The most interesting result of the first week of the new PGA Tour season came from a golfer not in contention: Vijay Singh’s tie for 40th at the Sony Open in Honolulu – at the age of 62. He didn’t have enough of a putting game to crack the top 10 last week and probably doesn’t have enough of a putting game to compete in any PGA Tour event, not right now. That doesn’t stop him from trying. The opposite.
Singh is the personification of will. He is a testament to the benefits of ruthless dedication to craft. More than any other golfer this side of Ben Hogan and perhaps Ben Hogan, Singh turned practice sessions into public displays of meditation and mindfulness. Not that Singh would ever use such words. If Singh had to choose between ‘manifestation’ and ‘being the ball’, he chooses btb.
But what Singh has really done all these years is hit so many balls that he has been able to play with something that approximates him.fewerheid. That is, reducing your swing thoughts from a manageable number (one) to the grail of all grails (nothing). A swing without thoughts, without language, nothing other than that of the swing whoosh. Dustin Johnson, at the height of his powers in 2018, was once asked what he thinks about during the swing, what his mind does. He said, “That’s a good question because I have no idea. Hopefully it doesn’t really do anything. When I really press it, I don’t really think about anything.” For Singh, practice sessions are a time to make the swing more instinctive, more like walking, breathing, being.
If you’ve been to Tour and senior events over the years, you may have seen Singh’s ex-wife, his ex-girlfriend, his son and several players watching parts of his marathon sessions from one hour to two to three. (His caddies, and there are many of them, have always been required to witness the whole thing.) Singh has a year-round patch of grass on which he claims squatter’s rights, on the back side of the TPC Sawgrass area, not far from his home in South Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. He once almost got hit when another player (his friend Rocco Mediate) infringed. Singh’s self-righteousness can be astonishing. It’s also his superpower. It should also be noted that, on occasion and over the years, Singh has befriended players who had almost no chance of keeping their Tour cards, but who were almost his equal in dedication. He practiced alongside such players and played practice rounds with them.
No non-American player has won more on the PGA Tour than Singh, who has 34 Tour victories. Rory McIlroy has 29. Gary Player has 24. He grew up in a working-class family in Fiji. As a young pro, he struggled in every way possible. He was banned by the Asian Tour in 1985 over allegations of cheating. Singh has always denied the allegations, but it appears that it has affected the rest of his professional life. He avoids talking to reporters when he can, is often curt or grumpy, and knowing his history, his marathon sessions seemed like something of a golf offering. They seem committed, serious, important. It’s not like he’s just filling time. At the age of 23, Singh worked as a club professional and bouncer. At the age of 43, he was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame. No other Hall of Famers played in Hawaii last week.
He earned $31,522 there, bringing his lifetime Tour earnings to $71,312,738, placing him eighth on the list. all-time PGA Tour career money list. Considering that Singh hasn’t played full-time on Tour in more than a decade and that he was 30 when he played his rookie season, that’s not surprising. Yes, he caught all the years of Tiger money flowing through the game, but not a cent of the LIV-inspired funny money. Maybe there’s another one in his future. It is not clear how many Tour events he will play this year. An educated guess is a bunch. What makes him feel more alive than trying to beat a collection of the best players in the world? Singh is a golfer, period.
He could easily pass the player currently ahead of him on the career money list, Jim Furyk, before the year is out, as Singh uses a one-time exemption as a top 50 career money winner to play regularly this year. That exemption ensures that Singh does not participate in the small-scale events and invitations, but he does participate in almost everything else. In theory, he could play his way to the Arnold Palmer Invitational and Players Championship and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Those events are played on courses where he could place in the top 10. He often played well at Bay Hill and won there once.
This 62-year-old returns to the PGA Tour. Here is the rule that made this possible
By means of:
Alan Bastable
Singh is already competing in this year’s Masters, thanks to his victory there in 2000. Yes, there were tournaments in 2000 that were won by players other than Tiger Woods. There were a few players who posed a serious threat to Peak Woods, most notably Ernie Els and Phil Mickelson. There was no player better equipped to handle the heat brought on by Woods than Singh.
Over a ten-year period from early 2000 to late 2009, the No. 1 player alternated back and forth between Woods and Singh. Forest, Singh; Forest, Singh; Forest, Singh; Forest, Singh; Bunch. Woods’ reign lasted much longer, but these are the only two names to top the official World Golf Ranking list for that decade. When Singh won at Bay Hill in 2007, Woods made a front-nine Sunday attack. “I wasn’t too worried,” Singh said triumphantly. Woods disappeared that Sunday.
To anyone who thinks a 62-year-old Hall of Famer shouldn’t take a spot on the PGA Tour that could go to a much younger and much needier player, I say this: He’ll be 63 before the Tour reaches Florida. He has absolutely earned the right to play the Tour. He doesn’t take anyone’s place. He is claiming a place that is his, that he has earned. The Tour has a rule that allows him to play, and he takes advantage of that.
In 2005, Tom Kite, at age 55, took advantage of the same rule with the intention of playing a full season. He played in 12 events and made only three cuts. Amazingly, in one of those events, which involved the old Kemper Open being played at the Congressional outside Washington DC, Kite was tied for three rounds before having a dismal Sunday. Kite was trying to do what Singh is trying to do, what countless people around the world are trying to do: slow down time. Singh will have the firepower to achieve more than Kite did over two decades ago. Is it an indictment on the senior tour that Singh is doing what he is doing? Of course it is. Singh knows that the best chance he has to improve the quality of his game is to play against the best players in the world.
When Padraig Harrington won the 2022 US Senior Open, he won by a shot over Steve Stricker. Harrington’s four-day total was 274, 10 under par. When it was over, I asked Harrington what the score would have been if the field had consisted of the best players in the world and not the best senior players in the world. “It would have been lower, but I would have shot lower,” he said. It was such a telling answer.
It is difficult for reporters to implicate Singh. When I first met him I was a caddy and for the last 35 years he has sometimes semi-tolerated me because he thinks of me more as a caddy than a reporter, but I’m not kidding myself here. In the fall of 2024, I found myself at a senior pro-am party at the Pebble Beach driving range, with Singh in attendance. I’ve typed this piece before, but now seems like a good place to take it out for some fresh air.
“Vijay, can I ask you one swinging question?” I asked.
“Not now,” he said in his usual dismissive manner.
Not now is his reflexive response to every question.
“Vijay, if not now, then when?”
He nodded half in agreement.
I mentioned an evening session on the range I had seen at Carnoustie two months earlier, at the British Senior Open. He was there for two hours, if not longer. I asked him what he was working on. He drove driver after driver after driver. He replied immediately.
“My transition,” he said.
Of course, I have no way of knowing whether he was actually referring to that specific session, or, more likely, to any session at all. (I’m sure he was trying to get rid of me too.) An answer anyway: transition. A one-word drive-range swing idea. If you don’t complete the backswing, you can’t make a downswing.
I guess the trick in Vijay’s golfing life is to get off the range, where you hit him right in the face with the benefit of a single swing thought, and then actually start playing golf, playing golf on a golf course, and not think about anything at all. Playing golf with the frantic joy of an empty mind, but also with total purpose, total dedication. Maybe it can’t be done, but a man can go to his maker and try.
Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@golf.com.
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