Sergio Garcia was born a continent and ocean away in Borriol, Spain, but he’s made up for lost time since moving to Austin, Texas.
A common phrase in Texas for those who weren’t conceived or delivered in the Lone Star State says, “I wasn’t born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I could.”
Sergio Garcia was born a continent and ocean away in Borriol, Spain, but he’s made up for lost time since moving to Austin, Texas. After marrying former Golf Channel reporter Angela Akins, Garcia has become a staple at Texas golf functions, including Ben Crenshaw’s Save Muny gala to benefit Austin’s Lions Municipal Golf Course.
A number of other celebrities attended the gala at the Four Seasons Hotel in Austin, including comedian Ron White, former University of Texas football star Derrick Johnson, motivational speaker Kondo Speaks, and actresses Becca Tobin and Jamie-Lynn Sigler. “Bachelor” host Chris Harrison served as emcee of the event.
https://www.instagram.com/p/DB9K5Zau9nh/?hl=en
According to a release from the organization:
Fore Kids ATX 2024 benefitted organizations near and dear to Sergio and Angela’s hearts, including Dell Children’s Medical Center, Foster Village, The Muny Conservancy Austin Youth Golf Academy and The UGLI Foundation – organizations dedicated to providing youth medical care, support for foster children, anti-bullying solutions and youth golf community programming.
Port Royal Golf Club stirred awake with howling winds and sheets of sideways rain which combined to send scores ballooning.
The scoreboards all say that PGA Tour rookies Austin Eckroat and Greyson Sigg are the clubhouse leaders in the first round of the Butterfield Bermuda Championship, but no one had a morning quite like Mother Nature.
Port Royal Golf Club in Southampton, Bermuda, the shortest course on the PGA Tour at 6,828 yards, turns nasty when the wind blows in from the Atlantic Ocean and the sun gives way to rain. On Thursday morning, Port Royal rolled its shoulders and stirred awake, an unpleasant combination of howling winds, gusting to 35 miles per hour, and sheets of sideways rain, which combined to send scores ballooning.
“It was a day to kind of survive and I’m glad I kind of hung in there,” said Scotland’s Russell Knox, who knows a things or two about playing in inclement weather, and signed for 1-over 72.
Russell Knox of Scotland talks with his caddie, former PGA Tour pro Willy Wilcox, while waiting to tee off on the ninth hole the first round of the Butterfield Bermuda Championship at Port Royal Golf Course on October 28, 2021 in Southampton. (Photo by Cliff Hawkins/Getty Images)
On Tuesday, England’s Matt Fitzpatrick said he welcomed the wind, but he didn’t have a day like this in mind.
“This is the hardest wind I’ve ever played in. You see winds like this, but normally you don’t play in them,” he said. “People are going to laugh at this because they probably think it’s my normal tee shot, but anyway, I ripped it (on No. 7) and it went 245. I think my season average last year was like 295. Just shows you how strong it is.”
A different type of golf – and temperament – was required to keep the ball flight low and help lessen the effects the trade winds have on ball flight.
“I had like a chip 4-iron to about 35 feet and I was absolutely delighted,” said Fitzpatrick who carded five birdies in a round of even-par 71. “There’s a few shots I hit that were, yeah, I was just happy to get them on the green. That’s kind of what it felt like today anyway.
“We were three, four clubs up every time on a yardage just trying to chip everything in there. There was just a couple that I maybe didn’t quite strike very well and they just ballooned off into no-man’s land.”
Brian Gay of the United States plays a shot from the drop zone on the 16th hole during round one of the Butterfield Bermuda Championship at Port Royal Golf Course on October 28, 2021 in Southampton, Bermuda. (Photo by Cliff Hawkins/Getty Images)
Getting to the green was only half the battle.
“Five foot for birdie and a foot and a half for par and, yeah, I was scared to death of it,” Fitzpatrick said of his putting adventures at the ninth hole. “I honestly didn’t know what to do, I’ve never had a putt like it.”
