Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today's episode is powered by tdamor Trade. Whether on the course or in the market, it helps to have a second set of eyes to keep you on your game. That's why Tedammeritrades Trade Desk is here to help gut check your strategies so you always feel confident teeing up a trade. Visit tedomritrade dot com slash Frida Egg to learn more about what their trade desk can do for you. Member SIPC, We are back with another edition of the
Frida Egg Podcast. Today I am joined by twenty nineteen US Midam champ Lucas. Michelle. Lucas is in Australian. He's the first international player to win.
The US Midam.
He won it last week out at Colorado Golf Club. He is from Perth originally but went to school in Melbourne and we get a little bit on Lucas's background is how he got into golf and how he got to the US to play the Midham and his plans for the next year as well as a little bit on the Midham. Enjoy the episode. Lucas is a golf course architecture nut in fact, he's now texting me pictures of a seaside course that he found in Perth sand Greens.
He's definitely he's just a golf tragic. So it's an interesting conversation and really looking forward to seeing Lucas play the next year on TV in the US AM Masters and US Open. So, without further ado, here is Lucas Michelle.
The fried egg requires a different technique. What you need to do is actually square the face so they'll dig down underneath that bad lie and propel that ball right out onto the green.
Here's it's a playing out of a buried lion of bunker is completely different than playing out of a night and clean lion of greenside bunker. You need to be aggressive on any shop, whether it's sitting cleanly or it's Friday Egg.
Well, we've all made the dreaded Frida egg not to be feared though it's actually a pretty easy shock to hit.
The best Am events are like the invates at the clubs, you know.
It's yeah, like I've seen, like I've obviously played a few of them now and like I thought, the Northeast Am was probably as good as it gets. Really, I mean that course is awesome one a moy set and then like the club runs it perfectly and they get in there, like I think they get in the where
is it Rhode Island. Yeah, the Rhode Island State Golf Association comes in and kind of does the rules and stuff like that, but the club still runs the tournament properly, and you know, they just they take they take ownership of it and they yeah, they just do it right.
How do you like?
What? So?
Like? What made you start playing stuff like Northeast am want to moist, like traveling over the US to play?
I well, I finished my studies at UNI in end of twenty seventeen. I'd never been to the US to play golf, but I'd always kind of gone around and played top level amateur stuff, you know, through Europe and the UK and and I don't know, I had a pretty keen interest in it all, in playing good courses and playing competition golf. So I sort of started out
I guess. I mean, as a junior you play competition golf, and then I kind of got old enough that I'd kind of get into some big events back home, and then at some point you start wanting to travel overseas so my first sort of big ones were when I traveled to the UK played the Dutch Ameter at a course called Eroinhoven, which is like a good Harry Colt course. There's actually a bunch of really good Harry Colt courses
in in the Netherlands. Then I played the warm Heath Trophy, which is I think it's Herbert Fowler walm Heath, but it's like great, great old school architecture, really early Golden Age, so it's like kind of got kind of it's a bit rougher around the edges in terms of the shaping and stuff like that, so that's really cool to see. And then I played like the North of Scotland. I think that was a course called lossy Mouth. Actually it's called more a golf club, but it's in losty Mouth.
And then I kind of just started traveling around and really enjoyed the I guess the element of really good courses and really good tournaments. And then I sort of that was on the way to an exchange for my university degree where I did six months in s andrew So that was I guess the start of a bit more love for links, golf and all that.
So that that had to be well, got the xtay to go spend six months at Saint Andrews. That's one of my regrets now, never doing a broad thing.
Yeah, I think it was funny, like when I when I moved to so I moved from Western Australia. I grew up as a kid in Western Australian and I moved to Melbourne and I started studying at the University of Melbourne and I I didn't kind of realize, but Melbourne UNI had this exchange program with the University of Saint Andrews. And it took me until my third year before I realized it actually was there. And then I remember looking online and it said, you know, University of
Saint Andrews. And I'm like, hold on a minute, like that's the St Andrews, isn't it like in Scotland? And I looked it up and it was, but there was only one spot for an exchange so kind of looked looked into it a bit more and applied and I just had my fingers crossed and eventually got that spot there. And then that was the sort of the trip I planned.
My first overseas trip I sort of planned was to go play some events before I went in and studied at Saint Andrews, and yeah, that was sort of the leading I played those ones I sort of talked about just then, like in the Netherlands and in England and up in Scotland, and then had six months over in St Andrews, which was I mean, the bit's actually the best deal in the world because you're effectively considered a
town resident. What they call it's a Links ticket, which is it's a two hundred pound pass for all seven courses of the St Andrews Links Trust, so that includes like the Old Course of course, and that lasts a year. So you played, you paid two hundred pounds for a year's golf on unlimited off on any of the courses, including the Old Course. So it's yeah, I made the
most of that. I think I probably played the Old Course in over six months, probably like I'm going to say, like thirty times, twenty five times, I don't know, and then a new course a bunch and the Jubilee and the Castle and all of them. They're all really really good. So that was pretty much dream come true for someone like me.
I need to look up like graduate programs at University of the same.
Yeah, yeah, it's a good it's a good university. I'm pretty sure they just got like he's got rated like number one in the UK for some list. I don't know what exactly was, but it's where the Prince, Prince and Kate, Yeah, Prince William and Kate Mett. I think. Yeah, so it's a pretty like prestigious uni. But it's yeah, I mean, it's an unbelievable deal to be able to do that.
Were you playing golf at University of Melbourne then?
And then yeah, back home, like college golf doesn't really exist in Australia. It's kind of disappointing. So all the golf that I've played has been outside of any university or college programs. So I've just the way it sort of works back home, is you the guys that I'm kind of friendly with that sort of my age a bit younger, tend to to play their golf separate to
any college affiliation. But we've got good state sporting organizations that sort of run high performance programs and through those it's kind of like a team training environment environment and that's how the players get better that in that sort of way, So it's definitely a bit different to college.
