Everyone that comes onto the Colonial property will be thermal screened and checked off a listGETTY IMAGES
Charles Schwab Challenge Tournament Dir Rob Hood said the event is "ready to go" for Thursday's opening round, which will mark the first PGA Tour action in three months. Speaking on Golf Channel yesterday, Hood said, "We've been planning this thing since March. There's been a lot of turns in the journey, but now we're set on what's going to happen, who's going to show up and what procedures are going to be." He noted there are a "lot of procedures in place" due to the pandemic, saying, "Everyone that comes onto property will have to be thermal screened and checked off the list." While it is "disappointing" to play without fans, Hood said they "understand how important this tournament is to the PGA Tour and how important it is to get things going again." Hood: "It was heartwarming when we contacted our local sponsors and told them it was not going to have any spectators, so they would not be able to come out and socialize with their guests. They converted hundreds of thousands of dollars of their hospitality dollars and converted it into our local charities. Our local charities are not going to suffer in any way from the no spectator policy" (“Morning Drive,” Golf Channel, 6/8).
STARTING STRONG: In Ft. Worth, Drew Davison wrote the Charles Schwab Challenge has "landed one of its best fields in its 74-year history," with the top five-ranked players in the world all participating for the first time. Davison: "It's a loaded field that has a major-type feel to it." The field will include 16 of the top 20 players in golf (Ft. Worth STAR-TELEGRAM, 6/6). GOLFCHANNEL.com's Rex Hoggard wrote the field at Colonial "will be the strongest this season according to the world ranking." The circuit's "exhaustive blueprint, from the 37-page Health & Safety Plan to the 35-page Participant Resource Guide, seem to have checked some of the right boxes, but not all." One top-25 player is "skipping next week’s Charles Schwab Challenge because he doesn't want to be a 'guinea pig.'" Hoggard: "Despite a wildly high degree of difficulty, the Tour has created a plan that the vast majority of players are comfortable with" (GOLFCHANNEL.com, 6/5).
