Sitting on a two-shot lead after the start of the Charles Schwab Challenge, Jordan Spieth is seeking his second win on the PGA Tour this season and third consecutive top-10 finish in this event. Joint leader and the 2001 winner, Sergio Garcia opened with his lowest score on Tour since 2016. He was coming off four consecutive missed cuts.
India’s Anirban Lahiri had a horrendous start with a 7-over 77 and looks certain to miss cut.
Making his ninth start in the Charles Schwab Challenge, Spieth, the 2016 champion, birdied his last three holes (Nos. 7-9) for a bogey-free 7-under 63, his lowest score in 33 rounds at Colonial Country Club (previously 64/R1/2015/T2).
Thursday marked his fourth bogey-free score at the Charles Schwab Challenge and first since the final round of 2017.
A significant point is when holding the 18-hole lead/co-lead on the PGA Tour before this week, Spieth has converted for the win on three of 10 occasions (2015 Masters Tournament, 2017 Travelers Championship, 2017 The Open Championship)
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His most recent 18-hole lead/co-lead came two weeks ago at the AT&T Byron Nelson in Dallas (T9). In his last 11 stroke-play events on Tour, has now posted a sub-par opening-round score 10 times (1-over 73 in last week’s PGA Championship)
Jordan Spieth is seeking his 13th career PGA Tour title and second of the season (Valero Texas Open). With a win this week, he could overtake the No. 1 spot in the FedExCup.
Garcia, making his 10th start in the Charles Schwab Challenge, played the stretch of Nos. 8-11 in birdie-birdie-birdie-eagle for his lowest score on Tour since posting a 7-under 63 in Round One of the 2016 AT&T Byron Nelson in Dallas (won in playoff).
This is the third occasion Garcia has opened a Tour event with a score of 63 or better; both previous occasions came at the AT&T Byron Nelson in Dallas (1999/62/T3, 2016/63/won).
A win this week would come 20 years after his first Charles Schwab Challenge victory. The most recent of his 11 PGA Tour titles came early in the season at the Sanderson Farms Championship.
With a win, Garcia would join Stewart Cink and Bryson DeChambeau as multiple winners on Tour this season
A week after his PGA Championship victory, 2000 and 2008 Charles Schwab Challenge winner, Phil Mickelson, opened with a 3-over 73 in his 17th start at the Charles Schwab Challenge.
Text courtesy:- PGA Tour
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