Golf doesn't have to be that complicated. Viktor Hovland only makes it sound that way.
Hovland was confounding as ever at the Valspar Championship. His confidence was so low that he arrived at Innisbrook uncertain if he was even going to play, and then five days later he delivered two clutch swings during the toughest stretch on the Copperhead course to rally for a one-shot victory he never saw coming.
Only the trophy was satisfying.
“Yeah, it's still not great,” he said when asked if he was happy with his swing.
Hovland rarely is. And that's why the 27-year-old Norwegian star could say without sounding offensive how proud he was to win on such a tough golf course “with not my best stuff.”
There is constant searching, not just to win but to hit shots the way he expects. Hovland has questions and he wants answers, and he won't stop looking until he finds them.
He is not wired like Dustin Johnson, who made a career-defining decision to go from hitting a draw to hitting a fade. After winning the U.S. Open and a World Golf Championship in consecutive starts in 2016, Johnson was asked how he went about making such a big change.
“Well, I was just struggling with the draw to get it in the fairway,” he replied. “So I said, ‘I’m going to hit a fade.' And I started hitting a fade.”
Simple, right?
Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy have had the same swing coach since they were about 8. Hovland has made 11 coaching changes since leaving Oklahoma State in 2019, some of them brought back on more than one occasion.
What hasn't changed is his mission — to hit pure shots — no matter how many detours.
Hovland reached what looked like the summit in August 2023 when he had a 65-61 weekend at Olympia Fields to win the BMW Championship, and then a 66-63 weekend at East Lake to win the Tour Championship and capture the FedEx Cup. He went 3-1-1 at the Ryder Cup, including partnering with Ludvig Aberg for a 9-and-7 win over Scheffler and Brooks Koepka.
He returned from a winter's break in Norway and felt lost again.
It was at Bay Hill a year ago when Hovland was asked the difference between winning without his best stuff or hitting it great and finishing fifth.
“I guess that’s kind of the insane part of my brain is that I just enjoy flushing a golf shot,” he said. “Obviously, we’re out here to compete and win tournaments. But I really just cherish being able to hit the shots exactly the way I want to. I think it’s a better predictor of how you’re going to play in the future.”
Therein lies the secret. He can win without his best stuff because he's very good. What he lacks is consistently strong finishes. He has never gone more than five straight tournaments in the top 10, which pales compared with the elite in the game.
But he can contend out of nowhere, such as his third place in the PGA Championship last year at Valhalla when he wondered why he even bothered showing up. That wasn't a threat, more a state of his mind. He also was runner-up at a FedEx Cup playoff event last year.
He doesn't doubt his ability, only what he has referred to as the “machinery.”
Perfection in golf is something to chase, not attain. That's why Hovland was amused at the label of being a perfectionist.
“I guess you can use that word to describe it,” he said. "I just view it as if you put your heart and soul into doing something, you might as well do it right. I’ve swung the club extremely well and I think my ball striking has been really, really good over a long period of time. And then when it’s not doing that, I’m going to work on that, I’m going to figure it out.
“I find it kind of weird that we’re professional athletes and the people that are wanting to improve are somewhat looked at as, ‘Oh he’s a perfectionist, he’s out on the perimeter searching too much.’ That's what we do. We are here to get better and we are here to win tournaments."
That's worked out just fine for Bryson DeChambeau, renowned for going down rabbit holes and leaving enough bread crumbs to find his way out if needed.
Hovland won with intelligent course management and good fortune. He could feel the club being out of position at the top, forcing him to try to save it on the way down. The timing worked in his favor at Innisbrook, particularly that 7-iron to 5 feet on the 16th hole Sunday.
And so the trophy from the Valspar Championship is in hand — his 11th worldwide — and the search continues. He is back with Grant Waite (for the second time), and the immediate goal is to be ready for the Masters. He’s not sure the swing he had at Innisbrook will work at Augusta National.
The chase continues, with no apologies.
“When you're struggling with something, it's just problems,” he said. “And problems are usually a lack of information. I would encourage people to go out and seek more information and try it out for yourselves. See if it helps your problems. And if it doesn't, then you've got to seek more answers. And you keep going and keep going.”
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On The Fringe analyzes the biggest topics in golf during the season. AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
