Bryson DeChambeau issued an apology on Thursday night after he blamed his equipment for his 1-over par first round at the Open Championship, which led to a stern response from club manufacturer Cobra.
DeChambeau’s bulked-up body made its links debut, but instead of using his new strength to outdrive his opponents he needed it just to muscle his way out of the thigh-high rough. He hit just four of 14 fairways, made five bogeys to go with four birdies and finished with a 71, seven strokes behind first round leader Louis Oosthuizen.
In his post-round interview, DeChambeau said: “If I can hit it down the middle of the fairway, that’s great. But with the driver right now, the driver sucks. It’s not a good face for me and we’re still trying to figure out how to make it good on the mis-hits. I’m living on the razor’s edge.”
Ben Schomin, the tour operations manager at Cobra, told Golfweek that it’s a challenge to design clubs without data because no one swings as hard as DeChambeau.
“Everybody is bending over backwards,” said Schomin, who helps design and build DeChambeau’s clubs how he wants them. “He knows it. It’s just really, really painful when he says something that stupid.”
DeChambeau, 27, wrote an apology posted to his Instagram account later on Thursday evening. “I sucked today, not my equipment,” the American wrote. “The comment I made in my post round interview today was very unprofessional. My frustration and emotions over the way I drove the ball boiled over.”
DeChambeau added that the Cobra staff were “like family to me, especially Ben Schomin”.
“I deeply regret the words I used earlier,” he wrote. “I am relentless in pursuit of improvement and perfection. Part of that causes me to become outwardly frustrated at times. … My game is a constant work in progress and so is controlling my emotions.”
DeChambeau has missed the cut in two of the three Open Championships he has played. He said he doesn’t think it’s the nature of links golf that causes problems; it’s the weather that accompanies it.
“The times I’ve played in the British Opens in the past, I think they’ve been a little wet and windy,” he said after his practice round, noting that he played well in the 2015 Walker Cup at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. “I usually struggle on that in general.”
But that was all before he added 40 pounds of mass and muscle so he could swing faster, hit the ball further and gain a huge advantage by having shorter clubs to the green, even if the ball is in the rough.
“This is the first time I’ve taken my length to links golf,” DeChambeau said Tuesday. “The key is driving it in the fairway this week. No matter what, you’ve got to be in the fairway. If I get … into the hay, probably not going to have a good chance this week.”
The poor start at Royal St. George’s continues a streak of also-ran finishes since winning his only major at Winged Foot. He tied for 34th in the Masters in November, for 46th in the Masters in April, for 38th at the PGA Championship and for 26th at the U.S. Open, where he briefly had a one-shot lead in the final round.
He also lost the only caddie he’s had as a pro, Tim Tucker, which they said was a mutual decision. DeChambeau relies on his caddie not just for yardage and reading greens but for his Mad Scientist stuff like air density.
Working with DeChambeau for the first time is the replacement, Brian Zeigler, an instructor at Dallas National.
yallacompare profile
Date of launch: 2014
Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer
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Sector: Financial services
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Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)
Day 3, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance
Moment of the day Just three balls remained in an exhausting day for Sri Lanka’s bowlers when they were afforded some belated cheer. Nuwan Pradeep, unrewarded in 15 overs to that point, let slip a seemingly innocuous delivery down the legside. Babar Azam feathered it behind, and Niroshan Dickwella dived to make a fine catch.
Stat of the day - 2.56 Shan Masood and Sami Aslam are the 16th opening partnership Pakistan have had in Tests in the past five years. That turnover at the top of the order – a new pair every 2.56 Test matches on average – is by far the fastest rate among the leading Test sides. Masood and Aslam put on 114 in their first alliance in Abu Dhabi.
The verdict Even by the normal standards of Test cricket in the UAE, this has been slow going. Pakistan’s run-rate of 2.38 per over is the lowest they have managed in a Test match in this country. With just 14 wickets having fallen in three days so far, it is difficult to see 26 dropping to bring about a result over the next two.
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Indoor cricket in a nutshell
Indoor cricket in a nutshell
Indoor Cricket World Cup - Sept 16-20, Insportz, Dubai
16 Indoor cricket matches are 16 overs per side
8 There are eight players per team
9 There have been nine Indoor Cricket World Cups for men. Australia have won every one.
5 Five runs are deducted from the score when a wickets falls
4 Batsmen bat in pairs, facing four overs per partnership
Scoring In indoor cricket, runs are scored by way of both physical and bonus runs. Physical runs are scored by both batsmen completing a run from one crease to the other. Bonus runs are scored when the ball hits a net in different zones, but only when at least one physical run is score.
Zones
A Front net, behind the striker and wicketkeeper: 0 runs
B Side nets, between the striker and halfway down the pitch: 1 run
C Side nets between halfway and the bowlers end: 2 runs
D Back net: 4 runs on the bounce, 6 runs on the full
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MATCH INFO
Who: UAE v USA
What: first T20 international
When: Friday, 2pm
Where: ICC Academy in Dubai
Pakistan World Cup squad
Sarfraz Ahmed (c), Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq, Abid Ali, Babar Azam, Haris Sohail, Shoaib Malik, Mohammad Hafeez(subject to fitness), Imad Wasim, Shadab Khan, Hasan Ali, Faheem Ashraf, Junaid Khan, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Mohammad Hasnain
Two additions for England ODIs: Mohammad Amir and Asif Ali
Desert Warrior
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Ben Kingsley
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Rating: 3/5
GOLF’S RAHMBO
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