THE MODERATOR: We'd like to welcome Max Homa here to the RBC Heritage. What are your takes on the course and how do you think it meshes with your game?
MAX HOMA: Yeah, this golf course, I think, is pretty highly revered by everybody. It's such a funny change from last week. We heard a lot about the redoes and things that changed -- I guess not redo, but renovations, and it's one of the rare nothing has gotten worse, which is awesome. They didn't change too much, which is even better, because everybody loves this place.
Should fit my game really well. Unfortunately I haven't played too well here, so hopefully this is the year.
Q. T9 last week at Augusta, first top 10 of the year. Do you feel like your game is starting to catch on?
MAX HOMA: Yeah, even the two weeks I missed the cut prior to leading up to it, I would have laughed if anybody said I would have missed those cuts, and then I was the one being laughed at right after that.
Game has been feeling really good for the last couple months, little minor tweaks here and there, but for the most part it's been doing the same stuff. It was nice last week to finally see a result from kind of the good prep work, so that was cool.
Q. You spent a lot of last year working on your game, and I guess been concerned about turning it around. It seems to me that you did that. What do you think were the biggest keys to getting back to be being in the Masters and tying for ninth in the Masters?
MAX HOMA: I think in pretty much anything, it's just easy to quit when it gets hard. So last year and a lot of the year prior, it was very hard. But I've always promised myself I'll quit this game at some point but I'm not going to quit when it's too hard for me to deal with.
There were some tough days or whatever, but I've done it before. I haven't had a very linear career, unfortunately, but I know I'm going to work my way through it, so just have to be patient. Doesn't mean I won't get frustrated. But just keep showing up. I think there's a massive skill in showing up and doing the work that gets taken for granted.
I just kept showing up, kept going to the golf course, kept working on it, and it obviously took quite a long time, and it's hard to bring certain little changes from home to an event, but I can see more of what I -- I see more promise than just people would with the score.
Right around May of last year I knew that I had gotten through the really bad part, that it was probably going to take a minute to find a week where it started to move forward.
But pretty much all last fall I played really nicely and have kind of kept it going this year. I haven't had high results, but the game has been quite good.
Q. Have you been working with anyone, any coaches, or is this just all you and golf balls and golf clubs and the great outdoors every day?
MAX HOMA: Yeah, Mark Blackburn. I went back to him in, I think, October, and we obviously put a lot of work in in the off-season, and he's just been amazing. We communicate so well. He seems very in tune with what makes me tick and what makes me -- I guess just our communication is just good.
It was nice to get a result last week kind of for him because he's done a lot better job than I've shown in the last couple months. So that's been fun to kind of get the band back together.
Q. How has the turnaround from the Masters been, and when do you feel like players kick it into gear here?
MAX HOMA: It's definitely interesting how tired I am. Now, granted, I do have two children, and one of them chose not to sleep last night, so it's taking me longer to get back into, I guess, a fiery mode.
But I'll never forget here two years ago, I got third at the Masters and I came straight down here, and I was obviously tired, but wasn't crazy. I remember I was just thinking to myself, do I go to the gym today after I hit balls? I wasn't like 100 percent certain. Then I remember I watched Scottie Scheffler walk by with his gym back going straight to the gym, so I said, I guess I'm going to the gym today.
I think when you look at excellence, when a week ends, a new one just begins and you pick right back up. Still, again, a little different now I've got both my kids here. It's a little more chaotic.
But I would say by tomorrow I'm sure my energy will be back and I'll be ready to compete, but that doesn't mean that -- the last few days we got a lot of good work in the best we could. But it is crazy how majors just feel like two weeks on you. Augusta is one of the few physical tests we have in golf. It's quite a bear to walk and prep for.
But that mental toll it takes on you is pretty draining, and it just goes to show how incredible someone like Scottie is that he wins so often and he's in contention so often, yet he does it again the next week. So it is something to truly look up to.
Q. For the past few years you've had really good success at the Masters and then coming here. Are there things this year that you specifically have learned or are looking to adjust considering you haven't necessarily cracked the top 25 at this event?
MAX HOMA: Not necessarily, no. Two years ago I would have wanted to call it a flash in the pan when I got third, but it was a little bit overwhelming. It's not that you don't expect it, but that was the first time I've ever been in contention at a major and really feel like I could have won that golf tournament.
