{"id":55478,"date":"2025-08-08T21:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-08T21:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55478\/"},"modified":"2025-08-08T21:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T21:59:07","slug":"garcia-dj-lead-after-rd-1-at-liv-golf-chicago-stinger-gc-top-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55478\/","title":{"rendered":"Garcia, DJ lead after Rd. 1 at LIV Golf Chicago; Stinger GC top team"},"content":{"rendered":"

Smash GC<\/a> Captain Brooks Koepka<\/a>, who hasn\u2019t finished in the top 14 on a LIV Golf leaderboard since the third event of the season at LIV Golf Singapore, got off to a good start and is T3 after shooting a 3-under 68. The five-time major champion made a birdie on the par-5 third hole to begin his round, and he made back-to-back tricky up-and-downs for par on hole Nos. 7-8 to keep his round afloat. He then made three straight birdies on hole Nos. 10-12 to get out in front before a late bogey on the 16th halted his momentum.<\/p>\n

Tied with Koepka and squarely in the mix is HyFlyers GC<\/a> Captain Phil Mickelson<\/a>, who dazzled the crowd at Bollingbrook, making five birdies in his first 16 holes. Mickelson, who after his round called Bolingbrook a \u201cfair but tough golf course\u201d made bogeys on his final two holes to fall back, but still in great position entering the weekend.<\/p>\n

More stars are tied with Koepka and Mickelson at 3-under, including Crushers GC<\/a> Captain Bryson DeChambeau<\/a>, Legion XIII<\/a> Captain Jon Rahm<\/a> and teammate Tyrrell Hatton<\/a>, and Stinger GC<\/a>‘s Dean Burmester<\/a>.<\/p>\n

With the season quickly nearing an end, several notable players fighting to secure their 2026 roster spots struggled to find form in the opening round. Majesticks GC<\/a> Co-Captain Ian Poulter<\/a>, who is currently 51st in the standings, struggled to find his rhythm and shot a 3-over 74 (T45). Poulter\u2019s Majesticks GC teammate Henrik Stenson<\/a> struggled as well, shooting a 4-over 75. Both players will need to come back strong in the next two rounds to have a chance to come away from LIV Golf Chicago with much-needed points.<\/p>\n

Conversely, Mito Pereira<\/a> of Torque GC<\/a> and Andy Ogletree<\/a> of HyFlyers GC<\/a> got off to a strong start to their week. Both Pereira and Ogletree carded 2-under 69s to find themselves in tied for ninth with a chance to make some weekend noise.<\/p>\n

For the round, Bolingbrook produced a field scoring average of +0.41.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Smash GC Captain Brooks Koepka, who hasn\u2019t finished in the top 14 on a LIV Golf leaderboard since…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-55478","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}