Matt Fitzpatrick has been at a loss to understand why his driving off the tee has declined dramatically on the PGA Tour over the past year, but the Englishman has found his answer ahead of The Players Championship
Matt Fitzpatrick He remarkably forgot that he had been playing with extra weight in his driver grip for over a year due to a decline in his game.
As he fights for glory in The Players ChampionshipFitzpatrick revealed that he has been playing with extra weight in his driver grip for about a year. While he is known for his attention to detail, the 2022 golfer US Open The champion admitted that he had not realized the simple problem.
Fitzpatrick added a four-gram weight to the shaft of his driver during testing in February 2023, but it remained there unbeknownst to him. He then began to notice that certain elements of his game off the tee weren’t working properly and went away, but had no solution.
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The 29-year-old only realised his mistake when his driver was re-gripped last month. He admitted that removing the grip had significantly improved his driving, insisting the difference was immediate.
“There was a weight in the handle, which we did some testing with in February of last year, and we never took it off,” Fitzpatrick said. “For some reason, I just forgot it was there.
“As soon as I hit it the next day, it felt like night and day. I could hit it as hard as I wanted, and it wouldn’t go left. Before, it felt like if I hit it hard, it would go straight left.”
Despite his struggles, Fitzpatrick still won the RBC Heritage Championship and Dunhill Links. He added: “My golf game got a little downhill from Harbour Town onwards, and we were going back and forth.
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“We were just really confused with the swing, we did all kinds of things. It turns out that by taking the weight off the top of the driver, I think because I took it off in Phoenix, I played it a lot better.
“I might have won four times if I had known.”
Fitzpatrick’s struggles with his driver over the past year are evident. He has dropped from 10th in strokes gained off the tee to 92nd on the PGA Tour because of the extra weight.
It was back to his best at TPC SawgrassIn his first round, Fitzpatrick missed only three fairways and shot a 66.
“I drove the ball like I felt like I could drive it,” he said. “For me, it was kind of like before: I drove the ball well, I putted well, and that’s always been what allowed me to play well.”
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