Kiwi golf legend Ryan Fox joined The Morning Rumble fresh off his first-ever PGA Tour win yesterday, where he sealed victory with an unreal chip-in birdie during a tense playoff against Harry Higgs and Mackenzie Hughes.
The Morning Rumble’s Bryce asked Foxy what was going through his head during the playoff after he hit his drive into the woods, to which he replied, “I thought I got shafted, to be honest.”
He continued, “I actually felt like I had a really good tee shot. Ya know, it's a tough tee shot, especially - I attempted a fade and I probably only missed my line by about five yards.
“I thought, you know, if it squeaks past the edge of the tree, it's probably going to be in the left side of the fairway or maybe just in the left rough. And I'm only gonna have a gap wedge in.”
Fox says at that point, he was thinking “oh, here we go again in the playoffs. My luck’s not working for me again.”
“And Mackenzie Hughes hits it further left than me, hits a tree and bounces out into the middle of the fairway. And I'm like, yeah, this is definitely not me.”
Despite the odds, he managed to carve out a shot from under the trees, landing it on the back of the green.
“And then the golf gods kind of turned in my favour,” he said. “I haven’t had a lot of luck in playoffs until then, but I’d happily not change what’s happened before for what I got yesterday.”
With a wedge in hand and a bit of rough behind the ball, Fox executed a near-perfect chip shot. “It landed exactly where I wanted it to… and about ten foot out I thought, it’s going nowhere else.”
The ball dropped, Fox says he let out a more polished reaction than at Wentworth, and the win was his - no putter required.
Mel then posed the important question, “how many shots of Sambuca were consumed last night?”
“There were none, actually. I was good in that regard,” says Fox.
After drinking some sav at the clubhouse, Fox and his family headed back to their apartment early to put the kids to bed and have a more humble celebration.
“My caddie, who came for a drink, he took us to the supermarket and we bought two bottles of wine, a $5 frozen pizza, and two Snickers bars,” he said. “It was a great celebration.”
The win comes just days after our very own Bryce Casey hit a hole-in-one at Titirangi Golf Course. How good.
Ryan Fox - the people’s champ.
