Renowned for its innovation and fan-friendly atmosphere, the Championship inspires players to perpetually push back the limits of what they can achieve. This year’s event is the 106th edition and will take place from 16–19 May at Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky, a private golf club designed by Rolex Testimonee Jack Nicklaus that has hosted the PGA Championship on three previous occasions (1996, 2000, 2014).

Rolex has been the Official Timekeeper and Official Partner of the PGA Championship since 2021 and the brand’s Testimonies have enjoyed regular success at this esteemed tournament. Gary Player (1962, 1972), Jack Nicklaus (1963, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1980), Tiger Woods (1999, 2000, 2006, 2007), Jason Day (2015), Collin Morikawa (2020), Justin Thomas (2017, 2022) and Brooks Koepka (2018, 2019, 2023) are among the champions whose names have been inscribed on the Wanamaker Trophy since the inaugural edition in 1916.

The trophy is named after American businessman Rodman Wanamaker, a pivotal figure in the formation of the PGA of America and the launch of its annual championship.

Brooks Koepka returns this year as defending champion, having last year emerged victorious at Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, New York, to claim his fifth Major crown and third PGA Championship title. The American previously won the tournament in 2018 and 2019, and in doing so, became the first player to successfully defend the PGA Championship since fellow Testimonee Tiger Woods in 2007.

Reflecting on last year’s triumph and handling the pressure associated with Major championships, Brooks Koepka said: “I’m very grateful. I think winning my fifth Major title meant the most to me given everything that I had been through with injury and coming back from that. I also had my whole team there which was special.

“I really enjoy playing on the biggest stages such as the PGA Championship, when the spotlight is on and when things are difficult. Major championships really test who the best golfer is, who has ‘it’ and who doesn’t. As they say in other sports, I am someone who wants the ball with a few seconds left on the clock.

“When I look back, I think success is defined by performances at Major championships. They are the one thing that set you apart in this game and to win as many of these tournaments as possible has always been my goal.”

The Championship is conducted by the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) of America. The Association is one of the world’s largest sports organizations, composed of more than 30,000 PGA of America Golf Professionals who love the game, are expert coaches, operators and business leaders, and work daily to drive interest, inclusion and participation in the sport. The PGA of America owns and operates numerous championships and events, including Major championships for men, women, seniors and The Ryder Cup, one of the world’s foremost sporting events.

Winners of the PGA Championship are eligible to play in the Championship for life and are invited to play in the three other Major championships – the Masters Tournament, the U.S. Open and The Open for the next five years.

Images: Rolex / Getty Images

The post Countdown begins ahead of Valhalla Golf Club’s fourth staging of PGA Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Daniel Rapaport
Appearance wise, there seems to be a disconnect. Omar Uresti doesn’t cut the figure of a man who is, at least according to the Court of Twitter Opinions, too accomplished to play in the tournament he just won rather comfortably. There were no 320-yard drives to speak of. He’s not a 20-something with biceps stretching his shirtsleeves.

Uresti is 52-year-old who stands 5-feet-6 on his best day, with no hair on the top of his head but grey mutton chops on his cheeks—and $3.87 million in career earnings on the PGA Tour. The Texas native never won (or finished second) in his 377 starts on the big tour, but this is a new chapter for him, and he’s now won the PGA of America’s PGA Professional Championship twice after a dominant performance this week at PGA Golf Club in Port St. Lucie, Fla.

The former University of Texas All-American built a seven-shot lead after his first three rounds of 67, 68 and 65, which gave him enough cushion to survive a nervy final-round 76—he was four over for the day through four—and still win by three over Frank Bensel Jr. Uresti becomes the oldest winner in the championship’s history, and he will now lead the contingent top-20 finishers who earned a spot in next month’s PGA Championship at Kiawah.

“I was a little anxious on the driving range,” Uresti said. “But then on the course, I felt good with my swing. Just the first four holes played pretty difficult, especially the first three. Got a couple bad breaks on No. 3, then was able to settle down and hit shots. Didn’t make any putts like I did first three days, but was able to hang in there and hit greens and two putt.”

There’s a touch of romanticism to earning a spot in the field at Kiawah: the club pros, the guys who fold shirts and give lessons all year, getting a chance to tee it up alongside the Rorys and Dustins and Jordans for a week. Which is why there was a healthy chorus of blowback when Uresti first won this tournament in 2017. Why was a guy who played 11 full seasons on the PGA Tour—and who is not currently on staff at any golf club—competing in an event created for guys who spend their weekends buzzing around in carts waving to members?

