Wyndham Clark got off to another poor start at the Paris Olympics, continuing a trend from The Open Championship at Royal Troon, where he badly missed the cut.
Wyndham Clark’s struggles continue; finds water early and often at Olympics
Wyndham Clark had another frustrating day, as he sits towards the bottom of the leaderboard in Paris.
Jack Milko has been playing golf since he was five years old. He has yet to record a hole-in-one, but he did secure an M.A. in Sports Journalism from St. Bonaventure University.
The 2023 U.S. Open champion began with two bogies and a double bogey over his first three holes, thanks to a pair of tee shots that found the water on the 2nd and 3rd. Clark’s opening tee shot also landed on the bank of the penalty area, forcing him to take his medicine by chipping back into the fairway. That led to a bogey-five, a harbinger of things to come.
He struggled all day, losing more than five shots to the field in overall strokes gained due to his poor putting and iron play. But his wayward tee-shots early did not help his cause either.
Alas, Clark managed to steady the ship on the 9th and 10th holes, making back-to-back birdies to climb to 2-over for the championship. But a bogey on the 12th kept him at bay, as he needed to make a 12-footer just to save his five. Clark was all over the place on that par-4, hitting his tee shot left into the bunker and placing his approach miles left of the green.
A birdie at the par-5 14th salvaged those mistakes, but his efforts to bounce back completely unraveled at the 15th. There, Clark found the water once again, this time with his approach, as he went on to make a double-bogey six.
He ultimately carded a 4-over 75 and sits in a tie for 56th, sitting 12 shots behind leader Hideki Matsuyama after day one.
Clark has had a mixed bag of a season since his historic victory at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am in early February. A back injury has created some inconsistency in his game, leading to poor results. However, he has posted five top-10 finishes since March—including two at the Travelers Championship and the Genesis Scottish Open.
“It’s been a lot of things that led me down a path of, ‘Is it something in my swing? Is it equipment?’ And then, coming full circle, we just realized now I’m a lot healthier, and maybe there were a couple of equipment things,” Clark said Wednesday in his pre-tournament press conference.
“But you start going down rabbit holes that maybe I shouldn’t have gone down, and next thing you know, I’m missing cuts by a little bit and not playing at the level that I was earlier in the year or some parts of last year.”
Perhaps Clark will dig out of the deep hole he has dug himself on Thursday in Paris. But if he fails to do so, more questions about his health and form will continue to linger as the FedEx Cup Playoffs in August await.
Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Be sure to check out @_PlayingThrough for more golf coverage. You can follow him on Twitter @jack_milko as well.
