News

Morning 9: Women’s Olympic golf: No. 1 Nelly in front | Bryson on COVID-19, vaccine

Published

5 years ago

Aug 5, 2021

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt

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August 5, 2021

Good Thursday morning, golf fans. Check out my latest Tour Truck Report here.

1. Women’s Olympic golf: No. 1 Nelly in front

The AP’s Doug Ferguson…”Already with her first major title and the No. 1 ranking, Nelly Korda took a big step toward a gold medal Thursday with a 9-under 62 that tied an Olympic record and gave her a four-shot lead.”

“…Her 62 still tied the Olympic women’s record set by Maria Verchenova of Russia last time in the final round at Olympic Golf Course in Rio de Janeiro.”

“Korda, who won the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Atlanta Athletic Club six weeks ago, was thinking more about the size of her lead than having a chance to become only the second woman to shoot 59.”

Full piece.

2. Decision pending regarding shortening women’s Olympic golf tourney

ESPN’s Bob Harig…”The women’s Olympic golf tournament could be shortened to 54 holes due to an approaching tropical storm set to hit Kasumigaseki Country Club on Friday, with a golf official saying the hope is that players will be notified before the third round if a change is made.”

“The scheduled 72-hole event is in danger because play is not allowed to extend beyond Sunday’s closing ceremony and the ability to play more than 18 holes in a day is mitigated due to heat indexes above 100 degrees.”

“We have notified the players that we may have to be forced to reduce to a 54-hole competition,” said Heather Daly-Donofrio, an official with the International Golf Federation, during a media briefing Wednesday. “We will not change [Thursday’s] schedule. We will play 18 holes as scheduled. We will play another 18 holes on Friday, and then we will continue to track this tropical system and see what Saturday brings.”

Full piece.

3. Bryson

Golf Channel’s Ryan Lavner…“A week after having his Olympic dreams dashed because of a positive COVID-19 test, Bryson DeChambeau was back on the PGA Tour – looking leaner and sounding a bit nasally.”

“DeChambeau said he lost about 10 pounds in the aftermath of his COVID diagnosis, which came July 23, during the first wave of testing ahead of his departure for the Tokyo Olympics. Unable to compete, he withdrew from the competition, allowing Patrick Reed to play for the U.S. Olympic team for the second time.”

…”When asked whether he had any regrets about not getting vaccinated earlier, considering his Olympic withdrawal, DeChambeau said: “The thing is, the vaccine doesn’t necessarily prevent it from happening. That’s where for me, I’m young enough, I’d rather give it to people that need it. I don’t need it. I’m healthy. I’m a young individual that will continue to be healthy and continue to work on my health. But I don’t think that taking a vaccine away from someone that could need it is a good thing.”

Full piece.

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The idea behind the Morning 9 is a roundup of the day’s most significant storylines presented in an easy-to-digest format. The Golfer’s Journal occupies the other end of the spectrum: long-form, photo rich essays from some of the best writers in golf discussing all elements of this beautiful, maddening game.

More a collection of essays than a magazine. More a coffee table book of first-rate photos than a glossy, ad-filled monthly — GJ is a must-have for true lovers of golf.

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4. Rose Zhang upset

AP report…??”Defending champion Rose Zhang tumbled out of the U.S. Women’s Amateur in the first round of match play Wednesday, with qualifying medalist Rachel Kuehn one of seven of the top eight seeds to fall.”

“Elle Nachmann, a sophomore from Boca Raton, Florida, who carries a 4.0 GPA in the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, beat Zhang 1 up at Westchester Country Club.”

Full piece.

5. Lexi’s bagman takes a rest

Charlotte Gibson for ESPN…”Lexi Thompson had a new caddie on her bag for the second round of the women’s golf tournament at the Tokyo Olympics on Thursday: Drew Hinesley.”

“Hinesley, who was in Tokyo working with NBC, took over because Thompson’s regular caddie, Jack Fulghum, suffered from heat exhaustion and dehydration during the first round and had to exit during the back nine at the Kasumigaseki Country Club on Wednesday.”

Full piece.

6. Tour reinstates indoor mask policy

ESPN’s Bob Harig…”With recent concern over the delta variant of the coronavirus and an increase in positive cases around the country, the PGA Tour this week re-implemented an indoor mask policy for all individuals, but it stopped short of resuming its COVID-19 testing.”

“Two weeks ago, the tour stopped the practice of weekly testing at events.”

