The Honda Classic 2011
The Honda Classic tees off on Thursday 3rd March on the PGA National Champions Course in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. I'll usually have a couple of outright bets pre-tournament, just for a bit of interest, but as my golf knowledge isn't great, I'll stick to a few big names or take advice from those who know more about it than I do. This year, I'll be following the selections of Racing Post's Steve Palmer - who has just released a new book.
I'll start making my own selections after analysing the stats on Saturday morning, before the start of the third round. Almost three quarters of PGA Tour event winners were in the top five on the post- second round leaderboard, so if we have no ties amongst the top five, each has a 0.75 x 0.20 = 0.15 chance of winning, fair odds of 6.67 (for you value hunters). Not interested in these probabilities yet, there are more stats to devour!
The next area to look at is the par 4 scoring average - who out of our top five is the most consistent? Adjust your probabilities accordingly. Now, the Honda Classic has a unique performance indicator in the penultimate three holes - 15, 16 & 17 - the 'Bear Trap' - a tricky par-10 trio that is going to catch out even some of the best throughout the first two days. Have any of the players perfomed particularly well on this section so far? Anyone shown any signs of weakness? I'm hoping to come out of this analysis with a couple of selections to back and follow over the final two days.
Picking a winner of this tournament would aid the Cheltenham Betting fund.