The Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill - 2026 Preview

The PGA Tour heads to the second stop of its Florida Swing this week for the prestigious Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill Club and Lodge in Orlando. A fixture on the schedule since 1979, Bay Hill is widely regarded as one of Florida’s premier and most challenging layouts.

Affectionately known as “Arnie’s Tournament,” the Invitational is a limited-field Signature event that consistently tests every aspect of a player’s game on one of the Tour’s most demanding courses. Bay Hill is a classic Florida style layout defined by its length, penal rough, firm and fast putting surfaces, and an abundance of bunkers and water hazards.

When the wind picks up, as it often does in central Florida, the course becomes even more challenging. Scoring reflects the difficulty: six of the last seven champions have finished at 12-under par or worse. On a layout that routinely ranks as one of the most difficult non-major tests on the PGA Tour schedule, par is a perfectly acceptable score on the majority of holes.

“Tough,” “can’t fake it,” and “mentally challenging” are all phrases players have used to describe Bay Hill. Course knowledge, total driving ability, long iron precision, a high ball flight into firm greens, and the ability to scramble from thick rough are all essential traits for success.

Justin Rose perhaps summed it up best when he said, “There’s really no way to fake it around Bay Hill. The rough’s pretty thick. Generally, the greens are quite firm which requires pinpoint iron shots. There’s enough trouble out there that mentally it’s a challenge. You have to really commit to shots.”

The Field

The Arnold Palmer Invitational is a limited-field event with the top 50 and ties making the cut. In total, 72 players, including four sponsor invites, will be competing in the PGA Tour’s third signature event of the season. The field contains 28 of the top 30 ranked players in the world, including world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who won the American Express in January and is a two-time champion at Bay Hill. World No. 2 Rory McIlroy, the 2018 winner, is looking for his first Tour win of the season as his Masters title defense is a little more than a month away. Justin Thomas is making his season debut after recovering from back surgery.

Russell Henley is the defending champion, winning last year at -11. Jordan Spieth, University of Texas sophomore Daniel Bennett, Max Greyserman and Billy Horschel were given sponsor invitations.

Bay Hill Club & Lodge – History

Originally the home of an orange grove, and only a few miles southwest of downtown Orlando, a group of investors from Nashville appointed architect Dick Wilson to design the course which opened for play in 1961. Wilson designed two nine-hole tracks, the Champion and Challenger courses. It was the first course in the world to be seeded with Tifway Bermuda grass.

When the owners of the course invited Arnold Palmer to play in an exhibition match to promote the club in 1965, Palmer fell in love with the property. He won the charity event that week and allegedly went home and told his wife Winnie that he wanted to buy the course. Palmer loved the property so much that in 1976 he officially bought the entire property and it remained his winter home until he passed away in 2016. In 1979, the Florida Citrus Open moved across town to Bay Hill, and the current PGA Tour event that we now call “The Bayhill Invitational” was born.

In the decades after buying the course, Palmer and his business partner Ed Seay gradually altered Wilson’s original design. In 2009, Palmer put Bay Hill through its largest renovation yet. Palmer made the course tougher and more like Augusta National. In his own words, he explained: “I’ve introduced firm, fast playing conditions on slopes around greens that run away from the pins. This will take the ball further away from the intended target instead of stopping it like the previous heavy rough did.” After a four-month redesign, Bay Hill also had newly positioned bunkers, re-grassed greens with flatter edges for more pin positions, and new tees which stretched Bay Hill to its current yardage of 7,466.

After the new superintendent, Chris Flynn took over, Bay Hill received a minor facelift in 2015. Fairways were widened and tree numbers were reduced, making the off-the-tee game somewhat easier. On the flip side, the course did get tougher because Flynn shaved off a great deal of rough surrounding the water and bunkers, making it far easier for balls to roll into hazards in the typical firm and fast conditions.

The last big change to the course happened in 2022. Players arrived at Bay Hill and were surprised by the sight. Most of the sloping run-off areas from around the greens had been replaced with thick three-inch rough. Rory McIlroy was disappointed with the development saying, “Historically, it’s been you’d miss a green and the ball would run off and you’d still have the chip off short grass, for example, and now that’s all been filled in with rough. There’s just so many areas that there were runoffs and sort of tight areas, which I think lends itself to the better chippers of the golf ball, and that’s been sort of taken away this year.”

