News

Morning 9: Hovland hoists a trophy in Mexico (again) | Not hampered by borrowed driver | Lydia Ko

Published

5 years ago

Nov 8, 2021

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt

For comments—or if you’re looking for a fourth—email me at ben.alberstadt@golfwrx.com.

November 8, 2021

Good Monday morning, golf fans.

1. Hovland hoists a trophy in Mexico (again)

AP report…”Viktor Hovland won again on the PGA Tour, this time without a clutch finish. The Norwegian star was too dominant to give anyone else a chance Sunday in the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba.”

“Hovland seized control with three birdies on the front nine, and never let Scottie Scheffler, Justin Thomas or anyone else get closer than three shots the rest of the way.”

“He closed with a 4-under 67 for a four-shot lead over Carlos Ortiz of Mexico, making him the first repeat winner since Mayakoba began in 2007.”

Full piece.

2. Not hampered by borrowed driver

Adam Stanley for PGATour.com…”Wednesday afternoon at the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba, Lee, who finished T2 last week at the Butterfield Bermuda Championship, was in the middle of a speed-training session. He was getting up to about 185 m.p.h. ball speed but Viktor Hovland, who was next to him, wanted to see how much more speed Lee could generate with his driver – which is about an inch longer.”

“Lee stepped on one, and the shaft shattered.”

…”Enter James Hahn, who had another Ping G-425 driver to nearly the same specs as Hovland’s usual gamer.”

…”Kenton Oates, who is a PGA TOUR rep for Ping, said the driver Hovland put into play on Thursday was the same model, same loft, and had the same swing weight – with a slightly different shaft – as Hovland’s usual driver…”

“It’s a little bit shorter, it’s a different shaft, but honestly, almost helped me this week because it’s a little shorter,” said Hovland. “It probably goes 10 yards shorter, but I just felt like I could really hit it a little lower and a little straighter. So I’m hitting that thing really well.”

Full piece.

3. Ko wins in Saudi Arabia

Our Ron Montesano…”Lydia Ko is the OG Ko, having earned that moniker at a young age when she took over women’s golf for a time. As she grew into the professional sport, she kept winning. The winning stopped, but the desire never ebbed.”

“This week, Lydia Ko reclaimed the game that made her the role model for many, winning on the Ladies European Tour by a healthy five shots. Atthaya Thitikul, one of the generation of young Thai golfers, claimed a second-place finish that was not nearly as close as it appeared if a five-shot margin can be considered close. Down by four to begin the day, Thitikul went out on Sunday in 32 and lost ground to Ko.”

“The Kiwi Ko posted eagle at the ninth hole to turn in 31, extending her advantage. Two more birdies, at 10 and 13, expanded the gulf to seven. A game Thitikul scratched three closing birdies onto her card to secure a five-shot advantage of her own (over third-place finishers Carlota Ciganda and Alice Hewson) but there would be no chasing down the champion.”

Full piece.

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4. Pieters takes Portugal Masters

Montesano again…”The tournament at Vilamoura went from the other tournament with a 61, to the tournament that no one seemed prepared to win, to a fifth tour title for Thomas Pieters of Belgium. To recap, Italy’s Nino Bertasio opened with a round of ten-under, survived Friday with 69, stumbled on Saturday with 74, and rebounded on Sunday with 67 to finish in a tie for fifth position. France’s Mathieu Pavon coasted through the first nine holes on Sunday, turning in three-under 32. His birdie at ten increased his lead, but his triple-bogey eight at the par-5 12th brought him crashing to earth. From there on, it was birdie-bogey-birdie-par-bogey-par for 70, and a minus-17 finish. Pavon will regret the back-nine par-5 holes, which he played in 4 over par on the weekend.”

“Enter Nicolai Højgaard, who played the first 17 holes in magnificent fashion on Sunday. He stood minus-eight on the 18th tee, 18-under for the tournament. Knowing that he needed one more birdie, he flew too high, creased the sun, and made bogey. Højgaard finished in a tie for second with countryman Lucas Bjerregaard, whose 67 brought him into a tie with Højgaard and Pavon for second stage on the podium. The stage was set for third-round leader Pieters to snatch a victory, and his birdie at the 17th gave him a two-shot cushion at the last. He converted a long putt for par at the last for a 68, a 19-under total, and his first win since 2019.”

Full piece.

5. KFT Q-School delayed

Golf Channel’s Brentley Romine…”The final stage of Korn Ferry Tour Q-School is extending into at least another day.”

“Inclement weather scrapped third-round play on Saturday at The Landings Club, forcing officials to implement a Monday finish. The third round will now begin at 8 a.m. ET Sunday on both the Marshwood and Magnolia courses while the final round will start at the same time Monday morning.”

“The last tee times on those days will be 10:12 a.m.”

“I’ve never been so pumped to get a text regarding golf in my life,” said Blayne Barber, who was likely not alone in rejoicing that no golf would be played Saturday in 40-degree temperatures, 15-20 mph winds and heavy rain.”

Full piece.

6. Steven Alker notches first Champions win

AP report…”Steven Alker had to qualify for his first PGA Tour Champions event three months ago and kept playing all the way to the Charles Schwab Cup final.”

“Alker capped off his amazing run Sunday when he closed with a 4-under 68 for a two-shot victory in the TimberTech Championship, easily moving into the top 36 players who advance to the Charles Schwab Cup Championship.”

Full piece.

7. Viktor Hovland’s winning WITB

Driver: Ping G425 LST (9 degrees @8.4)

Shaft: Fujikura Speeder 661 TX

3-wood: TaylorMade SIM (15 degrees)

Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei Blue AV Raw 85 TX)

Irons: Ping i210 (3-PW)

Shafts: Graphite Design Tour AD DI Hybrid 85 X (3), KBS Tour V 120 X (4-PW)

Wedges: Ping Glide Forged Pro (50-SS, 56-SS), Titleist Vokey Design SM8 WedgeWorks (60)

Shafts: KBS Tour V 130 X

Putter: Ping PLD DS 72

Ball: Titleist Pro V1

Grips: Golf Pride MCC

Full piece.

News

Testing Lorem Ipsum

Published

6 hours ago

May 13, 2026

Pro Shop

What is Lorem Ipsum?

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged. It was popularised in the 1960s with the release of Letraset sheets containing Lorem Ipsum passages, and more recently with desktop publishing software like Aldus PageMaker including versions of Lorem Ipsum.

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.