Dou Zecheng: Yuan Yechun inspired me

Fastest, Dou Zecheng will regain his coveted PGA Tour card after one day.

But he decided not to think about it.

In the third round of the Simmons Bank Open, which ended early this morning Beijing time, the 25-year-old Henan star played a 7-birder and 3 bogey 68 (-4) to rise to a tie for 2nd place with a three-round six-figure performance (69-66-68), and is expected to impact his third Korn Kong Tour championship trophy.

He is currently at No. 11 on the Light Tour season standings, 312 points away from the 900-point TourBound. A Light Tour champion can score 500 points alone – which means that if Dou Zecheng achieves the "Triple Crown" tomorrow morning, he will be granted PGA Tour membership three months in advance, fulfilling his long-cherished wish of returning to the PGA Tour stage for the first time after the 2017/18 season.

In fact, even if he is runner-up alone, he can let Dou Zecheng get 300 points, infinitely close to the PGA Tour card. But Dou Zecheng felt that it was precisely because he had "thought too much" about upgrading the PGA Tour before that he often led to his abnormal performance in the final round.

"How to get a PGA Tour card, I've thought too much about it before. Every time I come to such a position, I have to do something to get into the PGA TOUR. In the end I was a mess. In an official interview with the Light Patrol after the game, Dou Zecheng said frankly.

Dou Zecheng and the same group of boxing celebrations

Interestingly, he then mentioned the name of compatriot Yuan Yechun, who had already surpassed 900 points to lock in the PGA Tour qualification as early as April 3. In Dou Zecheng's view, Yuan Yichun's natural view of the upgrade seems to be worth learning from himself.

"I watched Yuan's interview, and he didn't even think about whether he could get into the PGA Tour, but always thought about how to become the player of the year and how many games he could win."

"I need to put my momentum a little closer in that direction. If I don't play well, it's not playing well, not because of a mental problem. Dou Zecheng said, "I don't want to think, 'Ah, I can get close to the PGA Tour card' and so on, but in the end I didn't play well." ”

This week, dou Zecheng has participated in the 99th Korn Ferry Tour, and his sixth time, he has finished in the top five championship camps after the 54-hole game.

Previously, he had twice won the title on Sunday from this position, but since 2021, he was expected to rush to the championship after three rounds, but he has always lost a good game.

The most recent was the second game of this year's Light Tour, the Grand Abaco Classic in the Bahamas in January, Dou Zecheng took a one-shot lead after three rounds, but swallowed a deadly bogey on the last hole of the main game, was dragged into the extended round by American Brandon Huggins, and finally lost after two extra holes, regrettably relegated to the second place.

After that, Dou Zecheng experienced brief ups and downs in his form, but then regrouped to maintain a high ranking in the season standings and scored a 61 at the Lake Charles Championship in March – the lowest single-round record for the Chinese on the Light Tour!

At grove University Grove Grove Grove This week, Dou Zecheng relied on the strong output of 1 eagle and 15 birds in three rounds to once again win the championship for himself. 'Played very steadily today and I think this week was a lot better than the previous week's putter, without any particularly big mistakes. He said, "I brought the caddie back this week and read the line with more confidence. ”

Dou Zecheng scored a 61-stroke mark in March

This is also the second consecutive year that Chinese players have created opportunities to rush to the title at the Simmons Bank Open. In 2021, Yuan Yichun won the second place in this competition by 3 strokes.

"It's a really competitive tour-level course." Dou Zecheng said, "This stadium is very challenging, tee mistakes will enter the obstacles on both sides, if the green is deflected, it will roll far away, and the putter is easy to push three times." ”

In addition to Dou Zecheng, Zhang Xinjun and Yuan Yichun also successfully advanced to the weekend final of this year's Simmons Bank Open, ranking 10th and 55th respectively after three rounds. This is also the next seven weeks after the Louisiana Open in mid-March, when all three Chinese mainland players have successfully advanced to the last two rounds of the Light Tour.

Yu Jun'an is expected to make Chinese Taipei golf history

At 1:45 a.m. Beijing time on Monday, Dou Zecheng will start from the last group of the final round to start the third victory of the ShockLight Tour and the journey of the PGA Tour full card. The opponent in the same group is another Chinese player in this game, Kevin Yu, a 23-year-old Chinese Taipei youngster.

Although Yu Jun'an is only playing on the Korn Ferry International Tour for the 16th time, he is taking a 54-hole lead for the second time, and if he wins the championship, the former amateur world number one Arizona State University student will make history in one fell swoop, becoming the first Chinese Taipei player in history to win the PGA Tour Second Division championship!

Whether Dou Zecheng or Yu Jun'an wins, they will become the third Asian to win the Light Tour this season after An Bingxun and Yuan Yichun. However, despite a fierce battle, Dou Zecheng said that he hoped that he would not have too many thoughts on the final day.

Dou Zecheng is expected to return to the PGA Tour after a gap of 4 years

"Play like this tomorrow, hopefully not too many thoughts." Go back to the hotel normally tonight, play games for a while, get up tomorrow to warm up, and participate in the game. He said.

"I wouldn't particularly want to play the first few to get a card — it's impossible to say none — but hopefully there will be fewer of those ideas."

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