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Kurt Kitayama is in the running to clinch the first PGA Tour title of his career. He dominated the 2023 Arnold Palmer Invitational field with a scoring deficit of nine.
Kitayama topped the leaderboard on Friday after the second round. Spanish golfer Jon Rahm took the lead in the opening round but was disappointed with his performance in the next two rounds.
Kurt Kitayama started the tournament in second position in the opening round before topping the leaderboard on Friday. He managed to extend the lead on Saturday and will start the final round with a one-shot lead over Viktor Hovland.
Kitayama, the two-time DP World Tour winner, opened up about his performance and said:
"Really proud of how I was able to fight back to even. I’ve always just felt like there’s no giving up. It’s just kind of in my nature. Even when it’s going bad, you can’t just pack it in. You fight for every shot.”
Hovland surprisingly impressed people with his performance, jumping 18 positions after the third round. He made a hole-in-one on Friday to chase the leader. Hovland opened up about his game in an interview. He said:
"I just got to keep doing what I've been doing. I've been hitting a lot of fairways and greens. Last year, I didn't quite hit it as good as I did earlier in the week. But even then, I still feel like I should have won last year if I had a half decent short game last year."
He added:
"I still hit it good enough to play a little bit better, but I feel like this year I'm stroking it well. My speed on the greens is not quite where it should be; I'm leaving a lot of putts short. But I really do feel like my short game technique has gotten a lot better, even though it hasn't really shown that this week."
The early and professional career of Kurt Kitayama
Kurt Kitayama was born and brought up in Chico, California. He graduated from Chico High School in 2011. During his school days, Kitayama was into basketball and served as the co-captain of his school team.
In 2009, he finished 3rd at the Callaway Junior World Golf Championships in the 15-18 age group category and was appointed the 2009 Player of the Year by the Junior Golf Association of Northern California.
He reached 47th in the amateur world golf rankings before turning professional in 2015.
Kitayama played mostly on Web.com.tour during the initial days of his career in 2016 and 2017. He then played on the Asian Tour in 2018 and finished 4th in the New Zealand Open and Asia-Pacific Diamond Cup Golf.
Kurt Kitayama earned the PGA Tour card in 2021 by finishing in the 23rd position in the Korn Ferry Tour finals. His best finish on the tour was at the 2022 Honda Classic, where he placed in 3rd position, which was improved to second place at the 2022 Mexico Open. He is yet to register his first win on the PGA Tour.
