[PHOTO: Alex Pantling/R&A]
Xander Schauffele’s wife, Maya, had the audacity to frame a photo of him celebrating his Olympic gold medal from Tokyo and hang it his home gym. It was apparently like breaking a marriage vow for the guy who seems to spend no more than a day celebrating triumphs.
“She put it so high up I can’t reach it – I have to get a ladder now, and it bothers me,” Schauffele said, somewhat facetiously, at his reigning Open champion’s press conference on Tuesday at Royal Portrush.
Schauffele, 31, collected his finest hardware in 2024, hoisting the massive Wanamaker Trophy after winning his first major, the PGA Championship at Valhalla in May, followed by a stunning win in The Open at Troon, where he charged with a Sunday 65.
In what seemed like the blink of an eye, Schauffele went from hapless contender to being on top of the golf world twice. Three times counting the Olympics. Not that he was impressed enough to put his gold medal or trophies on display at either of his homes in California or Florida.
“What am I going to do with [the trophies]?” Schauffele said. “I don’t really invite people over to my house. Am I just going to go look at it myself? That’s the way I feel about it. I don’t want to walk into a trophy room, like, Look how great I am. I was just raised to think that way, and it’s kind of stuck.”
Schauffele is so unconcerned with the trophies that he’s not even sure where they are, other than the original version of the claret jug, which he had to return this week. The best guess is that the keepsakes are somewhere in the vicinity of his childhood home in San Diego.
“Probably in a bank vault,” Schauffele said, “like one of the trophies was when they travel.”
Photo: Rob Casey – SNS Group
Schauffele was raised to think and play like an underdog, and that attitude hasn’t changed despite him rising to as high as No.2 in the world and now standing No.3 despite a challenging season that began with a cartilage tear near his ribs. The nine-time career winner, who finished T-8 in the Masters, T-28 in the PGA and T-12 in the US Open this year, seems to be gaining form. He shot a couple of 66s in the Scottish Open last week for a T-8.
The biggest challenge this week, he said, is re-learning the Royal Portrush layout on which he shot his best round of 65 on Friday in 2019 but closed with a sour 78, tying for 41st.
“I’m super-excited. I just remember last time I was here I really enjoyed playing this golf course,” Schauffele said. “I forgot how difficult it is and how penalising it can be. It’s been fun to get back on site, to get back on the holes. I think everything came back to me kind of quickly.”
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Playing skilled links golf came rather quickly to the Californian, who tied for second in only his second Open start in 2018, though it did take him until last year to get another top-10. Schauffele recalled his first introduction to links being at the Bandon Dunes Resort in Oregon, to which he drove with his dad and friends for 16 hours from San Diego, only to get howling wind and rain every day. It was so bad the rain gear failed.
And…
“I had a blast,” Schauffele said. “As much as it was nice to look forward to a hot shower at the end of the day, I had so much fun for some reason trying to figure out how to play golf in that weather. Even to this day, you look at guys who grew up in Canada or overseas in Europe, it will be windy and cold, and I always saw guys would shoot six or seven-under, and I’m, like, How are these people doing this?
“It was always a battle for me knowing, if I want to be a well-rounded player, I need to learn how to do it. Maybe I went in with that mentality, but I always thought it was a lot of fun.”
After his Open victory last year, Schauffele put himself in an elite group of players who have won at least two different majors. In that category he is the same as Scottie Scheffler, who is still seeking Open Championship and US Open wins. That they also carry themselves with similar, mostly stoic demeanours is probably not a coincidence.
“It feels that way,” Schauffele said. “When I hear him speak about his process… I feel pretty routine-oriented. He’s very routine, extremely routine. Very disciplined, his team, it’s like clockwork. I think all of us feel like we have our own system, and he very much sticks to it.
“His process is great, and I think he was talking about kind of going onto the next thing quickly. I just think that’s why he’s been No.1 and hasn’t even sniffed looking backwards. If he was sitting there looking at all his trophies every day, I’m sure he’d still be playing great golf, but I don’t think he’s that guy.”
About that picture in his gym, Schauffele was asked what he’d like to see instead. He drew laughter when he said his dogs, a clock or nothing. But there was an even better option for the man who has five top-10s at Augusta and is never satisfied.
“If anything,” Schauffele said, “put up like me in a Masters jacket, like that would piss me off, you know what I mean?”