Nick Watney, who managed three birdies in his round of 70, said Nos. 7, 8, 9, the most exposed corridor of the course, played toughest.
“It was gusting too, I mean I’m not good at that, but it felt like at least 40 miles an hour. There were a few shots that I was just like, I just want to hit this ball and I want to be able to see it when it stops. If I do that, then it’s a successful shot,” he said. “We could see the sheets of rain coming (at No. 9), so it was like I wanted to hit it as fast as I could without trying to rush it. Luckily, it stopped about a foot away and I felt like I had to pay attention on that one-footer.”
Knox grew up playing in a wee bit of wind and rain in Scotland, but even he conceded that the conditions in Bermuda were trying at times.
“Every shot was extremely difficult,” he said. “I think I hit a 7-iron from 120, I hit 4-irons from 150 at times. Chipping, I barely hit a full shot all day.”
Knox typically thrives in windy conditions, noting it brings out his creativity and “kind of activates something in my brain which I think makes me a better player.” But the conditions in Bermuda became so extreme for a stretch that the course was unplayable.
“No. 9, we were on the front edge of the green there and I’ve never experienced wind that strong, I think, on a golf course. I mean, we were down on the ground holding an umbrella. My fingers were like cramping I’m holding on so tight,” Knox said. “It wasn’t a question of they needed to blow the horn, there was no like physical way that you could play. We were like, well, we’re just going to wait until we can stand up. It was a good five minutes. That’s as hard as it’s rained plus wind that I’ve ever seen on a golf course.”
Competitors in the afternoon fared better as the rain halted and sunshine burst through the clouds. Scores improved ever-so slightly. Still Knox, who played alongside friends Austin Cook and Ryan Armour, was able to find the brighter side on a gloomy day.
“It was a nice day to experience the wildness with those guys,” Knox said. “Honestly, it was a day that anyone out there will never forget.”
Nick Watney benefits from an “amazing lifeline” to try to resurrect his PGA Tour career via a one-time PGA Tour top-50 career earnings exemption.
Nick Watney calls it “an amazing kind of lifeline.” After finishing 204th in the FedEx Cup Standings last season, failing even to make the Korn Ferry Tour Finals, Watney is playing this season on a one-time-only use of a top-50 PGA Tour career money-list exemption. Watney’s rank on the career money list entering the 2021-22 season? No. 50. In other words, it was now or never to use it.
“To have that was incredible,” he said.
Watney, 40, is making the most of it in the early going of the new season. He followed up a respectable T-29 at the season-opening Fortinet Championship with a tie for second Sunday at the Sanderson Farms Championship, shooting a final-round, bogey-free 65 to finish with a 72-hole total of 21-under 267, a stroke behind winner Sam Burns.
“This is why I play golf,” Watney said, “to be nervous and pull it off.”
Watney once was among the top players in the game, cracking the top 10 in the world in 2011 and winning five times between 2007 and 2012. But he’s endured a victory drought, 3,325 days and counting, since the 2012 Barclays and hit rock bottom last season when he missed 13 cuts in a row and 18 in a span of 19 starts to plummet to No. 660 in the world entering the Sanderson Farms Championship.
“Last year there were some low times that kind of, I asked myself some really tough questions,” he said. “You know, do I want to keep playing? Do I enjoy this?”
Watney’s soul searching cut to the bone, eventually getting around to this realization: “I’ve played long enough that I don’t really know anything else, you know?”
All that time on the road with nothing to show for his efforts made leaving his family unbearable. That had to be factored into the equation, too. So, what was the answer to the tough question of whether he still loved the nomadic life that is the PGA Tour?
“I really do,” he said.
He decided to go back to the grindstone. Watney began working with his longtime instructor Butch Harmon to try to recapture the magic that made him one of the best in the game. Watney may not have gone home with the Sanderson Farms signature rooster trophy, but he departed with a confidence boost – his first top-10 finish since a T-10 at the 2019 Safeway Championship and best result since tying for second at the 2018 Wells Fargo Championship – that could be the difference as he tries to make the most of his one-time career money-list exemption.
