Playing with Day and Rickie Fowler, Johnson opened with consecutive birdies and then eagled the 16th hole, his seventh of the round to be 4-under at the turn.
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Frustration, disappointment even anger were the dominant emotions.
“But you still just got to play your game no matter where you’re at”.
“I really did the right things to give myself the opportunity at getting into the play-off and having a shot”.
“Whatever gets thrown at me this week I am going to take it on the chin and keep pushing forward and hope that has me in the mix at the end of the week”. It’ll soon come my way. “It will happen”. In the 20 majors he has contested since making his debut at St Andrews five years ago, Day has posted nine top 10s.
It’s a threesome comprised of the winners of the last five majors.
It was no coincidence.
World No. 4 Day and compatriot Matt Jones sit in a tie for third at Whistling Straits after firing solid four-under-par rounds of 68 to be just two shots off American Dustin Johnson, who shot six-under 66 to lead again in the early stages of a major.
“The last round of the Open Championship I felt different, ” he said.
“I don’t know what changed but I felt more calm”, Day said of the conclusion of the Open, which he followed up with a victory in the Canadian Open. Everything was kind of slow-paced.
Day’s round featured three birdies and an eagle with just the one bogey.
“And I’m not saying it’s hard for me, but it’s something that I’m trying to learn and get better at”.
“The more I stay out here the more I realise it’s all about the head, rather than the game itself”.
Only two golfers have topped $10 million in official season prize money on the PGA Tour: Tiger Woods, in 2005, 2007 and 2009, and Vijay Singh, who brought in a record US$10.9 million by winning nine times in 29 events in 2004.
“I didn’t hit it as well as I know I can but the early birdies got the round going and then I held on down the stretch when I needed to”, Jones said. Now married with a son, Dash, and another child on the way, all that is missing is that first major.
There’s Jason Day on a major championship leaderboard.
“I didn’t let them influence me whereas early in my career I would have been already flustered and been thinking I need to force something”, Day told AAP.
The Australian who seems to contend in the biggest tournaments almost every time he tees it up is still searching for his first major title.
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A bogey on the ninth was his only blemish, but a birdie on the 13th ensured he’d join Day in the clubhouse at 4-under.