It felt like a bit of a whirlwind getting down here. Last year was a straight-up flash in the pan. I hit it horrendous at Augusta, and I had a pretty good feeling I was going to hit it horrendous here. Last week was quite helpful if you're not driving it amazing if you can do the rest of the things nicely, because you don't -- you can play the course from a lot of different places. So I had kind of a bad feeling coming here last year.
This year was much different. Again, I've been playing really well, and I really loved how I played last week. I won't make an adjustment, I just plan to hit it a little straighter than I did the last couple tries here.
Again, I like the course. It should fit me really well. I'd love to go show that this week. But yeah, three completely kind of different scenarios going on.
Q. In the past when the game has gone a little south, have you felt it coming before it happens, or do you go on a bad streak and afterwards go, man, I lost it again? I guess the reverse, now that you're getting it back, do you feel that coming, or do you need to have the results first before you realize you got it back?
MAX HOMA: Yeah, I think to the first part of that question, I think we're all kind of a little scared we're losing it, so I think you are more aware of that one when it's coming, but I don't think you ever think it's just going to fall off a cliff. It does feel like a slow bleed when you lose it.
As far as coming back, like I said earlier, the fall I knew it was good. I knew by May last year I was going to figure something out. I didn't know if I'm going to win again. I mean, who knows.
But I knew it wouldn't be just this -- from January through April I was hitting the ball so bad that it was -- there was no light, and then come May, I felt like I got through the hardest patch.
But the hard part is tying yourself so much to an outcome and a result. This whole season I've hit it really well, especially in practice rounds. I've had a few practice rounds that were just awesome and so much fun, and at home it's been really good. So it's hard not to get caught up in making cuts, missing cuts, 10ths, 20ths, 30ths, whatever. It's frustrating, but it's the good kind of frustrating.
It's hey, if I clean up -- early in the year I had quite a few three-putts and some wasted shots around the greens, and one bad swing here and there, things that I feel like when I was playing my best golf I did a lot of, too.
You would look back and just think, it was a couple momentum putts here and there. That's what it's felt like this season. I always can kind of notice, I think everybody out here can notice when it's close.
Again, it goes back to people like Scottie and Rory and all the guys who are always up there that even on the weeks that I'm sure it gets a little sideways, they still manage to put up a really good result. That's not something I've been great at but been closer to doing lately. That's kind of what I think you aspire to do. You're not going to play four amazing rounds of golf, so it's like, how can you control that. But as far as the big stuff, it's pretty clear at home that I know that it's good.
Q. What was the turning point for you this time?
MAX HOMA: Right around -- right when I went back to work with Mark. I had been playing okay before that. I had just gotten -- the swing path had gotten very outside and I've always liked to play a cut better, but I had gotten very, just fully cut biased, so we got a bit more neutral and spent a lot of time over the off-season kind of workshopping things.
By the time January rolled around felt good. Hit it really, really well in Palm Springs and putted awful, so that was a really good sign because I had a decent finish for making nothing.
Then we changed my grip to a bit stronger around Waste Management and it was just a phenomenal two and a half days of prep, like was so excited.
Then I got out there on the 11th hole, my second of the day, and there's trouble left, and I think that was the day my grip started to get a little weaker because I was scared of hitting it left.
A lot of these practice rounds and rounds even have felt really good. Weird stuff has happened and I haven't trusted a lot of things, but then again at Augusta, Mark was like, I think we need to revisit this grip, and that is definitely -- he's definitely on to it.
It's always a bit of a -- there's steps to how it comes back. But like I said, around fall I knew it was good. I could play golf. It just was a little -- you get a little handcuffed on a left-to-right wind when you're that out-to-in.
Q. They had a code of conduct policy in play at the Masters, and it'll be at the PGA and eventually make its way out here as well. It seems very subjective. If you were this charge or if you were on the committee, what's a violation in your eyes? Is it like a bird, an F-bomb? How do you figure that out?
MAX HOMA: I'm sure it's somewhere on the list. I have a very bad -- I say a lot of bad words. I very much try to do it not when a kid can hear. So I do think there's some, hey, don't say it in front of the wrong person, like be a bit aware of your surroundings. Not saying I've never done it. I don't like when people break clubs. I don't like when people beat up the golf course because we deal with it, and I think breaking clubs makes us look very, very spoiled.
I try my absolute best not to do it, and when it does happen, as far as slamming a tee box, I'm very upset with myself because we're very lucky to play this game where we do, and I think it is a bad look.
