There’s been some rain in the Phoenix area but the storms from California will lose some of their power.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Sunday’s final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was wiped out by inclement weather. The Los Angeles area’s Riviera Country Club, host of next week’s Genesis Invitational, has been getting pounded by rain from systems pushing along the West Coast and setting rainfall records fueled by El Niño and atmospheric rivers.
What about this week’s WM Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale?
Cloudy skies eventually produced some rainfall Tuesday afternoon and there’s an 80 percent chance of rain overnight. Tom Frieders, a warning coordination meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Phoenix, said the heaviest rainfall throughout the state is expected Tuesday into Wednesday, when there is a 55 percent chance of more rain. Thursday has about a 45 percent chance, then it should get nice for the weekend.
Matt Salerno, meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Phoenix, said Phoenix won’t get the same storms and rain totals as much of Southern California simply because of the topography.
“Just due to the fact that we have mountainous terrain around the city, and we are in a low spot of the Valley, the clouds and rain tend to form around us,” Salerno said. “As the winds start blowing from the south, those clouds and precipitation move away from the Valley up towards the mountains.”
The storms will lose some of their power as they move eastward.
“These storms hitting California are fueled by the atmospheric river that is streaming along the West Coast,” said Salerno. “The amount of moisture being carried by the river is not going to stay strong enough to make it all the way inland to us here in Phoenix.”
There is no expectation of any delays in the action, though, and fans are expected to turn out in droves like they typically do. Admission for Friday’s second round and Saturday’s third round have been capped. Last year was the first time they ever had to do that.
Sustained winds of 35-40 miles per hour and gusts of more than 60 mph forced the hand of organizers.
The final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was canceled due to inclement weather and safety concerns. Rain fell Sunday morning and although it slowed a little later in the day, sustained winds of 35-40 miles per hour and gusts of more than 60 mph forced the hand of organizers. Wyndham Clark was given the trophy after his 54-hole effort.
Due to moderate rain, preferred lies were in effect during all three rounds of the tournament. All week long, the weather forecast called for high winds on Sunday that threatened to push the tournament to a Monday finish and so Clark approached Saturday’s third round as if it could be the final round and with a sense of now-or-never to make a move.
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Only Mother Nature knows for sure whether fans will be dressed in fleece or flip-flops.
“Bring some nice warm clothes,” advised Kerry Haigh, chief championships officer for the PGA of America.
Then he added: “And bring some warm weather so you won’t need your warm clothes.”
Such is the conundrum of hosting the 105th PGA Championship at Oak Hill’s East Course in Rochester, New York, where only Mother Nature knows for sure whether fans will be dressed in fleece or flip-flops May 18-21.
“Oak Hill is a hard enough course in beautiful weather,” said Jay Haas. “Heaven forbid if they have a late spring.”
Haas, now 69, should know. Fifteen years ago, he survived windy, wet, bitter-cold conditions to win the 2008 Senior PGA Championship. The first few days of that event the temperature dipped into the low 40s, an example of the worse-case scenario for Haigh come May. And this year’s PGA Championship is being staged one week earlier than the senior version that has some of its competitors still thawing out. It has some concerned that the weather at this year’s PGA could be something the pros want no part of, especially if it snows. (The 7-day forecast predicts temps ranging from 40-71 degrees, with a high of 56 on Wednesday but hitting 70 on Friday.)
Veteran pro Leonard Thompson, who made more than 1,000 starts combined between the PGA Tour and PGA Tour Champions, remembers teeing off on the 10th hole at Oak Hill in 2008, his first hole of the championship, and it was sleeting.
“I missed the cut there and I wasn’t that upset about it,” he recalled. “None of us could figure out why they went there in May. That’s not prime season in Rochester.”
Jay Haas at the 69th Senior PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club on May 22, 2008, in Rochester, New York. (Photo: Hunter Martin/Getty Images)
There’s a reasonable explanation for the decision to host the PGA Championship on Lake Ontario’s southern shore this May: it wasn’t part of the original plan.
When the PGA of America signed a contract in September 2015 to bring the PGA Championship there a decade after Jason Dufner won what has proved to be his lone major, the PGA still was held in its customary August date and was dubbed “Glory’s Last Shot” as the final major of the season. But that was before the PGA Tour decided to revamp its schedule and bump the FedEx Cup Playoffs into August so that its season concluded before college football and the NFL kicked off and dominated the attention of sports fans.
To do so, the Players Championship shifted to March, opening a window for the PGA Championship to have the spotlight in May. The first spring PGA was held in 2019 at Bethpage Black in New York and the weather cooperated. Last year, the temperature the week of the PGA was warmer in Rochester than in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where Justin Thomas won the Wanamaker Trophy for the second time.
“Low 60s will be a beautiful day,” Haigh said of the weather at Oak Hill. “From an agronomy standpoint, the question is will they be able to grow the grass? They just need a minimal growing season.”
That’s a big if.