So through my I studied engineering at Union, and through that I kind of didn't really play any golf while I was actually at YETI, but I played it all on the side in the summers and played all my tournaments. There's a good we've got a good amateur circuit in Australia. We always get a few top players come down and they'll play like the March of the Amateurs. I was the amateur and a few of the other big tournaments.
So yeah, so since you graduated, do you graduate when you're twenty two ish?
Yeah, so I did. I started out doing a bat floor of science, which took three years, So I finished that when I was like twenty one, and that's that was when I was doing my exchange and in the in the last year of that. And then when I finished that, I went straight in and started an engineering master's degree because where I was studying it at Melbourne,
they didn't offer a Bachelor of engineering. Then he did the engineering programs through masters and I kind of always knew I wanted to do an engineering degree just because I was more of like a math, science y kind of guy, and so I kind of ended up doing another two years there. So I finished when I was twenty three, I think, Yeah, so I kind of took my time a bit doing it. I think I took an extra year and what was allocated, it's only a
five year program. I took six. Finished when I was twenty three and then just sort of didn't really want to go into full time work and I felt like my golf was at a decent enough level that I thought I might be able to put a couple more years into it and maybe try a professional kind of route with it. That's sort of what I've been doing the last couple of years, and it's it's kind of it's been up and down, but last week's been pretty good.
So yeah, yeah, that worked out well last week. But yeah, talk about how you've been you know, most people would turn pro immediately, but you've stayed amateur. Well, you've been working on it and you've been like, how what's your life looked like for the last two years?
Yeah? So, I actually pretty much since finishing university, I've I work at a golf driving range, the Melbourne Golf Academy. It's called It's Good Driving Range. I just work there. I do some caddying, out of Rayal, Melbourne and Kingston Heaths. So many of your listeners come down and need a caddy, they can just look me out and I'll try and jump on the back. But yeah, I do some cadding
down there. We don't officially have like caddy programs, but there's like a sand Belt caddie program that I'm part of and and we sort of caddy all over the spot in Melbourne. So I've been doing that. And then I've got a friend of mine who's opening up another golf business that I'm going to be working for soon, so that'll probably be a probably potentially give up the
driving range job to help him out. Yeah, just sort of working a lot of nights and then throwing a few caddy shifts here and there in the summers, and then practicing my game. And and I tried out of Australian to a school end of last year to try and get a card over here, and I guess try and make a bit more money than what I was at my caddying and driving range jobs. But I made to the final stage, but I missed out by two shots.
So instead of turning pro, which was kind of the plan at that stage, I decided to hold off because I knew i'd i'd be pretty close to getting a start in that mid amateur, and then because I was only turned twenty five at the beginning of the year, so it was my first year eligible, so I figured I might as well wait for that and give that a crack and kind of paid off. I guess you.
Did you have to qualify for the mid or did you get Okay?
Yeah, I was an exempt player based on the World Amateur Golf rankings, so I think they exempt thirty of the top ranked midameters and I was. I came in at like the eleventh ranked midameter or something like that. So yeah, luckily didn't have to qualify because it would have been a long trip for a little roll of the dice to try and get into it. But yeah, that was sort of the reason I came over was because I was exempt.
So so you came over. Tournament was at Colorado Golf Club and common Ground, and came over a little early to get acclimated.
Yeah, well, I mean Denver's it's like a mile high, I think, so I came in on it would have been it was the ninth of September, which tournament didn't start till the fourteenth, so I had five days or so before the tournament started, but we couldn't get out to practice until the twelfth, well the eleventh, technically he'd use the practice facilities, but you can play the courses
till the twelfth. So I chatted to a good friend of mine, Mike Clayton, who's been on the pod, and he he had a good con Yeah, Clayton's yeah, great guy, Yeah he is. And he he got me out to sand Hills in Nebraska, which I kind of thought it would just be like, you know, a couple hours down the road or something like that. But it was a fair trip out there was a five hour drive, but worth every second of driving out there because that place is like so cool. I loved it.
It's funny because like of where it is, Like, yeah, I was like a couple of weeks ago in eastern Nebraska and I was looking at the map and I was talking to a buddy. I'm like, I might go to sand Hills and he's like, what do you mean. I'm like, I'm faut as close as you can get.
You know, yeah, pretty much. It is literally in the middle of nowhere.
Like d as close as you get pretty much.
You can get. Yeah, I think Denver and Lincoln is the nearest in Nebraska. I don't know, it's like five hours either way.
Is it an amazing driving in to that place? Like you're just driving down the road and you look right and you look left, and you just see golf holes that don't again.
And every time you're round a cresh you're thinking, where's the ocean because because it looks like you're in like the sand dunes in Scotland, it looks identical. Yeah, it's it's such a cool place. And yeah, like like you said, like you're looking left and right and you looking down and you almost feel like you're going to drive off the road because you're just seeing golf hole after golf holl. It's incredible.
So is that you spent a few days there?
I spent two, Well I've slept one night there and I spent two foolish sort of days. So I played the course the afternoon I arrived and then so the guy that Mike and you was the course superintendent. Yeah, so I went out in the morning, Yeah, Carl Heglund. So I went out in the morning and kind of had to chat with him because I didn't I didn't catch up with him the night before and had to chat with him ally. So the cutting the grains and stuff,
which was pretty cool. Talked about it all and yeah, I really enjoyed that getting up at sort of sunrise and having a walk around, having a look and taking some photos. It was. It was awesome. That place is. Yeah, it's it's unbelievable.
I'm convinced sunrise when the when the groundscrews out, it's like it's the best, the best time.
To be on a golf course.
Yeah, it's like so peaceful and it's just you know, neat.
