Two weeks ago, Jon Rahm was playing the golf of his life at the Memorial at Muirfield Village, equaling the tournament’s 54-hole record at 18-under-par and opening a six-stroke lead over the field, only to be informed on live television while coming off the 18th green that he would need to withdraw after testing positive for COVID-19.
The guidelines of the PGA Tour and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention require 10 days of self-isolation after a positive test, limiting Rahm’s ability to practice before the US Open.
Only because he was able to return two negative tests within 24 hours was he permitted to cut his quarantine short and arrive at Torrey Pines Golf Course for the season’s third major before Tuesday last week.
Photo: Michael Madrid, USA TODAY
It was the sort of wrinkle that once might have derailed the fiery 26-year-old Spaniard, whose temperament at times has obscured his formidable talent.
However, rather than pout or complain or point fingers, Rahm said that he relied on the “power of positive thinking “ to help him maintain the mindset that got him over the line for his first major title on Sunday.
Rahm also credited advice he received from Padraig Harrington, a three-time major winner, and Nick Faldo, a six-time major winner, for helping him through the ordeal.
“Padraig told me a story in which he was leading by five after 54 holes, signed the wrong scorecard and got disqualified,” Rahm said. “He said he got a lot more from that instance — he learned a lot more than he would ever learn from the win.”
“Nick Faldo texted me the next morning and told me a story of how he was winning a tournament,” Rahm added. “He was leading by six with six holes to go and got disqualified, as well, and how he learned from that and got a win the week after.”
“I had in mind Padraig and Nick when I was out there on the golf course a couple times, knowing that they won shortly after and I knew today was my day,” he told reporters on Sunday.
Rahm started Sunday’s final round as one of 13 players within four shots of the lead. As one contender after another fell out of contention, Rahm played steady, effective golf up and down the 7,685-yard South Course, until moving to strike in the final reel.
Trailing Louis Oosthuizen by one shot, Rahm curled in a left-to-right downhill putt from 25 feet on the 17th hole for birdie. Then he got up-and-down from a greenside bunker on the par-five 18th hole, sinking an 18-foot birdie putt for a one-shot lead on the same green where he made a 60-footer for eagle to win his first PGA Tour title four years ago.
An agonizing wait followed as Rahm decamped to the practice range to stay warm for a potential two-hole playoff, but when Oosthuizen bogeyed the 17th hole after sending a tee shot into the canyon to fall two shots adrift, then failed to wedge in for eagle from 69 yards on the 18th fairway, Rahm could finally celebrate with his wife, Kelley, and their three-month-old son, Kepa.
“I believe from the biggest setbacks we can get some of the biggest breakthroughs, and that’s why I stay so positive,” Rahm said. “That’s why I kept telling Kelley — when she was devastated about what happened, and my family and everybody around me — something good is going to come. I don’t know what, but something good is going to come, and I felt it today out there on the golf course.”
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