With favourable conditions throughout the tournament, Cameron Smith rewrote the history books during his Sentry Tournament of Champions victory. The 28 year old finished 34 strokes under par for the weekend, besting Ernie Els’ previous Tour record of -31. Both golfers set the marks at the Kapalua Plantation course in Maui.
Generally when someone goes as low as Smith did at the ToC, one would expect that they cruised to victory. However the Aussie needed every stroke to emerge victorious as World Number 1 Jon Rahm was hot on his heels at -33. Not to be outdone, fellow Aussie Matt Jones posted a -32 over the course of the event, bringing the total to 3 golfers who bested the previous PGA record.
The 2022 PGA calendar kickoff was ushered in by 4 days of sunshine and virtually no wind to speak of (a rarity for the island course). With heavy rain prior to the tournament, the greens and fairways were in pristine condition and the field certainly took advantage of it.
Kapalua is known as an extremely forgiving course, without much in the way of hazards, or tricky hole configurations. That being said, a “normal” round usually has golfers battling 20+ mph winds coming off the Pacific. Take away that obstacle, and you can see why more than a few personal bests were set.
The victory marks Smith’s 4th career PGA Tour win, and moves him up to number 10 in the world golf rankings. The Brisbane native took home $1.5M for his efforts and etched his name into the PGA record books.
“Mate, it was intense,” Smith said. “It was pretty crazy. I felt like I needed to make a birdie to kind of keep up with him or stay in front.”
Up next on the Tour is a stop at Wai’alae Country Club in Honolulu for the Sony Open which runs January 13-16th. Smith previously won the event back in 2020 with a more pedestrian 11 under par.