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A midday thunderstorm blew through Quail Hollow on Tuesday, with a bolt of lightning coming so close to the property that the boom had those in the vicinity ducking for cover. As it had for much of the previous day, a deluge flooded the course and confined players for a time to the locker room. They got back out, only to get poured on again.
A bummer for many, but probably not for Bryson DeChambeau, who admitted that the nasty weather created a nice break for him. The man always seems to be on the move, whether it’s winning the LIV Golf event in South Korea only nine days ago, or working on his social media posts, or making personal appearances, as he did Tuesday morning at an event for First Tee Charlotte.
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Then there was a scheduled press conference in the afternoon ahead of the PGA Championship that begins here on Thursday. DeChambeau had yet to play the course this week because he stayed home in Dallas on Monday—to practice, of course.
“Yeah, I think for me, it’s actually provided me a little bit of rest,” DeChambeau said of the weather. “I was hitting a lot of golf balls last week and had a bunch of work going on. It’s actually provided me a little bit of time off.”
There’s one thing we know about DeChambeau, though. Even if his body isn’t moving, the wheels in his head are forever spinning.
There was another example of that on Tuesday when he was asked about how he processes rounds or tournaments after they’re over. And, of course, DeChambeau has had plenty to ponder of late. He played in the final twosome with Rory McIlroy in the Masters, only to witness first-hand the Ulsterman’s triumph while fading into a tie for fifth. In his next start, at LIV Mexico, DeChambeau held the 36-hole lead but was overtaken on Sunday by Joaquin Niemann. Then came the LIV Korea win, as DeChambeau closed with a back-nine 30 to notch his first victory of any kind since last June’s U.S. Open.
So how does the so-called Mad Scientist’s mind process it all? Like few others, for sure.
“I reflect on it a couple days after, take away what I need to improve, whether it be my iron play or a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Why did I get so nervous over a tee shot? Why did I feel this way?” DeChambeau said.
“I take those sorts of things, and I translate it into the next week. I did that pretty well in Mexico, albeit I still lost and hit one OB on 13 randomly and didn’t know where that came from. I felt that at Augusta, but it never happened, and then it happened in Mexico, happened a couple times in Korea. So I’ve worked on that to kind of set that back to straight and square.
“I take on that and I just kind of evolve it over time,” he said. “I adapt and evolve and layer it on. All those emotions that I have and all the misses that I have and all the things that I’m thinking about, I layer it on over the course of time; Is this gone or is it still there? How do I fix it if it’s not fixed? Then if it’s fixed, let’s move on to the next thing I need to tackle.”
Whew. Anybody else have a headache?
The effort is nothing less than admirable and clearly has made DeChambeau what he is today. Despite getting zero Official World Golf Ranking points for any of his results on LIV, the 31-year-old Californian is No. 15 in the OWGR on the strength of five top-six finishes in majors over his past eight starts. A year ago, Xander Schauffele beat DeChambeau by a shot in the PGA at Valhalla, only for DeChambeau to bounce back by clipping McIlroy at Pinehurst to capture his second U.S. Open win. Then came contending in April’s Masters, only to collapse with a 75 on Sunday.
Other than the Open Championship, which may have too many vagaries for him to calculate, DeChambeau believes he has figured out how to play the major championships, and it shows, with at least two top-sixes in the other three. He would seem to have another setup in his favor this week, with Quail Hollow considered a bombers’ track at which DeChambeau has a T-4 and T-9, respectively, in his last two starts, though his most recent appearance in the Wells Fargo Championship came in 2021.
“I remember you’ve got to drive it well. So far, I’ve been driving it well this season. Hopefully it continues,” DeChambeau said. “Greens are tricky. Got to have great irons. You’ve got to come in with a full, complete set of clubs that you feel comfortable with attacking flags at and just strategizing your way around the golf course.”
Clubs are another piece of DeChambeau’s world that frequently occupy his time. He made headlines last year with Avoda Golf irons that he put into play before the Masters, and at the end of the year he was dropping hints about a different set of clubs he was working on with LA Golf. “I’m building some equipment that you guys might know or might not know about, but we are very excited to be showcasing that next year,” DeChambeau said. “We’re going to change the game. We’re going to ruffle some feathers I’d say, in a good way, a really good way. We’re going to innovate beyond what’s known so far.”
Apparently, those irons are still as work in progress.
“I’ve been working on my irons a little bit. I haven’t changed irons,” DeChambeau said. “I was hoping to have irons by this week, but it just didn’t work out that way. I played pretty well in Mexico … played OK at Augusta. My irons weren’t that great. But played better in Mexico. My irons were really good in Korea. I feel like it’s moving in the right direction.”
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Main Image: David Cannon
