Greg Chalmers’ Form Turnaround in Puerto Rico
Greg Chalmers in action this week – photo Getty Images Andy Lyons
In his last twelve PGA Tour starts, Texas based Australian golfer, Greg Chalmers, has missed the cut in ten and has a best finish of 50th in the other two. In fact in his one and only start this year on the PGA Tour, Chalmers recorded a second round of 83 to miss the cut by a large margin.
Today, Chalmers finds himself just one off the pace set by Brandon Wu at the Puerto Rico Open but even he, heading into this week’s event, was unsure how things might pan out.
“To be honest, I don’t think my confidence was super high,” he said after his second round of 68 was added to his opening 66 at the Grand Reserve Country Club in Rio Grande.
“It was sort of teetering on what’s going to happen here. But you’re always open to the idea that something good could happen, you will start playing better and start seeing some better shots.
“I played nicely in the practice rounds. I was really excited about how I was hitting the ball leading into — I got here Sunday, so I had a lot of time to prepare, and I really hit the ball nicely on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
“But I have done that before and not done very well. So, I really am pleased to say that what I saw early in the week has continued, and I actually have a couple of things I wish were a little better, but really pleased with how that’s going.”
Birdies at his final two holes today saw Chalmers close within one of the lead of Wu who has yet to record a top ten in his PGA Tour career to date, playing events on the Korn Ferry Tour in the main.
Wu was one of the best amateurs in the US until turning professional eighteen months ago but was unable to gain status on the Korn Ferry Tour, although he did Monday qualify his way into a few events and eventually won their Tour Championship.
Because of the carry over of Covid 19 Wu has still not earned full status for the PGA Tour but a win this week would change all of that.
Chalmers is perhaps one of the more underrated of the Australian players on the PGA Tour as, although he has recorded only one PGA Tour victory in the twenty or more years he has competed in the US, he enjoys an enviable record at home having won two Australian Opens, two Australian PGA Championships and one Australian Players Championship.
Chalmers has only partial status on the PGA Tour via a major medical extension category and grabs starts where he can get them but now, at the age of 47, he no doubt looks ahead to the possibility of playing the PGA Tour Champions if he can play his way on to that tour.
Chalmers has been working with the highly regarded coach and former player Bradley Hughes in more recent times and, like some of the other players Hughes is involved with, he is beginning to show the benefits.
Victorian, Cameron Percy, another to be working with Hughes of late, is two shots behind Chalmers with New Zealander Tim Wilkinson another shot back.
Aaron Baddeley and John Senden have also made the cut.
