PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – The man with the striking ‘stache – think Wyatt Earp at the O.K. Corral – has game.
While the 32-year-old South African looks like he just stepped out of a black-and-white Western with a couple of six-shooters on his hips, he’s been a forceful presence with his clubs through the first four days of The Players Championship on the Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass.
He holed out from 62 yards on the par-5 9th to end his round and holed a bunch of 20-footers for birdie on his outward nine to finish Sunday’s storm-delayed second round on the first page of the leaderboard.
“Hit it perfect,” van Rooyen said of his shot that found the bottom of the hole.
When play was suspended due to darkness at 7:35 p.m. local time, van Rooyen was 5 under through 45 holes. That placed him four shots out of the lead set by Anirban Lahiri in the Tour’s flagship event that boasts the best field in golf and a purse of $20 million.
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Although he’s well known for going nuclear and destroying a tee marker in the 2021 PGA Championship, the video going viral and leading him to genuinely fall on his sword with an apology, his mustache is all the rage.
He’d like to change that, obviously, with his play on golf courses worldwide, but he’s having fun with the hair above his upper lip.
“Honestly, it’s the same thing over and over. ‘Love the mustache.’ ‘Love the mustache, man.’ Yeah, it’s good fun,” van Rooyen said. “Honestly, I didn’t really plan on it, but it’s sticking here a bit longer than I thought it would.
“It kind of has a mind of its own. Especially with the windy conditions here, it just goes all over the place. So I don’t have the control over it.”
What he does have is more control of his playing schedule since he won the 2021 Barracuda Championship, his lone PGA Tour title. It came with a two-year exemption that freed him up to plot out a schedule to his liking instead of being forced to chase as many starts as he could to keep his playing status.
“I think the feeling was vastly different a year ago, all new golf courses, trying to find my feet out here, and not playing well compared to everything at my feet this year,” he said. “I feel like I’m playing really well this year. I had two good finishes in the Middle East on the (DP World Tour). I haven’t quite scored well enough out here yet, but I’m finding my way.”
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