The answer is twofold: Uresti isn’t breaking any rules, and a lot of the guys he’s playing against don’t exactly do what you think they do.

The PGA Professional Championship was known as the PGA Club Professional Championship for the first 38 years of its existence after its first playing in 1968, and that old name (gone since 2006) certainly plays a role in the criticism. But the tournament is not limited to club pros. Any PGA of America member who is a Class A PGA professional is eligible, so long as they have made less than 10 starts on professional tours (including developmental and senior tours) during the last 12 months, not including majors. Uresti is indeed a Class A, a title he earned, in a stroke of irony, by being a member of the PGA Tour for 20 years. And he’s played just four events on pro tours in the past year—three missed cuts on the PGA Tour and a T-63 on the PGA Tour Champions.

“A lot of people don’t know what I do on the side,” Uresti said after his 2017 victory. “Not that I’m a full-time shop guy. But I have some kids and juniors who I teach on the side. I give free pointers to members at Onion Creek where I play and practice. I host a fundraiser for The First Tee of Greater Austin, the Omar Uresti Invitational. I play in other fundraisers.

“I’ve been paying dues to the PGA of America since 1993. During all those years I did play and travel, I played in hundreds of pro-ams. I gave lots of tips to these amateurs. One of the biggest things in the PGA of America is to promote the game. I’ve been promoting the game for as long as I can remember.”

If there were a time for officials with the PGA of America to alter these rules—say, to prevent players with a certain amount of career starts on a certain tour from playing—it was then. They declined to do so. And Uresti, who has now qualified for the PGA five times through the PGA Professional Championship after never qualifying as a PGA Tour member, wasn’t the only former tour pro who teed it up this week. There was Jeff Brehaut, who played six seasons on the PGA Tour in the early 2000s; Jason Caron, who played six years on the Korn Ferry Tour and had full status on the PGA Tour in 2003; Bob Sowards, who got through Q School in 2007; and Sonny Skinner, who played four years in the big leagues, to name a few.

Yes, Uresti is the most accomplished of the bunch, although he never exactly sniffed the Ryder Cup picture—his career-high World Ranking is No. 179, he never made more than $583,704 in a single season and he has just 14 career top-10 finishes. But he was hardly the only one in the field who has played full-time, or is currently playing full-time. (It’s also worth noting that a past champion of the event is Sam Snead, who also happens to have won 82 PGA Tour events.)

Which brings us to our second point. Would it be nice to have a tournament limited to guys who do run member-guests and don’t have time to practice like tour pros? Perhaps, but this simply isn’t that event. While the majority of the competitors do, indeed, have an affiliation with a club, several aren’t there working on a daily (or, in some cases, weekly) basis. The PGA Professional Championship is the crown jewel of the “club pro” circuit—there are tournaments year-round, and these guys play in them, and their employers understand that having a great player representing their course brings a certain cache. So they grant them time to work on their game with the hope that they will play their way onto TV or into news articles, with their name attached to the course’s.

Take Alex Beach, who entered this week as the defending champion after winning in 2019 (last year’s edition was cancelled due to the pandemic) and finished tied for sixth. Beach is 32 and represents Westchester Country Club in New York, but told Golf Digest last year that his “goal is definitely to earn full status on tour, and play full time.”

The online outrage, it would seem, should be directed toward the PGA of America rather than Uresti, whose greatest crime is his desire to compete and his recent propensity for winning. Don’t hate the player, hate the game.

The post Omar Uresti, golf’s most controversial ‘club pro,’ just qualified again for the PGA Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Alex Myers
It’s rare in sports when something or someone lives up to the hype, but the PGA Tour’s trio of Collin Morikawa, Matthew Wolff, and Viktor Hovland—the vaunted so-called “Class of 2019″—has actually exceeded its lofty expectations so far.

Hovland’s Mayakoba Golf Classic win on Sunday was already the sixth PGA Tour win among the three. It also moved him into elite company with his two class companions.

Just 15 months into their respective pro careers, all three are now ranked in the top 15 of the Official World Golf Ranking. Hovland, fresh off win No. 2, checks in at No. 15, one spot below Wolff. While Morikawa currently sits at No. 7.

Not too shabby for three guys who were all still playing college golf last May.

Morikawa, of course, is the first major winner of the three having captured the PGA Championship in August. But Wolff, the youngest of the trio at 21, finished in the top five in his first two majors. And his former Oklahoma State teammate Hovland made history of his own in 2019 with a PGA Tour record streak of 19 consecutive rounds shooting in the 60s.

