Tournament Preview: The Honda Classic (Feb 28 – March 3)

Not scared at all…David Lynn Planking The Bear Trap. Photo by @golfchannel

A lot of golfers will be playing “backyard golf” this week as the TOUR moves east to the PGA National Resort & Spa in Palm Springs, Florida.  The course is challenging with its notorious “bear trap” holes 15, 16 and 17 which present a par 4 sandwiched by a pair of challenging par 3s.

Last year defending champion and world ranked No. 1 Rory McIlroy posted a bogey-free 3-under in his final round for a 12-under total of 268.  It was the second-lowest winning number since PGA National began playing host to this event in 2007.  Here is the trick to surviving The Bear Trap: bogey avoidance and tackling the par 5.   Hazards make this course very tricky but it doesn’t measure super long, at only 7,110 yards.

Tiger Woods is back in action this week for his second PGA TOUR event of 2013 after winning his first event at Torrey Pines back in January.   Same as last week, FedExCup ranked 1 and 2 (Snedeker and Mickelson) will be sitting out again for this event.

You can never rule out rain in Florida as the weekend presents a slightly greater threat of wet weather. Round 1 on Thursday will be the warmest day of the tournament, with the high temperatures in the upper 70s.

Want to hear more about Golficity’s predictions on who will win The Honda Classic? Just visit our Fantasy Golf Predictions page to get the inside scoop about this exciting event.

Golficity’s Pick: Graeme McDowell

(Cover image by @pga_tour)