Masters 2018 Tournament, First Round Recap: Jordan Spieth Tops Leaderboards, Highlights And More

By the end of the first day (Thursday) at the 2018 Masters Tournament, Jordan Spieth led all golfers at Augusta National at -6 following a performance that included five consecutive birdies.

Masters 2018 Round 1 Recap, Leaderboards, Highlights

Spieth, 24, won the 2015 Masters at the age of 21, his first major tournament victory that made him the second-youngest player to ever claim the trophy and wear the elegant green jacket behind only Tiger Woods.  Spieth shot a 66 in the opening round on Thursday, and his five-straight-birdie run began on the 13th hole.

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Woods is seven strokes behind Spieth at +1, and tees off at 1:27pm EST on Friday (Round 2) alongside Marc Leishman and Tommy Fleetwood. Spieth teed off at 10:53am on Friday with Alex Noren, Louis Oosthuizen. 

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Here’s how Spieth did in Round 1:

From: Forbes.com.

Woods, a four-time Masters champion, last played at Augusta National in 2015. The 42-year-old last won the Tournament in 2005. On Thursday, he finished with a score of 73, one above par. Woods ended Round 1 tied for 29th place with 13 other golfers.

Sergio Garcia, the defending Masters winner, ran into some water hazard-related problems on Hole No. 15 on Thursday. The 38-year-old Spaniard — ranked ninth in the PGA Tour World standings — earned a score of 13 on the 15th hole to finish with a 9-over par score of 89. Garcia was in a tie for last place at the end of Round 1.

Besides Spieth, another impressive player on Thursday was Tony Finau. The 28-year-old Salt Lake City native played through an ankle injury, which he sustained after celebrating a hole-in-one. Finau — who is 34th in the PGA Tour World Rankings — shot a surprising 68 (-4) to finish second at the end of Round 1.

Among the other golfers who finished Round 1 above par were Adam Scott (+4), Jason Day (+3), Jon Rahm (+3), Justin Thomas (+2), Dustin Johnson (+1) and Bubba Watson (+1). 

Matt Kuchar, Phil Mickelson and Rickie Fowler were three players who had trouble with the first hole. The former two missed the fairway, while Fowler missed the green on his second stroke. Mickelson and Kuchar both made par, but Fowler failed to sink a 10-foot shot and fell to 1-under par. Fowler and Mickelson finished with a Round 1 score of 70 (-2), both tied with Leishman for 11th.

Here are some more highlights from Round 1 at Augusta:

Here is what the top of the Round 1 Leaderboard looked like:

From: Forbes.com

And further down:

From: Forbes.com 

Article by Pablo Mena