Mickelson begins 27th PGA Tour season at Safeway Open

Korea’s Byeong Hun An always knew he was going to give back to the game of golf which had opened up new sporting horizons in his life. It finally happened through the creation of the Ben An Junior Championship which the inaugural event was launched successfully at Orange Tree Country Club in Orlando, Florida over the weekend. An, 29, used his charitable allocation presented to every team member of the 2019 Presidents Cup to fund his own junior tournament with the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA), a non-profit organisation dedicated to the overall growth and development of young men and women who aspire to earn college golf scholarships through competitive junior golf. “I’ve always wanted to do this,” said An. “As soon as I got into the Presidents Cup, AJGA was top of my list of where my funds would go.” An’s parents were Olympic medallists in table tennis but he grew up learning golf. When he was 15, they sent him to the IMG Academy at Bradenton and thus, began his junior career on the AJGA circuit which would shape his game and prepare him for life as a professional golfer. “The year I played in the Presidents Cup, some Korean juniors came over and spent a few days in my house (in Orlando) to practice and play together and it felt good to help the kids. I care if they do well and just to be able to help them, it meant a lot to me,” he said. “I played and practiced with them which was really fun. I really liked that I was able to give them information, give them little tips here and there and spent the whole day together from 7am to 8pm. If pros talked to me and helped me out when I was their age, it meant a lot. It’s good to be able to give back.” An said competing against kids his age and across different golf courses and states toughened him up as a junior golfer that he went on to produce a memorable win at the U.S. Amateur in 2009. “I started to play a lot of AJGA events, about 10 to 12 events a year. Back then, it was great fun. You see everyone who are your age and they are good golfers. It motivated me a lot as I wasn’t amongst the best ones. They were always better than me,” said An. “It helped as you play in different states, different courses. You learn a lot as you play against the best juniors. You learn so much, not just the golf but how to behave on the golf course and what you have to do. You also learn how to conduct interviews with the media. It helps overall, as a person and golfer. Definitely helped as I was able to win the U.S. Amateur.” As part of his overall support towards grassroot development, An, who won the BMW PGA Championship in Wentworth in 2015 and has played on the PGA TOUR since 2016, intends to bring several Korean juniors over to the U.S. to compete in his event in the near future so they too will have the opportunity to widen their perspective of the game. “Due to Covid, it was hard to arrange for it this year. Hopefully I can have this event for as long as possible, 10 years, 15 years, who knows,” said An, who conducted a clinic with the participants during the event as part of his involvement. “I obviously want to see them play well when they turn pro and see them on the tour but just giving them the playing opportunity in my event, I think that means a lot to me as well, and hopefully for them too. They may not know it now but by competing, it helps in the long term and hopefully they become better golfers and better people.”

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One of the drivers is a 10.5-degree Callaway Epic Flash head equipped with a shorter length shaft – “about an inch-and-a-quarterâ€� shorter, according to Mickelson — so he can hit “cute little cuts into the fairway,â€� as he explained in his social media post. The other driver is a 9-degree Callaway Epic Flash Sub Zero head equipped with a longer length shaft in order to “hit bombs.â€� With the longer of the two drivers, as Mickelson explained to the media following his Thursday round, he has a more upward angle of attack and it results in a ball speed increase of 4 mph. The longer setup also allows Mickelson to keep up with the “young guysâ€� in ways that his body cannot. “My swing is different than a lot of the young guys, where they’re very connected and have fast twitch muscles that explode through the ball,â€� Mickelson said. “My body moves a little more lethargic. I use length of arc for great speed. I need longer shafts and timing to be able to create the same kind of speed.â€� The longer driver, however, does have drawbacks. Mickelson says that the longer-shafted driver launches about 16 or 17 degrees, which is “such a high launch you can’t control that 14 times a round.â€� The shorter driver, on the other hand, launches “closer to 11.5, 12â€� degrees, which is “much easier to control,â€� as Mickelson said. Although Mickelson said in his Thursday post-round interview with the Golf Channel that six holes at Muirfield Village Golf Club “open upâ€� around 325 yards, which he says he can achieve using the longer of the two drivers, he wants to “get a little work doneâ€� hitting cut shots with the shorter driver to prepare for upcoming events such as the U.S. Open and Open Championship. “I wanted to try to do well here [at the Memorial], but wanted to get practice in with the [shorter driver],â€� Mickelson said. “I felt like I hit the long driver, [I] probably hit it five or six times. More than a three wood, which I took out.â€� Mickelson, who is playing with two drivers and no fairway wood, shot a first-round 70 (2-under) at the Memorial Tournament, hitting 50 percent of his fairways and averaging 310.5 yards off the tee. In 2006, Phil Mickelson famously used two drivers – one to hit a draw and one to hit a fade – at the BellSouth Classic, where he won by 13 shots, and a week later at the Masters, where he won his second green jacket. Related: Steve Stricker using irons from 2006 at the Memorial Tournament While the strategy worked, Mickelson hasn’t returned to the dual-driver setup in a “long time,â€� as he said in a social media video post on Thursday. That is, not until this week at the Memorial Tournament. Mickelson posted a video on Twitter and Instagram on Thursday, before his 1:16 p.m. ET tee-time, explaining – in his own way — that he’ll be using two different drivers during competition this week at Muirfield Village Golf Club.

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