Rain-soaked Chevron Championship course could be a paradise for bombers and mudders

HOUSTON —Memorial Park Golf Course is the new home of the Chevron Championship and while it’s fresh to the LPGA Tour, it’s not new to professional golf.

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The public course has been home to the PGA Tour’s Texas Children’s Open since 2020, and Gary Woodland scored an emotional victory here last month. But there will certainly be differences to how it plays for the women compared to the men, and the rainy weather that drenched the course early in the week will be a contributing factor, too.

World No. 5 Hannah Green, who has won four worldwide tournaments this season and won captured last week’s JM Eagle LA Championship, is getting some valuable help on her bag this week from from her caddie, David Buhai, who looped for Karl Vilips during the PGA Tour event.

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Moriya Jutanugarn plays a shot from the bunker on the 10th hole during the practice round of the Chevron Championship.

Kenneth Richmond

“It's playing tough. It's playing quite long. Obviously, this rain is not really helping either, making things a little bit more difficult for us,” Green said. “I think it definitely feels like a major championship course. I hope fairways can at least firm up. I don't know if that will happen, but it will be interesting to see how they put the tee positions because some of the holes, depending on pin locations, could be quite tough.”

The LPGA lists the course yardage for the week at 6,811 yards—or more than 660 yards shorter than it was maxed out for the men. But in neither case do they usually play the full yardage of the layout in any one round, and the LPGA also has the par set at 72, rather than the 70 for the PGA Tour. Two holes have been changed from par 4 to par 5—the 533-yard first and 529-yard 14th.

Minjee Lee is another player figuring to have some inside knowledge, considering that her brother, Min Woo Lee, won in Houston last year and tied for third last month.

Some players, such as World No. 2 Nelly Korda, like to go with their own assessment of the course.

“No, I did not talk to any PGA Tour players. I didn't watch too much of the (PGA Tour] event. We were playing that week, so it was quite hard to watch and also compete,” Korda said. “But I know that my caddie, Jason [McDede], did. I like to suss out a golf course myself and make my decision myself than relying on someone else's input. Then I have too much information in my mind and I feel like then if I have their information versus what I scope out on the golf course, I start to doubt my information and then I'm not 100% confident in what I'm doing.”