Growth Spurt: Inside the Psychology of the Presidents Cup

So the President's Cup is, is one of two major team events that we have in the sport of golf.

Obviously, golf is primarily an individual sport.

Uh, 40, 50-something weeks per year, the best golfers in the world are playing individually for themselves, right? For, to try to, uh, go compete head-to-head and win tournaments.

And we've got the President's Cup and the Ryder Cup, which alternate years, of, as the big team events.

In my experience of working with players on tour, they love these team events, in part because they spend so much time competing against each other.

Um, but the President's Cup is, is Team USA matched against the world other than Europe.

So whereas the, the Ryder Cup is us versus, uh, Europe, this is everybody else.

And so that's Canada, South America, uh, Mexico, Asia, everywhere other than Europe.

Uh, and the President's Cup started in 1994, and historically, Team USA has done, um, really well in the President's Cup, and we're hoping, of course, that that will continue this year.

But if you wanna tune in, uh, the competition starts on Thursday.

Uh, to give you a little bit of information about the format, there are three primary formats that take place of how they compete throughout the President's Cup, and those are beginning on Thursday.

The, the players will play in a four-ball format.

And so what that means is, um, it's essentially best ball.

So you'll have teams of two and, um, everybody will hit their own ball, but then the better score will win.

Um, and that's why we call it four-ball.

So everyone's playing their own ball, but the best ball will be the one that is the score that is kept.

And so it's all a match play tournament, which means, um, you're competing not to get the lowest score, but to win the greatest number of holes.

So each hole, one of three things could happen.

On the hole, the, the US team could win, the international team could win the hole, or you could half the hole, which means b-the best score-- Both teams get the, the same score, then you half the hole.

But it's a match play format, um, throughout the entire tournament, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

Thursday being four-ball.

Then on Friday we switch to what's called foursomes.

So this is what we call alternate shot.

And this is where a lot of the, the chemistry and communication and a lot of kind of the psychological components that, that we, um, are most involved in really begin to show up, right? And so in a, in foursomes, the way that would work is one of the partners would tee off on the hole and hit the tee shot.

The next, the other partner would hit the next shot, and then whoever had teed off would hit the third shot, if there was a third shot, which on most holes there will be.