As Masters week commenced with a soaking behind closed gates, the radars suggested with some confidence that clearer skies are imminent. Any certainties around Bryson DeChambeau would be far harder to predict.
Typically, golf’s biggest enigma has arrived here wrapped in mysteries around his form and the question of whether mad science can flourish on a canvas better suited to art.
That he returned his best result in 10 months over the weekend, finishing fifth in LIV’s Miami stop, will conceal some of the rumblings.
But it was also somewhat conspicuous that he surrendered a two-shot lead in the final round on Sunday and will now set foot on a course with which he shares a complicated relationship.
Prior to last year’s tie for sixth, his missed cuts outnumbered his top-20 finishes by 2-0 across seven visits. But there were also clear signs in 2024 that an ever-whirring mind had cracked a few of Augusta’s codes, with no epiphany greater than his favouring of patience over an instinct to bomb the flags from all angles.
In many ways, that was the key launch pad of DeChambeau’s year, taking in his win at the US Open and closing with an invitation from Donald Trump to join him on stage during his presidential victory address. Surreal doesn’t cover it.
Any certainties around Bryson DeChambeau are hard to predict going into The Masters
He has a complicated relationship with Augusta – prior to last year’s tie for sixth, his missed cuts outnumbered his top-20 finishes by 2-0 across seven visits
He is a good friend of Donald Trump, joining him on stage during presidential victory address
But there are more than a few who place him far beneath Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler here. Former European Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley told Mail Sport: ‘He had a peak at the start of last year where he played well in the first three majors and won one, but he didn’t have a really good season on LIV last year (eighth in their 2024 standings after no wins).
‘He also hasn’t come out this season and set the world alight. I think the jury is out as to whether he can follow up how he played in the majors last year.’
As ever, Augusta will grab any flaws in swing and strategy and funnel balls to ropey spots. Perhaps for that reason, DeChambeau is not willing to debut a new driver that he has talked up as an evolution in club science.
His fondness for experimentation has previously involved 3D printed irons, each with an identical shaft length, and there was the curious revelation that he had been placing his golf balls in Epsom salts in pursuit of the perfect balance. The driver to eclipse them all, with a promise of less spin off a flatter face, is evidently not yet ready to leave his lab.
Of course, these are the foibles that once aroused scepticism and ridicule but now feed into a vast popularity – with 1.8million YouTube subscribers, he has the unique distinction of having feet planted in both golf’s traditional and frontier territories.
McGinley added: ‘He’s different and that’s okay. Nowadays you get a you get a reputation, and all of a sudden everybody wants to jump on the bandwagon and put a label on you, but I always say, ‘Let him be different’.
‘That’s all part of being a human. We want people coming at it from left field. Padraig Harrington is different but people judge Bryson differently to Padraig. They are both mavericks who are always trying new things. They’re geniuses in their own way.’
The contradiction of DeChambeau is that such a wild, innovative mind is often balanced by a an approach on the course that is often picked at for lacking creativity.
Former European Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley told Mail Sport that the jury is out on star
DeChambeau is not willing to debut new driver he has talked up as an evolution in club science
Taming Augusta would be yet another wild undulation that once seemed improbable for golf’s biggest American enigma
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At Augusta, where the sheer yardage you tick off is less important than the precise spots you choose for your landing, there is a virtue in holding back. For two rounds last year, DeChambeau led in a style many felt beyond him. The image of him uprooting a cross-walk sign and carrying it of his path, fed into the narrative of a second coming.
That major ultimately got away from him, with a second US Open title instead following in June. Since then, he has missed the cut at The Open, gone viral for hitting golf balls over his house and cavorted with President Trump.
Taming Augusta would be yet another wild undulation that once seemed improbable.
