Viraj Madappa qualified for LIV Golf after finishing T-6th in the International Series England
Viraj Madappa, the only Indian to qualify for the first ever LIV series event, finished 31st at the Centurion Golf Club, to pick up his biggest ever paycheck of US$ 156,000 (₹1.2 crores), which exceeds his total season earnings in any previous year. The 25 million USD event was a 54-hole no cut event with guaranteed paychecks for all 48 invited players.
Madappa, who has a 100% cut made record in 11 events in 2022, said, “I’ve been playing well, even at the International Series at Slaley Hall and had a good form coming in this week. I was happy with where my game was at, I played okay through the week, could have played much better. Getting into the LIV event itself was a bonus.”
Madappa recalled that on the last few holes at Slaley Hall, he wasn’t sure if he was close to qualifying for LIV event and added, “I actually didn’t know coming down the stretch that I was close to qualifying, as I had completely forgotten that the top-finishers will get a chance to play the LIV event.” Madappa was excited to get into the elite field with major champions, former World No.1’s and said, ” it’s something that every golfer aspires to be at events people want to be in”.
Prior to this Madappa has played at the Saudi International, where Dustin Johnson, Graeme McDowell and Phil Mickelson have been a regular and he knew the level of golf that was required. Talking about the Centurion course, and his week, he added, ” The golf course specially suited my game, it was tree line, little long, and a little windy, and am better at flighting it down, so the conditions were suited to my game and honestly I don’t feel like I played the best, a little disappointed with the way I played, should have scored better. I gave myself a lot of chances, but made too many mistakes off the tee, to be able to be in contention this week.”
Viraj rejoiced his week in London and shared that, “the atmosphere, the treatment was unbelievable through the week. The vibe on the range was unreal, they had spectators who could come as close as 10ft to the players, music playing continuously, grand stand as the viewing deck of the range, which was amazing to see.”
The golf world would have somewhat liked the shotgun start, the new format tried by LIV Golf, but Madappa is still trying to get used to it, as he felt, “it was little weird, because we are so used to knowing, when you make the turn at 9, but sometimes I only had like two holes to the turn. We were driving out, waiting for like 20-25 mins, that is something what we are still getting used to, but golf wise it didn’t feel too different.”
The LIV event saw close to 100,000 spectators per day and Viraj personally prefers noisy crowd ” the UK crowds are also pretty loud. On Friday and Saturday, a lot of people turned up, lot of noisy people too, which was nice to see there. It’s a different vibe to what we normally get from the quiet, proper crowd, and I personally like when it gets noisier.”
Madappa, when asked about the future of LIV Golf, added, “It all received positive reaction from the players and will be exciting to see how this all turns out. Being the first one, it was positive and I think they will get to know exactly how things fare and with new additions like Bryson DeChambeau, the field is getting more and more stacked.”
The 2011 Masters Champion, Charl Schwartzel, shot 65-66-72 (7-under 203) to win the event by a shot over his South African teammate Hennie Du Plessis, who shot 66-68-70 (6-under 204). Schwartzel picked up over US$ 4mn for the individual title and US$ 750,000 as his share of the US$3 million team prize to be split among the four team members. The other members of the team, all South Africans, were Du Plessis, Branden Grace and Louis Oosthuizen.
Schwartzel, who has two PGA Tour wins alongside 11 victories on the European Tour, recorded his first individual victory anywhere since the 2016 Valspar Championship on the PGA Tour.
Madappa, qualified for the event by finishing sixth at the Asian Tour’s historic first ever event on European soil, the US$ 2mn International Series England, a week earlier in Newcastle.
Credits:-
Photo – Asian Tour