Hideki Matsuyama holds a two-stoke lead after the first round of the men’s Olympic golf event in Paris after the former Masters champion shot an eight-under-par 63 at Le Golf National.
The Japanese player, who lost out in a seven-man play-off for the bronze medal in the 2020 Tokyo Games, had six birdies in his first 10 holes and kept a clean card with a 15-foot par save on the 17th.
“Fortunately, I was able to keep the ball in the fairway and left myself with a number of chances to score,” Matsuyama said. “I’m satisfied with the end result, but there are still a number of things I can improve on. It’s a great start and hopefully I can keep the momentum going for the rest of the week.”
Defending Olympic champion Xander Schauffele, fresh off his victory in the Open Championship, is nicely placed after an opening 65 left the American on his own in second place.
“It wasn’t sort of the dream, stripey start that you envision as a golfer,” Schauffele said. “But I’m happy to sort of ride the ship in and get away with what could have been worse. I missed a few putts coming in. But it’s Thursday. I’m not really sweating it too much.”
Also off to strong starts in the hunt for medals were Joaquin Niemann (Chile), Emiliano Grillo (Argentina) and Tom Kim (South Korea), who all fired 66s, with Masters champion and pre-tournament favourite Scottie Scheffler (USA) tied sixth after a 67.
FLEETWOOD & MCILROY IN THE HUNT
That’s a place shared by Team GB’s Tommy Fleetwood, whose four-under-par round included four birdies and no dropped shots on the par-71 course, along with Jon Rahm (Spain), Sam Valamaki ( Finland), Sepp Straka (Austria), Alex Noren (Sweden), Ryan Fox (NZ) and Erik van Rooyen (South Africa).
Rory McIlroy, playing in his second Olympics, remains very much in the hunt for Ireland following an opening 68, a score matched by fellow Ryder Cup player Ludvig Åberg.
France’s Victor Perez hit the opening shot at 9am in front of an unsurprisingly raucous crowd of partisan supporters, whose numbers swelled to over 20,000 during the course a day that was twice halted due to storm warnings.
A total of 41 players from the 60-man field finished the first round under par on a day of low scoring helped by the rain-softened greens.
One the 19 players over par is Team GB’s second starter Matt Fitzpatrick, whose indifferent season continued with a two-over 73 that left him in a tie for 49th.
The field is propped up by Columbia’s Camilo Villegas whose five-over 76 included four bogeys and two double bogeys.
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