After participating in the presentation event of the Open de España, in front of the Palacio de Cibeles, headquarters of the Ayuntamiento de Madrid, Jon Rahm shared a very special press conference alongside Ángel Hidalgo, last year’s tournament winner, answering all sorts of questions, from the conditions of the Club de Campo Villa de Madrid for this week, his passion for national events and representing our country’s colours, what happened in the Ryder Cup, and even what he expects from golf within our borders by 2031.
How the course is for the tournament: “We were training, but we haven’t been to the course yet, only the practice area. I’ve been told the greens are spectacular, I’ve heard someone say the rough around the green is a bit tougher, which is perfect for me. It’s a course that has become a bit short for today’s golf. Even though it’s narrow and requires precision, the best today can hit it long when accurate. When I’ve done well, it’s been with good long play and putting well. With short irons, I’ll have opportunities. Last year was different because Thursday and Friday were very windy. But without wind, it’s a course designed to make very few.”
Why he always comes to the Open de España: “To give you all the reasons why I come home… If I tell you the most important ones, if not something personal, because I want to win the tournament, I want to continue having a certain… importance isn’t the word, creating that history in Spain. Seve won it three times, if I can reach four, spectacular. And if someone won it four, then five. That’s how I see it. I’ve been lucky to be the Spanish champion from junior to absolute and to unite those stages is an honour for me. Doing it so quickly in my career, even more so. But, mostly, because I consider it my duty. If it weren’t for Seve, Miguel Ángel, Chema, Sergio, and many golfers, I wouldn’t be here. So in a way, I understand it’s my duty to come, play the Open de España, which I come to gladly, but I understand it’s my duty, to compete in front of the Spanish public, which for many is the only week they can see me, and while I’m playing good golf, I understand it’s my duty. Since I was 13 years old when I first represented Spain in a match against Portugal, it’s been a luck and an honour to do it more times, to win medals and amateur tournaments with Spain, let’s see if I can do it more as a professional. We have the Ryder, which represents Europe, but hopefully, to win titles with Spain. I hope there’s a generation that says that by watching me play they have the desire to be professional golfers and that in 15 or 20 years they say they’re there thanks to me. I couldn’t say it to Seve, to Chema yes, to Sergio too, and hopefully sooner rather than later. Hopefully, walking to the 1st hole with some promise who says they’re there because they saw me play golf.”
The values of golf compared to the Ryder: “New York… the week has been much criticised, I don’t want it to be too much because it’s a unique week in an important city in a very competitive tournament. I understand the public is a bit more involved. Also, that area has the reputation of being a bit tougher and they wanted to do it that way, but I’ll also tell the truth: I’ve heard worse things at a football match here in Spain. It doesn’t take away that it’s a bit the same as what you hear in other sports. In a stadium, if one person says it, you might not hear it. I wouldn’t criticise the way it’s being judged because in many sports you hear the same or worse, but they’re all at once and you don’t notice. This week is spectacular, we’re so used to football, that people who haven’t had the chance to see golf tournaments don’t know the atmosphere. It amuses me a lot when I walk down the street and they support me as if I were running down the wing and they say ‘go, go, go…’ and I have 300 metres left. But that energy makes it as beautiful as it was last year, with Ángel, David and me. And the years I managed to play well, in large part it’s because of the public. If we end up having more golf tournaments in Spain and create more golf culture, they’ll learn what a golf audience is like, but for me, let them continue like this because they make that Sunday more special. And whether I win or not, I’m supported in a special way, it’s very emotional and one of the reasons I keep coming back.”
How he arrives at the tournament: “Being such a unique week, what happened before doesn’t matter. You arrive with a different energy, rejuvenated from the whole year.”
Tournament increasingly difficult to win: “Yes, and hopefully it becomes more difficult. Hopefully, we reach a point where it’s a week of world golf, that Spaniards keep winning it but that it’s like an Open de France, de Ireland, that high-level players come who want to win it. It hasn’t been lost, but it’s seen less, with the travels we make and how exhausting it is, at the end of the year it’s played less. But hopefully, we reach a tournament level where Ryder players want to come and win.”
Preferred playing partners: “Without being too arrogant, I don’t care who I play with on Thursday and Friday, it’s never worried me. I can’t say… Even if I say Ángel, Puig, people who are friends, it wouldn’t change anything about how I approach those days. I’d say, to share it, with Puig because I play a lot during the year, another week not; with Shane Lowry for what he did that Sunday in the Ryder, to thank him and because he’s very fun, I love how he approaches the sport and how he plays. And I’d say any young Spanish player I haven’t played with. It wouldn’t be bad if this tournament did like Augusta or some majors, where you play with the defending champion. That the amateur winner in Spain plays with the tournament’s defending champion. A young player aspiring to be professional to learn at what level they are. The week in Mayakoba and the Phoenix Open as an amateur taught me a lot, seeing at what level you are compared to the best, helps a lot, it could be implemented.”
Extra pressure playing in Spain: “The public will always be a help. Throughout the week it makes it easier because on Sunday, if you’re going to win, the mind worries more about winning than the public. On Thursday you’re thinking if you can start well, but we can’t spend the whole week thinking about the public, you have to focus on what you have to do, on the next shot, then you can thank them, rely on them, use their energy to play better. When Pavon won, on Sunday I went out in the first groups and I was more down because I had no chance of winning. I went six under in nine holes and started thinking about the 59, pressuring myself with the public. Last year we weren’t thinking about the public, neither of us, only about winning. You have to focus your attention on golf.”
Spanish golf in 2031: “Without going too much into who will support, if companies or governments, as a child watching professional golf I think in Spain I saw up to eight European Tour tournaments and when I turned professional we almost had none. I’d like to have more, we had two last year, there will be two next year… I can’t guarantee I’ll come to all, but hopefully, there will be more opportunities to have golf in Spain. How to do it, I don’t know exactly, but hopefully, for the future, we have support in the country for this sport, that this tournament can be a Rolex Series, one of the final series… Hopefully, it’s difficult because outside the United Arab Emirates I don’t know if there is any. Hopefully, we have that support for Spanish sport. With the great work Madrid is doing with Formula 1, the NFL, football, hopefully, we have more support and have more than one or two tournaments.”
