Wyndham Clark arrives on the Olympic Males’s Golf Competitors as considerably of an outlier on Workforce USA.
No person has performed higher golf this 12 months than Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele, who’ve mixed to win three of the 4 majors. Then there’s Collin Morikawa, who tied for third at Augusta Nationwide, tied for fourth at Valhalla, after which posted a pair of top-20 finishes on the U.S. Open and The Open. Morikawa has had a stable main championship marketing campaign, a lot in contrast to Clark.
Clark, in the meantime, has missed the lower in three majors and tied for 56th at Pinehurst No. 2 in his U.S. Open title protection. He doesn’t boast the resume that his fellow Individuals have, which explains why many consider that Bryson DeChambeau ought to have changed Clark on Workforce USA as a substitute.
But, Clark does have 5 top-10 finishes courting again to mid-March, together with a pair of runner-up finishes at The Gamers and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He additionally posted back-to-back top-10s on the Vacationers Championship and Genesis Scottish Open. Royal Troon then despatched Clark spiraling, as solely six gamers completed worse than he did by 36 holes.
However forward of the Texas Youngsters’s Open in Houston, Clark threw out his again whereas figuring out, an harm that has continued all through the season and has led to some frustrations.
“I’ve some accidents I’ve been coping with, occurred proper earlier than Houston main into the Masters, and I haven’t been the identical,” Clark defined Wednesday.
“I really feel like I’m lastly attending to the place I can swing on the stage that I do know I can swing, and in order that’s form of been an ongoing concern, and it’s been irritating for me.”
Clark even admitted that he has misplaced distance as a result of his illnesses have prevented him from swinging at full pace.
“I’ve obtained to be sincere, I’ve been very pissed off with how I performed on the majors,” Clark added.
“I consider I wasn’t exhibiting how good of a participant I do know I might be, particularly at highest stage within the majors. However I’ve additionally obtained to have a look at how far I’ve are available in two years. I’m fifth on the FedEx in back-to-back years, and I’ve received a number of instances. I’ve lots of high finishes, and I’m right here on the Olympics. So I’ve obtained to verify I don’t let the surface individuals put an excessive amount of stress on myself as a result of I’ve grown a lot in these two years. You understand, it’s not the place I need to be sooner or later, however years like this, I’ve realized rather a lot and I’m hoping I take all of the issues I realized and play higher within the majors subsequent 12 months.”
Clark, whose solely top-10 end in a serious got here final 12 months on the Los Angeles Nation Membership, should wait 9 months till Augusta earlier than getting one other crack. Regardless of his agitation, he stays optimistic going into the Olympics, and if he can convey dwelling a Gold Medal, most of these frustrations will wash away.
Jack Milko is a golf employees author for SB Nation’s Taking part in By. You should definitely try @_PlayingThrough for extra golf protection. You possibly can observe him on Twitter @jack_milko as effectively.
