LIV GOLF REVIEW
LOW AVERAGE SCORING Steyn City was a terrific venue for our first LIV Golf tournament. Few others could have handled such big crowds. It televised well and boasted a world- class range facility. It had the space for a village and grandstands to be built around the 18th hole, and plenty of parking. The course’s challenge though was compromised by heavy rain on the eve of the first round, and the greens
15th) played as a 4. The average score of the Southern Guards team was 66.3. The low round was a 62 (eagle and seven birdies) by Irishman Tom McK- ibbin on Saturday (which received zero TV coverage), and there were seven 63, plus hordes of 64s. Thomas Detry post- ed most birdies, with 28, but what stood out was the general absence of bogeys even with such fierce rough. Jon Rahm and Dean Burmester had one each.
became dartboards. They were firm and fast beforehand after weeks of preparation. The average round score of 67.76 was the lowest ever recorded at a major tour- nament in South Africa with a field of more than 50 players. It is the sixth low- est average in the history of LIV Golf. All but two of the 57 players were under par for 72 holes, and that was on par 71 with the club’s par-5 third hole (tournament
Bryson DeChambeau has never been shy about staking out a position. While in South Africa he was asked whether the equipment arms race or raw athleticism deserved more credit for tour players bombing it further than ever before. His answer was unambiguous. "If you want to say a driver in 2009 is worse than now, I would disagree," he said. "I think they're relatively the same and not much has changed. You can't change it that much with the rules being the way they are." It's a bold claim. The average driving distance on the PGA Tour was 302.8 yards in 2025 – a 15-yard jump from 2009 (287.9 yards). Assuming driver technology has played a role in the distance spike isn't a stretch. That part is hard to argue with. Launch monitors, elite fitness routines and a generational willingness to go all-out have all moved the needle in a real way. Nobody's disputing that. But crediting the athlete shouldn't require discrediting the engineers who spent two decades sourcing new materials and optimising MOI and aerodynamics to make every off-centre strike more playable. Even Golf Digest's most recent testing with the Golf Laboratories swing robot confirms drivers are getting longer by reducing the penalty on off-centre strikes. The size of the head hasn't changed, but what's inside certainly has. The robot data makes one thing clear: The gear is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Put a 2009 swing into 2009 equipment, and you're leaving real distance on the table. Where DeChambeau does find firmer ground is on the rollback debate. Rather than simply opposing this golf ball change, he frames it as a question the governing bodies haven't fully answered yet. "What are the bodies of golf trying to accomplish?" he asked. "Are they trying to preserve the traditions and history of the game, or are they trying to grow the game, ‘I LIKE SHOWING HOW FUN IT IS TO PLAY GOLF’
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because those are two different things." It's a legitimate distinction. Roll back the ball and you're threading a needle – protecting classic courses for pros while potentially alienating the next generation of fans who showed up precisely because watching someone carry a par 5 in two is genuinely thrilling. "If you want to grow the game, that's not how you get kids to hit the golf ball further and enjoy it and want to be a part of this game," DeChambeau said. "I like showing how much fun it is to play the game of golf, not how difficult it is."
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106 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
MARCH/APRIL 2026
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