Life has never been too easy for Michael Thompson. The 35-year-old has been scrapping for elusive success, since his lone PGA TOUR victory at the Honda Classic in 2013. Thompson made 128 cuts in 227 starts with just 17 top ten finishes in his career. But his fortunes have been on an upswing recently. He shot 68 in the opening round of the Players Championship before the event was suspended, but more importantly, finished T8 in the RBC Heritage, the second event after the TOUR resumed in June.
On Friday, Thompson began his round trailing Richy Werenski by a solitary stroke. They began the second round off opposite tees, but remained in touch with Thompson fueling his card with three straight birdies from the 4th hole. Both men also suffered a bogey – Thompson on the 12th and Werenski on the third hole – coming home at an even 12-under par through 36 holes. The two men share the lead midway through the second round.
Tony Finau, Nick Watney, Xinjun Zhang and Ryan Moore are all at 6-under with a later start. Arjun Atwal was also among the afternoon starters, needing a low score on Friday to make the cut. The cut is projected for 1-under, with Atwal lying 2-over with a 73 in the opening round. The TPC Twin Cities courses plays to a par score of 71.
With the wind up on Friday, the course was playing tougher than it did the previous day. “I think my iron play was really good today, I was still seeing shots well, still seeing ball flight. Ball was coming off just the way I kind of pictured,” explained Thompson. Putts were still rolling really nicely. Like we talked about yesterday, it was perfect greens today. A little bit faster, so you had to give the downhill putts more credit. Overall, it’s just kind of a continuation of yesterday. That’s kind of the nice thing about the quick turnaround is that you kind of keep the momentum going when you’re playing well.”
“Yeah, the big thing is just try not to overpower the golf course, stay within myself, make good, comfortable swings, aggressive swings to good targets, be aggressive to pins when I can, when I have good numbers, and then if I’m kind of in between, then I kind of play away from the hole a little bit.” Thompson added. “I think it’s just keeping it simple. That’s kind of the key to good golf is not getting wrapped up in all the things that are going on around the golf course, it’s just going out, playing your own game and like you said, go play Michael Thompson golf and I’ll be right there on Sunday.”
Matthew Wolff kept himself in the mix with a 68. He was three back from the leaders at 9-under 133. Bo Van Pelt and Charl Schwartzel also shot 68 and are lying one behind Wolff. Tom Hoge moved to 6-under with a 67 in the second round.
