Henrik Stenson
Henrik Stenson has recorded six top-10s in his 13 Abu Dhabi starts including twice finishing runner-up on The National course. He talks to Kent Gray about finally sealing the missing leg of his personal Desert Swing slam and what it will take to win a sec
The former Open champion on his bid to snare an elusive Falcon.
HENRIK STENSON BARELY NEEDS THE PAIR of question-posing middlemen sitting in on this, his last interview of the 2017-18 European Tour season. We’re in a plush members’ lounge at The Els Club on the day after the DP World Tour Championship and the tanned Swede, fresh from a T-12 performance at Jumeirah Golf Estates, has not long finished playing with three fortunate amateurs in watchmaker Audemars Piguet’s annual Dubai golf day. This is last stop in the golf interview equivalent of speed dating with the equally jaded local media corps before Stenson can clock off for the off-season, even if it was a ridiculously short break as he went on from Dubai to finish fourth at Tiger’s bash in the Bahamas before contending again in the Indonesian Masters and eventually settling for another solo fourth placing.
With his famously dry sense of humour, the ‘Iceman’, is a favourite among the media, naturally engaging and eminently quotable. He knows how to play the game and remembers the media are merely a conduit to the fans, so has fun knowing his message will be reflected thus.
He’s also adept, it seems, at giving with little prompt. After the requisite exchange of pleasantries, Stenson eases into a leather sofa and begins talking, essentially interviewing himself for much of the next fascinating 25 minutes and 20 seconds. We know the time exactly as it is recorded on our dictaphones. We can also assure you the majority of the 4505 words spoken belong to the former Open champion and have the transcribe to prove it.
Maybe the former DPWTC, Dubai Desert Classic and Qatar Masters champion is simply in a hurry to get a largely vanilla season, albeit with a sweet 3- 0- 0 finish at the Ryder Cup, done and dusted. The 42-year- old’s last win netted the claret jug after his now fabled ‘Battle of the Son’s’ with Phil Mickelson at Royal Troon in July 2016. While he finished in a tie for fifth at The Masters and T- 6 at The U.S. Open among five top5s in the last PGA Tour season (there were also early-season top 10s in Abu Dhabi and Dubai), Stenson’s season was hampered by golfers’ elbow which required minor surgery before the Race to Dubai decider. That seems as good a place as any to let Stenson take up the story, which will resume at the 14th Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship. We already have our recorders at the ready, albeit little need for any pre-prepared questions.
MY [ LEFT] ELBOW INJURY wasn’t bad at the Ryder Cup but it was there. It’s like a nagging little problem. It was probably a little bit worse at the FedEx Cup playoffs but of course, if you’re still slightly injured, you’re irritating that.
IT WAS A SLIGHT [TENDON] TEAR that turned into a bit of a golf elbow and inflamed. When you’re in the middle of the season, resting a week, it doesn’t really get better. You play and it flares up. Ryder Cup I was on anti-in- flammatories. In the morning there in practice round when it’s cold, anyone who’s had a tendonitis problem will know… is a bit uncomfy before you get going.
I FELT LIKE I NEEDED TO TRY and get that better and took five weeks off, had the PRP procedure done. They draw some blood, they spin it, and they take out one little bit of the rich plasma, then they re-inject it. In effect, you almost re-injure the area. It gives it a better foundation to heal up. It’s gradually getting better.
I WAS HITTING A LOT OF BALLS [at Le Golf National], trying to turn my game around. I didn’t quite manage to do that, so there was still some work done in Paris. It was not short of any effort or heart in the first couple of matches there but I had to depend on my putting quite a lot. We managed to win those first two matches together with Rosey.
THEN ACTUALLY IN THE SINGLES MATCH
AGAINST BUBBA [ WATSON] I played really, really solid [winning 5&4]. I got it together then and didn’t give him a chance. That was nice. Of course, as you can imagine, the Ryder Cup, having not won any individual tournaments in 2018, that’s certainly the highlight of the year for me, together with two solid major championship performances at Augusta and U.S. Open. That’s what we take out of this year.
PUTTING IS THE AREA I NEED TO IMPROVE. I feel like it wasn’t a good year statistically but I’m still fairly happy where I’m at with the putting. It’s been more short game in general and the long game has not been really where I want it. Still won fairways and greens
“I’ll be playing for the 14th time I think it is now in Abu Dhabi. Yeah, it’s so many. I’m part of the inventory. They just wheel me up on the first tee. ‘Here you go, Henrik’.”
in regulations on the PGA Tour but there’s a difference being 20 feet away from the pin and being six feet away from the pin.
THE WAY I PLAY, BOTH STRATEGICALLY and also my skill level with the long game, I’m never gonna be far out in terms of hitting fairways and greens. But there’s a difference when you’re sticking a few close every round, compared to just keep on hitting greens 30 feet away...that’s not going to result in a lot of birdies. It’s not resulting in dropped shots, but you’re not picking up a lot either.
