Jon Rahm insists his aggressive edge has not been dulled by his transfer to LIV Golf as he bids to change into simply the fourth participant to win back-to-back Masters titles.
Rahm’s shock transfer to the Saudi-backed breakaway competitors got here after he had beforehand pledged his loyalty to the PGA Tour and criticised LIV’s 54-hole format, with no minimize and a shotgun begin as “not a golf match”.
The 2-time main winner has did not win any of the 5 LIV occasions he has performed however travelled to Augusta on the again of ending fourth in Miami on Sunday and profitable the workforce occasion at Doral.
“I’ve had a variety of enjoyable taking part in in these occasions,” Rahm mentioned. “The competitors’s nonetheless there.
“Yeah, they’re smaller fields however you continue to should beat a number of the finest gamers on the earth and you continue to should play on the identical stage it’s a must to play on the PGA Tour to win these occasions.
“I perceive there’s much less individuals. I perceive the workforce format’s a bit completely different. I perceive we’re going shotgun and issues are a bit bit completely different to how they’re in a PGA TOUR occasion.
“However the stress’s there. I wish to win as dangerous as I wished to win earlier than I moved on to LIV. Taking place the stretch while you’re in rivalry is the very same emotions. That actually doesn’t change.
“Profitable is profitable and that’s what issues.”
At the moment final yr Rahm had performed eight PGA Tour occasions and received three of them, though his final two occasions earlier than the Masters had appear him withdraw from the Gamers Championship as a consequence of sickness and fail to advance from the group levels of the WGC-Dell Applied sciences Match Play.
“If something, if I needed to go primarily based on how I really feel right this moment, on a Tuesday, I really feel bodily higher than I did final yr,” added Rahm, who began the primary spherical with a four-putt bogey however nonetheless shot a gap 65.
“However then as soon as competitors begins, it doesn’t actually matter. As soon as the gun goes off, no matter you are feeling is out the window. You’ve obtained to go on the market and publish a rating.
“It wouldn’t be the primary time we hear anyone not feeling their finest and profitable. The primary one which involves thoughts is Ben Crenshaw after he misplaced his swing coach and to return again after being on the funeral and win it.
“So it’s not one thing that I bear in mind [fewer competitive rounds], however I do really feel contemporary and prepared for it.”
Rahm confronted the “fairly daunting” prospect of constructing a speech at his Champions Dinner in entrance of what he described as an viewers of “all of the residing legends on this sport”.
That viewers consists of fellow LIV gamers and former champions Phil Mickelson, Sergio Garcia, Dustin Johnson, Bubba Watson, Charl Schwartzel and Patrick Reed, however a scarcity of world rating factors for LIV occasions makes it a lot more durable to earn a spot within the yr’s first main.
“There’s obtained to be a approach for sure gamers in no matter tour to have the ability to earn their approach in,” Rahm mentioned.
“I don’t know what that appears like. However there’s obtained to be a good approach for everyone to compete. They’ll want to determine a strategy to consider how the LIV gamers are doing and the way they’ll earn their approach.”
