Players who teed off early on Friday experienced the most difficult of conditions so far this week in the 108th PGA Championship at Aronimink.
There were bright blue skies, but players were weathering the storm of gusty crosswinds, thick rough and doing everything they could to make sure they were missing in the right spots to avoid a big number.
But Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama was superb in every way. He followed up an even-par 70 Thursday afternoon with a brilliant 3-under 67 to take the early clubhouse lead.
“It was really tough,” the 2021 Masters champion explained. “It was really windy yesterday, and this morning was windy. Plus it was freezing cold, and it made it very difficult.”
Matsuyama started on the back nine – the more difficult of the two nines this week – and kept the card clean. From the back fringe on the par-4 13th, he rolled in a 23-footer for his first birdie of the day and made the turn at 1 under.
Matsuyama kept things going on the front nine. He birdied the par-4 third on a 9-foot putt. He followed that with a birdie from 4 feet at No. 5, a 184-yard par 3.
“The greens are big and lots of undulations,” he said. “But if you're not hitting it in the right side of the fairway with your tee shot, it makes the second shot really difficult. So it's an all-around difficult golf course.”
Matsuyama’s only bogey of the day came on No. 6 when his approach from the fairway zipped back off the front of the green and he was unable to get up and down, but bounced right back with a birdie on a 20-foot putt at No. 7 that curled from right to left and died into the hole.
“My birdie putt hung on the lip and -- for a while, and then the wind blew it in,” he said. “So that was probably my best one.”
Matsuyama is no stranger to the mindset it takes to play well in majors. Along with the win at the Masters, he has nine other top-10 finishes in majors.
The key? Limiting mistakes.
“At majors it's missing it well,” he said. “In majors, I mean you're going to have misses, but you have to miss it in the right place.”