Yeah.
How would you compare the way sand Hills plays to golf and Australia and then also in.
Scotland, I mean the sand Hills there. I think it looks almost identical to what we have down on the morning to Peninsula in Melbourne. So like courses like Saint Andrew's Beach and the Dunes and Moonal Links and the National they're all on almost identical sort of topography and vegetation. It's kind of it's kind of crazy. Like when I was driving in, I was like, oh my god, like it feels like I'm down by the dunes or any
of those courses. So it looks a hell of a lot like that's that that sort of golf that we probably don't have the quality of a course as good as sand Hills, but there's some pretty good golf down there in down the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria. But I mean it plays very similar. Sand Hills is full kind of fescue and our course is a bermuda fair ways at least the grass greens. But yeah, I mean it
plays very similar. Firm, fast winds always an element, and similar to look aesthetics, spunk cring kind of that wastepunk cring kind of looks. So it's yeah, it's very similar, i'd say.
Yeah, so after sand Hill's you head back and then this first time playing at like major elevation.
Yeah, i'd played it like I mean, we had one. We've got a course in Australia up in Canberra that there's always a tournament every year, and that's maybe at like one thousand meters, which is like three thousand feet, so there's a slight noticeable increase in the distance that
you hit it. But Denver was a full sort of ten percent, So all your numbers whenever you're doing and you I rather than kind of adjusting my numbers for the week, I kind of just ran them backwards to what was my normal numbers and kind of worked off them. So like if it was one sixty, then I'd hit a I'd take ten percent off, which is sixteen of one sixty, and then so it's one forty four and just play that number. So that's sort of how I
approached it. But yeah, I definitely felt like that. I didn't know, like I didn't realize at first, but you just have to drink so much water and it's so easy to get dehydrated. And I had a headache for a bit. And it's definitely like has an effect the elevation, particularly like it's I've been at C level of my whole life. So yeah, definitely took a while to get used to. But yeah, yeah, I just got over it in the end.
I was out there a couple of weeks ago for a wedding and it's like, you know, you go to a wedding and the next morning you're just so dehydrated because like, yeah.
He's so dry in the mouth. It's crazy. It's nute and well if you were drinking alcohol as well, you would have noticed it, because I had a beer or two like on a couple of the nights and felt hammered a couple of SIPs.
Yeah, it's it's wild. So did you do you notice the ball like goes straighter.
Or yeah, I didn't notice that. No, I agree with that, Like I think I guess it's like there's less air resistance against it, so it kind of just like doesn't fizz as much with the wind with the spin. And yeah, definitely you notice like if you carve one offline, it might be like you feel like you just healed it or something that should have cut like thirty yards off line it only goes like twenty. Yes, you can. You can definitely see it sort of floats up a bit more and doesn't crazy curve offline.
Yeah, I heard, so I heard Colorado was playing like really firm.
Oh yeah it was. It was perfect for me because like we play golf like that all summer, all our tournaments all summer like that, especially the ones in Melbourne. The generally, the I think the Aussie Ameter is in Melbourne every second year, so every second year will pretty much be on a sand belt golf course. Last year was at Woodlands Golf Club, which is one of those sort of under the radar kind of sand belt tracks, and and that I mean it was exactly like that.
You know, greens rolling at twelve or thirteen and feather to slope on them, and then rock hard greens that you have to like a nine eine and you've got to account for like six seven yards a roll or bounce and roll, and even if you're coming in as high as you can, like, it's still going to roll out heaps. So it kind of made it the process of calculating yardages because you had the ten percent with the with the elevation of the site, so you kind of go with that. With those numbers, they say that
one sixty number. Again you go okay, that's one forty four, and then it's so and then you go, okay, it's going to roll out like six, that's like carrying one thirty eight. And then it might be uphill plus four or something, so then it's like one forty two. And then you're like, oh win, that might be like into the wind like and you think it's like tens. So then you there was so much to think about, which
is obviously, I guess makes it more interesting. I think when you've got to got to think about what you're doing a bit more.
Do you feel like that plane in that firm conditions was a big advantage obviously, like you know, most of the American golf is not firm and fast.
Yeah, no, I think I actually think it was a pretty It was a pretty big advantage because yeah, I mean Ryal Melbourne, you're doing the exact same things whenever you're playing there. You never whatever number you shoot with your lazy you're always like, it's always different, it doesn't matter what so in yeah, you're never carry it to
the pin at roll Melbourne. So having a lot of experience playing that sort of golf, I think, and golf where you really have to think about where you are going to hit it too, because there was a lot of short sided misses as well at Colorado because they
were so firm and fast. If you did miss it in a spot that you know, a bunker that was you know, short sighted to a pin or whether green ran away from you or in the rough somewhere where you just couldn't miss it, like you really have to think about where those misses were, and and and I guess even from the tee you sometimes had to think about, you know, how you avoid that miss by hitting it somewhere off the tee. So yeah, it was a lot to think about. There was a really good The sixteenth
hole was really interesting. It was a split fairway hole, which is kind of always like you can either nail it or you can just screw it up, because you know, either everyone goes one way or you know, or they get it right, and some people go both ways. And I think they got it pretty good because pretty much everyone I played with we're going down the wide route,
which is down the left and hitting probably driver. But the angle into that green as a path five was so poor that you just couldn't hold the green with the firmness of them and the speed. You just couldn't hold the green from the left fairway, whereas if you went down the right, it was only a three wood and it was a shorter route end and you played more across the green so it wasn't running steeply away from you and you could hold like a seven, nine
or six iron against it. And I went down the right my last two rounds.
One almost is like a radiance slope from the right pretty much.
