Mickelson two clear as Power faces another missed cut
Phil Mickelson is leading at La Quinta
Seamus Power is facing his fifth missed cut in a row and his sixth in seven starts this season after following his opening 74 at the Stadium Course with a one-over 73 at La Quinta Country Club in the Desert Classic in California.
At three-over par, the West Waterford man (31) may need to shoot 60 at the Nicklaus Tournament Course today to make the top-70 and ties who qualify for Sunday's final round as the projected cut mark is already at six-under par and set to rise.
Power got back to level for the tournament after 11 holes when he followed a bogey at the second with three birdies. But he then double-bogeyed the par-three 15th and bogeyed the 16th in a 32-putt round to slip to tied 151st.
Overnight leader Phil Mickelson found his putting touch late in the day and birdied four of his last five holes on the Nicklaus Tournament Course to add a four-under 68 to his impressive first round 60 at La Quinta and lead by two strokes on 16-under par from Australian Curtis Luck (66 NT).
“It was a good way to finish the round,” said Mickelson, who birdied the 11th and 12th but double bogeyed the 18th to turn in level par.
“I had kind of struggled that front nine, doing not too much, and then I doubled that 18th hole. But I ended up birdieing four of the last five and turned it around and really I struck the ball every bit as well,
“I just didn't putt anywhere close to as well as I did yesterday, I putted really good. So it's been a fun first two rounds and hopefully I'll keep it going this weekend.”
Mickelson believes he’s putting as well as he ever has and now works hard to maintain his ball speed with the driver.
“So, there's two areas that guys tend to decline when they hit about mid 40s or so forth,” said Mickelson, who will not be joining Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy in next week’s Farmers Insurance Open in San Diego and instead break his run of 28 consecutive appearances in his home town event.
“One is speed and one is putting. The last two years I've done a good job of improving my putting, I've actually putted better the last few years than I ever have in my career.
“The last thing is speed, because if I have speed with the driver then I can worry more about accuracy, it's much easier to control it when you can hit cuts, but you can't hit cuts if you don't have enough speed.
“So I had a good off season, I spent a lot of time all last year gaining speed and in the last couple of months of the year speed picked back up and so I'm able to drive the ball a lot longer and in return also straighter.”
Mickelson has played his home town event at Torrey Pines for 28 years in a row but he’s taking a break this year as he also plans to play the Waste Management Phoenix Open, the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and defend his title at the WGC-Mexico Championship.
Canada’s Adam Hadwin 66 LQ) and Steve Marino (65 LQ) are third, three behind Mickelson on 13 under with Jon Rahm (66 NT) in a tie for fifth with Wyndham Clark (67 NT).
World No 1 Justin Rose is tied for 28th on eight-under after a 68 at the Nicklaus Tournament Course.