“I think this proves to myself that what I’m working on is the right thing,” he said. “There was definitely some lean times, especially last year, but I mean that’s, I’m not trying to think about that any more, I’m trying to continue to get better and this was a great step this week.”
Birdies and eagles rule the Sanderson Farms, so much so that the average winning score the past five editions was 19 under.
We all know the familiar adage whenever the U.S. Open is contested.
Par is your friend.
Well, that doesn’t ring true at the Country Club of Jackson, home to the Sanderson Farms Championship in Jackson, Mississippi.
Birdies and eagles rule in the Sanderson Farms, so much so that the average winning score in the past five editions was 19 under. Here, you go low or go home.
That scoring trend seems likely again this year as players lit up the leaderboards with red numbers in Thursday’s first round. There were 20 scores of 68 or better – and that was just out of the morning wave of players. Defending champion Sergio Garcia was eight shots back when he went to the first tee for his afternoon round.
Par busters were so frequent that Corey Conners, who shot 5-under-par 67, didn’t realize he made five consecutive birdies.
“I really didn’t even know I made five in a row until I was signing my scorecard and I was like, ‘Oh, that’s cool.’” he said. “I just tried to play with freedom, was able to roll in some putts and, yeah, able to string some birdies together.”
Many others put plenty of circles on the scorecards on a day featuring light winds, overcast skies and warm temperatures. And with pure Bermuda greens, the players had a field day at the Country Club of Jackson.
“The greens are some of the best greens we play on all year,” Conners said. “I think it’s a very underrated golf course; it’s right in front of you, but you got to be really on, or you can have some trouble.”
Sahith Theegala had no trouble in a bogey-free 64 to grab the clubhouse lead. The 2020 winner of the Haskins, Jack Nicklaus and Ben Hogan awards honoring the best player in college is making his 15th start on the PGA Tour.
◾️ 3-time All-American. ◾️ Ben Hogan & Fred Haskins award winner. ◾️ Finished @PeppGolf with lowest scoring average in the nation (69.04).
“Really stress free,” he said of his round. “Probably the best way I can describe it. Just drove it really well. I was really working it well. I got my slider back. I was hitting a pretty good cut, probably 25 to 30 yard cut out there and this course kind of allows it because the trees around the tee box aren’t that close to the tees, so I was just working my ball flight in there and just felt really comfortable all day.
“Being in the fairway helps so much.”
Having the right attitude, especially when facing the heightened expectations Theegala had to deal with when he turned pro, helps, too.
“I think the main thing is that everyone that’s gotten to this point, they know their game is good enough to at least be out here and I think knowing that in the back of our mind, it sounds cliche, but just really have a good time out there,” Theegala said. “I would like to think pretty much everyone loves the game and that’s why they’re playing it and they just happen to be really good at it, so that’s kind of the mindset I’m going to keep having, just go out and have a good time.
“If the golf is there, fantastic. If it’s not there, there’s more to life and live to play another day kind of thing.”
Nick Watney signed for a 65. Roger Sloan and Kurt Kitayama were each at 66.
A large group at 67 included Conners, Adam Hadwin and Sungjae Im. Sam Burns, the highest ranked player in the world at No. 25, shot 68.
Despite the scoring binges, players said they don’t feel any extra pressure to go low to keep up.
“I’ve never done well if I thought, ‘Oh, I have to shoot X-under. I think I do my best when I go out and try to play the shot in front of me,” Watney said. “I know that’s super cliche, but that’s truly how I play my best. That’s what I was even trying to do today. Just to execute my best on that shot.”
Added Kitayama: “I feel like most tournaments scores are low so you kind of know what you gotta do and if you can get to that 20-under number, you can have a good chance to win any week. And if it’s lower, it just happens.”
