The PGA Tour once again faced the wrath of nature. The $7 million 2024 Shriners Children’s Open kickstarted on Thursday. While it started on a good note following a calm and peaceful morning, the latter part of the round was a chaotic one. The opening round was left incomplete. The second round was delayed by four hours due to gusty winds blowing in at a speed of 40 m/h.

Taking action based on the disruptive weather conditions, the PGA Tour organizers made an official announcement wherein they decided to close the TPC Summerlin for the spectators for the Friday round. Now, while they had already mentioned that the tickets could be used during the weekend, it turns out the action did manage to leave the golf fans infuriated. However, it looks like the venue is indeed a rather fierce one, and the team made the right decision. At least that’s what the PGA Tour pros say.

PGA Tour Pro Doug Ghim is currently living in Las Vegas and is hoping to make his sixth consecutive cut of the season on his home ground. He has played at the venue several times, and when asked if the weather conditions that were demonstrated this weekend were common, he said, “Yeah, it can get windy for sure.” He went on to add that on days like that, they mostly decide to stay away from the course.

Las Vegas is a sunny city, and the temperature dropping below 10 degrees is generally a rare sight for the residents. “It does seem like in this tournament in its history, Patrick Cantlay won one year; the scoring was pretty high, I guess.” He won the event back in 2017, scoring a 9-under in the Sunday playoff. Ghim further went on to add that generally when the time comes for season change, the weather becomes variable like it did this time. “So I would say it’s pretty abnormal, but I guess it hasn’t—it’s been seen before, so I guess that’s how I would characterize it,” he concluded.

Well, he is not the only one agreeing with the PGA Tour organizers on the matter. A lot of the players in the field of the TPC Summerlin shared their two cents on the terrible conditions on the ground.

Kurt Kitayama agrees with Doug Ghim

Kurt Kitayama went to the University of Nevada in Las Vegas and lives in Henderson. Being a resident of the same city as the TPC Summerlin, he was asked about the preparations that were made to battle through the tough conditions at the course. To this, he stated that windy weather like this was pretty rare during the fall. “We usually have pretty good weather this time of year,” he said.

The only time the weather gets as windy as it did during the first two rounds of the 2024 Shriners Children’s Open is during the spring. None of the players were prepared to face such weather at this time of the year, and it did come as a shock. “Different time of year, so, yeah, wasn’t ready for this,” concluded the 1X PGA Tour winner.

Now the question is, what do remaining rounds behold in Nevada? Stay tuned to find out.