Resilience is the word that comes to mind when we look at Seamus Power's performance this past weekend in Los Angeles.
Tied for 14th on Sunday evening, and level with potential Ryder Cup teammate Shane Lowry on 7 under after four rounds, it was another impressive weekend for the man from Touraneena who maintains his 28th spot in the world rankings.
Spaniard Jon Rahm won by two shots at Riviera Country Club, holding Max Homa at arm's length and in doing so, recaptured the world #1 spot.
Seamus opened up on Friday with a level par 71. Having begun with three birdies in five holes, it looked likely to be a blistering round but that was to be as good as it got for Power on the opening day. Three bogeys on the 6th, 10th and 16th saw him handing back all the good work he had managed early on.
Saturday was a slight improvement on his scoring, finishing -1 for the round, albeit with three shots dropped on the front nine. Having dropped two as he made the turn, the Waterford man was able to rally to birdie the 11th, before once again handing it back on the 12th. This is where that resilience kicks in. Facing the home straight on +1 he was able to shoot two back-to-back birdies on the 16th and 17th to improve his round to -2, making the cut on -2 overall.
It all started well on Saturday for Seamus, shooting four birdies on the front nine. A dropped shot on the par-4 8th was the only blemish on before making the turn. But again, resilience. Having dropped that shot on the 8th he went three straight holes picking up shots on the 9th, 10th and 11th.
However, all that hard work was for naught as the three straight birdies were handed back in one fell swoop on the 12th.
The 458-yard par-4 proved to be tricky all weekend for Seamus, managing a par at best on Thursday.
“I had one bad hole there on number 12, but besides that, there was a lot of good stuff,” he said to the PGA Tour media. That's a fair description of his efforts, but the impressive part was his ability to bounce back at the first time of asking. He was able to recover with a shot picked up on the 13th, and would once again birdie the 17th before handing in his card for a 67.
Triple bogey included, it was Seamus' best round of the weekend by two clear shots.
Heading into Sunday, he was best of the Irish with both Lowry and McIlroy further back. The Waterford native carded a final round 69 moving to T14 for the tournament. He was-2 for the day, with two bogeys counteracted by four holes where he picked up shots.
By the end of play on Sunday, it was another top-15 finish on the PGA and another healthy cheque ready for the bank.
To think that we have reached a point where we now consider a Top 15 on the PGA Tour to be "another grand weekend" speaks for itself.
