Perez ups lead to 4 shots at CIMB Classic

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KAPALUA, Hawaii — Xander Schauffele finished stronger than everyone around him Saturday, and it was good enough to keep a one-shot lead going into the final round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions. Schauffele closed with three pars for a 2-under 71 as he tries to become only the third player to win back-to-back in this winners-only PGA TOUR event at Kapalua, and the first since Geoff Ogilvy in 2010. This was a matter of not losing ground in the final hour. Justin Thomas, who won at Kapalua three years ago, ran off five birdies on the front nine to take the lead until his first three-putt bogey of the week on the 12th hole. He misjudged the wind on another 6-foot par putt at the 17th and failed to birdie the par-5 18th for a 38 on the back nine. That gave him a 69 and a sour taste. Thomas will be in the final group as he goes for his third win in his last seven starts on the PGA TOUR. But he typically scores well on the back nine, and he lost ground on this day. “I’m not very pleased,” Thomas said, speaking more to the finish than his 54-hole position. Thomas wasn’t alone. Patrick Cantlay ran off three straight birdies to get into the mix, only to hit a tee shot out-of-bounds on the 14th and hit another tee shot into the waist-high weeds on the 18th, leading to bogey. He shot 39 on the back for a 73 and fell five shots behind. Joaquin Niemann, who opened with a 7-under 66 on Thursday, failed to birdie the two par 5s and made bogeys on the two par 4s between them. He shot 39 on the back and had to settle for a 74, leaving him four shots behind. Patrick Reed had a 74, eight shots worse than his round Friday, and he was in the group four shots behind. RELATED: Leaderboard | Refinement to bring tougher test at Kapalua Schauffele was at 11-under 212, the highest 54-hole score to lead at Kapalua since Vijay Singh was at 11 under in 2007. Schauffele won last year by closing with a 62 to make up a five-shot deficit against Gary Woodland. Thomas is one who believes another 62 is out there if everything falls his way, even though the renovations to the Plantation Course are a big reason why scoring has been higher than usual. The weather hasn’t helped. Saturday brought another dose of gusts in the 25 mph range, and occasional rain that showed up out of nowhere. Ten players were separated by four shots going into Sunday, a group that includes Woodland, Kevin Kisner, Jon Rahm and a pair of newcomers who won last year, Matthew Wolff and Colin Morikawa.

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This time last year, Scottie Scheffler was an equipment free agent without a PGA TOUR victory. A lot has changed since then. Scheffler won four times in a two-month stretch last spring — including his first major triumph at the Masters — en route to winning PGA TOUR Player of the Year. In the midst of those eventful two months, Scheffler also inked an endorsement deal with TaylorMade. Scheffler’s most notable gear changes in 2022 included a switch into TaylorMade’s Stealth Plus driver at the beginning of the year, and a switch into TaylorMade’s Stealth 16.5-degree fairway wood prior to winning the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play event (remember, the TaylorMade Stealth fairway wood finally replaced his longtime Nike VR Pro fairway wood that he’d used for a decade! Scheffler is wasting no time upgrading to TaylorMade’s latest and greatest. He has the TaylorMade Stealth 2 Plus prototype driver and a Stealth 2 3-wood in the bag at this week’s Sentry Tournament of Champions. Scheffler ranked 19th in Driving Distance (311.6 yards) last season and 100th in Driving Accuracy. Scheffler said Wednesday, however, the new Stealth 2 driver may move him up the rankings in the latter category by offering more stability on off-center strikes. “The testing process, it was pretty simple for me,” Scheffler said Wednesday from Kapalua Resort’s Plantation Course. “This was, I think, an easy fitting. The driver, when we were going through the fitting … I noticed at first it was really stable. So if I was hitting it left, the ball would always kind of hang left, and then if one head was going too far right, the ball would kind of hang there. So the thing I noticed, and was excited about, was how stable it was. And getting into it was pretty seamless. I went up to The Kingdom (TaylorMade’s fitting center in Carlsbad, California) this winter and just kind of got into the driver, and the numbers were matching up nicely, and I thought it was a lot more stable, so I put it in play.” His driver is so new, in fact, that TaylorMade hasn’t yet announced any technical information about the design. It just went onto the USGA Conforming Club List earlier this week. Judging by the photos of Scheffler’s new Stealth 2 Plus driver, it appears that TaylorMade is staying with the red TwistFace – uniquely made from 60 layers of carbon – that the company introduced in its previous Stealth drivers. The red carbon face, according to TaylorMade, helped achieve faster ball speeds when compared to the titanium that is standard in today’s drivers. It does appear that TaylorMade has made some changes from the Stealth Plus to the new Stealth 2 Plus driver, though. The crown seems to have a glossier black finish compared to its predecessor, and the sole appears to feature a redesigned sliding adjustable weight near the front of the sole. Although Scheffler has changed into the new Stealth 2 Plus 8-degree head, he’s sticking with the same Fujikura Ventus Black 7 X shaft that he used throughout 2022. Scheffler is also upgrading into a new Stealth 2 fairway wood with 15 degrees of loft. As he explained on Wednesday, when he’s testing out new fairway woods, Scheffler first looks for the club to produce the correct distance to create the desired yardage gaps in his set. Then, from there, he wants to see that he can hit all of the different shots he requires from a fairway wood. “I always look for distance first (with a new 3-wood),” Scheffler explained. “Like, when we do the fitting, we’ll get it going the right distance, and then (see) if I can hit all my shots. I noticed with this one I was able to hit kind of down into the ball more, and so that part excited me. The front edge sat a little bit squarer, so it’s got a little better look to While Scheffler’s new TaylorMade Stealth 2 Plus driver and Stealth 2 fairway wood are still unreleased and unannounced by the company, Scheffler already sounds comfortable with the new designs. He’ll put them to their first competitive test on Thursday when he tees off at 12:15 p.m. local time in the opening round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions.

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