Who will wind up being the best of the bunch? That remains to be seen. In the meantime, they’ve already all proved to be worthy of all that attention.

The post Viktor Hovland’s latest victory gives the Class of 2019 an impressive world ranking feat appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Joel Beall
The PGA Championship will be played at TPC Harding Park in 2020. But it will be played without fans.

The news, first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle last week, was confirmed by the PGA of America on Monday. According to the PGA, the decision was made in coordination with the state of California and the city and county of San Francisco.

“We are both inspired and honoured to ‘play on,’” said PGA of America CEO Seth Waugh in a statement. “In doing so, we will spotlight not only the beauty of TPC Harding Park, but the fortitude of San Francisco and its remarkable people. We’d like to thank the state of California and the city and county of San Francisco for being terrific partners in helping us get to this place. While the local community cannot be with us physically on-site, we will certainly carry their spirit of resilience and unity with us as we stage our major championship, on their behalf, for all the world to see and enjoy.”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has seesawed on the prospect of crowds at sporting events, expressing pessimism towards the idea in April but reversing course in late May. However, after initially containing the virus in spring, California has seen a dramatic uptick in positive COVID-19 cases since the state’s reopening phases. On Saturday alone, the state reported more than 4,300 new cases. Overall, only New York has more total reported cases than California.

In its statement, the PGA of America said those who purchased tickets directly from the PGA will be contacted for refunds.

The 2020 PGA Championship is scheduled to begin Aug. 6. Brooks Koepka is looking to win the Wanamaker Trophy for a third consecutive year.

The post PGA of America makes it official: 2020 PGA Championship to be played without fans appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

“It’s like a dream,” said Paul Thomas, Justin’s grandfather, who with his wife Phyllis watched every shot on television from their living room couch. Not that that was different from just about any other day of the week.

Paul Thomas holds up a full-page ad of his grandson that appeared in USA Today.

“It’s pretty much all golf all the time around here,” Phyllis said. “The cable company makes you buy 150 channels to get golf. We’d be happy if we just had Golf Channel and nothing else.”

For some insight into the making of Justin Thomas and his quick rise to the upper echelons of golf – not quite as fast as good buddy Jordan Spieth, but fast nevertheless – one need only get to know the man who blazed the trail.

Paul Thomas, or PT to just about everyone he knows, left school at age 17 to become a golf professional. His interest in the game began, like many others in a long-ago era, as a caddie at Avon Fields Golf Course in Cincinnati. A native of Ashland, Ky., Thomas needed a job and simply up and decided he was a golf pro, and he peddled his services to courses in the Cincinnati area, starting at Sharon Woods, where he cleaned clubs, gave lessons, “anything that was needed.”

Paul Thomas watches Arnold Palmer putt during the 1983 Citizens Union Senior Golf Classic on the PGA Tour Champions at Griffin Gate Golf Course in Lexington, Ky. After a third-round 69, Thomas began the final round one stroke behind Palmer. Photo courtesy Paul and Phyllis Thomas

He bounced around to other jobs, from York (Pa.) Country Club to Tequesta (Fla.) Country Club. While at the former, he met Phyllis, who didn’t play golf and wasn’t that impressed at first blush. “I had no idea what a golf pro was,” she said.

Paul and Phyllis Thomas have been married for 62 years.

He tried the tour in 1957 without much success and then moved back to Cincinnati to become an assistant at Western Hills Country Club. After taking time to refine his game, Thomas qualified for the 1960 and ’61 PGA Championships at, respectively, Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, and Olympia Fields near Chicago. A second-round 72 that included an inward 33 on Firestone, tied with Doug Sanders for the low of the day, enabled him to make the cut. “I was a player today,” he told the press at the time. Thomas also competed in the 1962 U.S. Open at Oakmont after finishing fourth in sectional qualifying in Cincinnati.

His dream was to win one of those two majors. He never came close but competing in them yielded its own measure of satisfaction.

“That meant you were kind of a big deal, just making the field,” he said.

Stuart Franklin

Three of his four sons, including Mike, Justin’s father, were born by the time he landed his first head professional post in 1963 at Zanesville Country Club, about 50 miles east of Columbus. He stayed for 26 years. Of the four boys, Mike displayed the most aptitude, and interest. At 10 years old he offered to caddie for his mom in the club championship after she had taken up the game. She nervously topped a few shots, moving the ball no more than 100 yards in four strokes. Mike put down the bag and walked in. Paul confronted him.

