AUGUSTA, Ga. — It only took one round at Augusta National to break Harry Hall.
OK, “break” may be a bit strong, but the Masters rookie opened with a five-over-par 77 and immediately planned to make wholesale equipment changes. Most interestingly, he intends to play Round 2 with two drivers. Yep, he’s going full Phil Mickelson.
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The 28-year-old Brit revealed this after a difficult first round when he was asked a question attempting to prompt a positive answer. First round at the Masters, though. What do you take out of that? Well, he took that he needs to take some clubs out of his bag.
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“I need to get a lot better,” Hall said before asking a follow-up about what he planned to do after his round. “I’m probably going to put—I’m going to change my driver. I’m going to put two drivers in play tomorrow, different ones. I’m putting a new putter in play and going to figure out on the range.”
“I don’t think I spin my irons enough either,” Hall added. “I went into a spinnier ball this week, but I still, you know, can’t stop it on a dime like I need to. So I probably need to add off to my irons or do something to compete in these majors.”
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Is that all?
To be fair to Hall, Thursday was a day in which 10 players didn’t break 80. So he wasn’t even near the bottom of the leaderboard. And, again, he’s making his Masters debut.
But the one-time PGA Tour winner clearly wasn’t satisfied with how he played, particularly off the tee and on the greens.
“I think it played a lot firmer and faster today. You need to hit it far off the tee. I didn’t think you did, but as soon as the greens got firm, you need to hit it as far as possible to have less club in, simple as that,” Hall added. “I fade the driver that I’ve got in the bag at the moment, and I was driving back to the mini just to draw it off the tee on some of these fairways. When you give up 30 yards, you’re not really being very aggressive.”
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Hall actually only lost .05 shots off the tee in Round 1, according to Data Golf. The normally strong putter lost 1.41 strokes on the greens and a staggering 3.23 shots around the green. But he picked up 2.34 shots on his approaches. In other words, Harry, we wouldn’t tinker with those irons if we were you.
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