Bryson DeChambeau hit a wonderfully executed bunker shot to seal his U.S. Open victory at Pinehurst.
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After the drama and pleasure of the U.S. Open over the weekend, you may assume that Bryson DeChambeau would want to take just a few days to decompress. As an alternative, he’s busier than ever. After a whirlwind media tour in New York Metropolis, DeChambeau was again to his day job on Wednesday, getting ready for this week’s LIV Golf Nashville.
“I’ve been working on most likely a cumulative complete prior to now three days, like possibly 12 hours of sleep, possibly,” DeChambeau stated at his pre-tournament press convention. “You guys are the rationale why I preserve going. It’s been unbelievable.”
DeChambeau lined numerous floor in his interview, which included questions on how he balances content material creation with apply, his ideas about lacking out on the Olympics for a second time and what it’s prefer to be a job mannequin for younger gamers. However for followers hoping to glean one thing from the two-time main champion’s on-course technique at Pinehurst, he additionally went deep on his U.S. Open-winning bunker shot.
“As a lot as I’m a really mechanical, methodical particular person, there may be an artistry to me that not too many individuals know however I hope they’re beginning to see,” DeChambeau started. “And that 60-yard bunker shot, no matter it was, after I obtained up there, the one factor that gave me numerous consolation was G-Bo telling me, Bryson, I’ve seen you hit far more tough pictures than this. You’ve obtained this. I stepped in there and executed it.
“I needed a tap-in, but it surely obtained as much as 4 ft, and I used to be able to go nuts, and you would see me form of get after it with G-Bo saying, ‘let’s go.’ That was so huge. However I knew I had a four-footer to make. It wasn’t only a tap-in.”
As for what made the bunker shot so arduous? DeChambeau stated it was the precision required at affect.
“From a technicality standpoint, you possibly can’t miss it a millimeter behind the ball or a millimeter too near the ball,” he stated. “From 60 yards with an open face, it’s an explosion shot, and for those who catch it just a bit skinny, I’m hitting it into that clubhouse. There isn’t a room for error. Very, little or no room for error. For it to even go that far out of a bunker takes a reasonably darned good quantity of energy.
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“If I chunked it, too, it’s brief, hits the entrance edge and comes proper again down. Now I’m attempting to get up-and-down simply to get right into a playoff. The problem was by means of the roof, and it’s one thing that I by no means want anybody to have, to have that have. However in a U.S. Open, the hardest take a look at in golf, you get offered that, you’ve simply obtained to go full power into it and simply embrace it and say, look, that is what the sport of golf has given me, I’ve practiced this earlier than. You’ve simply obtained to execute it.
“However the problem degree was by means of the roof,” he continued. “I knew how exact I wanted to be. I keep in mind trying down on the bunker and seeing only a small sliver of shiny sand about an inch and a half behind the ball, and I used to be like, simply go proper by means of that space, and that’s all I considered. I knew how a lot power to provide it primarily based on how I used to be swinging it, and I hit it simply flawlessly. When it got here out, my eyes popped up, they widened, and I’m like, that’s good, and it landed good, and it ran out, and I’m like, ‘let’s go.’ That was huge. It offers me chills serious about that.
“The problem was by means of the roof. I can’t clarify, except someone experiences that for themselves, I can’t clarify how tough it really was.”
One other issue that DeChambeau stated benefited him at Pinehurst? Dialing in his wedge specs.
“I discovered what bounce works completely for me,” he stated. “I nearly haven’t any bounce on my wedge, but it surely has a wider sole, and that was a large factor for me. I actually constructed it, I believe, about lower than a month in the past, so my wedge sport has simply gotten actually good not too long ago due to that grind.”
DeChambeau will hope to proceed his main momentum in Nashville. He tees off alongside Carlos Ortiz and Jon Rahm at 12:15 p.m. on Friday.
