What bear trap? Jake Knapp dismantled the champion’s course at PGA National in the first round of the Cognizant 2025 classic on the way to a 12-mine of 59. Representing the 15th round in60 in the history of the PGA Tour, the performance of Knapp marks the first to have taken place in the state of Florida and the first of the 2025 season.
Knapp holds a lead of four strokes in the first stadiums of Cognizant Classic while the morning wave ends the first round in PGA National. Its 59 could have been even better because the right-handed right-handed could not convert an eagle putt of 18 feet on the 18th par-5 to draw 58 and equalize the marking record of all time of the PGA Tour as held by Jim Furyk.
At 12 sous, Knapp seated a certain number which would have been good enough for a playoff series in 12 of the last 14 players from Cognizant Classic. It remains to be seen if he can build there on the following 54 holes.
“I didn’t think about it,” Knapp said after the Tour. “I was just trying to be sneaky because I hit a good blow. I thought of the number, and you think about 59 years old, but it’s as if I would always think about how it should have been 58 or 57 or 56.
“Fifty-nine are great, but you could always do technically better, but it could always be worse. It was not too worried to breathe. If I arrived at 18 years old and I was already at 12 sous, I was going to play the hole in the same way. Yes, I felt like I wanted to do it just because I wanted to do it, to be honest.”
After starting his day with five consecutive birdies, Knapp signed for three consecutive pars – the longest sequence of his morning. He returned to the Birdie train around the turn with another circle on his dashboard on n ° 9 to play his first nine in 29. Two additional birdies came on n ° 10-11 to put the idea of a tour of less than 60 in everyone’s mind.
The respective conversions of 12 feet and 6 feet came to n ° 13-14 while Knapp entered the bear trap needing to play his last four holes in 2 sous. A long -distance effort of 34 feet on the 15th of the par -3 – its longest in the round – gave it a lot of margin of breathing in the middle of a section otherwise suffocating from the golf course.
A pair of pars preceded Knapp’s march to the 18th tee where he laced one of the best trips in his round in the finisher by 5. Driving an iron of 6 inside 20 feet, the second year student of the PGA Tour was walking towards green knowing that a tower of less than 60 was anything but his. While the eagle did not land, Knapp brushed his birdie to secure his place among one of the most exclusive clubs in the PGA Tour.
“I think you start to think about it too much, you just will add pressure to something that is very useless,” said Knapp. “At the same time, if it was Sunday and the tournament went to the line, it could be different. But at the same time, it’s Thursday morning, and I do my best to set up in the weekend. I tried to focus at the time and trust what I was doing all day.”
