Not even a two-and-a-half-hour weather delay could cool off Talor Gooch’s red-hot stretch of golf, as last week’s LIV Golf Adelaide winner grabbed the first-round lead for the second consecutive week.
Gooch’s bogey-free seven-under 64 gave him a one-shot advantage after Friday’s weather-disrupted opening round of LIV Golf Singapore.
However, his closest pursuers in a rain-disrupted day are a proper ‘who’s-who’ of golf Gliteratti, as Sergio Garcia, Brooks Koepka, Cameron Smith and Cameron Tringale right behind him, with Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau and Louis Oosthuizen two shots back.
It’s a leaderboard stacked with big names at the top, as eight major winners are inside the top 12 at Sentosa Golf Club. They’re all chasing Gooch, the RangeGoats star who opened with record-setting 10-under 62s in the first two rounds at Adelaide en route to his first LIV Golf individual victory.
“There’s no pixie dust I’ve thrown on the clubs the last couple weeks,” Gooch said. “It’s just the game comes and goes in waves, and hopefully we can continue to ride this wave for as long as we can and play a bunch of good golf.”
Leading the team leaderboard is HyFlyers, who come off their best result of the season, a fourth-place finish, in Adelaide. Tringale’s six-under 65 was the team’s best score, with captain Phil Mickelson (66) and James Piot (70) in support for the 12-under cumulative score. The South African Stinger collective are one stroke behind at 11-under, with Ripper, Smash and the RangeGoats tied for third at 9-under.
“It’s fun to see our captain playing so well,” Tringale said of Mickelson, the six-time major champ who earlier this month tied for second at the Masters at Augusta National. “This golf course is fun. A lot can happen quickly.”
Friday’s round was delayed after 12 holes due to severe weather in the area. The lengthy delay did not slow down Gooch, who birdied the par-4 13th before finishing his round with an eagle at the par-5 18th when his second shot from 253 yards finished inside 30 feet.
Gooch was 20-under through 36 holes last week in Adelaide, and entered the final round with a 10-shot lead. Given the bunched-up leaderboard behind him, Gooch is not concentrating on leads but just wants to maintain his good play.
“I have a buddy of mine that has been like a mentor to me since I was 10,” he said, “and he always said: ‘In golf, the penthouse and the outhouse are always right around the corner from each other.’ You try not to get too high or too low when things are too good or aren’t good. You’ve got to earn it. The 62s and 64s don’t just happen, and just because you’re confident doesn’t mean it’s going to happen again.”
With severe weather in the forecast for the weekend, the shotgun start for the final two rounds has been moved up.