Our Jack Hirsh received to see a number of the finest gamers on the Korn Ferry Tour up shut through the Magnit Championship Professional-Am. Here is what he discovered.
Magnit Championship
Image this begin to a improbable day of golf: You arrive to a completely excellent facility simply after dawn, take pleasure in breakfast earlier than heading out to one of many extra expansive apply services you’ve gotten ever seen, plop your bag down behind a totally untouched patch of completely manicured grass earlier than being requested a easy query.
“Would you want Professional V1s or ProV1x?”
There aren’t many higher questions.
Final week, I used to be lucky to be invited to my first pre-tournament pro-am on any main professional tour on the Korn Ferry Tour’s Magnit Championship. The Magnit Championship serves because the common season lastly for the Korn Ferry Tour and it’s held at Metedeconk Nationwide Golf Membership in Central New Jersey (the existence of Central Jersey is a hotly debated subject, however for simplicity’s sake, we’ll go along with it for now), simply an hour from my house in Philadelphia. Each of our execs mentioned it was one of the best course the Tour performs all yr.
I’ve been lucky to play with Tour execs earlier than, together with on the PGA Tour Champions after I was in highschool on the then-First Tee Open, however not solely am I a way more developed participant now, it was a totally completely different expertise.
Listed below are 4 issues I discovered taking part in in my first Korn Ferry Tour Professional-Am.
The sound is simply completely different
I’m a fairly good golfer and I can hit the ball fairly far. I’ve been as little as a plus-1 handicap, however I at the moment carry a 1.6 index. With my driver, I sit comfortably round 115-118 mph clubhead velocity leading to ball speeds round 170 mph.
I don’t let you know this to toot my very own horn, however extra so for comparability’s sake as a result of not solely do I play with loads of different golfers like me who’re considerably higher than me, I’m typically requested why I didn’t play DI school golf or what the distinction between me and a Tour professional is. The very fact of the matter is, in comparison with these guys, I suck.
Nowhere is that extra evident than the sound of the ball of their drivers.
We had been lucky to get paired with two improbable execs. For our entrance 9, we had been joined by Mason Anderson, a 25-year-old from Arizona who gained earlier this yr and is 14th on the Korn Ferry Factors record. Meaning he’s in fine condition to get a spot within the prime 30 by season’s finish and earn his PGA Tour card for subsequent season.
Taking part in in a pro-am? Professional says to concentrate on these 2 issues
Mason is 97th in driving distance this season averaging 302.7 yards off the tee. I didn’t hit too many good tee photographs on the entrance 9, however I didn’t have to know Mason would have simply taken my cash in a long-drive contest.
The sound of influence is that this stable THWACK that I merely can’t produce. His swing is quicker and he hits the useless heart of the face extra typically than I can dream of.
You get a way of this watching any skilled tournaments, however taking part in with them provides you a brand new perspective.
Our different professional, Pontus Nyholm, is thirty third on Tour in distance at 317 a pop. I’ll allow you to use your creativeness on how the ball sounds off his membership.
These guys have completed a whole lot of these
And, they’re simply as a lot execs at taking part in their half to make an expertise in a pro-am as they’re Thursday to Sunday.
You play 9 holes with one professional after which 9 with one other and you’re taking a bunch picture (above) on the flip. Each Pontus and Mason grabbed their luggage and knew precisely when and the place to face for our momento.
You might additionally inform they appreciated that every one 4 in our group hit the ball comparatively straight in comparison with the hacks they usually should shepherd round a course.
However that didn’t imply they hesitated to provide ideas.
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One of many gamers in our group, John Clark, a sports activities anchor for NBC Sports activities Philadelphia, has a swing that may be completely described by what I mentioned to him on the primary tee after I noticed it: “Inform me you performed baseball with out telling me you performed baseball.”
John is a reasonably new golfer, having picked it up through the pandemic, like so many. It’s protected to say he’s hooked now as he mentioned he simply joined a membership close to his house exterior of Philly.
He units as much as the ball identical to a batter digging into the field, even factors the membership to the goal from the hip like he’s calling a house run. However what Mason needed to repair on the eighth tee was how he sucks the membership again inside after which brings it again excessive, like a batter making an attempt to line one to left.
Mason needed John to take the membership again exterior and create area for him to shallow the membership on the best way down.
He tried it. Missle down the golf green.
The work for the week is sort of completed
By the point Wednesday comes round, each gamers and caddies have a fairly good concept of their sport plans for the week. With a 5-hour-15-minute tempo, they’d have had loads of time to hit an additional ball right here and there, however for essentially the most half, they didn’t.
Each Mason and Pontus took a couple of additional putts and chips across the inexperienced, however that was the extent of the scouting the course was already completed. There was little dialogue on tees and for approaches about what to hit.
10 takeaways each newbie can study from my first Professional-Am
They each informed me a lot of the sport plan formation occurs on Tuesday and Monday in the event that they arrive early. Wednesday is about studying the nuances of the greens and estimating the place pin places could be.
That jogs my memory, the pins undoubtedly gained’t be the place they had been within the pro-am as a few of them had been reduce on extreme slopes to maintain visitors off the components of the greens the place pins would possibly truly be.
The distinction is within the head
It really takes a village for a participant to make it to the PGA Tour. After all, each participant has a caddie, and each Trevor (Mason’s caddie) and Josh (Pontus’ caddie) had been as good and welcoming to us because the gamers.
However the distinction can typically be greater than only a nice caddie-player duo.
Each Mason and Pontus informed us they work with psychological coaches to assist them alongside and possibly get an edge on their fellow gamers.
It’s a standard apply you see on the PGA Tour, however even on the Korn Ferry Tour, the place assets are extra scarce, gamers are nonetheless searching for the psychological edge to get them to the highest of the sport.
