At Kapalua’s Plantation course on Friday, benign conditions made the scores ultra low. In fact, of the 59 players in the field, only two posted scores over par. Thirty-two players fired rounds of five-under (68) or better, and a whopping eight players signed for 64s — that’s nine under par!
Posting opening rounds of 69-65 (-12) would normally place you well in the mix on the leaderboard. But this week, Sepp Straka is still outside of the top 10 after 36 holes, trailing Hideki Matsuyama’s lead by four shots. But Straka did earn quite a distinction on Friday, carding an incredible seven birdies in a row on the back nine before finally ending his run with a par on the 17th.
“Well, I love a turkey, so I made three in a row on 12, and was pretty happy about that,” Straka said after his round. “Then birdied 13, 14, 15, which were pretty gettable, so I was thinking about six in a row, I never got to seven, but, yeah, I got kind of hot there with the irons and hit some nice shots and was able to make the putts.”
When the streak finally ended with a par on the par-4 17th hole, Straka said his playing partner, Patton Kizzire, was more disappointed than he was.
“I had a putt on 17 and missed it, and he immediately told me that he was pissed at me,” Straka said.
So what happened?
“I hit it like 20 feet and missed the putt,” Straka said.
A follow-up: Was that devastating?
“It was devastating,” he said. “It was a tough scene, but I’ll get by.
“[Playing partners Kizzire and Stephan Jaegar] were both pretty disappointed in my finish (laughing).”
Making seven birdies in a row is quite an accomplishment (the PGA Tour record is nine in a row), and one Straka says he can’t recall ever doing before.
“I definitely haven’t gotten eight so I think seven is definitely my max,” he said.
Although Straka had to convert seven putts in order to keep the streak alive, he attributed the birdie barrage to stellar iron play.
“I was hitting my iron shots really close,” he said. “10 I hit it to five feet. 11 I hit it to 10 feet. I just getting inside 10 feet. That can be tough with the wind out here, it wasn’t as windy today, but it’s also kind of hard to figure out exactly where it’s coming from, so it’s hard to really get it inside 10 feet, and I was able to do that for a little stretch there.”
While he’s currently in a chaser’s position on the leaderboard, when the scoring is this low, anything can happen over the course of two rounds.
“This is the type of course where, by the time I tee off, I might be in 15th place or something,” he said. “So you got to keep your foot on the pedal out here and keep trying to give yourself looks and keep trying to make putts.”