Yeah, like the radan, it's pretty much pretty much looks like a radan from the right fairway, and then from the left fairway it looks like you're just playing straight down like a like imagine a radan. You're just playing straight down from the left of the redand you don't stop it. Yeah, exactly, So it's yeah, it was effectively
like that. And I played down the right both times, like hit good three woods and I think the six iron and a five iron in and made birdie both times against Stewart and then in the last round against Joe. So I guess playing that strategy of taking a more aggressive T shirt which was a bit narrower and a bit harder to hit the fairwell and paid off for me. So I found that interesting.
You know, I'm looking at the whole. I haven't been out there. I'm looking at the whole, and I feel like this is like a classic case of like an example where you know it's way wider left right, but yeah, if you look at the right, and like example, if you just take away the left, like if you just put that fareaway on any other golf hole, people would
be like, oh, that's fine. It's just like you just have to lay up to the right and then yeah, And it's like it's funny how like just the giving somebody a wider option, they're always going to take it, even though like if that if you just took away the left side of the faraway and made that, everybody would hit it there and have no problem with it.
Yeah. I really wanted to get Scott force It's opinion of it, because he was playing this week. It would be interesting what he said, because I'm sure he would have said go left. But sure, when when you play it, it's like hold on a minute, Like when you see the firms of that grain and the slope which you can't see from an aerial, you go, okay, like the right is definitely better, I think anyway. But I would yeah, yeah, I.
Mean yeah, because especially with it being a part five, I imagine like if you don't hit a great drive, you're just laying up, you know.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I hit it in one of the rounds. I hit it like so the middle of the fairy like a little creek you can kind of get on the banks of it, and I just went down the I hit it down the middle, I like pulled it and caught the bank. So it was kind of luck. You'd been rolling in the creek and I just hit like a nine nine out. But the wed shot in was so so hard, like the pitchure that I had to hitt in, like you actually have to nail the pitch shot or you could even wedge it off the
green like. So it kind of made sense to go right, I think, and then have the opportunity to go for it because if you're playing as a three shotter down there, which a lot of people had seen to do, they'd go left and then they played as a three shotter, it just you still had you still had nothing with that wed shot in.
Yeah, it's interesting. It reminds me a little bit. There's a hole like it at Sand Valley, but it's kind of flipped the other way. Yeah, okay, so it's it's interesting. It's the corner cruncher. Definitely have some like holes that they use.
That boomerang. Yeah, they love the boomerang. That That Colorado that's the fourteenth hole was a boomerang green actually in the final round, it was quite cool. It was a drivable part four, so kind of like I ate at sand Hills. I think it's the same. Yep, yeah, so driveable. I hit it. I had a three wood. I could get a three wood there because it's a little bit downwind,
and I hit like a great shot. But I've hit it to the left left boomerang to a right pin like front left to a front right pin, so completely look, it looks like I'm completely screwed. And I kind of walk around and I'd sort of heard somewhere where cor said every time there's always a way to kind of get it around. I kind of looked at it and yeah, exactly, I looked, and I'm like, old on, Yeah, I actually
can get this like pretty close. So we went down there my caddy, and we sort of walked around it, and I looked at if I got it close enough to the bunker, there was almost like a like a little valley where you could feed it in like just on the edge of the trap where it wouldn't I wouldn't roll into the trap either, it would just kind of like feed into this this little valley trench kind
of around the bunker. And I just rolled it in there perfectly, and I went down to about five feet and the crowd couldn't believe it obviously because they just thought it was dead. But that was that was a cool shot to be able to play and made dirty and half the hole with with Joe. So yeah, that was that was really cool.
Yeah, it's uh, it's so curious. I think this all the time. Sometimes I think it hurts me. Sometimes I think it helps me. Do you think you're You're obviously have a key interest in golf architecture, You're a you're a golf golf magazine panelist. You know, you've played a lot of great places. You know, play on the sound belt, and you understand the principles of architecture. Do you think it helps you as a good player understanding architecture.
I think I think it can. I kind of I feel like I try to understand architecture and then I kind of try to in the same vein kind of understand what makes you play good golf. And I think they kind of they cross over, like like force it stuff kind of makes sense. I like force and stuff the decade stuff like I'm interested in it, and I think a lot of his stuff's correct, but they definitely overlap in parts to making making you play better, I think,
but I haven't really thought about it too much. What definitely hurts is when you have to play a terrible golf course, which, luck luckily, like in amateur golf, we'd actually don't play too many terrible golf courses. We play much better golf courses than most of the tour tours play.
That's one of my favorite Ogilvy things was he was like, yeah, when I was when I was coming up, but you know, I was playing all the great amateur events and then I turned pro and I'm playing in Germany and all that, and I'm like, these places are complete ship.
Yeah, I'm not really you know, if the pro career does take off, Tampro and all that, I'm kind of not looking forward to that aspect of it. It would be interesting because I haven't really had to play that much shitty golf in my life. It's been all pretty lucky, pretty good stuff.
It's funny, I kind of like enjoy playing tournaments on golf courses that offend me. It's like I have like that a little bit of that where the you know, it's right in front of you, it makes it really easy. Yeah, you know, it just becomes execution.
Yeah, and you kind of I suppose you probably appreciate the good stuff more if you play some of the bad stuff as well. It's kind of a bit of a bit of that too.
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out at zero restriction dot com. Now back to our conversation with Lucas Michelle. You went to Australian Q school obviously, now you've got you've got some pretty good exemptions coming up. What are the plans. I assume you're staying amateur for the time being playing the Masters in US Open.
Yeah. Yeah, I'm staying am obviously until the till the after the US Open, and then I kind of kind of depends if I play. Really if I say I lead leading am or something like that in the in the Masters US Open, it kind of opens a few doors for a professional career for sure, But I don't know, it's kind of it's all sort of up in the I don't like, I do want to turn professional eventually. That that was always a goal of mine as a kid, was to you, I always dreamt of playing professional golf.
