We would like to welcome our defending champion, Max Homa, to the media centre here at the Genesis Invitational. Max, as you’re coming back here, what’s it like after now entering as defending champion and a place that you’ve been coming to as a kid?
Max: Yeah, it’s bizarre. You know, having a framed picture and glove and ball signed in the locker room’s weird. All of it’s very surreal. I would have loved coming back here no matter what the year, what the day, even if it was just a Wednesday in the middle of the summer. I feel lucky to come to Riviera, but coming back as defending champion knowing what happened last year feels very fake, but I’m very appreciative and it’s cool to be back.
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Are there any specific moments that came to mind as you were entering the course from your playoff win?
Max: Yeah, it was actually after the playoff. We hung around, did some pictures, got to talk to Tiger Woods, which was cool, and then my favourite memory for whatever reason is everyone kind of left. Obviously, there was no fans, so it was just like empty in general, but everyone had left and Joe and I were grabbing my last couple things from the locker room walking out to the parking lot to leave and it was just us two and for whatever reason that felt very cool. You know, two kids from up the road, it kind of felt like the last people leaving the golf tournament. As Jamie Mulligan, famous coach out here, he says, “Who did you beat,” and you say, “I beat everybody.” That’s what it felt like, we were the last people at the golf course at our favourite place to play on the PGA Tour. I don’t know, that was my favourite part of the day honestly.
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Max, in the last couple years your life has changed considerably, the win at Quail Hollow and the win here and winning again. You’ve spoken about not wanting to be just the Twitter guy, the guy who’s known for winning golf tournaments. Does that seem like a difficult shift for you to make mentally? You said just a minute ago that it kind of feels fake, but how are you handling that shift of becoming one of the guys out here that’s trying to win every week and not just be known for something else?
Max: Yeah, I would say — I was actually talking about this yesterday, last night with somebody because they asked me the same question, like, man, your life’s really changed. I would say that my life hasn’t changed at all, I just make a bit more money and I actually flirt with winning a little bit more, but my life which in a good way hasn’t changed. Same wife, same dog, we do the same stuff every week. Like it hasn’t really changed a whole lot. And my grind to get better hasn’t changed at all. It’s just that the spots I’m in come Sunday are significantly different than the spots I was in come Friday three years ago, you know.
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I know it’s kind of like maybe a dumb way to answer it, but the fun part is I don’t feel any different. I feel like I’m still pursuing getting better. I guess it’s one of those things where if I sat back at times and thought about how different life is than two and a half years ago, I would think, man, that is crazy, but we play so much golf out here and I think we’re all for the most part obsessed with golf that every day just feels like, it’s almost like groundhog day.
I don’t know, I’m probably not articulating the end of this right, but just where I am in the World Golf ranking and the FedExCup and on the leaderboard is changing, but it’s like, at least for me, I prepared to be there, so just now it’s like, okay, it’s becoming more routine is probably the biggest difference. Last week in the crazy setting I got to third place and I felt really, really calm and I would say the difference it would have been in 2019 I would have been a lot like holy cow, this is foreign, if that part feels the least foreign now, but everything else has been nice because I don’t feel like it’s changed. I’m lucky in that way.
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You’ve spoken about gratitude in the past. Is it tricky, you want to appreciate whatyou’ve accomplished but still not be satisfied? How do you balance those two?
Max: It’s the hardest thing at least I found in learning about all this stuff or reading about all this stuff about happiness and gratitude because everybody, at least in this — I can only speak for my life, but in this life is competitive and like I’m raised to step on someone’s throat and win at all costs and whatever. Now it’s also like I’m just supposed to be happy for the opportunity. So there’s a blend, but I think it comes from there’s a great book called the Seven Spiritual Laws of Success and one of them is the law of detachment. When you are kind of, when you pretty much are okay with whatever happens and you can only just put in what you can put in and you control what you can control, if you can get peace through that, then the rest of it just becomes its own competition and its own fun.
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Am I grateful last week that I got 14th? I was grateful that I got to be in the mix and you pick little spots. Am I happy I got 14th? No, but I’m grateful for how fun that event was and how I got to be in that mix. So you have to really play with it, but I would say that’s the most complicated part of it because at times I’m like, man, how do you be grateful for something when you’re pissed about it? I don’t know, I’ll get back to you maybe in 10 years when I start to figure that out.
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