At the PGA Championship, golfers are intensely preparing for the competition, with 156 players vying for a share of the $19 million purse. Some, like Braden Shattuck, are practicing offsite to avoid distractions.
Key points
PGA Championship features 156 professional golfers
Total purse for the championship is $19 million
Braden Shattuck practiced offsite at Rolling Green Golf Club
Players are seeking swing improvements before the tournament
Tim Wiseman is participating in his second PGA Championship
Left: The range at the PGA Championship on Wednesday. Right: Jay Herz banging balls at a field down the road.Left: Getty Images / Right: Michael Bamberger
NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. â On Wednesday morning the smallish range here at the Aronimink Golf Club was a sea of golfing humanity, what with all the players and caddies and coaches and equipment techies toiling the same soil. Guys working it out, looking for swing thoughts â for feels, as Tiger used to say â with the opening bell of this PGA Championship a day a way. One-hundred and fifty-six professional golfers, 20 of them club pros, looking for a piece of the $19 million purse, plus a piece of golfing immortality, for the winner, and a different sort of immortality, for any club pro who should make the cut.
There was Tim Wiseman, teaching pro from the Different Strokes Golf Center, in New Albany, Ind., playing in his second PGA Championship. Just down the range from him was Jon Rahm, winner of two major championships. Wiseman and Rahm were working on the same thing, broadly speaking. Weâre all working on the same thing, broadly speaking.
As it happens, one of the 156 players was, notably, not on campus Wednesday morning. Braden Shattuck was eight miles down the road, on the range at the Rolling Green Golf Club. Remember how Phil Mickelson, in his prime, used to go offsite on the Tuesday or a Wednesday of a major to a nearby club and try to work things out there, in the name of privacy and lack of distraction? Heâd practice at, say, Sage Valley, down the road from Augusta National, in the days leading up to the Masters. Shattuck, the director of instruction at Rolling Green, wasnât doing that.
Q&A
What is the purse for the PGA Championship?
The purse for the PGA Championship is $19 million.
Who is Braden Shattuck and where was he practicing?
Braden Shattuck is the director of instruction at Rolling Green Golf Club, practicing eight miles away from the PGA Championship site.
How many professional golfers are competing in the PGA Championship?
There are 156 professional golfers competing in the PGA Championship.
What strategies do golfers use to prepare for major championships?
Golfers often work on swing thoughts and practice at various locations to find focus and avoid distractions before major championships.
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Every Wednesday morning in season, Shattuck runs a womenâs clinic at Rolling Green, and he wasnât going to miss this weekâs session just because he was playing in a major championship. These women are trying to get better, too! To one lady righthander with a chronic push-fade-slice, Shattuck offered this age-old advice: Go to the right side of the tee box and aim left. Talk about your fairway finders. A slice-fix tip to top all slice-fix tips. The woman had something new to think about. Maybe Shattuck will use the tip himself, come Thursday and Friday, if he finds himself coming down with a case of the shoves.
Youâre always working on something in this game.
Here was Tim Wiseman on the Aronimink range, teeing up his ball with the toe of the iron in his hands, trying to get his ball to sit just right on the spring grass. Here was Jon Rahm, a short walk away, teeing up his ball with the toe of the iron in his hands, trying to get his ball to sit just right on his patch of grass. A chasm, in talent, between the two golfers. But the ball is the ball and the club is the club and the only thing on it is your hands. Rahm and Wiseman and Shattuck and the women in his Wednesday womenâs clinic will all attest to the accuracy of that statement. And, of course, Jay Herz, will, too.
On Wednesday morning, Mr. Herz, a retired GE engineer who will be 80 on his next birthday, was in an open field about three miles from Aronimink, a bumpy 20-acre lawn owned by Radnor Township where golfers are allowed to hit their own balls, fetch them and do it again. His balls were orange and pink and white and gray. He carried them to his spot in two late-model plastic shoulder bags and in a long opaque plastic tube. His collection of tees, many of them plastic, were scarred by experience. He wore Levi dungarees, a plaid shirt, a floppy white hat, two golf gloves and a tan he brought north from his winter in Jupiter, in South Florida. The field is public, if youâre a Radnor township resident. GOLF AT YOUR OWN RISK a sign reads. There were two other golfers, out in the field, each at least 200 yards from the other. There were no risks in play, not in this day.
âWhat am I working on?â Mr. Herz said, repeating the question posed to him. âMy wrist snap.â He described what Shattuck, or Ben Hogan, might call delaying the release of the hands to the latest possible moment in the swing. Mr. Herz was looking for more lag. He was looking for more distance.
jay herz hitting balls at range
Jay Herz at Radnor Townshipâs makeshift range. Michael Bamberger
Anything surprising here?
Mr. Herz has been to Aronimink, once â to play tennis, which is his main sport. He was aware of the PGA Championship unfolding down the road, of course. He has a buddy, one of his regular golf partners, who is working the tournament, driving disabled spectators from one location to another. Mr. Herz was preparing for his twice-weekly golf game at local public courses with his regulars. He has a plan to watch the tournament on Sunday, from the comfort of his home.
He hit a shot.
âCould use more wrist snap,â he said.
He can hit his driver 150 yards regularly. Some of his good ones will go longer than that.
Mr. Herz has never seen Tiger Woods or Rory McIlroy in his travels through South Florida. He has seen Tigerâs restaurant.
Mr. Herz was asked if he imagined the players on the range at Aronimink were doing, essentially, the same thing he was doing.
âI do,â he said.
And could he define what that is?
âTheyâre trying to get better,â he said. âThatâs what Iâm trying to do.â
He teed up one of his old balls on an old tee and hit it with his old driver. It was a line drive. It was a beauty.
