Ogilvy shares Tour Championship lead
BY Bruce Young | US PGA Tour | 2010 PGA Tour Championship | Round One | 24 Sep 2010
Three players are tied on top of the leaderboard at the completion of the opening round of the Tour Championship at the East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta.
Australian Geoff Ogilvy and England’s Paul Casey and Luke Donald each recorded 4 under par rounds of 66 and lead by one over Jim Furyk with a further shot back to K.J. Choi.
Ogilvy, who was in 12th position on the FedEx Cup points list has moved into third position on the projected points although given the volatility and permutations of that particular list it means very little at this stage of the week. He has however made a fine start on a golf course where his previous best finish in a 30 man field has been 16th. He has put together several very good individual rounds over the years and his task over the following 54 holes will be to go on with it.
“I just played well,” said Ogilvy after his round. “I know it sounds silly, but it wasn’t anything in particular. I drove the ball quite nicely. I don’t think I hit all the fairways, but I was right next to a lot of fairways in good lies.
“I hit my irons very well and I had quite a lot of five, six, seven-foot putts for birdies and I made all of them, I think. So it was just a tidy round of golf on a golf course that’s pretty difficult.
“I mean, this course has got a lot harder since they put the Bermuda greens in. It’s got firmer. It shows you on a pretty nice day there was a little breeze but nothing to make it too hard that all you need is a little bounce on the green to add a whole new element to the golf course. You’ve got to miss them in the right spots.”
Of Ogilvy’s co-leaders after day one, Paul Casey has moved to the top of the FedEx Cup points table while Luke Donald has moved from 7th to 2nd.
Casey was coy when asked as to the ongoing motivation of his Ryder Cup snub. “No, this is – for me I’ve got an opportunity to accomplish one of the goals which I set for myself at the beginning of the year, so that’s – now that the tournament is started, I’m just trying to put myself that position to win and then tick off that goal, which would be a huge goal. I’m not getting wrapped up in any sort of extra motivation. I don’t need extra motivation. I’m motivated enough.”
A large group is at 1 under and in a share of 6th position including the world number one in waiting Phil Mickelson and Australian Jason Day who continues his remarkable and breakthrough season on the PGA Tour. Mickelson needs to finish tied for second or better this week to claim the number one title in golf for the very first time.
Of the other Australians Robert Allenby was next best at 1 over while for previous winner Adam Scott it was a horror day, especially from the tee and on the greens. Scott’s round of 74 has him eight shots off the lead.