But the more I play amateur golf, the more I kind of love it. But at the same time, I've got a good degree as well, So if I don't kind of make it as a golfer, I probably I don't know if I can see myself as a career amateur. That kind of that kind of lifestyle doesn't really exist that much in Australia. That career amateur sort of mid am you know, crump cup kind of you know, circuit
life doesn't really exist in Australia too much. So yeah, I'll probably I think I probably will give pro golf a crack after all that's done next year and and try to make something of my golf' that's pretty likely.
Talk about nice lane up. You get Augusta, you get Wingfort and if you stay for the US AM you got Bandon.
Yeah abandoned as well. I saw that. Yeah, it's kind of a because I get I get actually two years exemption to the to the U s M, so I could play Oakland the following year too if I wanted to. But I can't really see myself staying staying amated that long unfortunately. But I mean, yeah, it's pretty it's pretty good.
It's a pretty good little lineup. I'm going to be playing I think the Aussie Open as well, which is at the Australian Golf Club in Sydney, which is that's it's a good golf course, but it's a great event.
And then I've got a bunch of tournaments here in the summer, just amateur stuff, Australian Master, the Amateurs, which next year is at Victoria Golf Club, which is obviously a really good sand belt club used to be at used to always be held at Royal Melbourne, but with the presence carp and all that, I think they've moved it this year for the to Victoria, which is just across the road. Victoria's just don't Yeah. They just did a big Oakley Clayton cockingmead CCM. They did a big
green replacement sort of program. They had Polana greens for ninety years, like they were never quite up to the standard of all the other sand belt clubs, so they did they replaced all those with a new bank grass and they did some design tweaks to some of the ones that have been tweaked over the years by other architects just to get them back to I guess what they were supposed to be like when they were first built.
So I'm looking forward to it. I've played it a couple of times since it opened, and that'll be that'll be really good. And then the Australian Amateurs up in Queensland at Royal Queensland Golf Club, which is a really good track. Actually, it's like a it's another ogleby Clayton. Of course, they redesigned it in like two thousand and eight or nine, I think, And that's I'm looking forward to that. I've not played that one, but it looks really fun. And then I think I'm in the vic
Open as well, which is a pretty cool event. That's I think. I think it should be still an LPGA slash European Tour. Yeah, they run them run the LPGA and the European Tour event same same So it's a thirty six hole venue, so the same courses over the same.
The beach, the beach of course down in Morrington.
Right, yeah, well that so this one's actually the Bellerine Peninsula. So there's the Mornington Peninsula and the Bellerine Peninsula and they both hook around Melbourne. The Bellerin's on the west side, which is where Thirteenth Beach and both courses there are, and like bar and Heads is another one out there
and Port Fairies kind of more further down the road. Yeah, so Thirteenth Beach is the host of those, which is the Bellerine Peninsula, which is I mean it's another course that looks quite a bit like sand Hills, Nebraska, to be honest, a little bit flattered though, and it's a good, really good track actually thirty six hold track. Yeah, so
that'll be really good to be part of that. I've played that tournament, played a couple, played it twice before a few years ago before it kind of got big, before it got to European, to a status I got in. It'd be good to play with much stronger field for next year.
So back to the midam, I was just thinking, obviously, like winning has a lot riding on it. When when did you feel like thinking ahead became like a big thing that you had to stop yourself. You always hear people talk about staying in the present, and obviously like you yeah, like, well, at what point where you were did it really like you start to think like if I win this, I get to play in the Masters, I get you know.
Yeah. So from the start of the week I had like a it's kind of a good sort of outlook on it because if I didn't win, based on my performance in the Australian to a School the year before, I still had a bunch of events that good players as a pro at the end of this year, and then if I did win, I was playing the Masters. So it was kind of like a positive, positive sort
of situation. So in the first few rounds of match Player, I kind of wasn't really thinking about winning, Like I was kind of just like, oh yeah, like keep playing and playing well and kind of keep getting through. And then like when I was like a couple down, I was like, ah, now this is okay, and didn't really take it too seriously. To be honest, like I was
taking it. I was playing as well as I could, but in terms of like the consequences of playing poorly, I was like not really thinking too much about it. And then it was really when I got to got to the quarters and then the semis, I started thinking, okay, like hold on, like you've got a really good chance here to win this tournament and get all the everything
that comes with it. And then that's sort of when I had to take that in a positive way to sort of make me play better rather than potentially make me play worse. So I kind of had to use that as an incentive to play well rather than also like be mindful of it affecting my performance in a negative way. So the night before the final, I was obviously getting quite a few messages of good luck and that sort of stuff, but I did not touch my
phone that night. I just like refused to touch it because I just felt like any extra kind of you know, messaging someone to say thanks or whatever, I was just going to kind of put extra pressure on myself in me realizing the magnitude of what I was sort of about to do potentially. So, yeah, I didn't touch my phone the night before. Thankfully. I was staying with a family sort of friends of friends, and they didn't know
anything about golf. They knew I was in the final, but they kind of didn't realize the magnitude of it either. So I just sort of had a nice dinner with them, had a chat, and then try to get an early night and went off at nine o'clock. So bed and kind of actually slept pretty well because I wasn't really overly stressed because yeah, the family was really just didn't really realize what was happening.
I was going to ask, you know, like being in Australian, hey, everybody's got obviously all the Americans probably had buddies there. You know, you'd know people from your state Golf Association or other tournaments.
Yeah, were you?
Did you have any friends there early in the week.
So there was really only one person I knew in the whole field, and it was an American guy whose names of Bull Davenport. He's from It's from Florida. He's a pretty he's a good player. He went to Yale, had a pretty good college career up at Yale, and then he went into work. He works for Boston Consulting Group.