Related: 15 things you need to know about Justin Thomas

“He said, ‘If she can’t do better than that, then I quit,’” Paul remembered. “Mike got to be a really good player. He shot 65 at Zanesville as a young kid. He’d clear a place in the snow to hit balls in winter. He had certain expectations, and Justin was no different.”

But Justin took that to another level while growing up at Harmony Landing Country Club, near Louisville. “You could see the desire in him when he was 7 or 8, and he just got better every year,” Paul said. “It wasn’t long after that his dad and I just looked at each other and said, ‘He’s the real deal.’”

Paul’s favorite memory of a young Justin was watching him play the short course at PGA National in Port St. Lucie, Fla. “The holes were no more than 50-90 yards, and he would just go around and around trying to make a hole-in-one,” PT said. “He was all about making a hole-in-one. He’d hit the tee shot, and if it didn’t go in, he’d pick up and go the next hole. But I think he aced every hole at some point.”

A PGA Master Professional, Mike has been Justin’s only teacher. Paul, a renowned instructor at Zanesville and at his last job at Peek’n Peak Resort in New York before he retired, stayed out of it.

“I just talked to him about the game, about the old timers who played, how they did things,” Thomas said. “The one thing I tried to instill in him was confidence, telling him he could be a good player. I’d tell him, ‘The only guy who can screw this up is you.’ I think we know now that he’s done all right.”

Paul’s other contribution was fashion. “He learned a lot about dressing up from me,” he said with an air of satisfaction. “I was always wearing the best I could get on me, and the same with his dad. He was a little kid, and he’d never wear shorts because he said pros don’t wear shorts.”

Now that Justin has broken through, Paul said the floodgates could open for more major titles. Which would mean even more people wanting to talk to him about his grandson. At age 85, he still plays golf four times a week at Foxfire Golf Club south of the city. Phyllis, 81, also will play the occasional nine holes.

All golf all the time in the Thomas household.

“Oh, my gosh, all year long the whole conversation with the guys has been, ‘What’s Justin shooting today?’ He’s a big shot around here,” Paul said with a chuckle. “The 59 [in January at the Sony Open], making an eagle to shoot 63 in the U.S. Open, that’s some amazing stuff. We have a lot to talk about.”

“Oh, my gosh, all year long the whole conversation with the guys has been, ‘What’s Justin shooting today?’ He’s a big shot around here,” Paul said with a chuckle. “The 59 [in January at the Sony Open], making an eagle to shoot 63 in the U.S. Open, that’s some amazing stuff. We have a lot to talk about.”

PT can still score, too. He has shot his age or better every year since he turned 64. “Of course, now it gets easier, so it’s not as much fun,” he said. “Most of the time, if I can shoot something around 75, I’m usually tickled.”

Thomas said he looks forward to the day he can get together with his grandson and hold the Wanamaker Trophy, the prize he never got close to himself. He and Phyllis saw online that Justin was showing off his PGA hardware with Tiger Woods. They shook their heads in wonder. No. 6 in the world rankings and with four wins this season, Justin is a big shot everywhere.

“That PGA trophy, that’s the big one to win in our eyes,” said PT, who suspects he’ll see his grandson sometime this fall.

Would he like to have a drink out of the Wanamaker Trophy? “Nah,” he replied. “Just seeing Justin bring it in would be enough.”

The post Paul Thomas, Justin’s grandfather pro, relishes a win he could only dream of appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Koepka wound up with the low cumulative score in golf’s four major championships this year, shooting a combined 21 under while needing 1,119 strokes. And yes, he did most of his damage at Erin Hills where he was 16 under.

Koepka was one of only 13 players to make the cut in all four majors and he edged Hideki Matsuyama and Matt Kuchar by a single shot for this important distinction. Of course, the fact that he won a major while those other two remained winless despite close calls (Matsuyama at the U.S. Open and PGA Championship, Kuchar at the British Open) makes Koepka’s advantage in the year’s biggest tournaments a whole lot bigger.

The other 10 players to play the weekend in all four majors this season were Rickie Fowler (-16), Jordan Spieth (-10), Paul Casey (-9), Charley Hoffman (-3), Marc Leishman (+3), Steve Stricker (+3), J.B. Holmes (+10), Russell Henley (+12), Kevin Kisner (+16), and Lee Westwood (+20).

Although stacking different years up is obviously not an apples-to-apples comparison, in case you’re wondering, Jordan Spieth holds the record for low cumulative score at majors in one year for his 54 under total in 2015. Spieth won the Masters and U.S. Open that year and edged Tiger Woods’ previous mark of 53 under set during his historic 2000 campaign.

