"Drove the ball great, love my driver," said Brooks Koepka as he aimed another jab at Bryson DeChambeau following the second round of The 149th Open at Royal St George's
Saturday 17 July 2021 11:18, UK
Brooks Koepka could not resist the opportunity to mock bitter rival Bryson DeChambeau after his second round at The 149th Open.
DeChambeau has, once again, been the focus of his off-course activities rather than his form on the links at Royal St George's having incurred the wrath of his equipment sponsors following his erratic performance off the tee on day one.
Last year's US Open champion hit only four of 14 fairways in his opening 71 and declared "my driver sucks", prompting a furious response from Cobra tour operations manager Ben Schomin, who said: "it's painful when he says something that stupid".
DeChambeau took to social media to issue an apology for his post-round comments, and he put aside the distractions to fire a second-round 70 which got him into the weekend with nothing to spare on one over par.
As the world No 6 contemplated the prospect of an early start on Saturday morning, out in the second group of the third round with Talor Gooch, Koepka was looking at contending for the Claret Jug after rounds of 69 and 66 left him six adrift of record-breaking leader Louis Oosthuizen.
And after closing out his second round, he appeared to give a clear reference to DeChambeau's controversial comments on Thursday evening as he told Golf Channel reporter Todd Lewis: "Drove the ball great, love my driver."
Koepka, who will begin his third round long after DeChambeau completes 18 holes, then posted an image of himself in action on his Twitter account with the headline: "Driving into the weekend!"
While the feud between the pair shows no sign of dissipating, DeChambeau was also targeted by Open debutant Collin Morikawa, who defied his lack of links experience to fire a second-round 64 which set the early clubhouse target at nine under, a score later surpassed by 2010 champion Oosthuizen.
"I love my clubs. I love every single one of them, thank you," he joked in his post-round press conference.