Two of golf’s biggest stars join Kevin Durant, Patrick Mahomes and venture capital funds in financing the performance-tracking company.
What do Kevin Durant, Patrick Mahomes, Larry Fitzgerald, Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas have in common?
Along with several venture capital funds, Whoop has announced they are private investors in a $100-million round of Series E funding for the human-performance company now valued at $1.2 billion.
In addition to McIlroy and Thomas, several professional golfers, including Billy Horschel and Xander Schauffele, began wearing a Whoop band either on their wrist or around their biceps in 2019. Whoop measures the wearer’s heart rate hundreds of times per second, and when paired with a smartphone app it reveals how hard an athlete has worked by measuring strain. Whoop also tracks how long the wearer sleeps, how restorative that sleep is and how recovered the wearer is when he or she wakes up.
Rory McIlroy typically wears his Whoop 3.0 strap around his left biceps. (AP/Charles Rex Arbogast)
Series E funding is rare and typically occurs when a company wants to stay private for an extended period and delay going public for various reasons.
Appearing on Golfweek’s Forward Press podcast in April, as the COVID-19 pandemic forced the United States and many other parts of the world to shut down, Whoop founder and CEO Will Ahmed said data the strap collects may be able to determine that a user is sick before the individual becomes symptomatic.
Whoop 3.0 strap (Whoop)
Two months later Whoop gained notoriety when Nick Watney woke up Friday morning before the second round of the RBC Heritage and his Whoop revealed his respiratory rate overnight had spiked. Respiratory rate is the number of times you breathe, something Whoop tracks, and studies showed Whoop wearers who see a significant increase in respiratory rate often are asymptomatically carrying the coronavirus. After requesting that the PGA Tour test him before he played, it was confirmed Watney had COVID-19.
Nick Watney, wearing a blue Whoop 3.0 strap on his right wrist, in January 2020 (Orlando Ramirez-USA TODAY Sports)
A group of three COVID-19 positive but asymptomatic golfers played Thursday at the Workday Charity Open.
DUBLIN, Ohio – Call it quarantine, PGA style.
The PGA Tour this week adopted a policy in which asymptomatic golfers who’ve tested positive for COVID-19 can still play. Thus, on Wednesday night, Nick Watney, Dylan Frittelli and Denny McCarthy were placed in a threesome for the first two rounds of the Workday Charity Open at Muirfield Village Golf Club.
The three teed off starting on the back nine Thursday at 9:13 a.m., a tee time that hadn’t been on the schedule. All three finished above par on a hot, steamy day, with Frittelli and McCarthy posting 1-over-par 73s and Watney struggling to a 77 in a round that included three double-bogeys.
“Firstly, I’m happy to be playing golf again,” Frittelli said after the round. “I wasn’t sure how long it was going to take to get over everything and get back on the course, but I’m super happy to be playing again.
“It’s been pretty boring the last five or six days just sitting around doing nothing. It was fun to get out there. Obviously, (I had) a few hoops to jump through yesterday. It was a little tricky situation. But that’s fine. Life is full of surprises, so we’ll move on from there and hopefully get everything cemented in the coming weeks.”
Watney became the first player to be sidelined by the virus after the PGA Tour resumed play after a 13-week break when he tested positive at the RBC Heritage. McCarthy tested positive at the Travelers Championship while Frittelli tested positive at thee Rocket Mortgage Classic. Other players who have tested positive are Cameron Champ, Chad Campbell and Harris English.
Frittelli, McCarthy and Watney also tested positive this week ahead of the start of the Workday Charity Open. But they were permitted to play because they passed the PGA Tour’s protocol for returning from the coronavirus.
The Tour clarified its policy for players and caddies who tested positive for COVID-19 and were asymptomatic in accordance with the CDC’s “Return to Work” guidelines. Golfers may compete if at least 72 hours have passed since their recovery (no fever without using fever-reducing medications and improvement in respiratory symptoms, and 10 days have passed since the symptoms began).
