Defending champion and two-time winner Steve Stricker and Duffy Waldorf shot matching rounds of 4-under par 66 to take the early lead in the Kaulig Companies Championship on the South Course of Firestone Country Club on Thursday.
Australian Richard Green and Akron favorite Kenny Perry, also a former winner, are one shot back. Five players – including the PGA Tour Champions’ second-leading money winner this year, New Zealander Steve Alker – are tied for fifth place at 2-under par 68.
Near-perfect playing conditions with slight winds of less than 10 miles an hour out of the northwest did not produce a ton of sub-par rounds. Only 16 of the 78 players in the field were able to break par.
Stricker, winner of this event in two of the last three years, birdied three holes on the front against one bogey to make the turn at 2-under 33. He added two more birdies on the back, including a textbook birdie-4 on the famed 640-yard 16th hole.
After a remarkable 2023 season in which he won six times — including three majors — and had five runner-up finishes, Stricker is looking for his first win in 2024.
“It was a good, solid start,” Stricker said. “We had great conditions, soft conditions, I played well. I had a couple of other opportunities that I wish I could have taken advantage of but it was a good sold round.”
Waldorf, 61, who has not won the PGA Tour Champions since 2016, started his round on the back side and got off to a nice start with birdies on 10, 14 and 15. He also had consecutive birdies on the front side on the sixth and par-3 seventh.
When asked what was tougher to deal with, getting worn out physically or mentally, Waldorf was blunt.
“It wears you out both,” he said. “I was in the cart a lot today, so I just let it wear me out mentally. Fortunately, since my game was solid and I was riding in the cart a lot, I felt like I was pretty fresh physically and I wasn’t in a lot of trouble. That’s the thing, I stayed out of trouble today. I only missed a few greens and only missed a few fairways and wasn’t in a lot of trouble and that really helps your mental game.”
The second round begins Friday at 10:10 a.m. with play going off both the first and tenth tees.
RD1 SCORES: 2024 Kaulig Companies Championship >
– Photo by PGA TOUR Champions
