Xander Schauffele channels chilled Californian vibe to claim second major

CHAMPION: USA's Xander Schauffele celebrates with the Claret Jug after winning The Open at Royal Troon, South Ayrshire, Scotland.

We’ve all heard it said. That anyone can win one major, only truly great players do it twice or more. Xander Schauffele has gone from the best player in the world yet to win one to a two-time major champion, and he did it in just nine weeks.

A sublime, almost flawless six-under par of 65 on Sunday on this South Ayrshire links left the San Diego native on nine-under par for the tournament and two shots clear of Justin Rose and Billy Horschel, his nearest challengers.

Many threatened, most fell away, some could never climb high enough.

It was the 30-year old, who had hit the bar with a dozen top-ten major finishes going back to 2017 while serving notice of his potential and intentions with an Olympic gold medal in Tokyo three years ago, that lasted the course.

It’s not just that Schauffele has doubled up so quickly but the fact that he has done it on both sides of the Atlantic. For many golfing traditionalists, doing this on two such vastly different landscapes is the true mark of a great.

Whatever way you slice this, it must taste great.

“I don't know if that's true or not, but I'm definitely going to believe that's true because here we are. Yeah, it's completely different. Like we just talked about, it's a completely different style of golf.

“It makes you play shots and have different ball positions. There's so much risk/reward when the wind's blowing 20 miles an hour and it starts raining. There's so many different variables that come into play. It truly is an honour to win this.

“To me, it's big. To me, winning the Scottish Open [at the Renaissance Club in 2022] was big because it meant my game could travel. So to double that up and win a major in Scotland is even cooler.” 

He struck all the right chords afterwards, cooing over the sight of those bright yellow leaderboards dotted around the course, and waxing lyrical about the tournament’s traditions and the challenges inherent to links golf.

This was anyone’s tournament deep into round four.

The leaderboard was squeezed tighter than accordion at one point with virtual unknowns and some of the game’s elite caught in the middle. Schauffele began to feel this would be his day when he signed for a third birdie in four holes at the 14th.

He didn’t dirty his card with a bogey all day. Russell Henley was the only other man among the challengers who could say that stepping off the 18th green, but he could only manage a 69 with two birdies for all his steadiness.

Scottie Scheffler, the world number one, got to within a sniff but a double bogey at the 9th did for him. Horschel led at six-under but hit a wall around the turn and never recovered. Sam Burns was undone by a double and a triple bogey at 11 and 12.

Dan Brown’s fairytale story finished without the happy ending.

Rose and Thriston Lawrence were dogged pursuers and Shane Lowry pushed and prodded with four birdies in five holes bringing him back into contention at one point. Schauffele holding steady makes it a first clean sweep of the four majors for the Americans since 1982.

He had no hesitation in describing it as “the best round I have played”.

That’s what it took.

Schauffele reminisced afterwards about how he had first started to take the game seriously at the age of 13. Within two or three years he was sitting down with his dad and contemplating just how high he could go all the way to the top.

There were no histrionics from him here, with the club or with his mouth. His secret to this success? Limit your mistakes, avoid the coffin bunkers and don’t approach the course thinking you have to be perfect.

Growing up in southern California might not sound like the sort of foundation for success in West Scotland but he was no stranger to high winds off the Pacific Ocean and in his mid-teens when he first played a links at Bandon Dunes in Oregon.

Crossing the pond a week earlier for this year’s Scottish Open was another deposit in the bank for the ultimate glory, not just in acclimating for the weather but in putting the time zone changes behind him early. Every little bit helps.

Like so many champions, he is remarkably unremarkable.

There was a time back down the years when the red mist would rise on the course but Schauffele started tracking these mood swings and soon realised that the flare-ups were compounding his errors.

That was that, no more tantrums. Like Scheffler, he makes his way around a golf course with the serenity of a Tibetan monk. It is clearly working for him and, with the Olympics just around the corner, he’s unlikely to go off the rails between now and then.

“The same way I don't get really angry, I also don't let myself get too over the moon because to me it's the same thing. If I'm sitting there snapping a club, that would be the same as me running around fist pumping.

“It would take too long for me to adjust before my next shot to hit a good one. I've kind of embraced this sort of SoCal, laid-back kid, but there's obviously a fire burning deep within, or you wouldn't have a couple majors sitting by your side.” What odds a double Olympic champion, too?