LOS ANGELES — Rickie Fowler was on the range. Not an unusual endeavor for a professional golfer but an unusual endeavor for this professional golfer.
On June 16, 2022, Fowler was at home in Florida grinding on his irons and driver as the first round of the U.S. Open was unfolding at The Country Club, 1,400 miles to the north.
Fowler had fallen out of the top 150 in the world and did not qualify for what would have been the 45th major championship appearance of his career.
Just 364 days later, a rejuvenated Fowler set the U.S. Open single-round scoring record and tied the all-time major scoring record by shooting 62 to open play at Los Angeles Country Club.
“That was a long Thursday last year,” said Fowler. “I got some good work in. But yeah, nice to be actually out on [the] course.”
That may be the biggest undersell in the history of major golf. It is tantamount to Elon Musk saying, “Nice to be in the aviation industry” when the reality is that he’s sending rockets into space and landing them on little Xs in the desert.
“Nice to be out on the course” turned into a U.S. Open-record 10 birdies and history in a hurry. (Justin Thomas technically scored nine birdies and an eagle in 2017.)
Remarkably, there was only one prior 62 shot in the 150-year history of major championships from the late 1800s to 2023 but two shot Thursday afternoon in Los Angeles. Technically, Fowler held the record for about 20 minutes before Xander Schauffele joined him moments later.
Fowler began his day on the 10th hole and went birdie-bogey out of the gate, It was a fairly inauspicious start to the one of the most notable rounds in the 123-year history of this championship. After making a second bogey on No. 17 and going out in 32, it seemed destined to be a nice round … but nobody was thinking 62.
It got silly in a hurry on Fowler’s back nine (the first nine on the course). he went birdie-birdie-birdie on that side across the first three holes, added another at the seventh and took the hope of a record-setting number to the eighth.
On that 537-yard par-5, Fowler flared his drive into the junk and had a narrow window through which he pitched his second. Incredibly, from the spot you see below, he made one an all-time great birdie to push it to 8 under. As good it was, it got a bit lost in a sea of great shots and scores for Fowler. When asked for his best shot of the day, he paused.
“There were a lot, which is a very good thing,” Fowler said.
A two-putt par at the last was received by a small crowd that seemed indifferent or perhaps unaware of the history unfolding in front of them. In some ways, Fowler took on the same attitude as the folks watching him play. Though he generally knew what was on his card, he was only invested in hitting the shot in front of him.
“I would say from the middle of the round up until the 9th green, our last hole, I didn’t really know or see any scores,” said Fowler.
It’s been a long few years for the five-time PGA Tour champion who has, over the course of his career, had close calls at all four majors. Despite carding three top 10s and two top fives the sport’s four biggest tournaments, Fowler remains stuck at zero major trophies. He has not won a PGA Tour event since 2019 and posted just six top 10s over the last three calendar years. That’s fewer top 10s than Eric Cole, Dylan Wu and Mark Hubbard.
In that same period, he missed five of 11 major championships, an unfathomable number for somebody who played in 38 consecutive majors from 2010-19. From the end of 2014 to the middle of 2019, he never fell out of the top 15 in the Official World Golf Rankings. Over the next three years, he fell all the way to No. 185 in the world.
“It’s definitely been long and tough,” said Fowler. “A lot longer being in that situation than you’d ever want to. But it makes it so worth it having gone through that and being back where we are now. I would say we’re starting to get maybe as close as we’ve ever been to where I was through kind of that ’14-’15 area.”
Fowler has been playing better. He’s posted 12 top 20s in 17 starts this season and is gaining 1.76 strokes per round, his best total since 2018 when he was one of the better players in the world. Since Jan. 1, he ranks 12th in the world in total strokes gained ahead of Max Homa, Jordan Spieth, Brooks Koepka, Matt Fitzpatrick and Cameron Smith. It was also in January when coach Butch Harmon predicted that Fowler would win again in 2023, and his pupil agreed.
But this? Did anyone expect a U.S. Open record and the possibility for a return to the winner’s circle at the winner’s circle? Well, even Fowler’s peers nodded along with the 62.
“I mean, no one really surprises me out here,” said Homa, who shot 68 in Round 1. “It’s a great round. But the greens just aren’t very firm. And if you drive the ball well, you have a lot of iron shots. I learned it the best at Caves Valley at the BMW [Championship] a few years ago; it was the longest golf course ever, and it was soft and nobody shot over par.
“It makes sense, but I imagine it’s going to get harder. I kind of like this trend it seems like at U.S. Opens lately where the first round they kind of, they trick us into thinking we got it, and then as the weekend goes on, it gets quite hard. So, yeah, it’s very impressive, but they’re tremendous golfers. So I guess it’s impressive, not surprising.”
Though someone else shooting 62 just a few minutes later takes a bit of the shine off of the record Fowler now co-owns, it doesn’t reduce from what he accomplished.
Don’t confuse two 62s with an easy golf course. At the time they finished, nobody besides Fowler and Schauffele had shot better than 67, and both of those players gained nearly 10 strokes on the morning wave. For the sake of context, Jim Furyk gained just over 10 strokes on the field when he shot 58 at the Travelers Championship in 2016. This 62 was not equivalent to a 58 in a regular event, but it also wasn’t that far off.
Everybody knew it, too. Media members flooded the last few holes, and Fowler was surrounded as he spoke to a steady bevy of reporters and cameras. He even got a hug from Schauffele, suddenly a fellow 62 Club member.
It was a member of Fowler’s crew of family, friends and supporters who summed it up most succinctly. As he exited the golf course to sign a now-historic piece of paper, Fowler hugged a handful of folks including his wife, Allison. As he pressed onward, both toward the scoring tent and in the golf tournament, that group turned back inward and chatted excitedly about the day.
“That was awesome,” one of them said. Indeed it was.