Britain & Ireland within 2 points of Team Cup title

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The PGA TOUR’s biggest stars are at Atlanta’s East Lake Golf Club for this week’s TOUR Championship, as is one of the NBA’s biggest names. NBA veteran and former collegiate player of the year Blake Griffin is attending the TOUR Championship this week. Griffin, a six-time NBA All-Star, walked with Max Homa and rookie Sahith Theegala during Friday’s second round. “I love the fact that Max during The Open is like, ‘I’m playing with Tiger Woods today.’ He’s having a full freak-out moment that everyone else would but he’s not afraid to say it,” Griffin said. “I respect people that are like that. It’s just real. You’re a real person. He doesn’t take himself too seriously.” The 12-year NBA veteran recently took up the game as a competitive outlet and said he’s become “obsessed,” even building a simulator in his home. The TOUR Championship was the first golf tournament he attended, calling it “unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.” “I can’t stop,” he said. “I put a simulator in my house. If I have 30 free minutes, I’m down in my simulator and I’m working on stuff. I don’t know what I’m doing but I’m working on it. “I knew that when I retired from basketball, … I needed a competitive outlet or I’ll be like a psychopath,” he added. “I started playing and I was awful. I’m still awful but a better awful. “You want the challenge. … You want it to be hard. This is such a different sport. It’s so mentally tough, that’s why I love it. If golf was easy, nobody would play.”

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CHARLOTTE, North Carolina – Phil Mickelson has been using a Project X HZRDUS T1100 shaft for years, and in multiple different Callaway driver heads, but he showed up to the 2019 Wells Fargo Championship with an Aldila Rogue Black 130 MSI 60TX shaft in his Callaway Epic Flash Sub Zero driver. Mickelson, at 48 years old, has been gushing publicly about his newly-found clubhead speed with the driver, and he’s currently averaging 120.31 mph in 2019, placing him 19th on the PGA TOUR. By coupling his trusty Project X T1100 shaft with the Callaway Epic Flash Sub Zero driver head, however, he found his tee ball was hanging out to the left rather than turning over, according to Callaway TOUR rep Johnny Thompson. “He’s been playing that T1100 for a long time and it’s been a really good partner with some of the driver heads we’ve had in the past,� Thompson told PGATOUR.COM. “But with [the Epic Flash, he’s] kind of having more of a hanging miss. It wasn’t a slice; it just hung out there. It wouldn’t release.� While Mickelson is currently averaging 304 yards off the tee (T27) on measured drives in 2019, according to PGATOUR.COM stats, he’s ranked 204th on the PGA TOUR in driving accuracy percentage, and he’s ranked 213th – last on TOUR – in left-rough miss percentage, hitting it in the left rough off the tee 21.19% of the time. After a testing session last week at the Ely Callaway Performance Center in Carlsbad, California, Mickelson found that he was hitting the Aldila Rogue Black shaft on the center of the face more often, and “it was helping him square the clubface a little bit easier,� Thompson told PGATOUR.COM. The Aldila Rogue Black has a slightly softer profile than the Project X HZRDUS T1100 shaft he had been playing. “He’s really excited about some of the club head speed that he’s picked up,� Thompson told PGATOUR.COM. “High-launch, low-spin draws are kind of his thing right now, and that shaft definitely helps him square of the face and he’s definitely hammering it. He’s hitting it very hard.� By hitting more of a draw with the Aldila Rogue Black driver shaft, and hitting the center of the face more often, look for Mickelson to increase his fairways-hit percentage, and reduce his left-rough tendency off the tee. That is, if he does decide to put it in play come competition time on Thursday.

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