Frittelli said his symptoms were minor.
“Sunday night I had started basically getting some nasal congestion just like you would from an allergy, just had some kind of constriction in the tubes up there,” he said. “But then I had slight muscle ache for an hour that evening.
“I worked out Saturday morning, so those same muscle groups that I worked out were a little bit sore, and then I had two headaches in three days that lasted about maybe 20 or 30 minutes. Besides that, it was really nothing. I did feel a little lethargic and slow, but that’s normally the case when I don’t work out or I don’t get outside or I’m not busy.”
Watney and McCarthy did not talk to the media afterward.
But Frittelli said he wasn’t surprised he tested positive again this week.
“I spoke to my physician and quizzed him on how it works, and he said, ‘Oh, there’s a chance that you could be testing (positive) for up to a month,” Frittelli said. “I’ve got a friend in Japan who chatted to me, he said, ‘Dude, I’ve been testing for 28 days, I still haven’t got a negative.’ I knew that was a possibility.
“According to the CDC guidelines, if you don’t have any symptoms on day 10 and you’re perfectly healthy and you’re not showing any declining conditions, then you’re free to go back to work.”
Frittelli said he drive straight from his housing to the golf course – with his golf shoes on – and went straight from his car to the practice ground.
“I stretched at home. I ate breakfast in my hotel room and then straight to the parking lot and felt like Walter Hagen, just walked straight on to the driving range,” he said with a smile.
Frittelli said he’s talked to a few players about the situation.
“A lot of guys were intrigued, they were all asking me questions,” he said. “I told them the truth. I told them what happened and I tried to give them my best biology lesson that I could. But it spread like wildfire, and when it goes to a third, fourth, fifth source, then you hear some funny stories, so I think that’s what happened yesterday and guys started freaking out, obviously, but I guess that’s all been quelled now by the Tour.”
Nick Watney, Denny McCarthy and Dylan Frittelli, who tested positive for COVID, have been grouped for the first two rounds at the Workday.
Nick Watney, Denny McCarthy and Dylan Frittelli, who all tested positive for COVID during the PGA Tour’s restart and who the Tour says continue to test positive, are in the field at this week’s Workday Charity Open and, after a late change to the tee times, will play in the same group for the first two rounds.
After releasing initial tee times on Tuesday, the Tour announced on Wednesday night that the tee times were adjusted so that those three golfers could be grouped together.
They will now go off the 10th tee on Thursday at 9:13 a.m., a tee time that previously wasn’t on the schedule.
On June 19, Watney withdrew from the RBC Heritage prior to the second round after testing positive for COVID-19, the first PGA Tour player to test positive.
On June 26, McCarthy tested positive for coronavirus and he subsequently withdrew from the Travelers Championship before the second round.
On June 28, the Tour announced that Frittelli tested positive for COVID-19 in screening ahead of a charter flight from Hartford, Connecticut – where he missed the cut at the Travelers – to Detroit, where he withdrew from the Rocket Mortgage Classic.
The Tour said it is following the CDC’s symptom-based model for those three golfers, as they have continued to return positive tests but they all meet the CDC guidelines for Return to Work.
Part of the Tour’s statement reads:
For clarity regarding players and caddies who tested positive for COVID-19 and were symptomatic – in accordance with CDC “Return to Work” guidelines and in consultation with the PGA Tour Medical Advisor and infectious disease experts – cases in which a player or caddie tested positive and continues to test positive, the Tour follows a symptom-based model, as outlined by the CDC, allowing for him to return to competition if:
• At least three days (72 hours) have passed since recovery, which is defined as resolution of fever without the use of fever-reducing medications and improvement in respiratory symptoms (e.g., cough, shortness of breath); and,
• At least 10 days have passed since symptoms first appeared.
Watney was initially grouped with Seung-Yul Noh and Bo Van Pelt; Frittelli was originally with Nick Taylor and Hideki Matsuyama; McCarthy was with Fabian Gomez and Scott Stallings. Those golfers will remain in their slots as pairs.