But again, this is a very frustrating game, and it happens. I don't know where I'd draw that line exactly, but I definitely think beating up a golf course would be probably -- because the rest of us have to play it. But that's a tough thing to handle or to decide upon because it is so subjective. If I do something where no one is watching on TV, that gets graded a lot lower than when it's in front of everybody. I don't know how you would land that plane.
But it's never a bad thing to have that conversation being had at Augusta. That's good. Between that and pace-of-play stuff, there's things we can address, and we can wait until we figure it out until we implement it, but at least the conversation is going that way. We want to inspire the next generation to be better than us, so we need to be held to a higher standard.
Q. You birdied, by my count, 7, 8 and 9 to finish up the pro-am there. Can that kind of finish in a pro-am give you confidence, momentum, moving into the tournament?
MAX HOMA: I mean, it's not going to hurt. But like I said earlier, I'm really trying not to tie things to a result or an outcome. I hit it just as well the first six holes, didn't make any putts, then I do make a couple putts.
Yeah, when I get myself in the right frame of mind like I would say I was in today and I've been in the last 10 days or so, the patience becomes easier, so I was just more happy with the way I approached the round today, and I've been approaching my practice rounds, and I've been kind of observing just how my swing feels and where my golf shots are going.
Of course it's great to do, but it's not like I'm going to wake up tomorrow and go, all right, I'm on a birdie streak, let's try to keep it going.
Q. I wanted to know what's your favorite restaurant to eat at on Hilton Head?
MAX HOMA: I know they've got a Chipotle somewhere, so I'm probably going to say Chipotle. I go about five times a week, and it's on my bag. It is my wife's birthday tomorrow, so I'm going to take her somewhere, so hopefully that will jump up high in the ranks. It's more for her than me, so as long as she loves it, I'm good.
Q. Can I have you talk about hole 14 and get your thoughts on that?
MAX HOMA: Yeah. All the par-3s here are pretty remarkable. That hole comes in the part of the round where you're about to finish and sometimes you just want to get it to the house clean and it's such an awkward hole. It's a lot like Augusta in a way because it's in the trees and you know where the wind is supposed to be, but a lot of the times it sure doesn't feel like it's there, and you have to trust that it's there or keep it beneath the trees and play the wind you feel.
It's such a small landing area. They do give you the left side of the green, which is nice, as far as there's a bunch of fairway runout and it's not a very difficult putt from there. But it's just such a -- they all are similar, but such a small landing zone. It's why I love this golf course for myself. I've always loved hitting an iron, and that's what I've been the best at on my end.
It's quite the test, but it's not a comfortable golf shot. The penalty is so big.
It's not very long. I think yesterday we had a 7- and 8-iron or something like that, but again, I think a lot of it comes from the uncertainty of which way the wind is blowing.
Q. On the tee box, is there a thought that you have of, okay, I'm going to hit it this way or I have to do it a certain way?
MAX HOMA: Yeah, I think first and foremost, you decide what wind you're going to trust, and then you're going to pick a club that it's probably always going to fly at least five on to the front left part of that green, and then you're going to move your target accordingly.
If I'm between clubs and I have one that I'm not 1000 percent sure if it's going to cover all the way, I'll definitely move that more left. When a pin is in the back, it's almost a little bit easier at times because you can shift that target more right knowing if you push it a little bit it'll still carry the corner.
Everything is always pin placement on when we're deciding what thought to have, I guess, but the last thought you have is always the most important, which is just commit to it, and you've got to -- my sports psychologist has the best -- when you get to a really hard hole and there's nowhere to really hide, he always just says, best on best. Just get up there, trust your golf swing, trust the club you picked, trust the wind you decide you think it is and make the best swing you can, and you can almost close your eyes and know if you did a good job or not and then hope to God it's on grass.
Q. Did you pick up a Masters gnome last week, and if not, did you pick up a lot of Masters merchandise?
MAX HOMA: I don't think I've ever bought a single thing at Augusta. But my wife has. No gnomes for us. I've never really fully got that one.
But yeah, we have -- my son now has a Seminole golf shirt and an Augusta golf shirt with the Masters logo. I think my son might get beat up in elementary school. He's been very fortunate to have some pretty cool gear.
But no, I don't, but every day I seem to come to my locker and I've got another bag waiting for me to take home. My wife makes up for it. Usually we get a bunch of stuff for friends and family and the people who couldn't come. We've definitely brought home quite a few things before.
Q. Are you aware that there's an RBC Heritage plaid gnome this week?
MAX HOMA: I'm not, but again, this proves that I'm not anti-plaid, but we're just not gnome people.
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