AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am: 3 things to know after Round 1
Patrick Cantlay hits a shot on Thursday at Pebble Beach Golf Links.
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The leader, in his last round in his last tournament, shot a 61. He set the course record. On Thursday, the leader missed a repeat of both. By a stroke. Here are three things you need to know after the first round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, played at Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass Hill Golf Course.
Patrick Cantlay leads
Patrick Cantlay, two weeks ago, during the final round of the American Express tournament, shot a course-record 61 on the Stadium Course at PGA West. He was a stroke worse on Thursday.
Cantlay birdied his first three holes. Then holes 5 through 8 on his way to a front-nine 29. He added three more birdies on the back nine for a course-record-tying 10-under 62 and a two-shot lead over Akshay Bhatia and Henrik Norlander.
“My ball striking has been good. And the difference the last three rounds I played on Tour is just making putts,” Cantlay said. “I think I one-putted every green on the front nine. So when you only have nine putts on nine holes, it’s no surprise you played really well. Some of that is set up by ball striking. I had a lot of really good looks. And every time you play Pebble Beach, you kind of want to get off to a hot start on those first seven holes, and today I had a great start.”
19-year-old Akshay Bhatia hits 18 of 18 greens
Akshay Bhatia hit 18 of 18 greens, becoming the sixth player since 1985 to do so at Pebble. All could celebrate with a drink. Except Bhatia. He’s 19.
He hit his 18th green by about a yard. On 9, his final hole after starting his round on 18, Bhatia hit his drive just into the left rough, then just got on from there. He and Norlander are two strokes back.
“It was a good day,” Bhatia said. “I hit a good amount of fairways, and that’s relatively easy to do out here just because it’s pretty wide, and, yeah, 18 greens gave me a lot of good looks today.”
Jordan Spieth shoots 65
Jordan Spieth, fresh off a tie for fourth at last week’s Waste Management Phoenix Open, shot a seven-under 65 at Pebble and is three strokes back.
Among other players, Rickie Fowler shot an even-par 71 at Pebble, Phil Mickelson fired a two-over 74 at Spyglass, and John Daly shot an eight-over 80 at Spyglass, with a quadruple-bogey 9 on the par-5 14th.
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