Jon Rahm, the undisputed star of the Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters being played this week at the Real Club de Sotogrande, has appeared before the media to talk at length about the tournament and other topics of interest.
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On the fact of being able to play before the Spanish public
‘These are special and fun weeks. They are weeks that, as a Spanish player and because of the emotion that I have personally with the event, maybe a little more, I wouldn't say hard, but they do drain me a little more, because I want to come, I want to play well, I want to do well in front of the Spanish public. Maybe they are tournament rounds that perhaps mentally make me a bit more tired because I want to control that desire to do well, because of that emotion’.
‘But they have also made me have very good tournaments and Sundays, as was that last Open de España that I won with a great Sunday of minus nine, in 2017 and 2018.’
‘Even this last Spanish Open, that great final we had, with the shame that I didn't win. But it was a lot of fun and very emotional for Angel, which was something very special. Let's see if I can come this week here and get the win.’
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On Andalusia and Sotogrande
Normally it gives us good weather. Now I do not know, today seems more Bilbao than southern Spain, but it looks good the rest of the week. But let's see, it's a very welcoming area where the hospitality is incredible, we've always been treated very well, it's always a lot of fun. A course with a lot of history, which is a great golf course. I haven't played it yet this week, and in a few hours I'm going to see it for the first time, but I have very good memories. I've never heard anyone say anything negative about the course, and that means it's very special.
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On how important it is to approach a tournament in the right conditions
‘Fuck, if the Spanish Open.... I think I told my parents, I told my friends when I arrived and how I felt on Wednesday. After being sick, being in hospital and not having touched a club for a week, with the hurricane on Thursday, I told someone: 80, I missed the cut and I'll have a good time at the weekend. And from there to almost winning the tournament was unbelievable. And to do well at Dunhill too, which I had a bit of a thorn in my side from when I played with my father, missing the cut and not playing well, that 2021 Open, to also do well on a course where I know I can play well, to be able to go and do well. Let's see if I can do well again this week and give myself that opportunity on Sunday.
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On Alaia, his daughter born a few weeks ago, and his wife
‘They are all doing very well. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but with the problems we had during the pregnancy, which was not easy at all, that everything went well during the birth, that she didn't have any problems and that she is recovering so quickly in three weeks, it's incredible. Alaia, great, a very healthy girl and doing what babies do, which is sleeping, eating and keeping her mother awake, because there is little I can do. And the other two, well, there they are. The week I have been at home, they had this week of holidays, so I have been more of a father than anything else, and it has been a week in which I have had a lot of fun at home. Mentally I feel like I've had a lot of rest and I'm really looking forward to this last tournament of the year in Spain’.
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On the good results obtained after the birth of her children
‘No, I don't know, otherwise it's not them. But Kelly did say, that's true, that I didn't think I was going to win a major until I became a father. I can't agree with you, but it's true, I came close to winning a US Open two months later. I think it's something she saw in my personality, she hasn't been able to explain it to me, but it's something that she felt was going to happen because she was so happy that I was going to take that step. And it was a coincidence that it happened with the two boys, let's see if it's the same with Alaia’.
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On his previous experiences at the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande (second in the Sotrogrande Cup 2012)
‘The truth is that with the memory I have, I don't remember the differences in the course from 2012 to 2017. The truth is that, in general, the course is very similar, but I can't make that distinction from when I played a tournament that I remember too well what happened, because I won't forget that Sunday. It's a course where if it's not windy it's more accessible. The wind is a little bit what is needed in this part of the country to make the golf as difficult as it can be. In theory it should be a very accessible course, apart from the fact that with the rain we've had, it will be soft and the greens will be receptive. So if we don't have wind and we don't have rain, I think you have to expect very low scores. But that wind is the defence, which you saw last year, it was very windy and the score was not low’.
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On his experience at the Olympics
‘It was a lot of fun. We went to the Olympic Village that Monday to get to know a little bit about the Olympics, I would say. From the house, that is, we were 20, 25 minutes away from the camp, to get to the Olympic Village, it was an hour and a half, almost two hours. It was hard to get around Paris in traffic that week. And then the parking. If you don't stay inside the village, it's a bit more complicated. But still, something very emotional, something very special. I still make some trips with some of the sweatpants or the swimming costume that they gave us for that week, because it was so much fun. And 54 on the 72 holes, unbelievable. The rest, obviously, a bit hard for me and for everyone, but it doesn't take away from what a beautiful experience it was to be able to represent Spain once again in an event of such magnitude and to have a chance of winning, which is something very special. I'm looking forward to seeing if I can do it again on the 28th, in Los Angeles, on a course of which I have very good memories.
But the truth is, to share the experience with a good friend of mine and to do well on a course with so much history, which is such a good golf course as is the national golf, for me was one of the best weeks of my golfing life. The truth is that if he had won he would have surely been in the top three, but without winning yet, he is in the top ten’.