I STILL FEEL LIKE I’M VERY MUCH COMPETI
TIVE even though we’re heading towards the middle of the 40s. We’re not quite done yet. It’s motivating. The competition gets harder every year. I think everyone agrees on that, it’s harder and harder to win on tour. It’s not going to be any easier to win major championships going forward either. YOU JUST GOT TO KEEP ON WORKING HARD and trying to be as close to your 100 per cent as you can be when you tee it up in these events. If there were 20 guys who were bombing it before, now it’s 30 or 40 guys who bomb it. Even if it’s a tough course, a tight course and 25 might blow away, there’s still gonna be those other 10 or 15 that might have a great week driving the ball and playing from very far up the fairway.
I THINK LOOKING BACK, what took the most out of me [wasn’t winning the Open at Royal Troon but] was really the back end of 2013 into the beginning of 2014. I played so well from the summer of ‘ 13 until I eagled the last hole on Earth [to win the DPWTC W] to wrap up what was the best playing season in my career. I played so consistently at such a high level for six months and was in contention a lot and then you had all the awards and everything else after that. Then starting ‘14, I was just drained for the first three or four months. BECAUSE YOU’RE TIRED, YOU NEED TO REST, but now, because you haven’t spent the focus you need to on your game, you need to practice, but then you’re too tired to practice. It gets too much. There’s nothing left in the tank. I was actually very happy with how I managed to pick myself up on the back end of ‘14 and win the DP World Tour Championship because it was a hard season to get going. I THINK BOTH MYSELF AND MY TEAM, we learned a lot about how much it would take out of you, and all the things you agreed to do and all this. I think we were better prepared when I won The Open.
UP UNTIL THAT DAY, I was never feeling like it was going to define my career if I didn’t win a major championship but it was certainly the last box to tick. I also feel like everything else I’ve done over the years got lifted up by a little bit by it. Because then you look, okay, on top of the Open, I won a World Golf Championship title, Olympic silver medal, TPC, FedEx Cup, Race to Dubai, Tour Championship. Everything else stacks up nicely behind a major championship win.
THE CLARET JUG IS THE BIGGEST PRIZE IN
GOLF. For me, it was the biggest dream in my career to win. If it’s only going to be one, I got the one that meant the most to me.
IT’S INSPIRING [THE PROSPECT OF ANOTHER
MAJOR]. I know what I need to do. I know I’m still competitive at the highest level when I’m playing at my best. It’s first things first. If you do the right things all the time, you’re going to get the results as well. I feel like a big part of my success this year at Augusta and US Open was the prep work I did at the golf courses and game plan and everything was wrapped up nicely.
IF YOU DO THAT BEFORE [visit the venues early as part of his prep for the majors] you know what’s going to be required. I know Fanny [caddy Fanny Sunesson] told me, with Nick [Faldo], at the Open, a lot of times, you get lots of long putts. He would spend a month, two months before the Open spending some extra time. You might not spend hours doing long putts, but every time you’re on putting green, you might do 10 minutes extra on long putts. So when you actually get there, you got that little extra. I think as an athlete, you know when you’re prepared well, you’re feeling that mentally, you’ve done the work, you’re ready to go out there and perform.
I CAN CERTAINLY NOT GUARANTEE I’m going to play another Ryder Cup, but it’s certainly going to be harder to guarantee I’m going to play one in Europe. Looking at my age and how everything is going, I hope I get another chance two years from now and play in America [Whistling Straits 2020] and to win in America. I’ve played five, I won three at home and lost the two away.
I THINK IF MY RYDER CUP CHAPTER is over now, I would be more than delighted. But if there’s one little bit missing, that would be to be able to go and play in two years time and win it in the U.S. That would be the final chapter in my Ryder Cup book. IT SEEMS LIKE WE’RE CERTAINLY BETTER AT IT [creating a team bond] even though the U.S. team, they had that generation shift. You got Spieth, you got Justin Thomas, you got Brooks and DJ and a lot of Reed and a lot of the younger guys who know each other and travel a bit more and through college and all this and that. I think it’s hard to say that they don’t have [team chemistry] but I do think we just outplayed them on a golf course that suited us much better.
I WAS CONTACTED [BY AUDEMARS PIGUET] after my good season in 2013 and asked if I wanted to be joining the family. Happily, I said yes. Been proud to be an ambassador since the beginning of ‘14. Love the products. I think they’re very cool, very good looking. Solid. It’s a man’s watch.
I’VE GOT A FEW SPECIAL ONES [AP watches to commemorate different victories]. Of course, the blue and white one that I had winning the Open. That will always have a special memory.
I’LL BE PLAYING FOR THE 14TH TIME I think it is now in Abu Dhabi. Yeah, it’s so many. I’m part of the inventory. They just wheel me up on the first tee. ‘Here you go, Henrik’.
ABU DHABI’S THE ONE I’VE GOT TO WIN for the old [traditional Desert Swing slam of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Qatar] but they keep on adding Middle East events. It was Bahrain for a few years. Now Saudi’s coming out. I really want my name on that Falcon Trophy and hopefully that’s going to change next Jan. but I’ve been very successful in this part of the world so it’s all good.