“With no crowds, it’s very easy to go flat. I suppose that’s a sign of mental weakness”
After a long hiatus, the European Tour finally resumed with the British Masters at Close House and I can now talk to you about some actual golf! That said, the first week back was more about getting used to the way things are now and ensuring the tour’s safety protocols worked and were followed.
I think the tour did a very good job. It was all pretty strict, but they don’t have much of a choice – if they want events, that’s the way it has to be. Under the circumstances, it went pretty well. And the testing wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. I wasn’t looking forward to that too much given the reports, but I think my tester took it easy on me! It was one at the start of the week and then a temperature check every day when you entered the clubhouse.
I stayed on site at Close House – once you were in, you didn’t leave. It was a bit strange and you were only allowed to have one buddy – my caddie – so I ended up eating all my meals and spending all my time with him. It’s a bit of a shame that’s the regulation because it’d be nice to have dinner with some different people. Plus, everyone has been tested and is negative so it doesn’t make much sense to me to deny contact with other people. It kind of defeats the object of testing in my opinion, but hey, I’m just a golfer.
I knew it was going to be fairly restrictive in terms of not being able to go out and about, but only having one buddy eliminates the social side of tournament week. In recent times, that’s been the part that’s made life on tour that much easier. I’ll be frank and say that if it remains for a long period of time, I don’t see myself playing a lot of golf in that period. Hopefully that isn’t the case.
On the course, I played quite well tee to green. My ball-striking was really good from Wednesday to Friday, but my putting was horrendous, which was frustrating and came a bit out of the blue. It got to me in the end, because I could have contended given the way I was hitting the ball. But there were definitely positives.
Obviously, one of the main talking points was the lack of fans. I think I got lucky on the first two days as I was in the TV group, so there was an element of wanting to perform well because people were watching. Once they disappeared at the weekend and I started struggling a bit, my head was halfway down the A1 before I’d even stepped foot on the 14th tee. Once the buzz goes and you’re not in contention, it’s very difficult to gee yourself up. There would have to be a strong internal desire to do it, and I don’t seem to have that in me at the moment.
I bogeyed the 10th hole to go one-over for the round and when there are no crowds it’s very easy to go flat. I suppose that’s a sign of mental weakness – I’m not saying that should happen, but it’s the reality. Interestingly, I don’t tend to finish 15th or 20th very often – I either seem to be in the top five or 40th or missing the cut. That’s because I only really like winning and trying to win golf tournaments – if that goes out the window I don’t really care about money or my position.
In terms of money, the prize pools aren’t the highest on the European Tour right now, for obvious reasons, but they’re still remarkably at pre-pandemic levels in America. It’s still so early and we just need to wait and see how things are at year end and what the prognosis is for 2021. If such a significant discrepancy between the prize pools remains going forward, I think it would probably influence my decision making in terms of my schedule, but let’s see what the future holds. Honestly, I don’t really fancy the back and forth and I don’t see myself living in America.
In terms of my schedule for the next few weeks, I’ll now plan to play in the US Open because quarantine has been removed for professional sportspeople. Before and after that, I suppose it depends on the regulations and how much enjoyment I get from the events. As with a lot of things at the moment, it’s all a bit up in the air.