Hot shot hybrids:Austrian Markus Brier fires his Wilson Staff hybrid at the US PGA this week (Picture: Pete Fontaine/Visions in golf)
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On a course with so many doglegs, players are using hybrid clubs and long irons off the tee. Tiger Woods has fizzed long irons and fairway woods
all week and implemented the same tactics that saw him hit just one driver to win the 2006 Open.
“I don't plan to use many drivers,” he said
at the start of the week. “The ball is flying forever. I hit a 6-iron at the 10th that went 230 yards."
Paul McGinley, who shot a 66 on Friday, said that the difference in the flight of the ball this week in 100 degree heat “makes one-and-a-half clubs less than in the cold of Carnoustie."
" It's just a matter of working out the new yardages to go with the clubs in your practice rounds and when you've got that nailed, it's just a matter of numbers - and feel.”
The 89th PGA Championship is Tiger Woods' 50th major, including those played as an amateur, and the world number one spoke about how
course set-ups have got tougher and tougher.
“It seems like every course we go to has been lengthened and they change pars around. If
they can change Pebble Beach to a par 71, they can pretty much do anything,” he said. “Fairways have been narrowed but the rough has been
pretty consistent over the years.
"But a lot of the landing areas, at about 280 yards, have been pinched in. The ball is going further with
narrower fairways so they are even harder to hit. There is more of a premium on getting the ball in play. I played to the same spots as my
strategy here at the US Open in 2001, but probably with one or two clubs less because the balls are going further now.”