The post Why Brooks Koepka was the king of the majors in 2017 appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

RELATED: Why Brooks Koepka was the King of the Majors in 2017

According to Classic TV Sports, CBS showed 1.32 shots per minute during its final-round coverage of the year’s final major. That puts it right in line with the 2017 U.S. Open on Fox (1.30) and a shade below this year’s Masters (1.41), which also aired on CBS.

The site didn’t track the stat for the final round of this year’s Open Championship on NBC, however, it has done this for every other major since the start of 2014. And a quick comparison shows that networks have picked it up when it comes to showing more shots per minute in their coverage. Looking back, the average was 1.12 shots per minute in 2014, 1.16 in 2015, and 1.11 in 2016.

That averages out to only 1.14 shots per minutes shown at the majors in that three-year span. But the 1.34 average in 2017 represents an 18-percent increase.

So yes, when you’re watching golf at home, it’s always going to seem like networks should be showing more from the course. But on the bright side, it seems like they’re getting better.

The post This stat concerning TV coverage of this year’s major championships should have golf fans encouraged appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Yes, Fowler was happy for his good friend Justin Thomas winning the PGA Championship. But you got the sense this one maybe stung a little more than it did at Erin Hills, where Fowler went into the final round just two strokes off the lead of Brian Harman and one back of eventual winner Brooks Koepka.

“It’s special,” he said of Thomas’ victory, watching the trophy ceremony near the edge of the 18th green at Quail Hollow Club on Sunday. “I told him I was gonna go out and try to show him something. At least I was able to do a little bit of that on the back nine.

“My time’s coming. It’s not long.”

Maybe not. But it didn’t happen last week, thanks in part to a bogey-double bogey-bogey third-round finish Saturday that took him, for all intents and purposes, out of the tournament.

A day later, Fowler rattled off four straight birdies between Nos. 12 and 15 on his way to a 67 but finished three back. The thought of what happened at the end of the third round was still on his mind.

“It’s not an easy course, not an easy closing stretch,” he said. “Anything can happen.

“To see [Thomas] post [63] at Erin Hills, the start he got off to this year and the wins, it was just a matter of time. Some of it is playing good golf, some of it was being in the right place at the right time. I think it was a little of both for J.T. this week. [Saturday] he fought it out when he wasn’t having the best day. I was out in front of him for most of the day, and I struggled coming in and he made some good pars coming in to put himself in position to do what he did today.”

Fowler finished in the top five of two majors this season, and the seventh time over the last seven years. But he also has zero wins, as he noted in a humorous Snapchat post when he joined Thomas and Tiger Woods at Woods’ restaurant earlier this week.

Most players go through some form of blowing it before winning the big one. Fowler will break through at some point. And after Sunday it feels like that time is getting closer.

MORE CHANGES TO QUAIL HOLLOW

So much was made about Quail Hollow and the changes to the course for the PGA Championship (more on that later). It was best summed up by Rory McIlroy, who said, “This is not the Quail Hollow we have gotten to know over the last 10 years. It’s a completely different golf course.”

When the Presidents Cup is played there in 2021 it probably won’t be the one that we saw for the year’s final major, either.

The biggest difference could be … everyone at once now … The Green Mile. Currently, holes 16 through 18 make up the difficult stretch. According to Quail Hollow president Johnny Harris, a re-routing for the match-play event will push The Green Mile up to holes 13 through 15 so that they impact more matches.

“Everyone gets to play it then,” he said.

Other potential routing changes according to Harris would include the 10th hole being played as the 16th, the 11th as the 17th and nine as the finisher, among other possibilities.

As for the future of the PGA Tour’s Wells Fargo Championship held annually at Quail Hollow, that’s still TBD. The tournament will be there through the end of 2019 but with several scheduling changes expected, Quail Hollow could move from an annual venue to a big-event spot for the Presidents Cup, PGA Championship or other marquee championships every handful of years.

A CASE FOR RORY TO PLAY?

Rory McIlroy sounded on Sunday like he was trying to convince himself to play in the FedEx Cup Playoffs as his rib injury continues to linger.

His answer when asked why would he play?

“A sense of duty,” he said. “But then at the same time, if you are not capable of playing at your best, why should you play? So, again, it’s a Catch-22.

Stuart Franklin/Getty Images

”He has already won a FedEx Cup (last year) and has a lot to sort out—injury, caddie, short game. With little offseason to handle all this, a big-picture, long-term approach would probably be better than meandering through a few more events of what has already been a long year for the 28-year-old Northern Irishman on and off the course.

Which speaks to another point. More and more, we’re seeing top players get worn down by a never-ending calendar (see: Jason Day).

