In most cases, the champion of a PGA Tour event is one of the favorites the following year when he comes back to defend. He finds the course favorable and has wonderful memories of the week and holding a trophy aloft.
But that’s not the case for Austria’s Sepp Straka this week as he prepares to defend his 2025 Truist Championship.
Straka shot a 16-under-par 264 and earned his fourth and most recent PGA Tour title at last year’s tournament. But due to the fact that Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, N.C. hosted the 2025 PGA Championship, the regular tour stop was moved to the Philadelphia Cricket Club, where Straka defeated Justin Thomas and Ireland’s Shane Lowry by two strokes.
Straka then missed the cut by one stroke at the PGA Championship.
But Quail Hollow may play very different from a year ago, when soggy conditions took over the 7,583-yard layout. Straka would welcome a firm course and he may get his wish.
“When the greens are firm here it’s really tough,” Straka said. “Your landing spots get really, really small into the green. It puts an even bigger premium on hitting fairways because trying to get up and down on these greens when it’s firm is really hard to do. It just puts a premium on ball-striking, not necessarily to make birdies, but just to give yourself some easy pars. Yeah, it can play really tough. We’re expecting a little bit of weather I think on Thursday, so hopefully it doesn’t rain too much because I think everybody playing loves a good, firm golf course.”
Straka did tie for eighth at the 2024 event, when Rory McIlroy shot a final-round 65 to win by five strokes. He recalls that his ball-striking was very on-point that weekend.
“I was hitting the ball very well, especially my long irons,” Straka said. “I’m not one of the longer hitters, and length is a huge advantage on this golf course. … Playing out of the rough from 180 to 220 yards is not fun around this place. Yeah, I think I need to strike the ball well here.
“The good thing is no cut I don’t think this week, right?” he added, referring to the signature event’s no-cut status. “So, yeah, should be able to make the cut this week. So that will be nice.”
The 33-year-old is winless this year, but has made eight of 10 cuts and ranks 11th in the FedEx Cup race. But he knows his ceiling is much higher.
“I haven’t really felt like I’ve put together a really good tournament,” he said. “I’ve had good results, but I never really felt like I was playing great golf all year.
“But I feel like it’s been better here lately,” Straka went on to say. “Short game’s been really good all year. That’s, I feel like that’s kind of held me in there. A lot of times when things aren’t going so good that’s held me in there. So, yeah, I would say ball-striking I would like to see a little more consistency out of. The big thing is the putter is a little slower this year than last year. I feel like last year I made a lot of putts, especially early in the year. So hopefully we can get the putter warmed up and, yeah, have a little more consistency.”
