Sungjae Im, Billy Horschel and Shane Lowry are the highest-ranked players in action at PGA National this week for the Honda Classic; Watch early coverage live on Thursday from 1.30pm on Sky Sports Golf ahead of full coverage from 7pm
Last Updated: 22/02/23 10:55pm
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Take a look back at the highlights of the final round of last year’s Honda Classic, where Shane Lowry narrowly missed out on victory to Sepp Straka
Take a look back at the highlights of the final round of last year’s Honda Classic, where Shane Lowry narrowly missed out on victory to Sepp Straka
Billy Horschel believes a change in the PGA Tour schedule is required to help the Honda Classic build on a “disappointing” field and get more of the biggest names back to the event.
Honda ends its 42-year run as a title sponsor on the PGA Tour this week, with not a single top-10 player in the world competing at one of the tour’s most iconic venues.
That’s largely because the Honda Classic follows the Genesis Invitational, one of the new “elevated” events this year, with the tournament taking place ahead of the Arnold Palmer Invitational and The Players.
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One of the highlights of the golfing calendar takes place soon at The Players, with round-the-clock coverage from TPC Sawgrass live on Sky Sports Golf
The “Florida Swing” will kick off at PGA National on Thursday, live on Sky Sports, where Sungjae Im headlines as world No 18. Horschel also features as part of a run of five consecutive events to avoid missing the only South Florida event left in the calendar.
“I’m sort of disappointed in the PGA Tour in the sense that – I’m not going to say they didn’t prioritise the Honda Classic, they prioritise every sponsor that we have,” Horschel said Wednesday. “It’s always tough when you’ve got 47 different sponsors on the PGA Tour and you have ‘X’ amount of partners on the PGA Tour to always please every one of them.
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Relive how Rory McIlroy won the 2012 Honda Classic, securing him world No 1 spot for the first time in his career
“But when I was out on tour early in my career, this was a hot event. You had top 20, all top 20 players in the world playing here. This was an event to play at. Then eventually over the years it’s sort of been relegated to not as strong of a field anymore, due to reasons…scheduling being the biggest thing, where the tournament fell.”
Honda announced last year that it would be ending its run as the title sponsor of the event. A new sponsor has not been confirmed, but Horschel said he has been promised by the PGA Tour that the venue will continue to have an event on the calendar.
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How can the PGA Tour get more stars back to PGA National?
Horschel is one of dozens of tour pros who live in South Florida and has called on the PGA Tour to find a solution, with a move to a different part of the calendar a possible way to encourage players back to the event.
“You’ve got 30 to 40 PGA Tour pros that live within a couple miles of this place and I think you’ve only got a handful of them playing this week,” Horschel added. “That’s disappointing, it really is.
Billy Horschel is one of just three players from the world’s top 30 in action on the PGA Tour this week
“The (PGA) Tour needs to understand that, that when you have 40 guys here that could stay in their bed, hop in their car and drive 10, 15 minutes to a tournament, they need to make sure that they’re putting this in the right spot (in the schedule) so they get all those top players playing here on a regular basis.
“We used to have two tournaments down in South Florida, here and at Doral. Now we only have one. We’re not going to lose this one. I’ve been told that we’re going to stay here.
“Now we’ve just got to find who that sponsor is going to be for the future and at the same time, we need to make sure that the date itself is in a better spot. They’ve guaranteed me that we’re going to be here, and I’m excited about that.”
Watch the Honda Classic throughout the week live on Sky Sports. Early coverage begins on Thursday from 1.30pm on Sky Sports Golf, ahead of full coverage from 7pm.