But he went he did a transfer down into to Melbourne, the Melbourne office in twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, and he came down and played a couple of events down there, and actually met him playing one of our small sort of local circuit events, and we hit it off really well when he was down there. And then when I went over last year, I caught up with him because he was doing grade school up in Philly. We went and played Philly cricket together and and yeah, kept hitting
it off. And then so when he when I got into the mid Am, he also qualified through whatever you call him, you know, the normal qualifiers. He qualified in through one in Philly. So he was the only guy I knew in the field, but he kind of introduced me to a few guys that were playing the event. We played practice rounds together and then he made the match play actually, and he played stew Agastad in the first round. He lost like four and three to stew
and I. I was carrying my bag all week. I carried it first two rounds of stroke play stroight play rounds, and I carried it first round of match play as well. When when Will got knocked out, he said, oh, you can't be carrying a bag, come on, man. So he jumped on the bag for the for the rest and yeah, I was going to probably get a caddy from about the quarters, but then he off and up and I said, oh, yeah, that'd be that'll be awesome, And I mean, yeah, he's
really good. He was so good on the bag, so much fun. I don't know if you saw the celebration at the end, there's a video on Twitter, but we had a pretty good celebration at the end. But there was actually more to that. I don't know if you heard about the last hole what happened there.
I saw that someone went out explain for the listeners that didn't didn't see the story.
So there was. So the more I thought, the more I think about it now, the more I'm like, hold on a minute, like this guy was definitely trying to do something like a bit dodgy here. So Joe Drainy, who I played. We got to the thirty fifth hole, so two holes to play, and it was Dormy in my favor, so two of the two player and then we both hit the green. I headed to thirty thirty feet. I parted up to about three feet. He had a twelve footer, which if he hold it was for Bertie.
And we went to the eighteen obviously because he won that hole. If he missed, then I would have to hold my three footer to halve the hole and win the event. Well, when he missed his twelve footer, he took off his hat and started walking over towards me, and I'm thinking, like, gee, that's a generous gimme that he's given me here, but I'm also thinking, hold on,
like what's going on. So he comes over, extends out his hand and said I can't remember exactly what he said, but he said like like I'm making you part this source or something along those lines, like like it's not a gimmy kind of thing, but good luck kind of like shaking my hand as if like yeah, good luck kind of thing rather than like yeah, thanks, good game.
And mean, meanwhile, like the USGA official basically thinks it's done, so he's running over with the trophy like towards me, and then I have to go like, oh wait, no no, no no no, Like he's like he's saying no, no, no, it's like it's not it's not good. It's not good. I've got to put this. That's like like wave them off. And then I'm like, ah, alright, like shit, like this is a bit weird.
That's so strange.
I mean, like you take.
Your hand off.
Yeah. Well, apparently Joe explained it to the USGA guys, because the USJA guys obviously asked him afterwards, and he said, oh, like I just got confused by the situation or something like that was his explanation. But like the way he spoke to me about it seemed like kind of knew what he was doing. But I don't know if you
just said that to I don't know anyway. To me, it seemed like he was trying to maybe create something a bit of you know, a bit of confusion himself to maybe put me off a little bit that that was my impression, but I don't know if that was his intention.
Geez, that's really weird. I mean, like, I can't I can't think of it. It's almost like, yeah, a kicker, Like it's so out of like it's that like he took his hat off and said that before any other putt right.
No, no, exactly. It was so weird. So it'd be interesting that there was camera crew out there. They went recording it live for Fox Sports or anything like that, but there was a camera crew out there, so I'm assuming there's going to be like some sort of condensed sort of package of the of the finals, So it be interesting if they I'd love to see it again
because it was really weird. I'm sure he definitely took off his hat and he definitely shook my hands, so it'll be interesting to watch what it looks like if they if they end up putting it up.
Man, that's strange.
Yeah, it was really weird, but I just I've heard in a yeah, so so then I've got three feet to win effectively, and I'm like shitting myself because kind of I would have been sitting myself anyway, but I've got I've had a few extra minutes to sort of think about it all, and thankfully I just sort of rolled in the right.
Edge, kind of snuck it in there, and and then that was the celebration with Will, where I just ran over it and kind of kind of brushed brush Joe off a bit and just I'd already shaken his hand though, so I was okay, ran over to Will and had a good hug and yeah, celebration with him.
So that's that's crazy. Well, I mean, standing over that put, you probably were.
Just yeah, I was trembling, like my hand like I was. Yeah, I was about as nervous as I've ever been, for sure, because every every as much as I'd been able to kind of block everything out before that, it's got to become real at some point. And that's that's when it came became pretty real when I told fairy Foot for the for the Master's.
So yeah, it's uh, it's that's crazy. You see, Ivy, you were you were down and both those matches kind of in the in the final match you were down three and then and the match with Stu, you were down. Yeah, it's a you know, did you did you feel like the being down almost like locked in a little bit more?
Yeah, I think I didn't. I certainly didn't mind being down for the final because I think it's hard. It's it's hard to lead all day. It's I just feel like there's more, it's more to lose. You feel like you're you feel like you're in a position to lose rather than a position to win. So kind of didn't mind being down most of the day. In the final, I was actually against and he fought back and got it.
I think he got it back to square or maybe one in his favor in the back nine, but he kind of just mad made a couple of pretty silly mistakes, particularly on seventeen. He just completely misclubbed I think I'm seventeen in the semi final and dumb one in the water. So yeah, but it was I didn't mind coming from the position of sort of having almost nothing to lose in coming from a couple backs, so it kind of worked for me all week. There was a lot of rounds where I came from behind, so yeah.
So I was checked in with a mutual buddy and he mentioned that you know your your your golf career made event saved by not getting a job as a as a growing consultant at a golf architecture project.
