It took six extra holes, but Jason Day finally won the Farmers Insurance Open over Alex Noren with a birdie on the par-5 18th hole.
Day hit a number of clutch shots in overtime, including the 113-yard wedge into the 18th green to set up a tieing birdie on the last hole played on Sunday before the playoff was suspended due to darkness.
He picked up where he left off on Monday, knocking another wedge to a couple of feet after Noren had splashed his second shot in the water. Those wedge shots, however, were a bit of an anomaly as Day was only serviceable with his irons, particularly on Sunday when he hit only 10 greens in regulation and relied on his Spider Tour Red putter (1.765 strokes gained/putting Sunday) to bail him out.
Day’s US PGA Tour debut with TaylorMade’s new M3 driver (including shaft from upstart TPT), however, was encouraging. Although finding fairways wasn’t easy for the Aussie (a little over 50 percent for the week), finding yards was not as he averaged a robust 319.9 yards for the week. Day had the movable weights split in the middle track of the sole, a neutral setting.
The win was the third in a row on the US PGA Tour for TaylorMade’s new line of M3 and M4 drivers which feature a technology called Twist Face, which refers to a modest curvature in the face that results in the high toe area being slightly more open and the low heel area being slight more closed, in an effort to produce straighter shots on strikes in those areas.
What Jason Day had in the bag at the Farmers Insurance Open
Ball: TaylorMade TP5x
Driver: TaylorMade M3 460 (TPT prototype), 10.5 degrees
3-wood: TaylorMade M1 2017, 15 degrees
Irons (3-PW): TaylorMade P750
Wedges: TaylorMade Milled Grind (48, 52, 60 degrees)
Putter: TaylorMade Spider Tour Red
