Photograph by Thierry Des Fontaines may 2019 | golfdigest.com 49
“You have to be kind of delusionalto pursue pro golf.”H
eading south for your fourth season of PGA Tour
Latinoamérica isn’t a good feeling. There are worse things
than waking up and playing golf, obviously, but it means
being away from home and not making money. Few vocations have
that combo. A lot of new pros stay in the United States all summer and
wait for Web.com qualifying—what everybody now calls Q school—in
the fall. There’s no hope of profit on the Lat Am. It’s just a season points
race for the top spot to get full Web.com status, with some guaranteed
starts for the next guys. You’re competing for the chance to have a job.my parents didn’t play
golf. But with all the warm
weather and public courses, it
was a natural thing to try. As
soccer and tennis fell away,
I got serious. That summer I
brought my clubs to France. It
was the last one we spent there.
The treeline across my grand-
parents’ field I lasered at 200
yards, enough for long irons.
● ● ●
i won the san francisco
city amateur when i was 16.
Beating all the men, that felt
like a big deal. Until then there’d
been the really good kids—the
kids qualifying and going far in
USGA events, the next Tigers—
and I hadn’t been one of them.
● ● ●
even when i was at the
university of southern
california, i was in the
background. I wasn’t ranked
very high, and I didn’t play the
national summer schedule of
amateur events. We played so
much during the school year,
I wasn’t up for extra travel.
My senior year I had an elbow
injury and took the season off.
I turned pro after graduation
because I had it in mind I’d try.
I had the raw tools—I hit it farand had soft touch—but I’d nev-
er showed sustained stretches
of brilliance. Just flashes.
● ● ●
i was clueless. All I knew
about PGA Tour Latinoamérica,
I’d found on the Internet. The
tournaments are run well, and
going down there was excit-
ing—at first. After a few seasons
of only marginal progress, I
weighed applying for random
tech jobs near my hometown.
● ● ●
you can’t say it was di-
rectly responsible, but
the week before the el
bosque qualifier, i made
an equipment change.
I got on a launch monitor that
measured my lie angle at im-
pact and discovered, theoreti-
cally, that my irons should be
way upright. Like 5 degrees. I’m
fairly tall [6-1] with long arms,
and I stand close to the ball.
One clubfitter refused on ideo-
logical grounds, and another
on technical—the hosels would
break, he said. They made
noises, but they didn’t break.
● ● ●
i started hitting more
shots on line. Instead of
good strikes finishing 10 or 20
feet, they were on the stick at
the El Bosque. I shot six under
and survived a three-for-one
playoff. I actually felt sick in the
playoff because I’d laid up onthe last hole, a par 5, thinking
six under was plenty.
● ● ●
then in a huge surprise,
i win the web event.
Boom! No more Lat Am tour
for me. I miss nine of my next
13 cuts on the Web.com Tour,
but then win again in Missouri
in July. I finish fourth in the
season standings to earn my
2018-’19 PGA Tour card.
● ● ●
after making only three
cuts in eight events, i win
the pga tour’s puerto
rico open in february.
My life changes again. Instead of
worrying about keeping my card
and playing every chance I get,
I can start to make my schedule.
● ● ●
the other day i was hit-
ting balls next to justin
rose. It’s surreal being around
the guys I grew up watching on
TV. But I had a warped concept
of how tour life would be. I
imagined the PGA Tour would
be this huge party with amazing
restaurants, and everyone is a
mini-celebrity. But the stress is
more than I anticipated. Having
so much riding on your play can
be a burden. Instead of getting
upset at a shot, you’re getting
upset at yourself. My therapist
is also a sport psychologist, and
he’s helping me shine a light
on underlying stuff that could
be coming up on the course. As
for the great champions, when
you play with them you realize
they’re not perfect either. It’s
possible to beat them.
● ● ●
it’s funny. once i turned
pro, i lost touch with golf
media and culture. My life
was too saturated with the game
to read about it or watch on TV.
But now I flick on the Golf Chan-
nel, and they’re talking about
the tournament I’m playing in.
It’s bizarre. How can I not watch?
—with max adlerMartin Trainer
I changed my life in one week
martin trainer
Rookie, PGA Tour winner
age 28
lives San Franciscoit felt like groundhog
year. On my way to the Lat Am
in March 2018, I almost didn’t
bother stopping at the qualifier
for the El Bosque Mexico Cham-
pionship, a Web.com event. The
only way you’d ever know about
this qualifier is if someone told
you. As a rookie, it’s not obvi-
ous where to play and when. By
this point I’d picked up enough
Spanish to navigate the Mexican
PGA website and sign up. Best-
case scenario, I figured, was I’d
get into a Web event, play well
enough to pocket five grand,
then continue on to the opening
event of PGA Tour Latinoaméri-
ca. I was not feeling optimistic
about my game or life.
● ● ●
you have to be kind of delu-
sional to pursue pro golf.
When you’re young, you don’t
understand how hard it is to
make it. You practice and prac-
tice with the thought you’ll
keep improving and eventu-
ally, maybe be good enough.
That’s how I remember think-
ing when I was 14, swatting
balls in a field at my grand-
parents’ house in Marseilles,
France. They lived in a con-
verted barn, and our extended
family would congregate
there in summer. I was born
in France and lived there until
I was 5, but then we moved to
Palo Alto, Calif.