Seven different holes were affected by this alteration which now allows players to be more aggressive in firing at pins knowing that if they miss on approach, the rough will stop the ball and they will have a much more predictable chip shot. Viktor Hovland is a player that comes to mind as someone who may have benefitted from this change. A notorious poor chipper of the ball in his first couple of years on Tour, Hovland finished in second place in 2022 and tenth place last year after finishing 49th, 42nd, and 40th in his three prior appearances.

McIlroy finished his comments on the matter by confirming how much easier around-the-green play now is at Bay Hill. “I prefer the runoffs,” McIlroy said. “I think it separates the good chippers from the bad chippers. I feel like, when you miss a green when the rough is like this, you know, it’s half skill, half guesswork and luck. Whenever you miss greens and there’s runoffs and it gives you options, I think that’s where the guys with the better short games separate themselves, so that’s why I like runoffs. I like that style. You basically miss a green, and you’ve pretty much got just blast it out and try to hole the putt.”

Finish Position and Strokes Gained History at Bay Hill (2016-2025)

This includes the average finish position and Strokes Gained per round. Players are sorted by SG: Total. Bay Hill is the 3rd most predictive course on the PGA Tour.

Course Features

A stock par 72 classical Florida parkland course stretching to 7,466 yards, Bay Hill plays slightly longer than the PGA Tour average and is widely regarded as having major championship difficulty. With a scoring average of +0.90 over the past five years, it ranks as the sixth toughest annual stop on Tour. While players respect the challenge, the course can quickly become overwhelming.

As is typical of many Florida layouts, Bay Hill features 84 bunkers and water in play on nine holes. Those hazards have helped produce the highest percentage of penalty strokes on Tour over the past five seasons. The course also plays firm and fast. Combined with thick overseeded ryegrass rough, players who miss fairways and greens are routinely left scrambling to save par. Adam Scott emphasized the difficulty, saying, “The rough is incredibly thick. It’s a half shot penalty almost every time you hit it in it.”

Wind is another defining defense, something Florida courses are known for. In recent years, steady northerly winds between 12 and 25 miles per hour have significantly reduced both driving accuracy and greens in regulation percentages. The wind, paired with warm temperatures, dries the course out and makes it play even firmer and faster. Early in the week, the Bermuda greens typically roll around 12.5 on the stimpmeter. By Sunday, they can approach 14, with putts looking as though they are sliding across ice.

While a few holes feature modest elevation changes, Bay Hill Club and Lodge is predominantly flat. Much of the visual appeal centers around its water lined holes, where lakes and bunkers combine to create demanding forced carries and true risk reward decisions. Several par 4s require players to club down off the tee to avoid trouble. When laying back is paired with thick rough that halts errant drives, the course effectively plays even longer than its listed yardage.

Success at Bay Hill often comes down to precision and patience. Leaving the ball in the proper spots, choosing the correct angles into greens, and managing misses are critical. That is why course history has proven so important. Experience provides a clear understanding of where to position tee shots and approaches in these specific conditions. 17 of the past 20 champions had played Bay Hill at least three times before their win.

Jordan Spieth highlighted that edge, saying, “It’s a little tricky because it seems like a course where course knowledge can go a long way, given the difficulty of it and especially on and around the greens.”

Hole Preview

Bay Hill features one of the toughest sets of par-3s and par-4s on Tour. Each of the four Par-3s is over 200 yards long (216-yard average), and in total, averages 0.16 strokes over par. Five of the par-4s are over 450 yards long, and some play even longer because players have to use “less-than-driver” and choose to layup. Seven of these par-4s have bogey-or-worse rates higher than 20%.

With scoring so difficult, especially on the par 3s, the four par 5s take on greater importance this week. They each have a birdie-or-better average of over 38% and are reachable in two shots. They give players (especially the longer hitters) a chance to separate themselves from the field and will play a major role in determining who wins this week.

Rory McIlroy has often spoken about the importance of the par 5s here, even bringing up how taking advantage of them is one of the main reasons why Tiger Woods won eight times here. McIlroy also spoke of length being an advantage saying, “You also need to play the par-5s well. Tiger’s won it plenty of times around here and that’s what he did. He can play conservative for the most part, but if you make birdies on the par-5s, you’re going to be right up there. I feel with my length I can take advantage of those.”

