Twelve months ago, Xander Schauffle arrived at Scottish Open Gensis as one of the two best players in the world. He was the PGA defense champion and it was a week away from the Open 2024 Open Championship. Scottie Scheffler was no. 1 world, but if he looked at his back mirror, Schauffle was much closer than it appeared.
SOMETHING are different now for Schauffle. His 2025 season left a rib injury early. He fell into some bad shaking habits and has spent the last few months trying to be THAT Xander Schauffle again.
“I would say that faith is good,” Schauffle said on Tuesday Renaissance. “I don’t think I’ve given myself a lot of reasons to believe I’m playing well. It’s been a very bad year, to be completely honest.”
“Maybe minimized (damage) in my mind,” Schauffle said later. “Yes, you will be fine, you have played great golf. You just got out of the best year of your career. And I’ve currently supported it with the worst year of my career. It’s been a hot. As I said, I’m trying to do the best I can.”
That year it began with a T30 in the season’s sentine before damage to the ribs to avoid it until early March. Schauffle fought after his return. He encountered the cut at Arnold Palmer Invitational and fired a Sunday 81 in the player championship. That week in TPC Sawgrass, Schauffle Spent a lot of time in the range With his coach, Chris Como, trying to return to the pace that brought him two main titles in 2024. The combination of the new swing he won in 2024 and his first injury led to some issues he has never addressed before.
“I would say bad habits,” Schauffle said. “It was still new – the way I was moving the club last year was still new, and the bad place I got the club for this year was new. So I played a lot – or I hit many bad shots from a particular place but was home to me. I was playing from it, calling it short and I have been resting and closing. I know it.
Xander Schauffle on the unique quality of golf links
Schauffle seemed to be up after players. it completed T12 in Valsspar and t8 to masters. But he has not recorded a Top-10 conclusion as, with his best result being a T11 in the Truist Championship. By Golf Golf Golf Golf Won metricSchauffle ranks 28th in the stroke obtained: Total (1.01). It ranks 78th from tee (0.17), eighth in access (0.77) and 106 in placement. By comparison, last season, Schauffle was ranked respectively, fifth, second and fifth in those categories. The research quarrel has angered it.
“Trying to get into a kind of quarrel to try and feel something again, besides boredom,” Schauffle said of his goals for this two-week stench in the UK “I think I was angry.
This work begins between the ears, where Schauffle admits that he has had moments when his stay collapsed, but the return of return has taught him how important it is to be in the right mental place. When this happens, the game normally goes on.
“I’m very upset with the way I played. I’ve just really got this thought that I looked at how I would behave when things are going really well,” Schauffe said. “You know, there is no need to be a bipolar. Just do it as original as possible. If I’m shooting 80, I really don’t want anyone to look at me in the course and be like, that child shooting 80. I don’t care if boys become crazy or sad or destroyed or whatever is just one thing, I know that I am just a way, my mind in a particular place.
The double sample search is one of the excellent golf paradoxes: Sometimes, the best oscillation thinking reaches when your brain is turned off. Schauffle is not necessarily asking for his brain as much as he would distract him with something else. Like conditions and strong curves and heavy wind across the Atlantic Ocean can direct your attention away from technique, more towards the fundamental.
“I wish I could have come here and play at the beginning of the year, to be honest, only from a mental perspective,” Schauffle said. “Something to play here calms me a little. I definitely try to play less golf shakes.
“I was just thinking about how to come here, as I was just getting out of nine holes, just being a little more creative, getting into that other side of your brain. I was really beating myself for a long time to try and take myself to play like I did last year, things of that nature, which is not really that you have to do it. that I have played better. ”
Twelve months ago, Schauffle left Royal Troon with Claret South and felt like, if it were not on the same plane as Scheffler, he was at least really close. Climbing that mountain feels much steep now, but Schauffle is not looking to make it in a fallen.
“The little victories are where I’m fighting,” he said. “If I can play 72 holes without loving with my golf swing this week, that would be a massive victory, and wherever I finish, I would end. That would be a good place for me to go before I play next week.”
Many many have changed in one year for Xander Schauffle. He reaches Scotland again, knowing that his old form is still there, but he faces an unnoticed question: How do you find freedom when blocked in a comprehensive search for something that is difficult to find?
“What would make me really happy is that I can just play freely,” Schauffle said. “I think the obstacles of trying to play really good golf and then play bad golf and then just getting rubbing all day are really what pushes me nuts. That’s why we love the game, but it’s what they are crazy.
;)
Seduce
Golfit.com editor
Josh Schrock is a writer and reporter for Golf.com. Before entering Golf, Josh was the interior of Chicago Bears for the NBC Sports Chicago. He previously covered 49ers and Warriors for NBC Sports Bay Area. A native Oregonian and Uo alum, seduces and spends his free time walking with his wife and dog, thinking about how the ducks will break his heart again, and trying to become half a professor into pieces. A true romantic for golf, Josh will never stop trying to break 90 and will never lose the confidence that Rory Mcilroy’s main drought will end (updated: he did it). Josh Schrock can be reached in Josho.schrock@golf.com.