NEW APPROACH
Thomas says he’s been too conservative at the Masters
AUGUSTA, Ga. – Instead of blasting balls for five hours and putting for three more, day after grueling day, grinding himself into peak form in the week leading up to the tournament he’s long dreamt of winning, Justin Thomas switched gears ahead of his fourth trip to Augusta National. He rested.
The world’s fifth-ranked player escaped to the Bahamas last week with his parents. He fished. He lounged by the pool. He played a few holes with his dad, “just like we did when I was 8, 9 years old.” His hope: The respite will rejuvenate him enough to help him climb into contention during this week’s 83rd Masters, a tournament the 2017 PGA champion and former world No. 1 has never seriously contended at.
“I’ve had a hard time at this event every year because I love this golf course so much and I feel like it fits my game so well,” Thomas said Tuesday. “I’ve always prepared so hard and well for
when I get here, I really feel like I should have a great chance to win and I think that gets in my own way sometimes, or at least in the past couple of years.”
Maybe, he’s saying, he wanted it too badly.
The solution?
“I took a little different approach this year in terms of not wearing myself out at home.”
Thus the getaway last week, the fishing, the lounging, Thomas’ way of not stacking too much pressure upon his shoulders ahead of the biggest week on the golfing calendar. He has the game not just to contend, but to win. He knows it.
What he needed was a reset.
“I feel like my game sets up for majors very well,” Thomas explained. “I mean, I’ve had a couple good majors, but as a whole, I would say I have very, very highly underperformed versus what I feel like I should have and that’s what we’re trying to figure out: If it’s me, if it’s someone else, if I’m putting too much work in, if my mental game is off, if I’m pressing too hard, if I’m being too aggressive or whatever it is.”
Maybe Thomas is being too hard on himself. Or maybe he’s on to something. It’s clear his record in the major championships — 14 starts, three top-10s, one win — isn’t where he wants it. He’s never played his best at Augusta, where he’s made the cut in all three starts but never finished inside the top 15. Of his 12 rounds here, he’s broken 70 once.
His usual routine was to bury himself
in his preparation: pound balls on the driving range back in Florida for five, even six hours a day, then follow that up with three hours of putting and shortgame work. Three years later, the results nowhere near where he wants them, he decided to do the opposite: take a step back.
Partly to blame for Thomas’ mediocre Masters record? The respect, he says, he holds for the course. Instead of playing to win this tournament, he’s been playing not to lose.
Safe shots won’t sink you around Augusta National, but they won’t win you any green jackets, either.
“Especially this place, we feel I’m overcautious,” he said. “I’m playing too conservatively … it’s almost like I have an 8-iron in my hands and I’m like, ‘Oh, I can’t miss over there, I’m going to hit it to 30 feet.’ If I have an 8-iron in my hand, if I’m hitting it well, I’m probably going to hit it to inside 10 feet, so why am I not going at this pin, when if it was — if it’s the Sony Open, I would be going at the pin, why all of a sudden since it’s the Masters am I going to be aiming trying to make par?”
Thomas knows he can’t treat the Masters exactly like the Sony Open, but he also knows he can be more aggressive.
He oozed comfort on Tuesday, poking fun at his mini-slump — Thomas hasn’t won this season, but his four topfive finishes nonetheless point to a player on the cusp. He dropped the world “salubrious” when describing the challenge Augusta presents, then a few minutes later, spelled it correctly. He joked about the sort of sizzling round he’s yet to fire at this place — “You can shoot 5-, 6-, 7-under on the back nine, accidentally sometimes,” he said, before adding with a smile, “not that I have, but at least I’ve seen it on TV.”
And at one point, he went back to his first trip ever to the course, back when he was a wide-eyed 11-year-old and the family made the drive from Kentucky. It was 2004. They had first-round tickets. They set up their chairs on the second hole. They waited.
Then the rain came. And came. And came.
The round was washed out. The Thomases drove north the next day.
“I never got to see a thing,” he said. “I was a pretty bummed-out kid.”
The goal this week: Leave with a far different feeling. Near the end of his news conference Tuesday, Thomas weighed his 2019 like this: “Right now the way the game of golf is, if you’re not winning tournaments, you’re getting lapped. I guess I’ve just got to start winning tournaments again.”
This would be a heck of a week to start.