World Wide Technology Championship Overview
The players make the short journey over to Mexico this week, a wonderful course in serene conditions, we are in for a treat. Low scoring is to be expected, which is nearly always the case in the fall season.
El Camaleón Golf Course, designed by famed Australian golfer Greg Norman and opened in 2006, created golf history in 2007 when it hosted the Mayakoba Golf Classic, the first PGA TOUR event held outside of the United States and Canada. The course offers continually changing views as it winds through three varied ecosystems, the tropical Mayan jungle, mangrove wetlands, and the Mexican Caribbean Sea coastline, just like the chameleon from which it gets its name. El Camaleón, which Audubon International has accredited for its environmental dedication, has unique risks such as huge bunkers and crystal-clear freshwater canals, a superb course that I’m sure all players enjoy. The field isn’t as strong as last year in my view but still, we have Scottie, Morikawa & Hovland headlining the field.
El Camaleon is a simple setup where ball-striking has been an essential skill set in prior tournament renewals, while it never appears on the longest driving distance charts. Excellent accurate driving and approach play, on the other hand, is rewarded with scoring opportunities on green complexes that are soft, slow, and among the easiest on the Tour in terms of putting average. We can expect to see super-low scores this week if the winds stay calm throughout the week. Last week saw a difficult day 3 but other than that scoring was easy with a round of 64/65 commonplace on each day. We can expect similar scoring here if conditions remain calm throughout the week.
The game’s biggest names are featured in the 2022 Mayakoba field, led by Scottie Scheffler, Collin Morikawa, and Viktor Hovland, last week’s winner Seamus Power also attends.
who will lift that trophy come Sunday evening? Stay tuned to find out the angles Gingerbets will be taking.
Let’s break down those key skill sets and reveal those all-important outright picks.
Key Skill Sets Required
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- Driving Accuracy – Looking at the course details we can see that Driving Accurately is of huge importance, this week’s track is short by PGA Tour standards and the defence of the course come in from gradually increasing rough lengths as you miss the fairways, the wind will also play a huge part this week. Precision off the tee looks like it will advantageous according to all the data we have. Players who excel on sub 7200-yard tracks are worth considering.
- SG T2G – On this short and tactical layout I will be looking for player who have previously excelled on sub 7200-yard tracks in T2G performance. I will also be looking at more recent data than historical. For me this week is about those players in solid form from T2G. I expect the player who lifts the trophy Sunday evening to have solid T2G stats most recently.
- GIR gained – This is a critical stat this week, if not the single most critical. When looking at the previous renewals of this event each of the last 3 winners have ranked inside the top 5 for GIR that given week. I expect the winner this week to also excel in this area.
- SG Scrambling – Getting up and down will be imperative this week. When looking at the past 10 renewals of this event scrambling has been a key factor in determining success. 5 of the last 10 winners ranked in the top 10, getting up and down over 70% of the time that given week. I will be looking for a player with long term scrambling ability to complement ball striking this week.
- Par 4 Scoring efficiency – Every winner over the past five years has ranked top 10 in Par-4 Scoring, the distance of 450- 500 yards proving key, with 4 holes falling in this distance range.
- Putting – Putting will always be a critical factor in low scorning tests like we expect to see this week. I will be considering players who have putted well on Soft Putting surfaces as they are considered soft here at Mayakoba compared to other PGA Tour events.
