Adam Hadwin wasn’t the guy everyone came to see at Torrey Pines South on Thursday but he was the guy they ended up talking about at the Farmers Insurance Open.
Hadwin, who shot 59 last week at the CareerBuilder but failed to cash in with a win, kept his momentum Thursday when he shot a sparking 66 at Torrey Pines South. Even though Justin Rose put up a 65 at the easier North Course to hold the official lead, Hadwin’s round was the best, really it was.
“I don’t wanna say it’s as good as a 59 but it was pretty darn good,” the Canadian player said of his effort that he can one day tell his children about. He had beaten Tiger Woods by ten shots. “The conditions were soft out there and you could take advantage of that in places,” said Hadwin, whose day included seven birdies, four of them on the final six holes of the beastly South course.
Rose got his 65 with two eagles that allowed him to play his last five holes in five-under par over on the more birdie-friendly North course.
“Drove it well and we had ball-in-hand,” Rose said after his round. The field played lift-clean-and-place due to the wet conditions brought about by recent heavy rains in Southern California.
But all the attention was focused on the Tiger Woods group on the South course that included Woods, Jason Day and Dustin Johnson.
It was a struggle overall for the all-star group. All three birdied the final hole but that only yielded an even par round of 72 for day, a 73 for Johnson and an ugly 76 for Woods. Woods had it one-under through 11 but couldn’t find a fairway on his way in and played the 12th through 17th six-over with three straight bogeys and a double at the 15th then another bogey at 17.
On Friday, Woods, Day and Johnson will move over to the more birdie-friendly North course where Woods will have to shoot a low score just to make the 36-hole cut. His 76 left him in a tie for 133.