As for featured holes, Bay Hill may have the toughest two-hole closing stretch on Tour. The par 3 17th is a 221-yard tee shot often hit into a stiff north wind over water to a well-bunkered green. Just hitting the green in regulation is a terrific accomplishment as, historically, the hole has a birdie rate of only 8.7%.

The closing hole at Bay Hill Club and Lodge is a demanding 458 yard par 4 that regularly plays into the prevailing north wind. The tee shot is nerve wracking. Longer hitters must guard against water lurking on the right, while shorter hitters bring out of bounds into play along the left side.

A drive that misses short and right leaves a daunting approach from thick rough and requires carrying the entire lake guarding the 18th green. The putting surface itself is long, curved, and slopes from left to right. Rocks protect against any short bailout and also defend the typical Sunday hole location on the far right. Bunkers frame the back and left portions of the green, penalizing players who attempt to escape trouble in safer areas.

Strokes Gained Analysis

Off The Tee

While distance off the tee has proven advantageous at Bay Hill Club and Lodge, the average driving distance this week is still six yards lower than a typical PGA Tour stop at just 286 yards. Much of that is due to firm fairways and thick overseeded rye rough that quickly halts errant drives. With water hazards lurking and rough that is difficult to advance from, many players choose to club down to prioritize position. Even so, longer hitters still hold a meaningful edge when they can attack greens with shorter irons.

Total driving stands out as the key off the tee statistic. Players who combine length and accuracy consistently gain an advantage, and past champions such as Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy illustrate that profile. Bryson DeChambeau famously pushed the boundaries by cutting doglegs and flying hazards. McIlroy once noted, “I saw a stat the other day that this course more than any other one on Tour has a correlation between strokes gained off the tee and performance that is higher than anywhere else.”

At the same time, precision players such as Russell Henley, Tyrrell Hatton and Francesco Molinari have succeeded by consistently finding fairways. The primary objective off the tee at Bay Hill is avoiding hazards and keeping the ball in front of you. Over the past decade, the field has averaged 1.9 double bogeys or worse per player for the week, one of the higher rates on Tour. While the rough is penal, it is often the sand and especially the water that cause the most damage. The fairways average about 31 yards in width but frequently pinch in the landing zones, placing a premium on both discipline and execution.

Approach

Overall, Bay Hill Club and Lodge ranks as the fourth toughest course on the PGA Tour when it comes to gaining strokes on approach. From both the fairway and the rough, it consistently produces one of the highest average proximities to the hole. Greens in regulation percentage and proximity numbers are also among the most difficult on Tour.

What makes that especially notable is the size of the greens, which average roughly 7,500 square feet. It is uncommon to see surfaces that large paired with a GIR rate of just 57%. That speaks directly to the firmness of the putting surfaces and the impact of steady winds.

With water guarding many holes, players often choose to bail out to the safer side of the green, where bunkers typically sit. While that may be the prudent play with a long iron, it limits birdie opportunities. Fast speeds and pronounced slopes further inflate proximity numbers. Players frequently stress the importance of positioning approach shots correctly. Patrick Rodgers explained it well, saying, “I love that you have to think your way around the course and you have to manage it and put it in the right spots on the greens.”

Approach play is paramount because only elite ball strikers consistently create realistic birdie chances. 32% of approach shots come from beyond 200 yards, among the highest rates on Tour. 12 of the last 13 winners here were ranked inside the top 55 on Tour in proximity from 200 plus yards during the year leading into their victory. Targeting strong long iron players, especially those who launch the ball high enough to land it softly on firm greens, is essential. Short irons and wedges will be far less prevalent than at most Tour stops.

Around the Greens and Putting

Despite the thicker rough, scrambling percentages from the rough sit right around the PGA Tour average. On the other hand, scrambling from the tight lies around the greens is not an easy task at only 53%. Many of the green complexes are elevated, tiered, and heavily contoured, with significant bunkering guarding the surrounds. Saving par requires a versatile short game and the ability to execute a variety of shots under pressure.

The greens are TifEagle Bermuda and typically begin the week rolling around 12.5 on the stimpmeter before approaching 14 by Sunday. Putting performance has been highly predictive here with 10 of the last 11 winners finishing inside the top 15 in strokes gained putting for the week. At an average of 7,500 square feet, these are among the largest greens on Tour, placing added emphasis on three putt avoidance.