While the stars are lining up at Austin Country Club, a second-tier field is pegging it this week in the Dominican Republic.
It’s our first run-it-back event of the season, with the first Corales Championship already taking place last September. It was the third event of the new season. We will see another repeat event in two weeks when the TOUR heads back to Augusta National.
But for now, let’s jump back to the Corales and break down the course, weather, and field.
This week’s field will be set to 132 golfers. That is 12 fewer than the September edition. The first running was not an alternate-field event which explains the difference.
The tournament did a good job (again) of attracting some strong sponsor invites. That list includes Thomas Detry, Thomas Pieters, Lucas Herbert, Andy Ogletree, Justin Suh, Fabrizio Zanotti, and Miguel Angel Jimenez.
The Course
Corales Golf Club is a young course that was designed by Tom Fazio in 2010. It was used twice on the Korn Ferry Tour before getting the bump up to the big leagues.
This coastal layout features extremely wide landing areas off the tee. Golfers averaged more than 70 percent fairways hit in the first two TOUR events played here. It was more of the same in September with the field averaging 70.75 percent of fairways hit.
The penalty for missing a fairway is relatively small, so that gives you plenty of options in terms of strategy off the tee. This par 72 can stretch out to 7,670 yards but a big chunk of that comes at the par-5 12th and pat-5 14th which are both over 620 yards. Overall, you don’t need to pound a lot of drivers here but it is an option for those who want to play more aggressively.
In a way that lowers the importance of driver here because there is no requirement to be lenghty off the tee and big misses aren’t heavily punished. It turns into a second-shot course where great iron play can lead you to the top of the board. Of course, weather can determine just how dialed in you can get those irons.
There are six oceanside holes on the course and wind can become a factor.
If the wind starts to whip, then give a long look to the short-game wizards.
For grass, golfers will see paspalum turf which is common in these tropical environments. The greens usually run on the slow side compared to most TOUR events, around 10.5 feet on the stimp.
Course Quotes
Sifting through some past quotes, let’s try to break down the course to see how it will play.
Jhonattan Vegas: “When you go to grasses like this, like Paspalum that it’s slower and you have the wind, it’s hard to commit mentally to make sure that you hit it hard enough to get it to the hole. So it takes some adjustment. That’s kind of why you tend to see a lot of guys this week on the putting greens kind of getting adjusted to that speed”
Scott Harrington: “off the tee it’s not super demanding, the fairways are pretty generous. I feel as kind of a longer player I can kind of let it rip a little bit. Greens you can be really aggressive on. I mean, they’re sloped, but like where all the pins are, if you get it kind of inside 15 feet, really the putts don’t have a lot of movement so you can be really aggressive with your putter.”
Matt Jones: “The fairways are pretty wide here so you should have a lot of iron shots out of fairways, and if you can control your irons”
Paul Dunne: “It’s one of the widest courses I think we’ll ever play, so a couple loose drives that would normally cost me I can get away with here. And it’s tricky around the greens, which plays into my strengths.”
Dominic Bozzelli: “On this type of grass, the ball kind of sticks where it lands. I found it a little easier to dial-in your irons when it does that.”
Justin Hueber: “Honestly, you can hit it wherever you want off the tee. I’m swinging hard, trying to hit it as far down there as I can. Try to get as many shorter irons.”
Overview: Golfers talk about wide fairways and slow greens.
Correlated Courses
Looking at grass types, geography, course attributes, and past performance, here are a few courses/events that I think could prove to be a good pointer this week:
El Camaleon (Mayakoba)
Grand Reserve CC (Puerto Rico Open)
Pebble Beach Pro-Am Rota
The main theme this week is coastal courses with an emphasis on approach play or short game.
The Weather
Thursday: Sunny with a high of 84 degrees. Winds at 15 to 20 MPH.
Friday: Partly Cloudy with a high of 83 degrees. Winds at 15 to 20 MPH.
It looks like winds are going to be a serious factor this week with the forecast showing 15+ MPH on all four days.
Golfers to Watch
Charley Hoffman
He dealt with some back troubles on the West Coast but he’s been solid when healthy. Hoffman has gained 4.8 or more strokes on approach in three straight starts. He has a win at one of the correlated venues, El Camaleon. He’s also been known to excel in Texas over the course of his career, so we know he can handle the wind.
Emiliano Grillo
He landed roughly 6 more greens than the field during the September Corales and that’s been his recipe for success for a while now. He’s pelted more greens per round, compared to the field, in 16 of his last 17 events played. If you want lean toward ball-striking this week, Grillo is a great option at the top.
Thomas Detry
If you’re wondering why Detry keeps getting an invite to this event, it may be connection to the area. “I came over here actually after the World Cup, I came over here on holiday. A lot of Belgians have houses around here, and my uncle as well. So we came here, had a lot of fun by the beach, playing golf in the afternoon before the sunset. Yeah, I played this golf course pretty much every day.” He arrives with top 10s in two of his last four worldwide starts.
Thomas Pieters
Speaking of Belgians, this big hitter just missed out on the WGC-Match Play (currently 76th in the OWGR). He had an injury over the holidays but has shown no signs of it slowing him down with a 5-for-5 record since returning including three straight top 15s (Saudi International, Puerto Rico Open, Qatar Masters). He’s proven his winning potential with four career victories on the European Tour.
Justin Suh
He had a standout amateur career but got injured right after turning pro. He played through the injury and it really showed in the results. He’s found his health again and the results have flipped, landing top 40s in five of his last six PGA TOUR events. That includes a T14 at this event in September.
Pat Perez
The first thing I do when the TOUR heads to a course with Paspalum is check whether or not PP is in the field. Perez has three career wins and two of them have come on paspalum (2017 Mayakoba, 2018 CIMB Classic). What did he say after winning that event? “It’s actually not even the course that suits my eye, it’s the greens. Mayakoba, where I won, has the same greens and I putted better than anybody there, too. So I don’t know what it is. It’s the grass.”
Ranking the Field
1. Charley Hoffman
2. Emiliano Grillo
3. Justin Suh
4. Sepp Straka
5. Charles Howell III
6. Brandon Wu
7. Brice Garnett
8. Jhonattan Vegas
9. Thomas Detry
10. Thomas Pieters
11. Stephan Jaeger
12. Charles Howell III
13. Lee Hodges
14. Joel Dahmen
15. Luke List
16. Adam Schenk
17. Taylor Pendrith
18. Nate Lashley
19. Pat Perez
20. Will Gordon