No time for doubt: Why Open winner Ryan Fox is ‘the fastest player in the world’

SOUTHPORT, England — Ryan Fox needed 22 seconds to figure out how to hit the most important putt of his life.

There was no long-winded deliberation with his caddie. No stomping around to feel the slopes with his feet. Zero double-checking, and definitely no second-guessing. Fox’s routine simply does not allow for that. By the rules, 22 seconds is just over half the amount of time that professional golfers are allotted to prepare for a shot.

Fox didn’t care that the Royal Birkdale’s packed 18th green grandstands hadn’t yet quieted down after applauding his competitor, Sam Burns. Not even 30 seconds was all that was necessary for Fox to commit to a read, get his ball rolling on a solid line and secure the biggest birdie of his career.

So when his putt caught the left lip of the cup and barreled into the hole for the win, Fox, again wasting no time, launched his arms into the air in triumph.

The 154th Open Championship was his — a maiden major victory at 39 years old, a tournament won with no frills. Just pure, athletic, instinct-driven golf.

“I need to make sure this comes across right,” Fox said. “It’s not that difficult to pick a shot and pick a club. I get in there, and it all happens quickly… I just see the shot quickly, pick a shot quickly, and the less time I have to think about it, the less bad stuff can creep in there.”

Fox’s pace of play is the stuff of legend in professional golf circles. His caddie, Dean Smith, declared him “the fastest player in the world.” Jim “Bones” Mackay, the roving NBC commentator with Fox’s group on Sunday, said he has never seen a quicker player in his TV career, and told The Athletic he could barely recite more than Fox’s yardage into his microphone before the ball was struck. Scottie Scheffler has told Fox that when he’s paired with him, he’s so fast that it doesn’t even feel like they’re playing in the same group.

“I can’t work out if this was a burn or a compliment,” Fox joked.

Australia’s Min Woo Lee, a good friend of Fox, said the latter has been a fast player since the day they met, and the most impressive part of his game is that his pace never wavers.

“Even this week I was slowing down just because it was a major, but (Fox) just plays his own game and that’s something that I think everyone can learn off,” Lee said. “When a fast player wins, it’s the greatest thing ever. He has a lot of grit.”

Fox’s see-ball, hit-ball mentality stems from a childhood that didn’t include a whole lot of golf. As a boy raised in Auckland, New Zealand, Fox gravitated toward anything athletic, with sports that required some type of ball being the preference. That’s because it runs in his DNA.

Fox’s father, Grant Fox, is a rugby icon. He played for the All Blacks and competed on the inaugural World Cup-winning team in 1987. Fox’s maternal grandfather, Merv Wallace, played cricket for the New Zealand national team and served as the Test match captain. Fox grew up in a high-achieving sporting household, but didn’t feel the pressure often associated with those types of world-beater families. Instead, his upbringing shaped his natural abilities. It instilled in him the tendency to simply be an athlete. He didn’t start playing golf until he was 13 and only turned professional at 25.

“I see things fast. I was the same when I was playing cricket growing up,” he said. “I played almost every sport growing up, and tennis, I wanted to hit the ball hard, and cricket, I wanted to hit the ball hard. Everything just happened fast. I was never methodical at anything, to be honest, and it just carried over into golf.”

After his round and one-stroke victory over Cameron Young, Fox could only think of one player who plays faster than he does: Renato Paratore, an Italian who famously at least once hit before the first-tee announcer could finish reciting his name.

From afar, golf may seem like a slow, leisurely game. And in many respects, that’s exactly what it is. There are more tools than ever at a player’s disposal, and as a result, players are squeezing the most out of their games — pace of play be damned. The AimPoint green-reading method is one glaring example — a process in which players judge the undulation of the green with their feet.

Slow play issues on tour are ongoing, with players referencing high-level statistical plans and detailed yardage books during rounds, stalling play. It is not unusual to see a player and caddie go in unnecessary circles about wind direction and club selection. Pre-shot routines such as Patrick Cantlay’s foot-shuffling and Brian Harman’s waggles have driven golf fans up a wall.

But throughout the years, many top players have also spoken to the benefit of speed. Brooks Koepka, Matt Fitzpatrick and Ludvig Aberg come to mind as elite players who move throughout their rounds with purpose. The ability to react to the shot in front of you, and hit it with instinctive action — as if you were catching a pass or defending a goal — is oddly effective.

That’s what Fox has tapped into, and taking it to the extreme has propelled his game to major-winning status. He has eliminated the space for doubt in his game. There is a beautiful simplicity in Fox’s strategy: His confidence physically cannot waver. Things move too quickly for that to happen.

“You only really need to concentrate properly for 30 seconds or a minute before hitting a shot, and then you can switch off again,” Fox said. “That’s just the strategy I’ve had going pretty much my whole golf career.”

Fox will pace aimlessly around the putting green, or speak with Smith to avoid overthinking in between shots. He believes there is zero benefit to it, physically and mentally. When the wind switches or an outside factor becomes evident, Fox will back off his shot. But otherwise? “It’s full-throttle,” Smith said.

At The Open this week, Fox said that he and Smith stuck to that principle even more than they normally do. In consultation with his sports psychologist, Karl Morris, Fox said he decided to have fewer discussions with Smith about his club choice, allowing him to better commit to an ultimate decision. Fox also made a concerted effort to breathe, especially on the greens, because his pace can sometimes get the best of him.

“I’m better when I create a shot,” he said. “And creating a shot is almost getting the data off Dean, my caddie, then I make the decision on everything else, and then I verbalise what I’m going to do to him. I did that really well the whole of this week, especially coming down the stretch today.”

On Sunday, Fox walked noticeably farther ahead than his playing partner, Burns, as the pair approached the 18th green amphitheater at Royal Birkdale. He left the throng of cameramen and media members, waiting to see if he would sink that much-needed birdie, in the dust. Some may have assumed Fox seemed anxious or hurried.

Others have faced such an intense career milestone and lost themselves in that way. But that was not the case at all. Fox was just being Fox — speedy, but always steady — not wasting a second en route to glory.

There was never a doubt. He didn’t have time for it.

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