NEW SMYRNA BEACH — Marcus Byrd faced an age-old dilemma Sunday for golfers: Short putt, roughly 30 inches, downhill on a slick green, with an ever so slight right-to-left vibe.
Finesse the break and leak it into the 18th hole, or add some weight to the stroke, remove the break, and go for broke?
The gentle, leftward break was “ever so slight,” Byrd said, “but I was gonna hit it hard enough to make sure it didn’t break.”
“Hit it hard enough and hopefully she doesn’t miss the hole,” he said.
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It didn’t, and the 27-year-old Washington D.C. native won the Florida Golf Tour’s 60th annual Indian River Open at 12 under par (65-67) at New Smyrna Beach Golf Club. He finished a stroke better than recent Florida Gator golfer Quentin Debove, who birdied the 17th and 18th holes to keep the pressure on Byrd.
“Stayed pretty steady,” Byrd said of his Sunday play. “Hit some good shots, just kept the ball in front of me, took advantage of the par-5s (he birdied all four). I tried to make sure I wasn’t making too many mistakes and was taking advantage of the holes where I could.”
Byrd is a former Middle Tennessee State golfer now living in Atlanta. He played the PGA Tour’s Korn Ferry Tour this year but not well enough to maintain his exempt status. This year will bring mini-tours and attempts at Monday qualifying into Tour events.
“You gotta love it,” he said of the grind so many young golfers face in their attempts to play golf for a good living.
The Central Florida-based Florida Professional Golf Tour returns to the area in mid-January for the New Year’s Open at Cypress Head in Port Orange.
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Florida Tour Golf: Marcus Byrd rams it home to win Indian River Open
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