Fox admits it’s hard to make friends on PGA

Ryan Fox took advantage of one of the ten spots up for grabs in the ‘qualifying’ for the 2024 PGA Tour during the 2023 Race to Dubai. He has no fond memories of his first season across the Atlantic, when individualism and a struggle to make friends were commonplace.

Ryan Fox, statements

Like many non-PGA Tour players who come to the United States from the European Tour, reigning BMW PGA Championship champion Ryan Fox spoke at a press conference in Wentworth, England, on Tuesday about the difficulties he has had in adapting to a circuit that he only really discovered this season as a full member thanks to one of the 10 spots he secured at the end of 2023 via the Race to Dubai.

“It’s really hard,” he sighs from the start. It’s probably harder than I expected. I traveled there with my family for 20 weeks. I’ve been on the road for 30 weeks. When I came home after the Wyndham Championship (missed the cut), I’d only been home for four weeks this year.

So it was really tough at that level.” The 37-year-old New Zealander has yet to play his best golf on the PGA Tour in 2024. Despite making the cut 13 times, he has only had three top-10 finishes, finishing fourth twice (at the Zurich Classic with South African Garrick Higgo) and then the Myrtle Beach Classic and seventh at the RBC Canadian Open.

Still, he secured his 2025 card by finishing 106th in the FedEx Cup, including making all four cuts in the Majors (25th at The Open). “We didn’t have a base camp in the US, I hadn’t done the formalities to get my visa yet.

The competition seemed a lot more intense than I expected. I think last year when I played a little bit there, I played some of the bigger events, but I played really well and I maybe didn’t start out so well this year, and I missed a couple of cuts, but only a couple.

I felt like I had to do a lot more to be in contention, let alone make the cut, and it took me a while to understand that. I was never really in it. I had a couple of decent weeks without it being spectacular. I started to feel more confident in May, June and July…” During this press conference, the Kiwi, son of All Black legend Grant Fox, took the opportunity to mention the case of Scot Robert MacIntyre, who himself had a very difficult adjustment period before winning the RBC Canadian in early June.

The two golfers, who come from the European Tour, supported each other. “We both struggled in the beginning and we didn’t have much fun,” he admits. The week we both had our best week was in Myrtle Beach, where we played the first two rounds together.

I think Bob said to me on the first tee, ‘It’s great to play with someone I can chat to a little bit and know I like a little bit.’ Same for me. We knew each other well, we both finished in the top 10 and he got off to a good start because of that.

He had a little break at home and that gave him a little bit of new energy.” “All that to say, it’s tough out there (in the US). Everyone’s doing their own thing. I don’t know why. I think we both struggled with that.

I travel with my family, so the loneliness away from the golf course wasn’t there, but I still found it hard to make friends. I think the Europeans have kind of come together. It was nice to play a bit of golf with Bob and it’s pretty amazing to see what he’s done at the end of the season. I played with him in the third round in Canada and we had a good time in the last group.”