Jake Knapp was listed as the second-longest driver in the field as the PGA TOUR returned to Trump National Doral for the first time in a decade, with the Cadillac Championship now set against a course built to reward power. Chris Gotterup was listed as the longest driver in the field, and Gary Woodland ranked third among the longest hitters entered this week.
The event is being played on the Blue Monster Course, a 7,739-yard layout that is expected to play as the longest course on the PGA TOUR this season. That number matters because 8 of the last 10 winners at Doral ranked inside the top 25 in driving distance for the week, a sign that length has long been a useful edge on this property.
Trump National Doral has a 55-year history of hosting PGA TOUR events from 1962 through 2016, but the course history only tells part of the story now. The Blue Monster underwent a significant redesign in 2014, which makes older results less clean a guide than they once were even as the site's reputation for favoring long hitters still hangs over the tournament.
That mix of old history and newer architecture gives the Cadillac Championship a simple shape this week: bombers have the numbers, and the course is built to test whether they can use them. Knapp, Gotterup and Woodland all arrive with the kind of length that has historically played well at Doral, but the redesign leaves enough uncertainty to keep the week from being reduced to a pure distance contest.
