Landry jumps out to Quicken Loans lead
As those around him seemed to be losing control, Andrew Landry remained calm. As Landry’s threesome made its way to the No. 7 tee box at TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm, the golfers’ 16th hole of the day, Francesco Molinari spiked his ball on the cart path after narrowly missing a birdie putt and muttered to himself as it plunked into a nearby pond.
Landry gazed out at the group hitting ahead and smiled as he chatted with his caddie, Terry Walker, who took long drags from a cigarette. The pair’s relaxed demeanor cut a stark contrast to last week’s Travelers Championship, where Landry missed the cut following an opening-round 81. On this bright Thursday morning, Landry shot a tournament-record 7-under-par 63 to take the lead after the first round of the Quicken Loans National.
“You’re going to catch golf courses that suit you and you’re going to catch golf courses that don’t,” Landry said. He shook his head. “It’s just one of those things. You’ve just got to let it go.”
Starting on the back nine, Landry birdied his first hole and hit what would be his longest drive of the day on the next, but right of the fairway. He found his ball in the rough, resting “in a perfect lie, and I had a perfect angle.”
His iron play was one of the major culprits for his struggles the weekend before, but he had used the unwanted days off to try to refine his mechanics. Landry adjusted his stance to be slightly farther from the ball when swinging, hoping it would also flatten his plane.
That in mind, Landry drew an 8-iron out of his bag, emblazoned with razorback mascot of his alma mater, Arkansas. He also knew he had to practice caution.
“It sounds so cliché,” Landry said, “but you’ve just got to be so patient out there. I mean, one loose shot and you can really get yourself in some trouble. . . . I was very fortunate” with my lie.
Landry cut the 8-iron shot hard, and it finished 13 feet from the cup. He rolled in the putt to start his round with consecutive birdies.
“Taking that momentum right there and just building from it and keeping it going definitely helped,” Landry said. “I hit my irons really well, and that was kind of the key to the whole entire day.”
From there, Landry gained steam. He parred the next two holes, birdied the two after that and made the turn with a 4-under 31. On the front, he quickly faced his biggest challenge of the day on the greens, a week after changing putters. On the par-5 second, he rolled in a 15-footer for birdie to get to 5-under.
Birdies at Nos. 6 and 8 got him to 7-under and got the gallery behind him. One fan shouted, “Can’t stop you, Andrew!”
Landry’s face remained nearly blank. He nodded. The closest his flow came to being disturbed was on his final hole, the par-3 ninth, when a helicopter’s propeller rippled through the air as he lined up to swing. He jumped off the tee as if scalded by hot water. He never looked up at the sky but waited until the sound had faded before addressing the ball again.