USPGA Championship: Form stats for the second major of 2022

The 104th PGA Championship kicks off in Oklahoma on Thursday, when Southern Hills hosts the tournament for a record fifth time.

No other venue has even staged the PGA Championship on four occasions, with seven courses tied-for-second in the list with three appearances each.

As for Southern Hills, it has hosted seven major championships during its life, these being the PGAs of 1970-82-94-2007, as well as US Opens in 1958-77-2001.

You can add to this tally two Tour Championships during the mid-1990s, along with a string of prestigious senior and amateur events.

Yet, according to the superintendent at Southern Hills, this week's test will be far different to the ones that faced the world's leading golfers in years gone by.

Latest betting for this week's PGA Championship

'Not Just A Test Of Accurate Driving'

Russ Myers, who assisted architects Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner in their re-design of the course during 2018 and 2019, said Southern Hills will no longer be a venue where driving accuracy alone is the key to scoring low.

He said that one of the aims of the re-design was to test many more skills within a golfer's repertoire of tricks, than simply keeping it straight off the tee.

In an effort to add creativity to the list of skills required this week, rough was removed from the perimeters of greens, so that golfers attempting to get close to pins which are located near to the edge of putting surfaces, need to be truly confident in their abilities - otherwise they face interesting attempts at recovery.

The renovation has thinned out the density of trees alongside fairways, while the creek was reinstated as a serious threat to competitors.

The long and winding creek was very much a key element of Perry Maxwell's original design back in 1936.

Therefore, Southern Hills will not resemble a course where straight hitting and great putting are the only major tests this week.

In an interview with Golf Digest Myers explained: "It's so hard to get close to the pins because the greens are not large. You can go out and hit 18 greens and two-putt each one and shoot 70, and be disappointed because you'll feel like you should've shot 64."

Avoid The Water

And to emphasise that it's not all about straight driving, the fairways have been widened from approximately 27-28 yards to 40.

Water comes into play on 13 holes, most of it in the form of the winding creek and other small streams.

Similar to the majority of major championship venues, most of the small greens are well-protected by sand.

Southern Hills is one of those rare courses where the greens are sown with Bentgrass, while fairways are laid with Bermuda.

Southern Hills Stats

One remarkable stat to emerge from previous Southern Hills' major championships is that all seven winners were at the top of leaderboard after 36 holes - and remained there.

Five of the seven were outright leaders after two rounds, while the other two winners held a share of the lead.

And by the end of day three, six of the seven champions were leading the tournament on their own.

Champions' Positions
1958 US Open (Tommy Bolt) (Outright lead at 36 & 54)
1970 PGA Ch`ship (Dave Stockton) (Tied for lead at 36 / Outright lead at 54)
1977 US Open (Hubert Green) (Outright lead at 36 & 54)
1982 PGA Ch`ship (Raymond Floyd) (Outright lead at 36 & 54)
1994 PGA Cha`ship (Nick Price) (Outright lead at 36 & 54)
2001 US Open (Retief Goosen*) (Tied for lead at 36 & 54)
2007 PGA Ch`ship (Tiger Woods) (Outright lead at 36 & 54)
* Won play-off

And five of the above seven winners were either tied for the lead, or the outright leader, after 18 holes.

The exceptions were Dave Stockton, who was tied-fifth in 1970, and Tiger Woods who was tied-23rd before carding a second round 63.

Fast Major Starters

The table below shows the 12 fastest starters in major championship golf since January 1st, 2018.

In this example, Justin Rose was 'Within three strokes of the lead after 18 holes, in eight of his 16 majors (50%).'

% ... (Within 3 Shots @ 18 - Rounds)
50.00: Justin Rose (8 - 16)
42.86: Brooks Koepka (6 - 14)
37.50: Xander Schauffele (6 - 16)
37.50: Scottie Scheffler (3 - 8)
37.50: Brendan Steele (3 - 8)
33.33: Russell Henley (3 - 9)
33.33: Louis Oosthuizen (5 - 15)
33.33: Matthew Wolff (2 - 6)
31.25: Dustin Johnson (5 - 16)
31.25: Rory McIlroy (5 - 16)
30.00: Lee Westwood (3 - 10)
28.57: Aaron Wise (2 - 7)
Min. No. of Majors = 6

Latest odds for First Round Leader

Twitter: Golf Stats Alive