“Given the increase in cases across the country, resumption of some level of serial testing is a possibility,” said Andy Levinson, senior vice president, tournament administration for the PGA Tour, in an email. “However, at this time with our high vaccination rates across core constituents, our medical advisors have not recommended testing of asymptomatic individuals regardless of vaccination status.”

Full piece.

7. Spieth

Golf Channel’s Ryan Lavner…”Even if Spieth said that he realistically could have won “three or four” times in 2021, including a major, he takes pride in his progression. No doubt, it’s been a resurgent year for the former world No. 1 who, at one point, was spiraling toward the top 100 in the world (now he’s all the way up to 11th.) Sitting No. 2 in the FedExCup standings, he has a chance to win his second season-long title and $15 million. He’s a virtual lock for a fourth Ryder Cup appearance, too.”

“I’m doing a lot of the major things really well now, which is allowing me to have more consistent start lines through the bag, which allows me to step up with confidence and have chances to win golf tournaments,” he said. “I wouldn’t say there’s anything that I sit there and say I’m doing it the best I ever have, but I think I’m doing a lot of things really well. I’ve given myself quite a bit of grace and I’ve gained a lot of confidence, but I still think that there’s a next level through the bag with each part of my game.”

Full piece.

Seriously — check out the spread above. Subscribe to the Golfer’s Journal (or give it as a gift to the golf aficionados in your life!).

8. Don’t miss 1-footers

Rory McIlroy had this to say regarding Justin Warren’s Monday qualifier playoff exit following a missed one-foot putt… “Don’t miss 1-footers, I guess, is a piece of advice,” McIlroy said. “I guess that’s a little bit tough love.”

McIlroy then continued, talking about his first chance to win a professional event, at the 2008 European Masters, where he missed an 18-incher in a playoff to lose.

“I thought about it for a long time until I got that first win,” McIlroy added. “But I guess the solace he can take is he’s played well enough to give himself a chance. Like we all do dumb things under pressure at times, I’ve certainly done them. The next time – you know, I learned from that that every putt that I had, I took a little bit more time and I wasn’t quite as careless. So there’s a lot of things you can learn from these things. I guess he can take encouragement that he gave himself a chance and he played well to be in that spot.”

Full piece.

9. WITB Time Machine: Tiger Woods 2013 WGC-Bridgestone winning gear

Driver: Nike VR_S Covert Tour Prototype (9.5 degrees)

Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana White Board 73 X

3-wood: Nike VR_S Covert Tour (15 degrees)

Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana Blue Board 103 X

5-wood: Nike VR_S Covert (19 degrees)

Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana Blue Board 103 X

Irons: Nike VR Pro Blade (3-PW)

Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100

Wedges: Nike VR Pro Forged (56, 60 degrees)

Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400

Putter: Nike Method 001

Ball: Nike ONE Tour D

Full piece.

GolfWRX

News

Testing Lorem Ipsum

Published

4 hours ago

May 13, 2026

Pro Shop

What is Lorem Ipsum?

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Why do we use it?

It is a long established fact that a reader will be distracted by the readable content of a page when looking at its layout. The point of using Lorem Ipsum is that it has a more-or-less normal distribution of letters, as opposed to using ‘Content here, content here’, making it look like readable English. Many desktop publishing packages and web page editors now use Lorem Ipsum as their default model text, and a search for ‘lorem ipsum’ will uncover many web sites still in their infancy. Various versions have evolved over the years, sometimes by accident, sometimes on purpose (injected humour and the like).

News

2026 PGA Championship betting odds

Published

2 days ago

May 12, 2026

Gianni Magliocco

Scottie Scheffler leads the betting ahead of the second major championship of the year, with the World Number One a +345 favorite to get his hands on a second PGA Championship.

Rory McIlroy who won the Masters back in April is a +800 shot to complete half of the calendar slam at Aronimink Golf Club this week, while Jordan Spieth can be backed at +5900 to become a career grand slam winner.

Here is the full betting board for the 2026 PGA Championship courtesy of DraftKings.

