Augusta misses out on Van Rooyen as wife scores over golf
● Erik van Rooyen should have been battling the beautiful Augusta layout at the Masters this weekend, but instead he’s hitting golf balls into a net in his lounge.
Van Rooyen and wife Rose are locked away in their new house in Jupiter on the east coast of Florida, US, sitting out the Covid-19 pandemic ravaging the world.
But SA’s second-highest ranked golfer in the world, at 42, is still practicing his shots, with his coach watching on video.
“A lot of the golf courses here have closed down or they’re only allowing members so I can’t go out and practice,” Van Rooyen told the Sunday Times.
“The day involves FaceTime video calls with my coach, probably three, four times a week. I’ve got a net up and I’m hitting a ball into the net and we’re discussing certain things.”
The net, however, is indoors.
“I’ve had to move a few chairs around because when it’s outside, the light gets a little too sharp and my coach can’t see properly on the phone.
“I’ve got a lovely wife,” he added with a laugh. “She’s been quite accommodating.”
Hitting off a mat with fake grass, Van Rooyen is also aided by a gadget called trackman, a radar system that measures elements like the attack angle of the club face into the ball, the amount of spin, the spin axis as well as the flight and distance of the ball.
He’s unable to practise chipping and putting, unlike some of his rivals.
“A lot of the guys, like Rickie Fowler, have a bunch of greens in his yard that he can chip on or putt to. I don’t have that.
“I’m also fine with that because I don’t want to bring golf to my house. I want to leave it at the golf course.”
Then he chuckled. “But at a time like this, I think it would have been handy.”
For someone who was ranked outside the top 100 a year ago and beyond 300 three years ago, the shutdown of world golf has interrupted an impressive rise during which he finished tied eighth at the PGA Championship, won the Scandinavian Invitation and tied third at the WGC event in Mexico.
But Van Rooyen is philosophical about it. “In that sense, it was a pity because I felt I was playing some really good golf, especially leading into the Players and then the Masters.
“But the last thing I’m going to do is worry about what could have been. Momentum is a head thing as well, it’s a perception of where you think you’re at.
“Everybody’s in the same boat.”
Instead, he’s enjoying the time at home. “It’s been lovely for me because the schedule throughout the year usually is so busy. We bought the house in August. We were in SA for Christmas with my mom and dad and family.”
By the beginning of February, when they returned to Jupiter, Van Rooyen had spent just three to four weeks in the house.
“To be here now is a silver lining. Just to be at home with my wife and spend some time here, it’s been great.”