Masters: Par‑3 day and portraits

The soft opening of the Masters is not soft at all. By Wednesday, Augusta National is already in full costume, with the Par 3 Contest turning a practice day into a public ritual a day before the first round begins on Thursday, April 9. (usatoday.com) The event is played on a separate nine-hole course tucked into the northeast corner of the property, not on the championship layout that decides the green jacket. The holes run only 90 to 155 yards, which is why the afternoon produces family cameos, relaxed swings and a steady chance of hole-in-ones. (sports.yahoo.com) That mix is the point. The Par 3 Contest lets players loosen up in public while patrons get a last look at stars before scorecards start to matter, and by Wednesday afternoon the week stops feeling like setup and starts feeling like the tournament itself. (nytimes.com) The contest also has its own strange little folklore. More than 100 aces have been made there over the years, but no player has ever won the Par 3 Contest and then won the Masters in the same week, which turns a light exhibition into a superstition fans repeat every April. (sports.yahoo.com) This year’s Wednesday scene arrives with two giant names missing from the competitive field. Tiger Woods is not playing at Augusta National in 2026, and Phil Mickelson is out as well, removing two players who have shaped the tournament’s modern TV gravity for more than two decades. (cbssports.com, sports.yahoo.com) Woods’ absence changes the frame of the week even before the first tee shot. His last Masters start came in 2024, and local coverage in Augusta has treated his nonappearance as one of the defining facts of the 2026 tournament build-up. (augustachronicle.com) Mickelson’s withdrawal pulls away another familiar thread. He is a three-time Masters champion and had been set for what reports described as his 33rd start, so his absence trims another piece of the event’s old rivalry era from the picture. (sports.yahoo.com) That leaves Rory McIlroy even more central to the week’s imagery. On Tuesday night, Augusta National held the annual Champions Dinner in honor of McIlroy’s 2025 victory, and the club’s newly released portrait placed him in the middle of the table with chairman Fred Ridley on one side and Ben Crenshaw on the other. (golfweek.usatoday.com) The Champions Dinner is one of the Masters’ most carefully managed traditions. The defending champion hosts past winners the night before tournament week fully opens to the public, so the photo functions like both a reunion picture and a yearly transfer of status. (nbcsports.com, golfchannel.com) This year’s portrait stood out partly because of who was not in it. Reports on the dinner said 34 champions attended, while Woods and Mickelson were the notable missing figures, which made the image look a little less like a gathering of every era and a little more like a handoff to the current one. (newsbreak.com, golfweek.usatoday.com) McIlroy’s role is bigger than ceremonial because he enters as the defending champion after winning the 2025 Masters in a playoff over Justin Rose. That win completed the career Grand Slam for McIlroy, so his return to Augusta this week carries both title-defense pressure and a chance to extend a story that already felt historic a year ago. (skysports.com) So Wednesday at Augusta is doing three jobs at once. The Par 3 Contest warms up the players, the missing names reshape the tournament’s cast, and the Champions Dinner portrait gives the week its official family photo before the real competition starts on Thursday. (usatoday.com, golfweek.usatoday.com, cbssports.com)