By Rahul Banerji
Anirban Lahiri goes into his seventh PGA Championship with the comfort of a bogey-free final round at LIV Golf Tulsa behind him that saw his team miss the podium by a whisker at Cedar Creek.
India’s lone face at the high-pressure parallel league, Lahiri opens his campaign in the year’s second major alongside Korea’s Si Woo Kim and Stephen Jaeger of Germany for the first two rounds at Oak Hill.
Ahead of the 105th PGA Championship, Lahiri tweeted, “Another solid bogey free Sunday and a great buildup to the PGA Championship. It’s now major time.”
As many as 99 of the world’s top 100 players are in the PGA Championship field including LIV Golf stars Phil Mickelson, a two-time winner, Tulsa winner Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka, Patrick Reed, Bryson DeChambeau and Cameron Smith.
The much-debated point about how 54-hole regulars would last over 72 holes was well settled by Mickelson and Koepka, who shared second place behind Jon Rahm at Augusta National.
Seventeen LIV Golf members are in the field at Rochester, New York (England’s Paul Casey being a late withdrawal) with Lahiri making the list on the back of his runner-up finish at the Asian Tour’s International Series Vietnam event in mid-April.
Much-awaited
It was a call-up Lahiri, who will also turn out at the Asian Games later this year in China, was waiting for. With LIV Golf offering no official ranking points, it needed a strong finish in Vietnam to gain precious world ranking points.
Lahiri’s eventual runner-up placing at Cam Ranh guaranteed him enough points to open the door to the PGA Championship, where he has a tied fifth finish, an India best at a major back in 2015.
In all, the 35-year-old has 17 major appearances so far making the cut at the Masters in 2015 and 2016, at the Open thrice (2012, 2015, 2016) and twice at the PGA Championship, He has not made the weekend rounds at the US Open in three starts (2015, 2016 and 2019).
Meanwhile, Joohyung Kim is prepared for a severe test when he lines up in his third PGA Championship appearance at Oak Hill Country Club this week.
The 20-year-old, already a two-time tour winner, is amongst a strong Asian contingent gathered at Rochester for the tournament that delivered the region’s first male major champion in Korea’s Y.E. Yang in 2009 at Hazeltine.
Another Korean, Sungjae Im, who missed out last year due to Covid, will tee up in good form following a home victory on the Korean PGA Tour last week.
Strong contingent
Other Asian hopefuls keen to make an impression at the challenging par-70 Oak Hill layout include Si Woo Kim, K.H. Lee and Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama, winner of the 2021 Masters, , the PGA Tour said.
“It’s a tough track, but it rewards good golf. So looking forward to it,” said Kim on Wednesday.
Kim missed the cut at the PGA Championship in 2020 and last year, but he was 23 rdat the US Open and T47 at The Open Championship last year.
Last month, he finished a joint 16th in his Masters Tournament debut.
“It’s my third one. It’s kind of cool to have it because this is the most major championships I’ve played so far,” said Kim, who won at the Shriners Children’s Open and has three other top-10s this season.
With Justin Thomas defending his title this week against world number one Rahm, second ranked Scottie Scheffler and number three Rory McIlroy, Kim knows he faces not just a demanding golf course but also a powerful field.
Tough track
“It’s hard for everyone. I think it rewards good golf shots, and I think that’s the big thing. You can’t fluke it around here.
“You really need to control your ball really well, hit a lot of fairways; you have to hit a lot of greens.
“At the same time, you just have to be really mentally tough. It’s a major championship. I feel like this course definitely shows you why it’s a major championship,” said the world’s 19th-ranked player.
Oak Hill hosts its seventh major championship in all and the first since the 2013 PGA Championship.
Three PGA Championships (1980/Jack Nicklaus, 2003/Shaun Micheel and 2013/Jason Dufner) and three US Opens (1956/Cary Middlecoff, 1968/Lee Trevino, 1989/Curtis Strange) have been held here previously.
Also read: Anirban Lahiri gets seventh PGA Championship call-up
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