Phil Mickelson started off his 2012 season with a performance at the Humana Challenge, formerly known as the Bob Hope Classic. Mickelson has had a strong history at the event won it in 2002 and 2004, but had not played in for more than half a decade.

His main reason for playing in the event this year was the presence wildstar gold of Bill Clinton and his foundation, as Mickelson stated prior to the event, “I admire President Clinton and the charitable work of his Foundation, which helps millions of people around the word, and I applaud him for joining Humana in using the tournament to help promote health and wellness. Some of my best seasons have come after starting at this event and I’m really excited about coming back again.” That excitement soon got the best of him during round one of the event, though.

Phil got off to a great start during his first round at the Humana Challenge, with an incredible eagle on the sixth hole. He then went on to shoot a three-under 33 on the front nine and was looking in great shape to compete for the title. However, two miscues on the back nine really cost him. The first occurred on hole 10 when Mickelson hit an out of bounds tee shot and ended up making double bogey on the hole. He did it again on hole 14 as well, and three putted on the green for a triple bogey 7. They really took all of the momentum away from Mickelson on the back nine, and he limped into the clubhouse with a two over par 74 when all was said and done.

However, Phil Mickelson had a positive attitude after the round and it showed throughout the rest of the week. “I’ve been playing so well heading in that I’m not going to let one round affect my outlook. It’s a long week, a long month, a long year and one round is just getting started.” Phil would go on to shoot solid rounds of 69-66-69 to finish in a tie for 49th at the Humana Challenge, with Mark Wilson being the eventual champion by two strokes over Johnson Wagner.

Mickelson had an odd tournament to say the least at the Humana Challenge. For his first round he had a 57% driving accuracy and hit 83% of the greens in regulation, but had 33 putts to go along with it. On Saturday of the event, Phil improved his driving accuracy to 69%, but only hit 56% of the greens in regulation to go along with 23 putts on the day. A lot of this can be attributed to it being his first event played on the PGA Tour in 2012, as everyone is trying to get comfortable with playing competitively and what not. Hopefully Phil Mickelson can get everything gelling together before his next event, because he really showed spurts of greatness throughout the Humana Challenge.