Even if players aren’t teeing it up every week and only playing around 25 weeks a year (on tour and elsewhere around the world), some extended time off seems only beneficial. Especially with how cramped the season gets this time of year.

THREE THINGS I THINK I THINK

I think the PGA of America saved itself from what could have been a disaster in the waiting by adjusting its setup for Sunday’s final round and making it a little more player friendly. For the first three days, a lot of golfers said birdie opportunities were scarce because of a combination of faster-than-expected putting surfaces and holes located on ridges that couldn’t necessarily accommodate the green speed. Couple that with some simply poor changes—the fourth green, with, in short, no good hole-locations, was most notable to players I talked to—and the whole thing just seemed off, until it was saved by the finish. What does it tell you that club member Webb Simpson was critical of the “new” Quail Hollow’s setup for the PGA? …

I think Thomas is the leader in the clubhouse for Player of the Year honors if voting ended today. But having talked to a handful of players, a lot can change depending on what happens in the Playoffs. Jordan Spieth is still in the mix with an outside shot for Brooks Koepka, Sergio Garcia and Dustin Johnson. …

I think the PGA Tour’s unveiling of its fall schedule for the 2017-’18 season, complete with the inaugural CJ Cup at Nine Bridges in South Korea, is the latest sign of not only how global golf is but how the biggest tour in the world is becoming more global, too. It was only a few years ago that all the fall events were played in the U.S. Now half of the eight are scattered across the globe, including three in Asia.

WHO I LIKE THIS WEEK

The Wyndham Championship is the last chance for those hovering around the 125 spot in the FedEx Cup standings to secure a spot in the postseason. At 116th, that includes Ben Martin. The good news for the 2009 U.S. Amateur runner-up, who is now 29 and won the tour’s annual stop in Vegas three years ago, is that he’s trending in the right direction of late with three finishes in the top 15 in his last six starts. He also putts well on Bermudagrass and in his last start at the Barracuda Championship ranked third in the field in greens hit, an important number to keep in mind at Donald Ross-designed Sedgefield. The player I like even more, though, is Chez Reavie. He tied for fourth at Memphis in June and has been steady for a couple of months with top-25s in the U.S. Open and PGA. He’s also in the top 30 on tour in total birdies, par-4 performance, is 32nd in GIR and leads in proximity to the hole. He also has a couple of top 10s in the event.

David Cannon/Getty Images

The post Fowler a step closer to his major, what’s next for Quail Hollow and a first look at the fall schedule appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Last year you visited Scotty Cameron’s studio and walked away with the putter you won the PGA with. What was that experience like?
Anytime you go to the Studio and work with Scotty and Paul Vizanko, you learn something new every time. It’s an unbelievable experience. It’s really fun. You walk out of there with more knowledge than when you go in there. I feel like I leave having something good to work on with my putting and my mechanics. It’s not just looking at different putters. You’re looking at what putters are going to give you the best roll and bring out your best stroke, what’s the right weight. I was struggling a little bit with my stroke last year and I wanted to try something different. I just kind of picked that putter [the mallet-style Futura X5] up and it felt kinda good.

You had been playing a blade-style putter before that. Had you played mallets before?
This was a totally different look for me. I’ve used a Newport 2 style for basically my entire life. I had used a Cameron Fastback model during my year on the Web.com Tour for about 85 percent of the season but other than that it’s been a Newport 2, so it was a completely different look.

You made a couple of changes at Quail Hollow. Different wedge, put the 5-wood in instead of the 2-iron. Do you regularly adapt your set makeup to the courses you’re playing?
Absolutely. The 60-degree wedge I was using was the one I used at the British Open and I can’t think of more different conditions than Birkdale and Quail Hollow. You’re going from firm and tight turf and not really any grain over there to a little bit wet, also very tight, but grainy Bermuda grass. The other 60-degree I had was meant to dig and that wasn’t going to work at Quail Hollow. You don’t want to use the bounce when it’s that grainy. You’re just going to embarrass yourself. In terms of the 2-iron and 5-wood, that’s something I’ll change frequently, usually depending on the par 5s.

You have the new Titleist 718 MB blades. What was the process in making that switch?
It was an easy transition. Just hit some balls with them and I liked them right away. They are very similar to what I have now, but I liked the updates. They were more forgiving and I was able to hit the shots I wanted and the shot shapes I like to see.

Why do you prefer muscleback blades instead of a more forgiving club?
It looks clean at address. The feel is great, they go through the turf well, they have a good sound to them. All the irons are great but I’ve used blades most of my life. I’m hitting them well so I’m not about to change.

