{"id":500938,"date":"2026-03-29T00:05:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T00:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/500938\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T00:05:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T00:05:12","slug":"pga-tour-nicolai-hojgaard-and-gary-woodland-looking-to-earn-masters-spots-at-texas-childrens-houston-open-golf-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/500938\/","title":{"rendered":"PGA Tour: Nicolai Hojgaard and Gary Woodland looking to earn Masters spots at Texas Children&#8217;s Houston Open | Golf News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Nicolai Hojgaard is three shots adrift of leader Gary Woodland at the halfway stage of the Texas Children&#8217;s Houston Open as he looks to clinch a place at The Masters.<\/p>\n<p>The Dane is currently ranked 47th in the world with the top 50 after this week&#8217;s tournament to receive invitations to the Augusta National major from April 9, live on Sky Sports.<\/p>\n<p>Hojgaard is well-placed to secure his spot after a round-of-the-day eight-under 62 at Memorial Park on Friday, one that featured seven birdies &#8211; including four in a row to finish &#8211; an eagle and a sole bogey.<\/p>\n<p>        Datawrapper<\/p>\n<p>                This content is provided by Datawrapper, which may be using cookies and other technologies.<br \/>\n                To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.<br \/>\n                You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Datawrapper cookies or to allow those cookies just once.<br \/>\n                You can change your settings at any time via the <a href=\"#privacy-options\">Privacy Options<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>                Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Datawrapper cookies.<br \/>\n                To view this content you can use the button below to allow Datawrapper cookies for this session only.<\/p>\n<p>                <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-permanently\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"datawrapper\" data-show-on-fallback=\"false\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow\">Enable Cookies<\/a><br \/>\n                <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-once\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"datawrapper\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow-once\">Allow Cookies Once<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The 25-year-old &#8211; who missed the cut on his Masters debut in 2025 &#8211; is in a share of second place alongside Jackson Suber on 10 under with Woodland on 13 under after a seven-under 63.<\/p>\n<p>Hojgaard said: &#8220;It&#8217;s so easy to say [The Masters] is not on my mind and good golf will take care of it. It&#8217;s on my mind 100 per cent, we all want to be there.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;But when I&#8217;m playing golf I don&#8217;t think about it. I feel like my game is good enough to qualify for it. There&#8217;s two more days here in Houston and I like where my game is at.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Woodland &#8216;feeding off&#8217; crowd support in Houston<\/p>\n<p>Woodland is pursuing a first PGA Tour title since the 2019 US Open at Pebble Beach.<\/p>\n<p>          <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sdc-article-image__item\" loading=\"lazy\" intrinsicsize=\"768x432\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/skysports-gary-woodland-texas-childrens_7205332.jpg\"   alt=\"Gary Woodland, PGA Tour golf, Texas Children's Houston Open (Associated Press)\" data-testid=\"article-image-image\"\/><\/p>\n<p>        Image:<br \/>\n        Gary Woodland leads the Texas Children&#8217;s Houston Open by three shots at the halfway stage<\/p>\n<p>The 41-year-old &#8211; who would seal a Masters spot himself with victory in Houston &#8211; underwent brain surgery in 2023 and later spoke about the post-traumatic stress disorder he has suffered.<\/p>\n<p>The world No 139 said going public made him feel &#8220;1,000 pounds lighter&#8221; and he is now hoping to &#8220;feed off&#8221; crowd support across the final two rounds in Texas.<\/p>\n<p>Woodland told reporters: &#8220;This as much as any week, I feel like I&#8217;ve had a lot of support. I kind of feel like I&#8217;m playing at home.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The fans have been amazing. I kind of need that energy to help me through the day, that definitely helps. That&#8217;s something hopefully I can ride on this weekend as well.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>          <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sdc-article-image__item\" loading=\"lazy\" intrinsicsize=\"768x432\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/skysports-pga-tour-golf-pierceson-coody_7205333.jpg\"   alt=\"Pierceson Coody, PGA Tour golf (Associated Press)\" data-testid=\"article-image-image\"\/><\/p>\n<p>        Image:<br \/>\n        Pierceson Coody faces an anxious wait to see whether he will qualify for The Masters<\/p>\n<p>World No 56 Michael Thorbjornsen is at eight under and in joint-sixth as he targets a Masters place but Pierceson Coody now faces a waiting game ahead of Augusta after he was forced to withdraw in Houston with a back injury.<\/p>\n<p>Coody, the grandson of 1971 Masters champion Charles Coody, is projected to be 50th in the world after this week but could yet be overtaken.<\/p>\n<p>Watch round three of the Texas Children&#8217;s Houston Open live on Sky Sports Golf from 12.30pm on Saturday. There is also coverage on Sky Sports Main Event from 8pm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nicolai Hojgaard is three shots adrift of leader Gary Woodland at the halfway stage of the Texas Children&#8217;s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":500939,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[5904,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-500938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500938"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500938\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}