High winds force delay at Genesis Invitational
Tiger Woods arrived at Riviera Country Club on Saturday just in time for the Genesis Invitational to be delayed by high wind.
Woods, host of the tournament in Pacific Palisades, California, is not playing this year as he recovers from a fifth back surgery. He spent most of the late morning visiting with Dustin Johnson, Xander Schauffele and other players who had time on their hands.
The wind was gusting to 35 mph, strong enough in such dry conditions that golf balls wouldn’t stay on the green. And then a piece of communications equipment was toppled near the 14th tee, and officials halted play.
It was supposed to resume after a delay of just over three hours. But as players were warming up, play was stopped again.
Sam Burns, who had a five-shot lead going into the third round, was poised over his opening tee shot when the horn sounded to suspend the round.
The wind both hurt and helped.
Keegan Bradley had a 40-foot birdie putt across the 10th green to a right pin position. The wind kept pushing the ball along, beyond the cup, to the edge of the green and down a slope between two bunkers. He made double bogey.
Max Homa hit 5-iron from 222 yards in the fairway on the par-5 opening hole. It was a smart shot to the middle of the green, and the wind and slope pushed it closer and closer to the hole until it stopped 10 inches away. Homa tapped in for eagle to reach 8-under par, four shots out of the lead, right before the horn sounded.
Weather delays are not unusual in golf, just not when the sky is brilliant blue and visibility is so good the Pacific could easily be seen through gaps in the eucalyptus trees.
“We had some balls move around on the putting greens, which we were able to deal with under the rules,” said Steve Rintoul, the PGA Tour’s tournament director this week. “However, ultimately I think we got into a situation of player safety, safety of our volunteers and everybody else out there on the golf course was our primary reason for shutting things down.”
There would not be enough daylight to finish the third round if play ever resumed.
Two years ago, rain forced the final groups to play 34 holes on Sunday, so finishing the tournament was not expected to be a problem.
Johnson, who was five shots behind Burns, had a 15-foot eagle putt when play was stopped. Jordan Spieth, in contention for the third straight week, opened with a birdie and was five shots back.
Spieth, an 11-time tour winner whose last victory came at the 2017 British Open, is in the mix after a few years of frustration.
Two weeks ago, Spieth shared the 54-hole lead at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, and last weekend he had a twoshot lead after three rounds of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Although he didn’t pull away on Sunday of either — he finished tied for fourth, then third — he relocated that relevance that defined him earlier in his career.
After his opening round at Riviera, Spieth talked about the relief of being able to “trust these swings” as he navigates courses where he has built up “scar tissue” from disappointments past.
“I really like the progress that’s being made,” he said. “I’m just trying to get better and better. I’m not looking at what I’m doing right now as final, as far as the last couple of weeks. There’s a next level that I’m searching for.”
Three years of frustration have taken a psychological toll on the former world No. 1.
“It’s kind of the first time in my life where I’ve had a significant dip in success,” Spieth said. “It had kind of been a nice uptick every single year. So just kind of learning how to deal with that and doing it — and having to do it in such a public way was very difficult — can sometimes present even more challenges.
“But at the same time, the idea is to get to the bottom of it, turn it around, make progress each day and recognize that’s the past and I can use it as having some scar tissue and use it to my advantage going forward.”