Wyndham Clark sets the bar with 67 on 'tricky' day at Arnold Palmer Invitational
Wyndham Clark sets the bar with 67 on 'tricky' day at Arnold Palmer Invitational
ORLANDO, Fla. – Eric Cole grew up playing countless rounds at Bay Hill Lodge and Club, including alongside its owner, Arnold Palmer. Cole, 36, attended the Arnold Palmer Invitational as a fan, worked at the tournament as a caddie and for the last three years has been a contestant in the PGA Tour signature event. When he arrived at the practice range on Thursday morning and the wind was swirling, he knew what likely what was in store out there.
'It's a hard course in normal conditions. Today was brutal,' he said.
Cole said he felt as if he had broken par, which is 72, even though he had to chip and put well to sign for 2-over 74. Still, that was seven shots more than leader Wyndham Clark, who birdied 18 for a brilliant 5-under 67. When a volunteer asked Cole about his day, he sighed and summed it up in two words: 'I survived.'
It was a day of survival of the fittest but it helped to have a late tee time.
'It was still breezy, but not quite as tough as the guys got it this morning,' said Rory McIlroy, who took advantage and shot 70.
Gusty winds greeted players when they arrived at the course. Crosswinds meant players had to aim for the rough or worse yet at the water, and hope the ball blew back to the fairway.
That didn't work out for Cameron Young, who blew his opening tee shot out of bounds left and shot 10-over 82. He wasn't the only one to shoot in the 80s – Max Homa was just a stroke better at 81, Rafael Campos shot 80 and five early finishers posted 79. One week after Jake Knapp fired an opening-round 59 and the field scoring average was 68.82, Bay Hill decided to be a bear, playing to an average score of 74.624. Tough but fair has become the tournament identity, which Sam Saunders, the grandson of the tournament namesake, declared is exactly the way Palmer wanted it to be.
'The players all know when they show up here that the rough is going to be long, the greens are going to be incredibly fast and firm and it's going to be a test,' Saunders said. 'It's no shock to the players.'
A few players avoided the carnage better than others. None did so better than Clark, who topped the field in Strokes Gained: Tee to Green and closed with birdies on two of the three final holes. Even Clark, who finished runner up last year, conceded that he hasn't always fancied Bay Hill. But he's changed his mindset and the world No. 7 got off to a fast start with a birdie at No. 2 and found his groove. He stuffed a pitching wedge from 146 yards to 2 feet at 18 to build a two-stroke lead.
'I don't know if I figured it out,' he said of the puzzle that is Bay Hill. 'I definitely feel a little more comfortable on it.'
Keegan Bradley, the 2025 U.S. Ryder Cup captain, made three birdies in a row starting at No. 8, including a chip in at the ninth, en route to shooting 3-under 69, the only player in the morning wave to shoot in the 60s.
'Anything under par any day around this place is good, but on a day like today it's one of the better rounds I've played all year,' Bradley said. 'I think that this is the hardest course we play all year. I used to think it was Torrey, I think it's here now.'
Others who shot 69 in the opening round included Shane Lowry, Corey Conners and Christiaan Bezuidenhout.
'I turned on the TV and watched some golf this morning and it didn't look much fun out there,' Lowry said. 'I wasn't particularly looking forward to my round.'
World No. 1 and defending tournament champion Scottie Scheffler and two-time major winner Collin Morikawa managed to break par with rounds of 1-under 71. Scheffler said that the chill in the air in the morning sent him back inside to grab a sweater and he was glad to be in red figures.
'You pick your poison out here. You can probably create a story with whatever it is. The greens are tough, the rough is high, and the wind is up,' he said.
Scheffler noted that the fairways are soft due to rain on Wednesday, but the greens are hard as concrete.
'So it can be really challenging to get the ball close to the hole, especially if you're not coming from out of the fairway,' he explained.
World's top three players are together once again
For just the third time since the Tour Championship in August, the top three players in the world are in the same field. McIlroy, No. 2 in the world, missed his second putt this season from inside three feet but carded five birdies and signed for 70.
Xander Schauffele, No. 3 in the world, returned from a rib injury that kept him on the sidelines since January. On Wednesday he noted that Bay Hill wasn't his 'dream place to come back to' and as he so elegantly put it, 'got my ass kicked.' Schauffele didn't make a birdie until 16 and posted 5-over 77.
'I'm a bit of a masochist, I guess. I knew I was going to come in on short notice to what is sort of like a major championship setup around the greens, and with the greens being crusty, I really felt it there more than anything else.'
On Thursday, the fickle wind is what the field felt more than anything, an extra element for competitors to judge. Palmer must be smiling down from above.
'It suits his style,' Cole said. 'If you pull off a shot and hit it good here, you're going to be rewarded. If you don't, you're going to be penalized. It's very fitting that his name is on this tournament.'
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