For the past few weeks, illnesses have struck the PGA Tour, forcing many players to withdraw from events. Tour pro Sepp Straka is feeling the flu this week at the 2025 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.
But the 31-year-old Austrian pro isn’t withdrawing from this star-studded Signature Event. He’s leading it.
“Yeah, battled some flu symptoms out there most of the week,” Straka explained after his third-round 70 on Saturday. “Yeah, honestly, the pro-am format might have helped me the first two days, it was kind of a slow round so I could kind of take my time and save some energy.”
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Maybe it’s not surprising the flu-stricken Straka chose to play this week, given the tournament’s $20 million purse. What is surprising is that he’s beating many of the best players in the world in the process.
World No. 3 Rory McIlroy, making his first PGA Tour start of 2025, has been lurking all week. When Straka got on the bogey train mid-round on Saturday, McIlroy even charged into the lead.
But Straka’s collapse didn’t continue. Instead, he made birdie on four of his final five holes to re-take the lead at 16 under heading into Sunday.
And that was while battling wet and windy conditions that tested everyone on Saturday.
“Yeah, definitely feeling a little bit fatigued, but honestly with these conditions, even if I was 100 percent, I would be feeling a little bit fatigued,” Straka acknowledged Saturday evening.
“It’s mentally pretty draining,” he continued, taking about the difficult conditions. “You can’t stay dry, ball’s not going where you want it to go, putting is tough. It’s really hard to kind of stay in the moment, stay in the present. Yeah, I was pretty happy about how I did that today.”
As for his illness, Straka revealed that rather than hurting him this week, it might be helping him. He suggested it could be improving his focus.
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“Yeah, you’ve just got to put the feelings to the side and try to execute your golf shots. Honestly, in some ways that might even help,” Straka explained. “Just have a target kind of mentally to kind of focus on your golf shots and your target and yeah, that might have helped me a little bit.”
And while Straka might not be a household name, his performance is understandable given recent results. He’s won three times on the PGA Tour since 2022. And he’s already captured a victory in 2025, at the American Express, before McIlroy had played a Tour round.
But even with his late Saturday charge giving him the 54-hole lead, Straka’s path to victory on Sunday is not a simple one. McIlroy shot a 65 on Saturday, five shots better than Straka, as did former Open champion Shane Lowry.
Both major champions will start the day only one shot off the lead. Justin Rose and Tom Kim are another shot behind.
