Tiger Woods meets with Stoneman High student at Honda Classic

ORLANDO, Fla. - Rickie Fowler and Viktor Hovland have been sharing the same longitude and latitude this week, each competing at the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard. However, as recent journeys go, they have been on different trains bound for different places. Hovland, 23, is the red-hot wunderkind not far removed from Oklahoma State. He is riding one of those sizzling golf tears where nearly every bounce seems to go right, and he finds himself in contention once again as the API moves into the weekend at Bay Hill Club and Lodge. (At 7-under 137, Hovland trails leader Corey Conners by two shots.) Hovland has been a rocket ship in the Official World Golf Ranking. He was ranked 100th just more than a year ago, and now he is 13th. He smiles a lot, and for good reason. RELATED: Full leaderboard | Day's tee shot gets stuck in tree, takes one-shot penalty Certainly Fowler, now 32 and a five-time winner on the PGA TOUR, can relate to Hovland's success. Fowler is one of a long line of Cowboys standouts paving a path to the PGA TOUR for Oklahoma State players such as Hovland and Matthew Wolff. Fowler has been struggling. Searching. Tinkering. He and swing coach John Tillery have been making changes. Fowler knows exactly where he wants to be - contending in majors (four top-5 finishes in 2014), making U.S. cup teams, winning big titles (such as THE PLAYERS Championship six years ago) … because he has been there. He is working as doggedly at home as he ever has, long hours, sacrificing, waiting and hoping to see results. And still waiting. Hovland and Fowler were in the same group along with Aussie Jason Day the last two days at Arnie's Place. Hovland made seven birdies and shot 4-under 68. Hovland is riding a stretch of six top-6 or better finishes in his last seven starts. Fowler needed a chip-in for birdie at his final hole on Thursday just to shoot 76. Friday's goal to sneak back inside the cutline never was going to be easy. But he'd do what Arnold Palmer would do. His head was down Friday, and he got after it. When Fowler rinsed a tee shot at the dogleg par-4 third hole (his 12th) on Friday, he ballooned to 5 over for the tournament. He appeared destined for another disheartening week in a frustrating stretch of them. Coming in, Fowler had missed three cuts in his last six starts. But he is a fighter, and birdies coming home at Nos. 4 (28 feet), 5 (42 feet) and 6 (2 feet) at least gave him a chance. Fowler, who sports shirts and hats and shoes honoring Palmer when he plays here, had missed the cut only once in nine starts at the API; he made 118 feet of putts in a round of 70. At 2-over 146, he headed to lunch not knowing if he'd be working this weekend. He longed for two more rounds at Bay Hill to find some traction, some momentum. Something positive. "Things are definitely moving the right way," said Fowler, once No. 4 in the world, now ranked 65th. "Just had a couple swings that cost me. But I’m happy with it. It’s getting closer and closer, so we'll see if we get a tee time tomorrow. If we do, we’ll go play like hell this weekend. If not, we’ll go get ready for our tee time next Thursday (at THE PLAYERS)." Peter Malnati had a chance to knock out all the players at plus-2 late Friday, but made double-bogey at 18 and missed the cut himself. Fowler was in on the number. A needed break. More than a year removed from his last top 10 (2020 American Express), Fowler doesn't hide the fact that golf these days is more work than fun. He made five consecutive West Coast starts, something he hadn't done since he was a rookie. When he is home, he stays dedicated to his craft. The days he takes off are only to give his 5 foot 9, 150-pound body a rest. "It’s definitely been a grind," Fowler said. "I think more so it’s just a mental challenge, because playing and competing against the best players in the world for a decent amount of time now, and being up there at one point in the top 10 for quite some time, and being one of the top guys in the world, it’s just hard. You know what you’re capable of, and where you should be - or what you expect out of yourself. "So that’s been more of the struggle, not beating myself up too much, and kind of taking a step back, let everything happen, be patient. But, yeah, it’s been frustrating at times, been a grind. But we’re still grinding it out." Funny how life works sometimes. As he was grinding just to make a cut, Fowler didn't need to look very far to see the level of play to which he wants to return. Hovland isn't "walking" around Bay Hill this week; he is floating across the grounds at Arnie's Place, his game honed and sharp. Sure, he could hit a few more fairways (8 of 14 Friday), but most everything is working. It doesn't matter if you are 23 or 32; Hovland and Fowler know that golf is cyclical, and hot golf can be fleeting. So when you have it going, you make the most of it. Good golf exists on razor-thin margins. Fowler was greenside in a bunker in two shots at the par-5 12th and walked away with bogey; Hovland came up short on the par- 3 seventh and holed his bunker shot from 10 yards. Birdie. "Yeah, it’s been very fun," Hovland said. "Obviously playing very good and I don’t feel like I have that many holes in my game anymore, which is cool, because I missed plenty of greens out there today (seven) and I still shot 68, even made a bunker shot and got some really cool up-and-downs. Walking from the fairway over to the rough wherever I was hitting from, after missing the green, I would have been anxious the whole way … But now it’s like, ‘All right, I’ll be all right. Even if I make a bogey here I can birdie the next.' So it’s just a very relaxed kind of attitude. It’s a lot easier when you’re playing well. You just kind of let it all happen." Therein lies the difference. One guy is just kind of letting it happen right now. The other is trying to make something happen. Fowler has viewed it from both sides. At Bay Hill on Friday, you needed to watch only one grouping to see the contrast. Rickie Fowler is working hard, and said he is starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. No, he isn't there yet. That's the magical journey of golf.