Also, the Tour, in accordance with those CDC guidelines, is using a “test-based model for asymptomatic cases in which a player or caddie who tests positive but has not had any symptoms may return to competition if he returns two negative tests results, a minimum of 24 hours apart.”
That’s how Cameron Champ, who also initially tested positive for COVID, was able to play in last week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic.
This week, Champ is grouped with Nate Lashley and Keegan Bradley for the first two rounds at the Workday Charity Open.
Harris English is the fifth PGA Tour player to test positive for COVID-19 since the season restart.
A fifth PGA Tour player has tested positive for COVID-19.
The Tour announced Monday Harris English tested positive for the virus and has withdrawn from the Rocket Mortgage Classic. The 30-year-old did not compete during last week’s Travelers Championship.
Harris is the second player to test positive ahead of this week’s event at Detroit Golf Club. The Tour announced Sunday Dylan Frittelli also tested positive for the virus.
English, a two-time winner on Tour, competed in the season restart at Colonial, but missed the cut. He finished T-17 at the RBC Heritage. His best finish ahead of the season being postponed in March was T-4 at the Houston Open in October.
— PGA TOUR Communications (@PGATOURComms) June 29, 2020
“While it’s disappointing to receive this news, as I feel healthy, I’m pleased that the new safety protocols we have in place worked this week,” English said in a statement provided by the Tour. “I fully support the Tour’s new rule of not allowing anyone on the tournament grounds until testing negative, as protecting others in the field and everyone affiliated with the tournament in the community should be the number one priority as a result of a positive test. I appreciate the tour support and I look forward to competing again after I’m fully recovered.”
The PGA Tour implemented a new rule that players must await a negative COVID-19 test result before being allowed on tournament grounds after Nick Watney, the first Tour player to test positive after the Tour’s restart June 11, interacted with other players while awaiting a test result.
Social distancing? A dismissed exercise. Masks? About a ratio of 1 to 10 against. It’s as if the coronavirus never reached Sea Island.
Driving onto this island heaven in Lowcountry ahead of the RBC Heritage was a jolt to your quarantine senses.
Restaurants were teeming inside and out, bicyclists were swarming dedicated paths and side streets, hotels were running at or near capacity judging from the overflow parking lots, and Mom-and-Pop shops were bustling.
Upon further exploration, one came to see the famed Harbour Town Lighthouse casting a shadow over a populous marina and the numerous beaches packed beach towel to beach towel.
Social distancing? A dismissed exercise. Masks? About a ratio of 1 to 10 against.
It’s as if the coronavirus never reached these shores.
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Joel Dahmen said it was “wild out there,” and that was before the weekend crowds arrived. Justin Thomas said “they’re seeming to not take it very seriously. It’s an absolute zoo around here. There’s people everywhere.”
The congested landscape – it was more crowded than the top of the leaderboard as the players teed up another rousing tournament – was an eye-opener for players and all the others inside the “bubble” of safety the PGA Tour developed in consultation with infectious disease experts to reduce the risk of COVID-19.
After waking that day and having a few symptoms consistent with the virus, Watney, who ventured outside his rental home only to go to the course and once to the grocery store (and he was wearing a mask), met a physician and took another COVID-19 test.
Awaiting the result, he went to the course to get ready for his 12:21 p.m. tee time, as is allowed. Shortly into his warmup, however, he got word of his positive test. He and his caddie left the course and began to self-isolate.
But Watney, who is feeling better, had come into close contact with 11 people and the PGA Tour tested each of them – including his two playing partners from the first round. All 11 tested negative on an initial test and awaiting results on a secondary test.
Still, many players questioned why Watney was allowed on the course to await his test result despite having symptoms. As the Tour goes forward – it next heads to Connecticut for the Travelers Championship, the safety plan could be amended, which is what Tour commissioner Jay Monahan said would be the case if need be.