In 2008, the Senior PGA Championship dealt with frost delays during the practice rounds. An Eastern Mountain Sports store in a nearby shopping plaza had a run on gloves, performance undergarments and stocking caps. The lemonade stands and ice-cream carts at the course? They never opened for business. Too chilly. One look at the 10-day forecast led to a wave of pre-tournament withdrawals, including the likes of Ben Crenshaw, Fred Funk and Lanny Wadkins. And even those who showed up had second thoughts. Nick Price cited a back injury in withdrawing after shooting 3-over 38 for nine holes in the second round while Jerry Pate cited no reason after carding a 14-over 84 in the first round, which wasn’t even the highest score in the 156-player field.
“It was unforgiving, one of the hardest weeks we’ve had,” said Haigh.
Craig Harmon, who retired in 2013 as Oak Hill’s head pro after a distinguished 42 years at the club, said he was glad to see Oak Hill play tough in 2008, although the rough may have been too thick, heavy and wet for the 50-and-over set.
“You don’t want your historic golf course to play like a pitch-and-putt and 22 under wins,” Harmon said. “I remember when Johnny Miller shot 63 at Oakmont in the final round of the (1973) U.S. Open, the following year the Open was at Winged Foot and my dad (Claude) was the pro there and he said to the superintendent, ‘No one is shooting 63 next year on our watch.’ They grew the rough up and it was called the Massacre at Winged Foot.”
Hale Irwin famously won the 1974 Open with a score of 7 over par. After a loss at the 1995 Ryder Cup at Oak Hill, Haas found redemption by winning the 2008 Senior PGA with the highest winning score in championship history at 7 over. Haas played the first two rounds alongside Irwin, who missed the cut at Oak Hill’s massacre. But before he departed for warmer climes, Irwin left a note in Haas’s locker encouraging him that his game was sharp and to go take the title.
“Hale wasn’t one to throw around bouquets,” Haas said.
The mercury rose enough on the weekend to be tolerable, but scoring kept rising too. In the third round, Haas hit a low, drawing 8-iron from 172 yards at the 17th hole that rolled in for eagle and catapulted him into a tie for the lead. At Sunday’s trophy ceremony, Harmon watched from nearby, and as soon Haas finished his various duties he made a beeline to Harmon and said, “I’m on the wall baby,” a reference to joining an impressive roll call of the winners of majors at Oak Hill who are pictured in the club’s Hill of Fame.
The 69th Senior PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club on May 24, 2008 in Rochester, New York. (Photo: Hunter Martin/Getty Images)
In preparation for hosting the 105th PGA, Oak Hill superintendent Jeff Corcoran handled normal spring maintenance practices such as aerification to the course in the fall, knowing that any recovery time would be limited for a May championship. In another new twist, the PGA instructed its tent company to build out the scaffolding of its three largest structures ahead of time. That should allow them to do the rest of the decking and flooring even while snow still is on the ground.
What will the move to May mean for future championships? The PGA still has Aronimink in Pennsylvania (2026), Baltusrol in New Jersey (2029) and Congressional in Maryland (2030) on the docket in coming years, but the May date could eliminate the traditional great courses of the northeast from future consideration. It very well could be that Oak Hill’s fourth PGA Championship since 1980 could be its swansong.
“As long as the weather is halfway reasonable it can be our greatest championship yet,” said Haigh, trying to put a positive spin on the biggest unknown of staging this major. “Let’s talk in June about future PGAs at Oak Hill.”
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AUGUSTA, Ga. — Springtime in the Augusta area is notoriously fickle. Weather patterns can shift in a heartbeat, turning a terrific day into a mess, or vice versa.
The 2022 Masters Tournament should be spared from most of that unpredictability. But bring your umbrella.
The forecast for the tournament days of the first major in men’s pro golf in 2022 looks promising for fans and players alike, but Tuesday’s practice round and the Wednesday Par 3 Contest are less certain.
Monday is expected to be a great day to kick off tournament week, with a high near 80 and light wind, according to the National Weather Service and The Weather Channel.
Thunderstorms, however, are in the forecast for both Tuesday and Wednesday, with up to an 80 percent chance of rain or storms on both days. Temperatures should be in the upper 70s to low 80s.
The bad weather heads out in time for Thursday, however. The Weather Channel says there is only a 25 percent chance of rain on the first tournament day, but patrons should expect a cool western wind throughout the rest of the week, ranging from 10 to 20 mph.
By Sunday, the temperatures should return to the mid 70s, making Masters Sunday a great one for fans and golfers alike.
Augusta weather forecast for Masters Week
Monday: Partly Cloudy. High 79. Low 55. Wind E at 5 mph. Chance of rain 1 percent.
Tuesday: Thunderstorms expected. High 80. Low 64. Wind SSE at 15 mph. Chance of rain 80 percent.
Wednesday: Thunderstorms likely in the a.m. High 77. Low 64. Wind SW at 11 mph. Chance of rain 80 percent.
Thursday: Partly Cloudy. High 76. Low 53. Wind WSW at 14 mph. Chance of rain 25 percent.
Friday: Partly Cloudy. High 67. Low 47. Wind W at 15 mph. Chance of rain 13 percent.
Saturday: Mostly Sunny. High 69. Low 50. Wind W at 15 mph. Chance of rain 1 percent.
Sunday: Sunny. High 74. Low 51. Wind W at 10 mph. Chance of rain 6 percent.