Yeah, yeah, that's true. Actually I'm interested. Who's spoke cued Mike Hacking, So okay, yeah, that's quite funny. Yeah. So they're doing a project up at Port Lonsdale. It's a new sort of a new golf course. And I in the last year i'd sort of sort of I was planning to do the tour school, but then I was also pretty interested in my golf architecture and my golf had been I'd had sort of like a rough year
with my golf. I'd had a fair bit of success early with my with Miami at a golf taking it full time, like I won a decent tournament early on, and then about yeah, probably a year later, I hadn't really hadn't really picked up. It's sort of been all
kind of sort of mediocre results. And then this came up, and I was chatting to Mike Clayton about it because they worked together, and I sort of talked about and it seemed like it was it was a contract, so it was only like twelve months I think, and I sort of thought, well, that a to be a cool thing to just try and see if I like it, because I've always been interested in the golf architecture and if I could just try it, you know, it's a
twelve month contract. It's it's just completely once or twelve months up. You're sort of done. There's no like, yeah, no time, like you don't have to stay on really, and I figured I'll just try it out. But obviously I didn't didn't get the role, which probably worked in my favor now looking back on it. But yeah, it would have been a cool thing to understand and all that, but yeah, I missed out unfortunately.
Yeah, that's it's a blessing in disguise. That's like life, you know.
Yeah, it's almost like it.
You know, you missed you missed Australian Q school for exactly. It works out.
It's funny, exactly. Yeah, it is funny. So you never know what's going to be around the corner.
So you've got obviously kind of a busy schedule. You're you caddy at Royal Melbourne. Any any thoughts on the presence Cup. Has anybody reached out to you about caddying or helping with the.
Vent uh not really To be honest, yeah I would, yeah, I to be honest, if someone said, yeah, you want a Caddy for someone, so I'd be like, yeah, on hundred percent. But yeah, nothing yet did I did say, you know, you get your random people onto it are saying, oh, they should choose Lucas as the captain's pick because Caddy's there and all this. I'm like, OK, calm down, Like but yeah, I mean I'm gonna go definitely go watch it.
Definitely be out there watching. I hope they hope. I mean, the course is so short, like it's I don't know what it is. It's probably like six hundred meters, which is like six eight hundred yards. It's like so sure for those guys. So it'll be interesting how it plays well.
I'm sure the greens will be firm and fast, and you know, scoring it will still be pretty low, but it'll at least be interesting to watch with the firms of the greens and the speed and the fair ways are so wide, guys will not not kind of not know what to do. I think, yeah, it'll be interesting. I'm looking forward to it.
I think that it'll be really cool to watch because you'll see so many of those in between holes where it's like you can push driver up to thirty yards, but do you really want to do that?
Yeah, my favorite one of those is, Yeah, my favorite one of those of the third on the West course, which is probably it's kind of comes in at the ship point in the round because I think it's the first, i think the first of the composite for the Presence Cup, and it's like normally when we play it, if I'm just playing it with friends, it's just like a driver to get it in like the swale short of the green, and from there you've got like a pretty okay chip.
But they play they're going to be playing a teer bit further back, which is better because they've just added that in. So they'll have the option of either hitting like iron or three wood to kind of give themselves maybe eighty or ninety yards where they can put a bit of spin on it, or they can hit a driver. But if they hit a driver, they've got a really awkward pitch to a green that completely runs away from
them that they can't get any spin into. So if you hitting driver, you've actually got to go really far right off the tea, which the green's tucked around the left. You've got to go so far right to try and get the angle in to almost hit so the green's not completely running away from you, so it's more like hitting sideways into it, kind of like that hole. And I was telling you about it Colorado. So that'll be interesting how they play that, because that is a new
t since it was their last time. But it's a shame that it's the first hole because I feel like they' all just hit iron or something. But yeah, that's one of my favorites. And then I mean there's a bunch
of holes that they don't actually play. There's a very similar hole on the property on the west course, number fourteen, which isn't part of the composite layout, and that that holds great because if hid in the if you kind of aim straight at the green and which sort of ves you into the right roff, you've just got no
shot from the right ruff. You just can't hold the green, whereas you've got to hit it out as far left as you can, almost up against the T tree, which is right where Jeff Ogley lives actually in that T tree. He lives about from that T Tree's about ten meters a cross is his backyard. That's the perfect angle in.
It would about better if he was living in the T Tree.
You know. Yeah, well maybe he does.
I don't know, just sitting there watching golf.
Yeah yeah, but yeah, that's one of the great holes there.
It'll be really cool to watch. I want to come down for that, but I don't want to come down when I can't play the golf course. So selfishly, I'm probably gonna. Yeah, till after that when I.
Went, yeah, are you gonna because you've not really You've seen so much in America, but I mean there's still so much probably to say, but you've never really been out. Have you been played golf in Scotland or Australia or anything like that.
I'm like an America. I'm just an American golfer. I you know, there's this is the hard thing. There's so much to see and there is. I kind of felt like there was a void in American golf coverage in terms of you know what, Yeah, you know, just good golf courses to see that don't get a ton of pub So it's like, but I gotta go for personal reasons. I got to go because you know, you have to have like the ability to relate stuff back. It's like anything.
You probably see it, Like you go and you play a course and you're like, oh, this reminds me of this hole at this place.
Yeah, and there's so much of that. Yeah yeah, I mean it's kind of like, I mean all those old architects, they all went to Scotland and studied the Scottish courses and the holes. It's kind of like you kind of got to do it. It's just you got to see where everyone got their inspiration from. And then and then in Australia you've got to see how how different it is and how it's still so cool. Yeah.
I've opened New Zealand Australia this winter and then and then a heavy dose of the UK next year, so it'll be uh good international bound you know. Yea Campia camp a fraud for a much longer. So you thought about next year with the who's going to be on the bag for Masters?
