2022 Fortinet Championship: Max Homa, Danny Willett tied for lead after Spherical 2 motion in Napa

September 17, 2022

NAPA, Calif. (AP) — Max Homa moved into place to defend his title on the Fortinet Championship, capturing a 5-under 67 on Friday to share the early 36-hole lead with Danny Willett on the PGA Tour’s season opener.

Homa, a two-time winner final season and a captain’s choose for subsequent week’s Presidents Cup, had an eagle, 4 birdies and a bogey — his first of the week — for a two-day complete of 12-under 132 at Silverado Resort & Spa.

“The course suits my eyes,” Homa mentioned. “I hit a variety of wedges at present and I have been hitting the wedges very well, so once I get a variety of wedges from fairways like these, I really feel like I can assault the pins.”

The four-time PGA Tour winner performed collegiately at California.

“I’ve acquired an awesome assist system right here,” mentioned Homa, who received the 2013 NCAA particular person title. “I’ve acquired family and friends up right here and a bunch of, you recognize, individuals who respect I went to highschool up right here.”

Willett, winless in the USA since his triumph on the Masters in 2016, shot a bogey-free 64. The English participant stored his PGA Tour card for this season due to gamers defecting to the Saudi-funded LIV Golf sequence.

“Yeah, we type of acquired handed a lifeline with the blokes leaving, which was good,” Willett mentioned. “We type of needed to reassess issues and determined we would press on and play a little bit bit extra this fall over right here and actually attempt to get some factors up early.”

Willett has eight titles on the European tour, most lately final October on the Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks Championship in Scotland.

He had eight birdies in his second spherical and is bogey-free for the week.

“, the tough is hit or miss and with the greens being agency as they’re. To go bogey-free is absolutely good,” mentioned Willett, who has solely six top-10 finishes on the PGA Tour since successful his lone main. “The sphere sport is fairly sharp, the quick sport’s fairly sharp.”

First-round chief Justin Decrease was two photographs again after a 71. His greatest end in 28 earlier PGA Tour occasions courting to 2013 was a tie for eighth.

“It is at all times onerous to observe up a really low spherical with one other good spherical and even decrease,” Decrease mentioned. “However I’ll take one beneath at present. May it have been higher? Sure, but it surely undoubtedly may have been worse as effectively.”

Jason Day, Harris English, Charley Hoffman and Webb Simpson have been among the many gamers who missed the reduce.

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