Other subtle changes will definitely be made. While players weren’t naïve to think they’d escape the virus when play resumed, seeing the bustling island and hearing about the first positive test since the Tour returned got their attention. And got them hoping next week’s landscape won’t be the same.
A bottle hand sanitizer at the RBC Heritage at Harbour Town Golf Links. Photo by Brian Spurlock/USA TODAY Sports
“It definitely got me thinking about kind of everything that I’ve done this week,” Webb Simpson said. “I’ve tried to be really careful, but I could probably be more careful. I hadn’t really gone out to dinner. I’ve gotten takeout every night. But in terms of even wearing the mask, any time I’m out of my comfort zone away from the golf course, I think it’s smart.
“And really, the six-foot rule I’ve been good about, but I probably could be better. So it definitely got me thinking.”
Added Ryan Palmer: “Everything you do, you’ve got to pay attention.”
This week, takeout and delivery were the top 2 choices for most of the players when dinner rolled around. A few players had their own chefs. Many cooked up their dishes themselves. Expect that approach to continue.
“We need to be more careful,” said Vaughn Taylor, who played with Watney in the first round. “I felt like coming in the last week everyone was super careful, and then we got here, and the vibe on the island is a little more relaxed. I feel like we might have gotten a little more relaxed too, complacent with being careful.
“Everyone has kind of ratcheted it up a little bit. Not hanging out with too many people, hanging with too many guys, stay out of restaurants and bars and those things. I think, if we do that, we should be safe. We’ve all got to keep that in the back of our mind and just be smart.
“It would be nice if we just had the ability to get tested whenever we like. Some guys want to get tested more. Some guys are comfortable with the way it is. I think it’s still a learning curve. I feel good that the Tour is going to get everything worked out.”
Sergio Garcia traveled to South Carolina on a private plane with Nick Watney, the first PGA Tour pro to test positive for COVID-19.
Nick Watney became the first positive COVID-19 test on the PGA Tour on Friday. He found out while preparing for the second round of the RBC Heritage at Harbour Town Golf Links in South Carolina.
Watney left the practice area and then withdrew from the tournament. He was sharing a house this week with his caddie, Tony Navarro, as well as Brendon Todd’s caddie. All three are now in self-quarantine for the next 10-14 days, with follow up tests throughout.
Sergio Garcia, who flew privately to South Carolina with Watney on Tuesday, was also tested Friday. He texted Golfweek to say that his result was negative.
On Saturday, after his round, Garcia said he felt terrible for Watney, calling him one of the nicest guys on Tour.
“Unfortunately, it had to happen to him,” Garcia said, who then made an odd declaration.
“There’s a lot of other people that probably deserved it a lot more than him, and he’s the one that got it.”
Garcia then continued with more praise for his friend.
“Nick is unbelievable. He’s a good friend. He was very worried about me. He sent me several texts. I talked to him. He must have said sorry to me probably 25 times. I told him that it’s all good.”
Garcia then talked about how a positive test for himself would’ve kept him from making a second straight cut.
“After missing the cut last week by one and this week finally playing nicely in the second round and being in the middle of the pack, if I would have given positive (COVID-19 test), then I wouldn’t be able to play on the weekend, and I would have been very, very disappointed.
“Fortunately for me, it was fine. Hopefully, his (Watney) is not bad, and we can have him back as soon as possible. Unfortunately, that’s the way it is. I feel terrible about it. But unfortunately, it’s the way it is, and we all knew coming out here and playing that there’s a possibility of catching it some way.
“We’re hoping that no one gets it, but I’m sure that, unfortunately, he won’t be the first and he won’t be the last because there’s a lot of things that can happen. There’s so many unknowns about this virus that we don’t. … we think we know a lot about it, but there’s a lot of things we don’t know. Hopefully, he recovers very soon and very quickly, and we can have him back.”
Golfweek’s Steve DiMeglio contributed to this article.
