Lucas Herbert (5-under): “My iron play was pretty good. That’s improved a lot in the last few weeks, which has been something we’re wanting to work on for probably 12 months now. Just good flight in the wind out here. Was a little bit breezy on the back nine and then it was all just solid. I didn’t really throw any shots away with any silly doubles or anything like that, so that was kind of my big case, really. If I stop throwing stupid shots away, I tend to go all right.”

Brett Rankin (5-under): “Twelve months ago I needed a good week here just to keep my card. I ended up having to go to Q School a couple weeks after this event last year and just been doing a lot of work with Richard Woodhouse and things have just come together. I’m just in a good space technically. I feel like I can work the ball both ways at will at the moment and I’m just starting to get the putter going again so it’s been a really consistent year. I won a couple four-day events. I won Darwin (NT PGA) in the year as well. It’s been a year of firsts and I’m definitely happy with where the game is at the moment, for sure.”

Travis Smyth (4-under): “This is my seventh week in a row and I’ve never played this much golf in my life. It’s a tough course. It definitely favours the longer hitters. The type of grass on the greens up here, it’s down grain spots on the greens so if you can come in with wedges and 9-irons as opposed to 8s and 7s, it’s much more of an advantage to the longer hitters. But you’ve got to golf your ball around here.  There’s so many water hazards everywhere. As soon as you go in the rough, you’ve got to play defensive golf a little bit because it’s hard to control. It’s not easy holing putts, too, and chipping is tough as well.  It’s a good test of golf, for sure.”

Nick Cullen (4-under): “I had a lesson with Brad Hughes just before I left the States. Drove over to Greenville, South Carolina, to see him and just been working on his stuff the last couple weeks. Really feels like it’s starting to come together. I drove it really well after I switched to his stuff but didn’t hit my irons as well, so starting to hit some really good iron shots, too. I probably hit four or five wedge shots within four or five feet, so definitely helped scoring. Pretty tricky to hole putts, the greens are sort of moving around the place. Didn’t really hole much outside that so I needed to hit it close to make some birdies.”

Wade Ormsby (4-under): “Ball‑striking feels well under control. Overall I feel pretty good. Could have made a few more putts early, but I just couldn’t get the feel of the greens. It wasn’t that I was misreading them or hitting bad putts, just couldn’t quite get the feel of them. That little stretch, kind of 11, 12, 13, 14, in through there, that’s where the guts of the golf course is and that’s largely into the wind or off the side. You’ve just got to play that stretch really well into the wind and then some of the par 5s are downwind so you can take advantage of them.”

Stewart Cink (2-under): “I know I have the kind of game that can compete around this course, I know I can. I love this kind of place. It’s the kind of course that really gets your attention on your second shots because of the way the greens are. That’s kind of been the bread and butter of my whole career, approaching the greens and making the right decisions. I mostly did that good today, but I got myself into a few little messes and binds out there, especially at the end I was a little sloppy with a few approaches. Hopefully we can clean those up and keep moving forward.”

Cameron Champ (1-under): “I haven’t played a firm golf course in a pretty long time and probably not going to for quite a while with the PGA TOUR schedule coming up. It’s nice, it’s different. They can put the pins in some tricky spots. I feel like it’s nothing I’m not used to, it’s just different and just kind of nice to see. Happy with how I played considering how I hit it, so I’ll take it and move on to tomorrow. We’ll go down to the beach today. Definitely stop by that mall again, Pacific Fair, and just hang out and relax. We’re trying to do as much as we can just to stay awake.  We’ll definitely check some stuff out and have a little beach time today.”

Cameron Smith (2-over): “I was just kind of a bit flat all day, couldn’t really get any momentum going. Hit a few good shots earlier in the round and didn’t hole many putts, and then the run started to come there towards the end. Just one of those days. In the end, 2-over probably isn’t that bad.”