Fox ready to fire after lean trot
Ryan Fox was frustrated and couldn’t help but wonder whether he’d experience the feeling of being in contention again.
But his game finally clicked in Geelong a week and a half ago. His second-place finish at the Vic Open was his first top-10 since winning the World Super 6 Match Play title in Perth last February.
It’s just what the 33-year-old Aucklander needed to kick-start
2020 ahead of the lucrative WGCMexico Championship this week, followed by the New Zealand Open in Arrowtown next week.
‘‘It was nice to know [I could still do it]. I haven’t been in contention for a while, I wasn’t quite sure if I was going to be able to do it again, to feel like I was fully in control down the stretch,’’ Fox told Stuff shortly before leaving for Mexico.
Finishing two shots behind Australian Min Woo Lee propelled Fox 32 spots up the world rankings to 124th (he’s now
128th), albeit significantly lower than this time last year when he was riding high in 66th.
Having finished in a share of
11th at last year’s NZ Open, Fox got stuck in a rut, missing the cut in seven consecutive tournaments, before finishing tied for
16th at The Open at Royal Portrush last June.
‘‘I still give last year a pass mark. I had my first win, I had my best result in a major, I had a couple of other decent results in there as well, but through the middle I was pretty awful, to be honest,’’ Fox said.
‘‘I got married, had a honeymoon and all that – it was a year with a lot of other stuff going on as well through the middle.
‘‘Maybe after winning early, I let the expectation get a little bit too high and that probably played on me a little bit and the frustration came out a bit quicker as I expected to play better.’’
But Fox and coach Marcus Wheelhouse didn’t attempt to reinvent the wheel. Instead, they stayed patient and stuck to their guns.
Fox was comfortable with most aspects of his game for the six months leading up to the Vic Open. He just hadn’t strung it all together. Now that he’s broken the back of his slump, the frustration has been banished and Fox has a different perspective on the poor patch.
‘‘Golf has a funny way of beating you down when it wants to, or when it needs to, and it certainly did that for me last year and I probably needed it. It got me refocused towards the end of last year,’’ he said.
Fox will tee off in the $10.5 million Mexico-WGC Championship at Club de Golf Chapultepec, which is 2500 metres above sea level, at 6.15am tomorrow.
He’s going to be in the same boat as last year next Wednesday, when he arrives in Arrowtown a day before the New Zealand Open tees off at The Hills and Millbrook, which will host the final two rounds.
‘‘Obviously, the preparation for the New Zealand Open isn’t as good as it could be but I know [Michael] Hendry won a few years ago doing the same thing . . . so it’s certainly doable,’’ Fox said.
Having made the New Zealand Olympic team four years ago alongside Danny Lee, Fox also has an eye on the Tokyo Olympics later this year.
‘‘The rest of the goals are very similar to the last couple of years – I’d love to have another win and finish as high as possible in that [European Tour] Order of Merit.’’