RIO 2016: Australia leading golf in the first round

Justin Rose of Great Britain celebrates after hitting a hole in one on the fourth hole during the first round of men’s golf on Day 6 of the Rio 2016 Olympics.

“They’ll be waking up in the morning (in Melbourne) and getting a shock to see their old man is the leading the Olympics”, Fraser said.

An IOC review next September may mean golf’s return to the Olympics does not last beyond Tokyo in 2020, but International Golf Federation president Peter Dawson hopes that will not be the case.

With one swing, Adilson da Silva of Brazil put golf back into the Olympics for the first time in 112 years.

And, for him, it’s not money. No bueno, as they say in Cazaubon’s country – or Nao bom, in Portuguese. “They do that sport with so much passion”. We went because it was our love, what we wanted to do. “At the end of the day, you play for the top three or you play for the golden pineapple, which no one cares about”. The National Post said golfers have spotted three-toed sloths, monkeys, boa constrictors and even a small crocodile out on the course. Above all, it made him realize “that I didn’t do anything wrong by coming here”.

This was about absence as much as the present, not so much an “I was there” moment as “I was there but none the world’s top four players fancied it”.

“I feel like the greens were a bit faster, maybe a foot, foot and a half, and obviously the wind adds in a bit more”, Fowler said. “It was the athletics that I think of at the Olympics”.

“I tee it up in four majors every year and if I was injured and didn’t play well”.

“This week, it’s 60 guys playing and we’re all winners”.

Golf’s return to the Olympics is drawing raves from fans, even if one local’s embrace almost went a little too far.

Health concerns over mosquito-borne Zika, a virus linked to severe illness and birth defects, were named by many as a reason for saying no. A playoff like the way Rickie Fowler won The Players Championship? Kaymer knows he has it good. “I didn’t putt very well”.

“But the actual work?”

“It was interesting, the cheers were going up and you could tell what country they were”. The Olympic theme, that everyone is the same, I enjoy that. “There’s a lot of athletes from different sports in there, and I didn’t try and go for some dead lifts of 80, 90 kilos when there was a guy holding up 180 kilos on both arms”.

“Only in the Ryder Cup do you have such patriotic support and that’s what made it so special today”, he said.

Watson finished second at the WGC-Cadillac after winning the Northern Trust Open in February, but his showing since is a tie for eighth at a European Tour event in China. So the Aussie Fraser is in the house with the lead, but the favorite is right there and in flawless position to have a gold medal draped around his Claret Jug by the end of the weekend.

“It’s a low scoring golf course, it really is, there’s so many opportunities”.

“It played tough this afternoon, it was extremely windy, very gusty, changing directions and changing strength so it wasn’t easy at all”, Sergio Garcia said. Not just for the fans and viewers, but the players themselves.

“Most weeks there are 156 players and only one victor”.

And if he doesn’t win a medal?

“No matter what happens this week”, he said, “it’s the greatest week of my life”.