On your driver, it’s the Titleist 917D2 which has an adjustable hosel. How do you have that set and do you ever tinker with the settings?
I don’t change it too much but I have changed the settings at times. I’ve gone back and forth between A-1 [standard loft and lie] and D-1 [standard lie, minus .75 degrees loft]. I actually changed my setting last week at the PGA. I was hitting good drives but was just leaking it a bit to the right. So I altered the loft and felt I could see a little bit more of the face and could turn it over a little easier and not lose it to the right.

That said, it sounds like once you find something you like, you tend to stay with it?
If you’re changing it probably means you’re not hitting it well, so I don’t want to be changing equipment a lot.

You’re still a young guy, but how has your appreciation of what equipment can do for your game evolved?
Quite a bit. The guys at Titleist make it so easy on us. Anything I need they’ll do for me. Anything I want to change, they’ll help me with. Anything I’m curious about or have questions about they’re going to answer for me. I can practice all I want, but if I don’t have the right equipment for my kind of game it’s not going to mean very much. In some ways what they do for me is more important than what I do to get ready.

When you first started getting into the game, what was the first club that captured your attention to the point you said to yourself, “I really want this club?”

I remember wanting a Scotty Cameron Circle T putter really badly. I remember the first time I went to the Studio and I got to pick one out and have it customized. That was pretty cool. I actually got it lengthened and refinished a couple of years ago. It’s a very pretty and special putter to me.

Do you pay any attention to what other players are using?
I kind of do my own thing and worry about what I’m playing. Yeah, once in a while I’ll take something out of someone’s bag and take a look at it, but for the most part I’m more interested in my equipment.

A lot of your tour brethren have stampings on their wedges. You have “Radar” stamped on yours. What’s the story behind that?
It’s a funny story. I tell everyone that it’s a nickname that nobody calls me. When I was going up through the junior ranks Phillip James from Titleist I went on to California to the test center and I was hitting wedges with Mr. Vokey and P.J. and I made a couple of chip shots and hit a couple of good wedge shots and they said something about it being like a radar and P.J. refused to send me wedges going forward unless it has “Radar” on them so it kind of stuck from there.

Ever hit a persimmon driver or balata golf ball?
I actually have. Only couple of times and probably not enough to understand how much harder it is to use than what we have now. But it’s definitely a different feel.

Related: 15 Things You Need to Know About Justin Thomas

How many golf balls do you go through in a round and at the end of the week what do you do with all your extras?
It depends. If it’s a short course where you use a lot of wedges, it can be three or four. Hopefully not more than five—I don’t want to be losing any balls or taking drops. I usually go through three, though. I carry nine in my bag. Three that I use for practice putting, and the rest for competition. At the end of the week I sign them and give them to people who work the tournament like standard bearers and also fans.

What’s the most unique thing about your equipment?
Probably that my irons have absolutely no offset. They’re very customized for me. They look different from everyone else’s irons. It’s such a clean look from the shaft down to the hosel down to the clubhead. I will say that when I’m not hitting it well those 4- and 5-irons look pretty difficult to hit, but it’s a great look. I’m not sure how it started but I think it was when I picked up a set of irons about four or five years ago and said I wanted a set like that. Been using irons like that ever since.

The post Justin Thomas reveals he’s more of an old-school equipment guy than you might think appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

But here are a few other things you need to know about the 24-year-old rising star, and the favourite for the 2017 PGA Tour Player of the Year:

Getty Images

Justin Thomas has been dreaming of making it on the PGA Tour since attending, at age 7, Tiger Woods’ win in the 2000 PGA at Valhalla.

JT has a VHS tape of the tournament, which he estimates he’s watched 50 times, motivating the Louisville native to put in the work to one day make it to the same stage.

Add Justin’s win at the PGA Championship to the long line of champions with strong PGA of America ties.

Justin grew up in Kentucky, playing a lot of golf with his father, Mike, being the club pro at Harmony Landing outside Louisville. And Justin’s grandpa, Paul, was also a club pro, serving in Zanesville, Ohio. Paul was a good enough player to play in the 1962 U.S. Open at Oakmont.

The 2017 PGA Championship winner would spend most days in the summer picking the range and hitting shots as his father worked.

At the end of the day, he and his dad would play for dollars as a kid after he was done picking the range, and it got competitive: “We would play for a dollar, and it was pretty heated out there. And I’m a pretty sore loser, so I did not handle it well when I lost and had to give up a dollar,” he said.