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On the last day of the 2012 Sotogrande Cup, in which he finished second
‘What I don't remember is whether I started as leader or not, I was close. I was four or five under on the 12th tee, on the day. I was leading by four or five. And I don't remember exactly if I relaxed or got too nervous. I sent it to the left, made a double. Bogey on 13. Birdie on the 14th. Bogey on the 15th, three putts on the 17th, I think it was another bogey. On the 18th I still had a five-yard putt for birdie and to win, and I'll never forget it in my life because I left it short of the centre half a centimetre from the hole. And then I lost in the play-off to, I think, Robin Kind and Kristoffer Ventura on hole one. Well, it happens. I think I was 15 at the time, and those bad moments are sometimes necessary to learn and develop as a player. In the end, today it's a bad memory, quote-unquote.
Yes, what I don't remember is what was the next big tournament I played, because that was in 2012. I think it was already university, for me. I don't remember exactly, it's more than a decade ago, but yeah man, it was the first big tournament at European level that I had a chance to win and I didn't win... but from then on I think I've done pretty well’.
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On whether you remember the good or the bad laps in more detail
‘No, that day there was a bit of everything, in inverted commas. I remember I started with a birdie on one and two. I remember a putt on the 6th, I was four under in six holes, I remember that. And then I left it given on 11, that's what I remember. A bit of everything. I think the really bad ones, the ones that really cost you something, like that Sunday, you remember, because you feel it a bit more, and it's hard when you're playing and you see that it's getting a bit out of hand. And you have to learn that, to try to maintain a certain level of control. But also, obviously, there are some very good turns that I'm going to remember. In the end, there's a bit of everything. One way or another, they leave a certain imprint there mentally that you're going to remember. But it's something that when it comes to golf, I don't know why, I remember most of the shots, the clubs, the distances, the wind, the conditions of the day. I don't know why, but it's something I've always remembered, which has been very good for me in previous years’.
‘There have been several times when I've had a putt, several years in a row, seeing it get away one way or another, and then in the third year, I've put it in. It reminds me a bit of Phil Mickelson at Augusta, on the 12th hole. He tells you that in 2002 he had a putt and missed it just under, in 2003 he missed it just over, and in 2004 he put it in. In the end, I remember him telling me that story and there have been moments, maybe not of that magnitude, but I remember something similar. And it's amazing, you talk to someone like Phil or Tiger, they remember what they've done 35 years ago and they tell you exactly that. Not only about them, but also about who was in the group, who had done other things. They are aware of the situation and they remember, and I think that's why they have reached the level they have reached. They remember a lot of what they have done and they learn from the mistakes that have been made in the past’.
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On the vertigo of all that has happened in his first 30 years and the changes he has gone through
‘I, personally, I like to think that as a person I haven't changed. In the end, I think that every moment in life makes you learn, makes you mature. Every day you learn something new and you have new experiences, but my essence as a person, it's not that I've changed. So I don't feel any different from what I was in that summer of 2016. Obviously, a lot has changed, but I don't know, when you live it, that's part of it, that's what I wanted to achieve in a personal way and in a golfing way. So there comes a point where it's not like it's normal, but I've dreamt it so many times that it's like it's not the first time I've seen it. And there have also been moments in my life, there have been changes. I think that going from an ikastola in Euskadi, in Bilbao, to study in Madrid when I was 15 was a big change for me. Simply, the change of studying in Spanish was very difficult. Then from there to the United States. I think those two changes were bigger than anything that has happened to me as a professional so far.
‘So there have been certain stages in my life that I think have prepared me for something like that. And there comes a point where it's experiences. And while I'm playing in tournaments, it's like I don't know why it's hard for me to process it and think about it, but maybe in two weeks, when I'm a little bit more on holiday mentally or when it's my birthday, I think about it and what's happened the last eight, nine, ten years, not of everything that's changed. And the truth is that last week, in those moments with Alaia and the two of them playing, it is a little easier to think a little bit about everything that has happened. But I don't see it in a way that gives me that vertigo. I see it as something so positive, in every way, that I'm very happy.
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On his goal of majors
‘The intention is the same, but having got one, the goal is two. Having got two, the target is three. And if you get three, it's four. And keep on adding. So mentally that's what it is. With the idea that when I said 19, that's the target. I understand that when I was 17 I was a bit overbearing. Like when I was 14, I don't know if I said it to Garcia, and I said I wanted to be the best in the world. So the same story. But if you don't believe it, if I don't believe it, nobody will believe it. So, in the end, if I don't have that goal and that dream, I don't get to where I am. And I'm someone who, if I don't have a sufficiently big objective, I'm not going to make the maximum effort to reach it. So it's the same thing, that's what I meant by reaching or not reaching 19. But if I'm halfway there and I get to 9 or 10, it's an incredible race. Nowadays to get to 5 is very difficult, because only two players have done it in the last 30 years.
‘So if I get to four or five, let's surely say it's been a very good run. Good number now is three. If I get to three, four. I'm not going to tell you a number because I don't know. I hope I get to 19, but I don't know. In the end that's what I put in my mind and it will come or it won't. But for now, the number is three. But for the moment, the number is three and then we'll go on to the next one.
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