KAWAGOE, Japan (AP) – Jon Rahm tested positive for COVID-19 for the second time in nearly two months and was ruled out of the Tokyo Olympics golf tournament on Sunday, where he was one of the top podium contenders.
The loss of the Spanish came just hours after his American rival Bryson DeChambeau suffered the same fate with a diagnostic test.
Rahm’s positive was announced by the Spanish Olympic Committee (COE).
Rahm had played the British Open last weekend.
“The positive has been detected by undergoing a third consecutive PCR test, mandatory for all those who have been recently in the United Kingdom, as is your case, since The Open has just played,” said the COE.
Successive casualties shook the second day of full competition in Tokyo. They also shake up the golf tournament that starts on Thursday and show how fragile it can be to mount the Olympic Games in the middle of a pandemic.
The Olympic golf event was deprived of the last two US Open champions.
DeChambeau was enshrined in the 2020 edition at the Winged Foot field and Rahm won the title last month at Torrey Pines, in a kind of comeback. Just two weeks earlier, the Spaniard withdrew from the Memorial tournament, when he led by six strokes in the third round, after receiving in full competition that he had tested positive for coronavirus.
The Spaniards found no substitute for Rahm, making Adri Arnaus their only participant in the men’s tournament at the Kasumigaseki Country Club. DeChambeau will be replaced by Patrick Reed.
DeChambeau said he was “deeply disappointed not being able to compete in the Olympics for Team USA.”
A 2018 Masters champion, Reed will be only the second golfer to compete twice in the Olympics. Golf rejoined the Olympic program in Rio de Janeiro 2016.