Well, Will is the guy that carry for me. So before that final round we'd sort of talked about I don't know if he brought it up or if I brought it up or whatever, because like were sort of at some point we started talking about on the day before, like catting and stuff in the masses and all that, and I told him on the Sami or the quarter, I said, oh, look, I haven't committed to anyone. Yeah, And I said to him, like, you're right up there kind of thing, like it's been going great kind of thing.
And then and then with the success I had in the semi, I think I thought about it that night and I was like, you know what, like he's been so great, he's a good friend. I get along with him. Well, we were on similar wavelengths. So the next day I told him, you know, in the morning, I said, you know, I made up my mind. We're going to Augusta, so let's just get this done. And you played to.
The karma too, you had to, I mean, the guy stayed.
Yeah, yeah, go to work as well.
Yeah.
He saved me, like you know, one hundred us around as well, you know, with a local. Yeah, it was you know, he played it well himself and I played it well too, so it all worked out that positive for both of us.
Yeah, that that'll be awesome. And then you were wearing a wing foot shirt, so you've seen it.
Yeah, I played wing foot. I played it last year because I went up I was in the New York area because I think I did a USAM qualifier up there. It wasn't the one that the one at whipper Will this year and I did that this year whipped Well, I'm trying to think while I was there, I think I was up there for a qualifier.
Where did I do it? It may been the one you emailed.
No, I try to get into that one. Yeah, I tried to get into the SX one but it booked out so quickly. I ended up doing one at like a Asocles up there that was like pretty average, but but that was that was where I went and played wing foot. And yeah, so I had that picked up that jumper, that sort of violet kind of lavender colored thing that I was wearing in the morning and it was cold. I only brought two jumpers, so sweaters, jumpers,
what are you want to call them? With me? And I wore the green one the day before and it kind of didn't kind of clashed with what I was playing to wear in the in the final round, so I had to put the wing foot one on, which is a bit of a flex if I'm honest to the guy, just like I am. But he was wearing Joey. Joe was wearing a an RBC Canadian Open jacket because he played there like a month before so or whatever it was, so he was flexing as well.
So what do you think of Wind?
Yeah, I think it's really good. Yeah, it's I mean, I hadn't seen it before gilt on the work, but I saw a lot Yeah, twenty eight in the World wrest So I mean it's it's awesome. Yeah, I loved it. I think that the guy I played with sort of showed me what they've done, like standing out the green pads so you got more sort of interesting pins in the corners and taking out a few trees and fixed up a few of the morning lines, and I thought it was great. I wanted to play the East though
as well, because that looked really interesting. That looks kind of like short, quirky, kind of a good little path in the trees. That looked really cool as I was playing one of the holes. I can't remember have you played.
I played it the Yeah, like a week ago. Awesome. The Green okay, so cool?
Do you play both?
Just the just the West? Just go back just the west. Yeah, but the same thing.
I wanted to play east when I get the chance.
I was looking at the east, I was like, man, that looks really neat, you know, like a couple of the part three.
Is that one, Yeah, the.
One that's right next to nine, Yeah, with no bunker.
Yeah, I think that was the one. Yeah, just like raised green like mounds all around. Yeah, it was. It was a cool couple of cool views around.
I felt like, you know, it's winkfists really cool because like, if you play well, you can you can score out there.
Yeah, but you gotta if you keep it in playoff for tea. I think that's the biggest thing. The greens are pretty generous. They're pretty wide greens, and yeah, they're like, you know, you can have some tricky parts across them if you're not accurate with your irons. But I felt like I drove it pretty good that day and didn't really struggle. But I could imagine if you're hitting it into the rough and it's just got to be so hard to hit those greens from the rough.
Yeah, Yeah, that's it. It's it's definitely you gotta hit you gotta drive it well out there.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, but you gotta drive it everywhere, well everywhere if.
You want to. Yeah, especially I mean, I mean I know it's going to be us open conditions and unplanned it so the rof's going to be crazy. Yeah, it'll be interesting.
So obviously you get the invitation, you've got to be planning a Augusta trip before, right, Yeah.
I think I'm not going to go like crazy, like super early or anything like that.
You got a little bit of it I think to deal with too.
Right, Yeah, that's the issue, Like I'm not I'm only going to get there early like but not come back kind of thing. So I think I'll probably head there like mid early mid March for a trip because at least the course will be somewhat representative of what it'll be like a month later. So I reckon I'm going to do an early ish, yeah, mid mid early March trip, stay on because the I think it's the Azalea Invitationals the week after like sort.
Of like late marching Club Charleston.
Yeah, country Club Charleston. So I reckon I'm going to stay and play that because that finishes up on like about the twenty fifth of March, and then I could have like a week and a half to kind of prep for the Masters.
Yeah you should. You should see the country club, yeah two, and yeah, I should see.
That's close to that's true. Actually I almost I almost played that this year, that tournament. They've got a good, good amateur tournament there. Yeah, mackenzie, it's really really neat. Actually I played the number.
Four course at Pinehurst and I think it's the that's the fifth hole, maybe the third hole, fourth hole, I think past three, it's identical to that that hole at Palmetto.
Ye seven. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I really want to get out there, so probably, Yeah, I'll probably head there early. You had to, had to be, and then stay on and plack up courses and head to Augusta.
You'll be you'll be acclimated.
Yeah, it'll be uh but uh yeah exactly, it's.
It's late there. I'm gonna let you go. You probably got some jet leg, yeah a little bit. Thanks for coming on, and uh hopefully, well we'll talk. So we'll see you in uh in the spring, if not earlier.
Yeah, now, definitely if you want to get me on again. As a as I'm readying for the the event, I look forward to it.
Yeah, next one will be in person. Maybe he'll be in Australia, who knows.
Yeah, okay, perfect, No, that'll be really good. Yeah all right, yeah, I'll look forward to maybe hosting you out of Metro. Then you've been listening to the Fried Egg podcast. We do the digging for you.