SONOMA, Calif. — Nick Price made a 25-foot putt on the 18th hole to pull even with David Eger at 6-under-par 66 atop the leaderboard Thursday in the first round of the Charles Schwab Cup Championship.
Battling intermittent rains that are expected to get worse during the weekend, Price and Eger took a one-stroke lead over Mike Goodes in the Champions Tour’s season-ending event. Tom Kite, who played a bogey-free round along with Price, and Andy Bean are two shots back in the $2.5 million tournament, which also decides the tour’s season-long Schwab Cup points competition.
“Given the forecast, I guess this was the round to get your good score in,” Eger said.
Price, who has won more than $1 million in 17 events this season, hit a 41-footer for birdie on the 16th before ending his round with another long putt.
“I had good control with my irons, my distance and my accuracy,” said Price, who is out of contention for the Schwab Cup and its $1 million annuity after playing just a part-time Champions Tour schedule. “That’s really what set up my round. I missed some very makable putts . . . but all in all, it always balances out. Those two bombs I made, sometimes that happens.”
Jay Haas, who leads Fred Funk by a slim 12-point margin in the Schwab Cup competition, got off to a solid start with a 3-under 69. He was five strokes better than Funk, whose 74 was the first round’s worst score.
Bernhard Langer, the Champions Tour’s money leader by less than $50,000 over Haas, shot a 71. Langer is third in the Schwab Cup standings, while Eduardo Romero (69) and John Cook (70) also have mathematical chances to win it.
Jones, Letzig share lead
PALM COAST, Fla. — Kent Jones recovered from a tee shot in the rough to birdie the 18th hole for a 7-under 65, giving him a share of the lead with rookie Michael Letzig in the first round of the Ginn sur Mer Classic.
They had a two-shot margin over Ryan Palmer, who birdied three of his first five holes and eased his way to a 67.
Jones and Letzig played college golf at New Mexico a decade apart, but that’s where the similarities end.
Letzig, who had never played a PGA Tour event until earning his card last year through the Nationwide Tour, is 109th on the money list and is in good shape to keep his job for next season.
Jones has spent most of his 10-year career around the 125th spot on the money list — the cutoff for keeping his card — and he arrived at the Ginn Ocean Hammock Resort at No. 179.
He hacked out of waist-high native grass with a 5-iron into a fairway bunker on the par-5 18th hole, then hit 6-iron within 6 feet for an unlikely birdie and a share of the lead.
“That was my best round of the year, but that’s not saying much,” Jones said.
Letzig made six of his birdies from farther than 20 feet and matched Jones with a bogey-free round.
Jeff Overton, playing only a week after an emergency appendectomy because he has fallen to No. 126 on the money list, shot a 71.
Kjeldsen atop Volvo Masters
SOTOGRANDE, Spain — Soren Kjeldsen shot a 6-under 65 for a three-stroke lead over Sergio Garcia after the first round of the Volvo Masters, and Lee Westwood (70) surged ahead in the chase for the Order of Merit title.
The Associated Press