Sam Greenwood

Though he hasn’t been on a Ryder Cup team yet, Justin Thomas celebrated the 2008 victory at Valhalla with some VIP access.

One of Thomas’ favourite memories is high-fiving Phil Mickelson behind the 17th green when J.B. Holmes clinched the winning point for the U.S. team at Valhalla. With his father being on the PGA of America board that week, Thomas got to hang out with all the players that week.

Getty Images

Thomas’ win at Quail Hollow might’ve clinched the 2017 Player of the Year title.

This season was already stellar — with three PGA Tour victories, including a 59 in his win at the Sony Open, and a (then) record-tying 63 at the U.S. Open at Erin Hills. The PGA Championship victory gives him the most wins out of all major winners this year.

Photo by Walter Iooss Jr.

At 145 pounds (66kg), Justin Thomas is one of the biggest hitters on tour, pound for pound.

It’s actually insane how far JT hits it, given his size. Thomas ranked first in driving distance at Quail Hollow (328 yards off the tee) and ranks seventh on the PGA Tour this year (310 yards, 10 yards more than the tour average).

He had one of the most impressive collegiate resumes in recent memory.

As a freshman at Alabama, Thomas won the Haskins Award as the nation’s top golfer in 2012. He turned pro after his sophomore year, in which the Crimson Tide won the 2013 NCAA Championship and earned his PGA Tour card after a strong 2014 on the Web.com Tour.

Thomas is roommates with fellow Alabama golfer and PGA Tour player Bud Cauley in Jupiter, Fla.

Their prize possession is a custom, crimson-colored pool table with a Bama logo. Along with so many other tour pros, Thomas and Cauley reside and practice in Jupiter, where they’re both members of Medalist G.C. and The Bear’s Club.

You may or may not have heard, but Justin is buddies with Jordan Spieth.

Since they competed at the Evian Junior Masters in France when they were 14 and 13 (above), they’ve been buddies. Thomas told Golf Digest in 2014: “I don’t think him and I really sit back and reflect on what we’ve accomplished too much, but I probably do more than Jordan does,” Thomas said. “And it’s pretty cool. It’s crazy to think where our careers are gonna end up and how long we’ll be competing on the same level.”

RELATED: My Shot: Justin Thomas goes deep on Alabama football, Nick Saban’s chipping, and putting games with Jordan Spieth

The Spring Break boys now have four major wins with Thomas’ win.

And victories in the final two majors of the year, with Spieth winning his third at The Open, and Thomas taking home the title at Quail Hollow. Spieth’s no longer the only #SB2K16/17 bro with a major win.

When you realize Christmas is only 2 days away…

A post shared by Justin Thomas (@justinthomas34) on Dec 23, 2016 at 8:12am PST

Justin Thomas and Rickie Fowler made back-to-back holes-in-one at the 2016 Masters Par-3 Contest.

Paired with Spieth, the trio shared a moment they’ll never forget.

Thomas made sure his girlfriend, Jillian Wisniewski, was at Quail Hollow to see his first major win.

Though we usually don’t get too much inside info about his girl on social media, we found out Thomas didn’t want Jillian to miss his big win: “My girlfriend was supposed to fly out [of North Carolina] at about 7:00 and I was like, ‘You need to change your flight to later, because I don’t know, I just feel like I don’t want you to miss this, I feel like I’m going to get it done,” he said after.

@vokeywedges hooked me up with a few of my favorite (clean) rap lines for my fresh set.. Lovin em! Have to thank @wosellers for some help too

A post shared by Justin Thomas (@justinthomas34) on Feb 24, 2015 at 8:47am PST

You can always find cool stampings on Thomas’ wedges.

Usually, Thomas’ wedges are stamped with “RADAR,” describing his spot-on wedge play. But as seen above, he’ll mix in the occasional hip-hop lyric, such as these from 2015, with Lil’ Wayne, Rick Ross and Drake songs.

The family is very tight-knit: Justin’s mom regularly travels with him on tour—even hanging with him and his friends and going out to dinner with them.

During Thomas’ rookie season, his mom, Jani, would regularly go out to dinner with Thomas’ friends at night. And if you’re at a tour event in which Thomas is playing, you can expect to see her around the grounds each week.

Stuart Franklin

–His father, Mike, has a frame of the golf balls from special moments in Justin’s career.

Moments from this year include Thomas’ record-tying 63 in the third round at Erin Hills, and the 59 at the Sony Open. We’re quite confident at least one ball from Quail Hollow (above) will make it to the display.

The post 15 Things You Need To Know About Justin Thomas appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.