Rahm: “I played good golf, minimized mistakes and always got better”

What a start and finish of the first round at Bay Hill by Jon Rahmleader with 65 strokes and two ahead of the second rank in Arnold Palmer Invitational on the PGA Tour in Orlando (his 138th PGA Tour tournament): three consecutive birdies on the first three holes, and a spectacular finish with an eagle-birdie-birdie. hat And that he missed a lot from the tee, with some fairways taken, but again in the putt he was deadly.

In his last four victories on the American circuit, the Basque started tournaments with rounds of 64 or 65 shots. Eagle’s putt on the 16th hole was his first at Bay Hill in 88 holes played on this course and his 10th on the PGA Tour this season.

Winner of three tournaments this year: Tournament of Champions, Amex and Los Angelesthe last player to win four before the Augusta Masters was Johnny Miller in 1974. Remember that this is his second participation in the event where the promoter is the legendary ‘Arnie’: he finished tied for 17th in 2022 with laps of 72, 70, 74 and 74.

He Number One in the world It comes out and everything comes out. He has once again taken the lead, and will definitely be a big challenger this week notch his eleventh victory on the PGA Tour, and first! in Florida. In the mixed zone, the man from Barrika summed up his performance: “I started the round in a big way, with good swings and hence the three birdies. Then I had a bad stretch and the putt for par (very long) at 15 was key because I woke up, then came the eagle on the 16th and on the 17th and 18th I hit the two best irons of the day”. Then he remembered that on these greens “you have to be careful with your speed because it’s very possible to go over a meter or two”.

Jon spoke again about the 15 putt to save par from 10 meters: “Huge. I took my worst swing of the day and ended up having to putt more than 10 meters for par. So do that with a hole in A birdie around the corner is always important. I accepted the bogey…I was left in a bad position after the drive and I thought that a ‘5’ was not a bad result. So sometimes it turns out to be expensive “, explained the Biscayan.

“We played very small margins and we took advantage of them”, Rahm continued, stressing that “I think I played good golf, but it was not easy. The fairways become firm and it is not easy to catch the them. When you miss one, you go into the rough and you have to rely on being lucky with how the ball hits you. four missed opportunities, the fairways and the greens. I haven’t made many birdies though on the intermediate holes, it was a good round of golf.

Memorial, Genesis and now for Bay Hill…

Bay Hill is an unforgiving course where you have to be calm and patient when things go wrong. “You come out here and you know. You have to do it in phases. Obviously you have to put the ball in the fairway. When you put it in the fairway, where can you be aggressive? That’s what I think I did really well. . Choose your matches and hopefully you can birdie the ones you choose,” he added.

Comparing his performance this Thursday to last year, Jon said, “The only difference between some of my rounds last year and this one is the putting. I don’t think I’m putting as many greens for four days here. And now I “I’ve done a lot. From a good putt to a bad putt, there is the tiniest difference imaginable. Especially with these fast vegetables.”

Asked if he liked the opening sequence of three birdies in a row or the finish with an eagle and two more birdies, he said “I got better quality shots in the first three, but that was just being picky. If I’m going by the difficulty of the holes, I think obviously the last three holes are better.”

When asked what he needed to improve on for the next three laps, he said: “You go back to the round and you see a lot of mistakes. I just took the opportunities to reduce the mistakes and made some tricky situations very difficult . great result. It can always be better.” , but this is the first day. Ask me on Sunday if I continue to play like this and I will probably change my answer”, he concluded, not before launching into a final sentence: “It is an honor to also be able to win the Arnold Palmer tournament, as I did in his with him Nicklaus or Tiger’s, but there’s still a lot left. Let’s keep working, the season has started brilliantly, but we have to continue like now” .