Australia’s Nathan Green and American Michael Connell fired five-under 65s to share the first round lead at the Honda Classic on Thursday, while Yang Yong-eun opened his title defense with a dreadful nine-over 79.
Green and Connell both returned bogey-free rounds in gusty, cool conditions at the PGA National Champions course in Palm Beach Gardens to lead Colombia’s Camilo Villegas, Briton Oliver Wilson and Brazil’s Alex Rocha, ranked 711th in the world, by a stroke.
Fiji’s Vijay Singh lurked one shot further adrift on three-under 67 with Americans D.J. Trahan and Bubba Watson.
“I thought someone would have shot it ... someone will generally have one of those days, and sort of lucky it was me today,” said Green, who recorded his first PGA Tour win last season at the Canadian Open.
“I’ve been hitting it fairly straight, and when you’re chipping and putting is on, I think you can sort of shoot a good score anyway and I think that’s sort of what it was,” Green said.
Yang, who won his first PGA title with victory at the Honda Classic last year, got his defense off to a bumbling start and never recovered.
Playing the back nine first, the South Korean bogeyed the 10th then made a mess of the 436-yard par-four 11th taking a quintuple bogey nine.
Yang twice hit his approach shots into the water then three-putted, including a miss from inside five feet.
The PGA champion also had a double bogey and three more bogeys to go along with two birdies to finish ahead of just two players.
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