{"id":10320,"date":"2012-04-27T04:33:03","date_gmt":"2012-04-27T02:33:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/04\/golf-duke-thrives-in-new-orleans-tired-watson-opens-with-71\/"},"modified":"2012-04-27T04:33:03","modified_gmt":"2012-04-27T02:33:03","slug":"golf-duke-thrives-in-new-orleans-tired-watson-opens-with-71","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/golf-duke-thrives-in-new-orleans-tired-watson-opens-with-71\/","title":{"rendered":"Golf-Duke thrives in New Orleans, tired Watson opens with 71"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">April 26<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; Masters champion Bubba Watson struggled<br \/>\nwith fatigue as Ken Duke birdied two of his last three holes to<br \/>\ngrab a share of the early lead in Thursday&#8217;s opening round of<br \/>\nthe New Orleans Classic in Avondale, Louisiana.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>While Watson launched his title defence with a battling<br \/>\none-under-par 71 at the TPC Louisiana, fellow American Duke<br \/>\ncapitalised on a strategy of patience to card a flawless 65 in<br \/>\nblustery conditions.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Bidding for his first victory on the PGA Tour where he has<br \/>\nbeen a runner-up three times, the 43-year-old Duke rattled up<br \/>\nseven birdies to finish level with compatriot Cameron Tringale.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u201c&#8221;You have to be patient out here,&#8221; journeyman Duke told<br \/>\nreporters. &#8220;\u201cYou can&#8217;t hit it (to) four, five feet on every hole<br \/>\nbecause there&#8217;s so many mounds on the greens.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u201c&#8221;You have to take your 30-foot putt here, 30-foot putt<br \/>\nthere and take what it gives you. If you roll one in, you roll<br \/>\none in. I did that a couple times today.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>American world number seven Steve Stricker and Swede Daniel<br \/>\nChopra opened with 66s while Ben Curtis, who won the Texas Open<br \/>\non Sunday, was a further stroke back with fellow American John<br \/>\nRollins.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>It was a tough day, though, for defending champion Watson<br \/>\nwho was competing in his first event since winning the opening<br \/>\nmajor of the year at Augusta National 18 days ago.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>HIGH-PROFILE GROUPING<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>April 26 (Reuters) &#8211; Masters champion Bubba Watson struggled with fatigue as Ken Duke birdied two of his last three holes to grab a share of the early lead in Thursday&#8217;s opening round of the New Orleans Classic in Avondale, Louisiana. While Watson launched his title defence with a battling one-under-par 71 at the TPC [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-10320","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10320\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}