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PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Golf is a game of inches. And grams, apparently. Adding 3.5-gram weights to his irons has paid dividends for Anirban Lahiri at THE PLAYERS, where he’s the overnight leader heading into the Monday finish at TPC Sawgrass. Lahiri sits at 9 under par, one shot ahead of Tom Hoge and Harold Varner III. Lahiri is 5 under par for his first 11 holes of the suspended third round after shooting 67-73 in the opening two rounds. “I think the biggest difference was we made a change to the irons this week,” Lahiri said after his first round. “I changed the weight. The irons have been my weak link, and they came out much better. I feel like my confidence is getting better, which is really positive. “It’s really something that’s minor. I’ve added maybe 3 1/2 grams of weight to all of my irons. … These last couple of weeks, especially, we’ve been playing really tough golf courses, and you hit it 4 or 5 yards offline and you can make 6 instead of 3. And I had a lot of that happen to me. It’s frustrating when you know you’re not making bad swings and you’re not getting the results you want, so it’s equally satisfying when it comes together like this.” Lahiri is using a Srixon ZX Utility 4-iron and Srixon Z945 irons for his 5-iron through pitching wedge this week. The Z945s were first released in Asia in 2014 and became available in North America the following year. Hideki Matsuyama was among the players to use the clubs when they first came out. Lahiri used lead tape to add weight to his clubheads. The added weight gave Lahiri increased face awareness and gave him a more consistent swingweight from his woods to his irons. “He found the windows of old and spin rates of old, and it was off to the races,” said Rusty Estes, who worked with Lahiri on his clubs. Lahiri arrived at THE PLAYERS after three missed cuts and a T74 in his last four starts. He was 24 over par in those 10 rounds. He also ranked 212th (out of 217 players) in Strokes Gained: Approach-the-Green this season, losing nearly a stroke per round. He’s fourth this week, having gained 5.95 strokes in 47 holes. He’s also hit 36 of 47 greens this week, including 10 of 11 in the third round.

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Bee-yoo! Bee-yoo! Arnold Palmer alert! Arnold Palmer alert! That line from “The Other Guys” is ironic because The King needs no introduction. His legend will last forever. It’s a fact cemented further with Monday’s announcement that the Rookie of the Year will now receive the Arnold Palmer Award. Of course, as much it all started in golf, his cool was kept fresh throughout his life thanks in part to his dedication to keeping golf courses current. This is perhaps no more evident than at Bay Hill Golf Club and Lodge. It hosts the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard for the 41st time this week. For the latest modifications to the track, expectations for those in the field and more, scroll past the ranking. Tuesday’s Fantasy Insider will include Phil Mickelson, Henrik Stenson, Bubba Watson, Louis Oosthuizen and The Honda Classic champion Keith Mitchell among other notables. Bay Hill is a stock par 72, but it wasn’t always. It debuted as a par 71 in 1979, transitioned to a par 72 in 1990 (when Robert Gamez holed out for eagle on the par-4 finisher to win; he’d go on to claim what is now the Arnold Palmer Award) and tightened to a par 70 from 2007-2009 before it reclaimed its par of today (following a significant renovation). Palmer’s penchant for tinkering served as the common thread for the fabric of his tournament’s history. It’s a theme carried on this year with new tee boxes on the par-5 fourth hole and par-4 ninth that have lengthened the course by an aggregate 35 yards to a tournament-record 7,454 yards. In addition to other upgrades such as a new area to work on the short game and numerous spots of improved landscaping, modern irrigation has been introduced to water only the primary rough whenever preferred. Speaking of which, the longest rough, which is overseeded, has been allow to grow as high as three-and-a-half inches. TifEagle bermudagrass greens, which are not overseeded, are average in size but prepped to run as fast as 13-and-a-half feet on the Stimpmeter. Of all publicized measurements, that’s as slick as it gets on the PGA TOUR. Rory McIlroy put on a clinic with his putter en route to a three-stroke victory here last year, but that’s what he needed to do to prevail. He ranked just T45 in greens in regulation (at the field average). However, when he manufactured those scoring opportunities, he led the field in proximity to the hole and paid them off also by pacing it in strokes gained: putting, fewest putts and scrambling. Of 61 attempts inside 10 feet, he whiffed just twice. While the primary rough separates the excessively wayward, hitting fairways isn’t a prerequisite to contend. At T48, McIlroy felt short of the field average. Instead, distance off the tee is more valuable, especially when it concerns gettable par 5s, while the greens are as fair as the field would want. Mother Nature should cooperate. After some rain, wind and cooling early in the week, a dry, calm and warming trend will take over. Sunshine is expected through Saturday while daytime highs will climb 10 degrees or so and into the low 80s by the weekend. The return of the threat of rain re-enters the picture on Sunday when the high could climb into the mid-80s. The impact of wind will be felt only with the energy. As of midday Monday, the field stood at 123. That’s three more than what’s scheduled because Gamez, Ernie Els and Tim Herron are exempt as winners prior to 2000. They’re considered add-ons and would not be replaced if any withdrew. For the fifth consecutive year, the champion will receive three-year exemptions for PGA TOUR membership and into THE PLAYERS. ROB BOLTON’S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM’s Fantasy Insider Rob Bolton recaps and previews every tournament from numerous angles. Look for his following contributions as scheduled. MONDAY: Rookie Ranking, Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Medical Extensions, Power Rankings TUESDAY*: Sleepers, Fantasy Insider WEDNESDAY: One & Done THURSDAY: Champions One & Done * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM’s Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf, which also publishes on Tuesdays.

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