes.
I always struggled on the greens which are a type of Bermuda grass so they are very grainy, and by the afternoon they are like putting on shag pile carpet. I was better off reading left-handed Swahili than reading these greens, and I know a lot of players feel the same way.
The course has one of the best finishing holes in the world of golf, and continuously ranks among the toughest holes each year on tour. All the way from the tee to green down the left-hand side is a huge lake, so anything left is a no no. Fairway traps down the right cut into the fairway so the landing area is around 22 metres wide – that`s tight! Once you have negotiated the drive you’re now looking at about 160 metres to a long narrow green. If you have any shot turning right to left into this green look out water, it’s just of the green on the left. By the end of the week this hole will average around 4.5 shots.
Now the weather for the week is supposed to be absolutely perfect with temperatures around 25 degrees every day and not much wind, so that means plenty of birdies for the players.
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