At the beginning of this year, I made a list of goals I wanted to achieve in my own golf game. Of course, there are the mundane actions, like playing more rounds, getting a hole-in-one, and going on a trip with friends, but there are two action items that have stuck with me over the past few weeks. The reason is that the way they run is counterintuitive to each other.
Well, I would like to lower my handicap to the lowest number in my life. I want to play golf smarter. I want to experience the rush of scoring in the 60s and making birdies one after another. I want to put the plus sign next to my name again.
But I want to be able to hit shots while achieving that. I want to give shape to them. I want them to escape. I want to take advantage of the conditions and carve. I want to play golf with a capital G, even if this tightrope walk ultimately results in a facial injury. It’s more fun that way, it’s crazy.
You may be reading this and thinking, “I have to hit shots to play golf,” but I don’t think that’s actually the case. At least not the type of golf you’re thinking of. I’m talking about the Sony Open type of golf that was held last weekend at Waialae Country Club.
Seth Rayner’s design, which spans about 7,000 yards and can be played to par 70, should be outdated by now. The game was supposed to pass by that, but it still remains a game that has what players want and is one of their favorites. What they need is not distance, but rather skill, the ability to take different shots from different windows at different times, taking into account a myriad of factors.
Now it’s timeless.
Chris Gotterup’s run pulls him away from the field to win the 2026 Sony Open, the first tournament of the PGA Tour season
patrick mcdonald
When you try to compare eras of different sports, what people who follow recent or current athletes often say is that they became more athletic through general evolution, right? Their skills improved. Equipment and training aids have become more convenient. Data is being deployed in ways that drive decision-making like never before.
The players’ diets are much better. They consume very little alcohol and continue with the same diet that they know will fuel them in the most effective way. While your workouts are getting more and more effective, recovery methods like cold plunges and red light therapy can help your muscles recover and relieve pain in the blink of an eye.
Although not basketball or football players, golfers find themselves in this same situation. Due to continued major mistakes, the equipment is far from what it was at the beginning of this century. Driving ranges are littered with Trackman and Foresight launch monitors, with some players obsessing over their numbers like toddlers with tablets in front of them.
On the golf course, players and caddies know where to bet their luck and can quantify, for example, how much better it is to take the driver off the tee on a hole than to lay back and take position.
Therefore, many believe that golfers have improved. I’m not here to say they’re not — I mean, have you seen what Scotty Scheffler has done the last four years? Have you seen Rory McIlroy firing on all cylinders? — but I don’t think everyone is. I think bulk has become more efficient.
They have become better at identifying the path of least resistance, choosing it, and trying to record as few strokes as possible on their scorecard. After all, that’s the name of the game, right?
Golfing this weekend got me thinking about this. In Dubai, wild weather wreaked havoc on players during the second round, with 2019 British Open champion Shane Lowry expressing how much fun he was having on social media. He signed with a 3-under 68, nearly six strokes above the field average.
“It was refreshing to play in those conditions today,” Lowry wrote. “I enjoy shaping the shot and hitting it 130 yards with an 8-iron.”
Something similar happened on the other side of the world at the Sony Open. Waialae Country Club had its last cheer on what some believe will be the PGA Tour’s last trip to Hawaii due to upcoming schedule changes. From Thursday afternoon until Saturday, players were forced to play golf with a capital G.
If you didn’t know that, you were on a flight back to the mainland on Friday.
Almost everything had to be considered for every shot. Things like wind direction changing depending on the direction of the hole, shot shape and runout, how they affect total yards, where the right mistakes were. Golf may be played in arenas at the beginning of the week, but when it really matters and real bets are on the line, it’s best left as an outdoor sport.
“You don’t usually hit that many shots on the driving range,” Jordan Spieth said. “It’s not like you’re hitting a 5-iron from 160 and trying to make a chip shot. You just get a very accurate idea of what the situation is and it’s really fun when you’re doing well.”
In a perfect world, this would happen every week. Golfers need to do more than just see the target, know the number, and swing the ball to play golf. The juggling act between deciding which variables to weight and which to ignore is an integral part of the game. It is a place where elites further separate themselves.
In fact, there are only a handful of cases each year where a confluence of variables changes the situation in this way. It’s the golf course, it’s the season, it’s luck. In the 2026 season, it happened to be held during the first week. The PGA Tour may leave Hawaii in the future, but I hope this tournament was enough to remind you that golf doesn’t have to either.
