Adam Scott reflects on a 22-year career that has so far yielded 31 wins, a world no.1 ranking, and a coveted major championship victory at the 2013 Masters. Despite his advancing age, the 42-year-old Australian still feels he has time – and the desire – to add to his already impressive CV
After more than two decades on tour, I’m all about trying to get the right balance in my life between work and family. I moved back to Europe during Covid and settled my family in Crans sur Sierre in Switzerland. I have to do things now to make things as easy as possible for me get around to the tournaments that I want to play, while also not being too far from my wife and the kids. I’m still playing a global schedule, mixing tournaments on the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour, but I’m a bit more picky about where and when I play.
As it did for many people, the pandemic has changed a lot of things for me. Previously I had a very global team, and we had become used to being able to operate and to live wherever we wanted. My trainer was in Hawaii, my coach was in London, and I was living in Switzerland, and during Covid no-one could get to one another to see each other. I spent very little time with my coach, and I don’t even work with that trainer anymore because it was just not possible to do that. So there’s been a lot of changes, and until last summer I felt like a lot of balls were up in the air and nothing was very consistent and I was always juggling something. But you’re constantly learning in this game. And for me it’s been a good time to have a hard reset on many things. I feel like I’ve dealt with a few things that were tougher to deal with, and at least I feel like I’ve come out of it in a better place.
I probably set my expectations a little wrong at the start of last year, but when you’re competitive it’s very hard to lower them. I expect to play at a very high level and if I don’t I’m not really even going to have a job. You can make a lot of excuses, but I don’t think excuses get you very far in. this game, so you just have to figure out a way to deal with whatever situation you find yourself in. After being on Tour for 20 years I know that things don’t always go your way, because it’s a difficult game. So, although I’ve been frustrated when I haven’t played as well as I want to, I have never let it take me to a breaking point.
I managed to turn my game around in the back end of last year when I was able to sort out my equipment. Because of Covid, I hadn’t seen the guy who fits my clubs at Titleist for about 18 months, and I was using a driver that he didn’t particularly like for me. I saw him last summer, and just changing that had a trickle-down effect on everything getting better through the bag. I was hitting the driver better, and because of that the confidence got a bit better, and it’s so crazy that a little thing like that just helped.
The driver is an important club for me. When I look at last year, from February to July, I felt like I was driving it into the rough all the time, but when I’m swinging well I drive the ball very well and that confidence filters through the bag. And as I got into the back end of last year and adjusted some of the golf aspects like my driver, I could start seeing the positives again. That was obviously very helpful and made it easier to adjust my attitude of ‘I’m over this’ to ‘I’m looking forward to playing and getting stuck into a new season’.
My game is in a very good place at the moment, and it’s in a place where I feel like I can get results and that has been born out this year, with six top-10 finishes from 18 starts and getting through to the Tour Championship after finishing fifth at the St Jude Championship and the BMW Championship. I’m in a good spot physically and mentally, and I’m still in what I would still call the prime of my career. I’ve got a lot of experience behind me, so it’s time to take advantage of everything I’ve put into my career at this point and hopefully I get into some situations where I can make it go my way on Sunday and win some big events and maybe tick off a couple of those boxes I have left.
Even at my age, It’s fairly easy for me to stay motivated because I haven’t really achieved everything I want to achieve in the game. There are still a few boxes to tick, and that’s my focus now for as long as I stay out here. Watching Phil Mickelson win the US PGA at the age of 51 certainly gives me hope that I can still play at a high level for another five years at least. I know he’s put an incredible amount of work in to being able to do that and I’m not taking that for granted, but I feel like I like I’m in pretty good shape physically and hopefully I can still be a top player.
The Majors are really what golf careers are defined by, more so than ever. I’d love to win more and be a multiple winner. At this point I need to be greedy because I don’t have much time. Certainly, the Open Championship is unfinished business for me, but I’m not going to be picky – I’ll take any of them!