PGA Tour starts again, and Jarrod Lyle is a part of it

Tournament organisers knocked back Jarrod Lyle’s request for a sponsors exemption, so he fought his way into the field through qualifying instead.

Jarrod Lyle isn’t one to back down from a fight. After organisers of the opening tournament of the season The Frys.com Open knocked back his request for a sponsors exemption Lyle went and fought his way into the field via an 8-man playoff at Monday qualifying.

Having fought off two bouts of leukaemia, Jarrod Lyle is preparing himself for another season on the PGA Tour and has an assured spot in next week’s event. The 32-year-old needs to earn $324,123 in 19 events to keep his card after Lyle was forced from the tour in 2012 with his second bout of leukaemia.

Lyle requested a sponsors exemption to the opening tournament of the new 2014/15 PGA Tour season but was knocked back.

Lyle told Ben Everill that he wasn’t even told by organisers that he’d missed out on an invitation:

“I was disappointed not to get an invite, mostly because they didn’t even let me know. We just had to wait until the field was finalised on Friday,” Lyle said. “I understand invites are hard to get and plenty of worthy players want them but it was a shame they didn’t at least let us know.”
“My wife Briony was pretty devastated but I told her I had a chance to qualify and what better way to stick it to them.”

Lyle shot a 6-under 66 at the Monday qualifying event to make a playoff that saw eight players vying for four spots in the Frys.com Open field. Two other Australian also made the 8-man playoff including Mat Goggin and Greg Chalmers, and with no journalists on hand, Mat Goggin took it upon himself to relay the action via his Twitter feed. Goggin was one of the first players to earn his spot in the field and then followed his Australian mates around the next few holes of the playoff.

So in the end, Mat Goggin and Jarrod Lyle will tee it up in the Frys.com Open in Napa, California this week. They join seven other Australians in the field: Aaron Baddeley, Stuart Appleby, Matt Jones, Cameron Percy, Robert Allenby, Marc Leishman and Steven Bowditch.

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