Mickelson makes ‘history,’ shoots 65
Lefty is a shot back after hitting every fairway
PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — Phil Mickelson has been coming to the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am since 1995 and has won it four times, so there isn’t much he hasn’t accomplished along the Monterey Peninsula. Thursday delivered something new.
Mickelson didn’t miss a single fairway.
“History was made today,” Mickelson said after his 6-under 65 at Monterey Peninsula, leaving him one shot behind Brian Gay and Scott Langley. “To the best of my knowledge, it’s taken me 27 years and a few months to hit all fairways in a single round in competition. I may have done it before, but I don’t ever recall doing it.”
His accuracy was better than his memory.
According to the PGA Tour, Mickelson has done it seven times, most recently 21 years ago at Torrey Pines. Perhaps even more remarkable about that round in 1998 was that even playing from the short grass on every shot, he still had a 73.
That wasn’t the case on an ideal day — perhaps the last beautiful day of the week — for scoring. Over three rainsoftened tracks — the Shore Course at Monterey Peninsula, Spyglass Hill and Pebble Beach — 59 players in the 156-man field shot in the 60s.
And there was no shortage of entertainment, as usual.
Brandt Snedeker probably wasn’t thinking birdie when his tee shot on the par-5 18th at Pebble Beach missed left and bounced down to the sandy shore. He played it off the beach back to the fairway, hit 7-iron to 10 feet and made the putt for a 69.
“I didn’t hit myself, I didn’t fall down getting out of the rocks down there — it was a little slippery,” Snedeker said. “So it all worked out great. I’m feeling like a genius right now, but at the time I didn’t know.”
Keith Mitchell hit a lefthanded shot from a wooden bridge at Monterey Peninsula through the rough and onto the green that led to par and duly impressed his amateur partner, PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan.
Bill Murray kept everyone laughing even after his round, when a volunteer asked him to sign his cap. Murray noticed Pat Perez had already signed it, looked at the scribbling on the bill of the cap and said, “He misspelled his name.”
And there was plenty of good golf along the way.
VIC OPEN: In Barwon Heads, Australia, Felicity Johnson made a late move up the leaderboard Thursday at the LPGA’s Vic Open to take a two-stroke lead after the opening round.
The Englishwoman shot an 8-under 65 on the Creek course at the 13th Beach Golf Links, where men and women played in alternate groups in the unique tournament format also sanctioned by the men’s European Tour.
Nick Flanagan, an Australian who won the 2003 U.S. Amateur, shot a 10-under 62 on the Creek course to take a two-stroke lead in the men’s tournament.
MEDIATE: Pro golfer Rocco Mediate, 56, says he’s sober now, having taken his last drink on Oct. 23, 2017. But the self-described “habitual alcoholic” drank daily before that as a way to cope with the back pain that has dogged him throughout his career.
That includes his time on the course during PGA Tour events.
“Absolutely I have [played while drinking]. Because it was just normal for me. It was just a daily ritual, let’s say,” Mediate, a six-time winner on the PGA Tour who’s best remembered for his duel with Tiger Woods at the 2008 U.S. Open, told the Golf Channel’s Vince Cellini.
Mediate had seven top 10 finishes last season on the PGA Tour Champions Circle for 50-plus golfers.