Lower shoots career low score to gain first round lead in Fortinet Championship
By Kyle Foster, photo courtesy of Don Lex (LuckyDuckImages.com)
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
A new year season has sprung for the PGA Tour. Once again, it begins at Silverado Resort and Spa’s North Course for the Fortinet Championship.
While the first round may not be where a player can win the tournament, a bad round could certainly take them out of contention. That’s why a solid first round of play is all that’s needed to stay in the hunt for the final prize on Sunday.
Before the round even started, tee times were moved back by 90 minutes due to fog around the valley this morning. Because of the delay, not everyone was able to get in a full round.
In 2022, the field has six former Napa winners, dating back to 2015. One of them is Max Homa who won last year and it kickstarted a year in which he finished fifth in the FedExCup Standings and qualified for next week’s President’s Cup.
When the afternoon tee times began, Justin Lower quickly launched himself to the top of the scoring. He finished the round with a career-low score of 63 to put him at 9 under for the day. It was done with nine birdies and no bogeys for the round as well.
“I’ll take it. I birdied half the holes, so that’s always a good start, I guess,” Lower said of his round. “I’m honestly just happy to be in the position I am having I guess full status for once. I actually get to play events I wanted to play this fall. Last fall I only got three starts, so looking to get off to a better start this fall for sure.”
Lower was able to do all of this despite hitting half the fairways in the round. He hit just 7 of 14 fairways. He got on the green in regulation 14 times and was perfect when it came to scrambling and sand saves.
The only issue with having the lead after 18 holes is that no one has been in the conversation when the weekend comes around.
Defending winner Max Homa also went out in the afternoon and shot a 65 to put himself in second place all alone. He too had a bogey-free round with seven birdies.
“Yeah, just played solid, made it as easy as possible,” Homa said. “Holed a couple good putts, but for the most part just gave myself a lot of looks. Hit some wedges fairly close and played the par 5s 2 under, which out here you have to take advantage of them. They’re narrow, awkward tee shots, but I did well on a couple of them. So yeah, clean start to the season.”
Byeong Hun An stole the show in the morning tee times by going out and shooting a six-under 66 to jump to third on the leaderboard.
“I drove it — I didn’t drive it as good. It could have been a little bit better. I putted decent, hit it pretty good I guess,” An said of his round. “And there’s some mistakes here and there, but I scrambled very well and made some long par putts and birdie putts. Everything kept nicely together, I guess. Nothing was falling away from the vehicle, so overall 6 under, very happy with it in the first day of a new season. I’m looking forward to it.”
An was able to gain the lead by catching fire on the back nine holes where he made five of seven birdies for the round. The lone bogey of the round came on the 13th hole. Other than that, An was marvelous at scrambling to keep his score low. He was 6 of 7 when it came to scrambling.
Fellow countryman Seongyeon Kim joined An and tied for third on the leader board at six under for the day. That’s not bad for a guy who just completed his first round ever on the PGA Tour.
Kim could’ve had the lead if it wasn’t for bogeys on the 6th and 16th holes. He was great when it came to putting the ball on the green in regulation, as he was 14 for 18 in that department.
One of the biggest names in the event is Rickie Fowler. Fowler finished the round with a bogey-free round of 67 to put him a few strokes off the lead.
“Yeah, I always like it when there’s bogey-free in there,” said Fowler, a five-time winner on tour. “For the most part that was not in — wasn’t necessarily an issue other than one hole I had to make about a 15-footer for par after I hit it in the bunker. Other than that, it was a fairly simple day, but I think a lot of that was set up by drove it fairly nicely, especially the second half of the day and kind of was just able to keep moving forward. Not many times where I had to play too defensively. I think we did a really good job of executing and hitting a lot of shots where we were trying to.”
Fowler had an all-around solid round by hitting 9 of 14 fairways and 15 of 18 greens in regulation. Plus, he was 3 for 3 when it came to scrambling with a sand save.
Nick Taylor also shot a 67. However, he couldn’t have done it in a different way. He had three bogeys on the front nine to go along with a trio of birdies as well.
“Yeah, it’s great. I don’t know if it’s a rusty start or what, but it was kind of a long morning,” Taylor said of his slow start to the round. “I had probably 30 minutes to go before I teed off and then just kind of sat on the range for an hour and a half hitting shots here and there and taking breaks. That wasn’t the best kind of start, a little sloppy, but kind of clawed it back together, and to finish off like I did was a nice way to start the year.”
Birdies on holes 10, 12, and 14 put him under par before an eagle on 16 put him at five under for the day.
“Yeah, hit two great shots in there and left myself in a good spot,” Taylor said of his eagle on the 16th hole. “It’s one you expect to hit pretty close, but to go in was a nice bonus, so it was nice to kind of cap off the round that way.”
The Fortinet Championship continues with the second round and cuts tomorrow. Before that, the first round will finish up beginning at 7:20 am after play was suspended due to darkness with 35 players on the course still. Play was suspended due to darkness at 7:24 pm.
