Toshinori Muto in his 19th year as a professional made a great start at "Panasonic Open" with bogey free round of 65.
"To be able to mark a great score at the tough course like this makes me feel that my best performance is back."

The only difficult moment he had today was at the 8th, where his ball went into the thick nasty roughs, but he saved the 2-meter par putt to get out of it. On his back nine, he made 3 straight birdies from 12th hole and became the co-leader for the Round 1.

His only top 10 finish for this season is 7th at Dunlop Srixon Fukushima Open. He had hard time figuring out his best fitting for his Irons and was changing the shaft constantly, but as he changed the shafts to the original ones, his game started to get better.
"My Driver shots are not stable yet, but other shots are really good now and I was able to make many chances."

Last Tuesday, Toshinori was invited to a dinner party hosted by the Shinhan Bank CEO, the company sponsoring the first ever Japan Korea and Asian Tour co-sanctioned tournament "Shinhan Donghae Open" which was held last week. At that dinner, many Korean players told that "Toshinori is the oldest player among the filed this week." Toshinori is now 41 years old.

"I haven't really thought about my age much, but I was the oldest in the field this week. I feel obligated to act as the elder role model for the younger players."

He may be the oldest player in the field, but he still has a lot of guts. He has been away from winning since 2015. His daughter who is in junior high is doing well in her ballet contests. And she has been saying to her father that "I seem to be doing better than Dad."

"I better win soon."
This week, 51 years old Toru Taniguchi who is going back on forth on Regular and Senior Tour energetically is also in the field. Toru has made his first victory in the Senior Tour last week at Japan Senior Open and looking aggressively to make consecutive win on both Tours this week.

"Seeing Toru do so well, I must do better" said Toshinori.
He is eager to win against at least his elder senior Toru, and also try to win the whole tournament.