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Seve’s number one, Jon Rahm’s next challenge

Michelangelo Barber

Updated:01/23/2022 00:54h

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When quality jumps unintentionally, you have to look for short-term challenges to avoid getting bored with what to do every day. In the case of any golfer this would be an exaggerated and unrealistic approach, but when it comes to Jon Rahm you have to completely change the discourse.

Since the last child prodigies who have accessed the big circuits with the charisma of geniuses (Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy) nothing like the Spanish had been seen. In just five years as a professional, he has already managed to win fourteen times on the two tours in which he participates, has won a grand and the European Order of Merit. All this finishing in the top 10 in half of the tournaments in which he participates.

What’s more, He has been number one in the world for 35 weeks., a figure that can be increased gradually as long as he keeps Collin Morikawa away just by being ahead of the American on the days that coincide, physically or from a distance. Three weeks ago both were in Hawaii and there the Basque endured the type without problems (the Californian was second and fifth). Now, things change quite a bit if the faces are not seen physically, since there it depends on the points that each test distributes. The calendar that the Biscayan has designed for this course is focused on the most lucrative and, specifically, this weekend Jon performs on the American Express of the PGA Tour, while Collin does so in Abu Dhabi, of the European. Morikawa needed to win in the desert but his bad tournament makes the Basque sure add another week on the throne.

some new goals

With the aim of winning an already treasured major, for 2022 Rahm has set himself two big goals. Since he no longer has the burden of entering the Olympus of golf, because as he himself recently declared, it began to cause him some pressure (in each one that passed without victory they already told him that he was the best player without a big one), now he can concentrate on other challenges. Aside from the British Open in St. Andrews, he only thinks of keep universal number one The most time possible.

«At first I saw it as a consequence of the work done, because it is not something that you can control directly», he commented in reference to when he first reached the top in the summer of 2020, and now time has made him see it differently. You are already at a level reserved for a select few and can pursue another series of achievements. The most important, being an ambassador of this sport. «I am clear that I am one more link in the chain and if I am in this situation it is because before there have been other stars who have contributed to making golf something important. When I retire, my job is to leave it better than I found it, “he concludes. The mirror in which one looks, out of closeness and devotion, is Severiano Ballesteros. The one from Pedreña broke molds throughout his career and that led him to not be able to capitalize on all his potential as he could have achieved at the moment. He was a pioneer in many aspects, one of them being that Europeans could play without restrictions in America and that golf became a global activity. For this reason, when he broke the myth that the Masters could not be won by those from the Old Continent in 1980 and 1983, the World Cup leaders had to create a ranking to reward good players and that they compete on an equal footing with the Americans.

In 1986 the Sony Ranking was born and the Ballesteros, Greg Norman, Bernhard Langer, Nick Price, Ian Woosnam or Nick Faldo reached the top along with Fred Couples. Unfortunately, the recurrent physical problems of the Cantabrian prevented him from staying there for more than 61 weeks and that is the figure that the man from Barrica now yearns for.

In his constant progression, and in the absence of the ranking being updated this Monday, Jon went on to Vijay Singh two weeks ago and now he is eleven weeks away from overtaking Nick Price already fourteen of Brooks Koepka. Thus, he would enter the top ten ever, a new success in his career, but what really motivates him is reaching sixth place, which Seve still maintains on the list. And then keep looking for other goals. The man from Santander still has five majors to his credit.

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