NAPA, Calif. — Wyndham Clark said he loves wine and all the delicious food that this region of Northern California is famous for, and he also fancies Silverado Resort’s North Course, home of this week’s Procore Championship. But during his pre-tournament press conference ahead of this week’s tournament, Clark made it clear he’s competing in the first event of the FedEx Cup Fall for one specific reason.
“I think the last time I screwed up,” he said of his debut in international team competition last fall in Rome. “I took too much time off and wasn’t quite prepared for the Ryder Cup, and this year I wanted to make sure I don’t do that. There’s no preparation better than playing against the best players. I think this is the best prep you can have.”
Clark elaborated on the mistake he and several of his teammates made. Last year, without the Olympics on the schedule, the Tour Championship ended Aug. 27, more than a month before the Ryder Cup began on Sept. 29. Clark elected to skip the Tour’s Napa stop last year.
“Last year it was realistically four weeks (off),” said Clark. “And then by the time you pegged it up to play, it was the fifth week, so it’s five weeks. I mean, I would never prepare for a big event where I had five weeks off between one tournament to the next.”
Clark said he turned up rusty to Marco Simone and didn’t feel sharp when he played his first match on Friday afternoon, a Four-Ball match with partner Max Homa against Robert MacIntyre and Justin Rose of Team Europe.
“Through four holes I said (to Homa), ‘Man, I’m sorry,’” Clark said, “because I kind of was not playing good the first four holes. I said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m not tournament sharp right now, I’ll get into it.’ Then eventually I started getting more comfortable.”
The Euros rallied to win the last two holes to tie that match. Clark claimed he wasn’t the only one with rust on their game.
“I felt like a lot of us weren’t prepared,” he said. “If it’s something that I do myself or hopefully Team USA kind of makes it mandatory that everyone does it, I think we should all play before. I know we have such a grueling schedule and we all just played the Tour Championship, but if we can just do – it’s just one more week to play and to keep us sharp so that we can win, I think it’s worth it.”
Clark, winner of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am in February and No. 6 in the world, also learned another lesson. Last year, he tinkered with his set of clubs, which he hadn’t used in competition before.
“That was really stupid of me,” he said. “Same irons and everything but I adjusted some lie angles and lofts, and I won’t be doing that again this year.”
Clark also told one humorous story of how a fan managed to get under his skin during his first match in the Ryder Cup.
“While I’m reading a putt, a guy goes, ‘Wyndham, you haven’t made had a putt since the U.S. Open.’ At the time I hadn’t played good golf leading up into it, then played good at the Tour Championship. I was kind of pissed off,” Clark recalled. “And then I made that putt and I kind of like stared down in the crowd or something. And Max was like, ‘What are you doing?’ I was like, ‘Well, that guy said I haven’t made a putt since the U.S. Open.’ He goes, ‘Well, you just made one there.’
“Then I make one on the next hole and I turn and kiss the putter at the guy and Max is just laughing. We laughed about it for like two holes. What’s great is we were in such a good mindset that we just kept making birdies and kept the momentum going. It was a funny thing there. There were some more words said, I can’t repeat what was said, but it was just a very funny moment so it’s something we’ll both remember forever.”