Scottie Scheffler +345 – (Check 0ut his WITB here)

Rory McIlroy +800 – (Check out his WITB here)

Jon Rahm +1300
Cameron Young +1500
Bryson DeChambeau +1700
Xander Schauffele +1850
Matt Fitzpatrick +1950
Ludvig Aberg +2000
Tommy Fleetwood +2600
Collin Morikawa +3500
Brooks Koepka +3900
Justin Rose +4300
Russell Henley +4600
Si Woo Kim +4700
Justin Thomas +4800
Robert MacIntyre +5300
Patrick Cantlay +5300
Viktor Hovland +5400
Tyrrell Hatton +5500
Jordan Spieth +5900
Sam Burns +6000
Hideki Matsuyama +6200
Adam Scott +6400
Rickie Fowler +7000
Chris Gotterup +7400
Patrick Reed +7400
Min Woo Lee +7800
Ben Griffin +8000
Sepp Straka +8400
Shane Lowry +9000
Akshay Bhatia +9200
Maverick McNealy +9200
Joaquin Niemann +9200
Jake Knapp +9200
Jason Day +9600
Kurt Kitayama +10000
J.J. Spaun +10000
Harris English +10500
Nicolai Hojgaard +11000
Gary Woodland +11000
David Puig +11000
Michael Thorbjornsen +12000
Jacob Bridgeman +12000
Keegan Bradley +12500
Corey Conners +14000
Alex Fitzpatrick +15000
Sungjae Im +15500
Sahith Theegala +15500
Harry Hall +15500
Alex Noren +16000
Thomas Detry +16500
Marco Penge +16500
Kristoffer Reitan +17000
Alex Smalley +17000
Wyndham Clark +17500
Sam Stevens +17500
Keith Mitchell +17500
Daniel Berger +18500
Ryan Gerard +20000
Nick Taylor +20000
Rasmus Hojgaard +21000
Dustin Johnson +21000
Pierceson Coody +23000
Aaron Rai +24000
Jordan Smith +24000
Angel Ayora +24000
Bud Cauley +25000
Matt McCarty +26000
Jayden Schaper +26000
Brian Harman +27000
Taylor Pendrith +27000
Ryan Fox +27000
J.T. Poston +27000
Cameron Smith +29000
Ryo Hisatsune +29000
Michael Kim +29000
Max Homa +29000
Denny McCarthy +29000
Tom McKibbin +30000
Rico Hoey +32000
Matt Wallace +32500
Ricky Castillo +33000
Haotong Li +33000
Michael Brennan +34000
Max Greyserman +36000
Stephan Jaeger +37500
Christiaan Bezuidenhout +37500
Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen +39000
Aldrich Potgieter +40000
Andrew Novak +42000
Patrick Rodgers +42500
Daniel Hillier +42500
Max McGreevy +46000
Billy Horschel +48000
Chris Kirk +48000
Ian Holt +49000
Casey Jarvis +49000
William Mouw +50000
Steven Fisk +50000
John Parry +50000
Nico Echavarria +52500
Garrick Higgo +52500
John Keefer+55000
Matthias Schmid +57500
Austin Smotherman +57500
Sami Valimaki +60000
Andrew Putnam +60000
Lucas Glover +62500
Daniel Brown +62500
Jhonattan Vegas +75000
Emiliano Grillo +80000
Mikael Lindberg +85000
Adrien Saddier +100000
Bernd Wiesberger +100000
Elvis Smylie +110000
Stewart Cink +130000
Kota Kaneko +130000
David Lipsky +150000
Chandler Blanchet +150000
Andy Sullivan +150000
Joe Highsmith +180000
Adam Schenk +200000
Travis Smyth +200000
Davis Riley +225000
Martin Kaymer +400000
Brian Campbell +400000
Padraig Harrington +450000
Kazuki Higa +450000
Jordan Gumberg +450000
Ryan Vermeer +500000
Austin Hurt +500000
Tyler Collet +500000
Timothy Wiseman +500000
Shaun Micheel +500000
Y.E. Yang +500000
Michael Block+500000
Mark Geddes+500000
Luke Donald+500000
Bryce Fisher+500000
Jimmy Walker +500000
Jason Dufner +500000
Jesse Droemer +500000
Jared Jones +500000
Garrett Sapp +500000
Francisco Bide +500000
Zach Haynes +500000
Paul McClure+500000
Derek Berg +500000
Chris Gabriele +500000
Braden Shattuck +500000
Ben Polland +500000
Ben Kern +50000

Tour Photo Galleries

Photos from the 2026 PGA Championship

Published

2 days ago

May 11, 2026

GolfWRX Staff

GolfWRX is on site for the second major of 2026: The PGA Championship from Aronimink in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania.

The tournament’s location, just outside Philadelphia, and its status as a major championship mean GolfWRXers are in for a treat: WITBs from a strong field, custom gear celebrating the PGA Championship, and the rich culture of the City of Brotherly Love — we have noted a relative absence of cheesesteak-themed items thus far this week, but most of the rest of the usual suspects are well represented.

Check out links to all our photos below.