First-tee jitters? Justin Thomas guides rookie through intense nerves - Golfweek

MEDINAH, Ill. – Justin Thomas will never forget handling first tee jitters at his Presidents Cup debut in 2017. He was partnered with Jordan Spieth, who had been there, done that two times already and told him that it was Thomas’s call as to whom would hit the opening tee shot in their foursomes match.

“We were walking to the tee, and I'll never forget walking over that bridge and seeing that horseshoe and the vibration and just the hair, and I just (said), ‘I'll go. I'm going to go.’ He's like, ‘You got it, you're good.’ He knew exactly what I was feeling and what I was going through, and that's why he was a great partner,” Thomas said. “It's a bizarre feeling that's hard to explain, but it's pretty sweet.”

Nearly a decade later, Thomas, 33, is the savvy vet paired with 21-year-old rookie Jackson Koivun, the second-youngest American to compete in the Presidents Cup, and dishing out advice on how to handle the nerves of the opening tee shot and beyond.

“I told him you're going to feel some things you've never felt before,” Thomas said. “You're going to be really nervous. I'm going to be really nervous. Everybody out here this week is going to have a lot of shots and a couple in particular that you — it's like a borderline out-of-body experience. I know a lot of other 21-year-olds would kill for that feeling. It's going to be great.”

Koivun has experience representing the U.S. in international team play as a competitor at the 2025 Walker Cup, the amateur version of the Ryder Cup, but the entire crowd at that event likely could fit into the stadium-style buildout at this week's first tee, where upwards of 3,000 singing, cheering, and delirious fans will make players feel like a couple of gladiators rolling in to battle.

“It's always nerve-wracking, right?” said fellow U.S. team member Collin Morikawa. “I think the buildouts get bigger every year. The entrance just gets that much more exciting and nervous, and you feel it, right? You almost want to get there a couple minutes early to calm yourself down … But it's always an exciting memory to have, especially once you hit that first tee shot.”

And the first hole at Medinah Country Club’s No. 3 course, located west of downtown Chicago, is no gentle handshake, either. A par-4 measuring 489 yards, the opening hole features a split-rail fence running down the left as an out-of-bounds threat. Tree clearance during a redesign completed in 2024 has allowed for a fairway that now swings out to the right before doglegging back to the left and is divided by a centrally placed bunker. A cavernous bunker protecting the right of the green means an approach shot from the left is preferable, but the out-of-bounds fence again sits tight to that side, making it a riskier tee shot.

“You got fence on the left, rough on the right, bunkers right there. It's one that you're going to really have to pay attention to,” Morikawa said. “You definitely can't cheat it around that hole. You're going to have to hit two good shots to give yourself a look at birdie.”

Nico Echavarria, a rookie on the International Team, may have put it best: “The tough tee shots at the start, you just have to suck it up and hit a good one. The first three holes are very challenging, but it's also good there's a lot of variety of what could happen on a hole. You could win with pars, but you could also make birdies. I think it's probably the best three starting holes I've ever played.”

Part of the reason for the intimidating start at Medinah this week has to do with the re-routing of the course. For the Presidents Cup, the traditional fifth hole plays as the first and continues from there with the traditional fourth hole serving as the 18th. There is method to this madness – at least on paper. Data shows that fewer than 40 percent of team match-play matches reach the 18th hole, with many ending on the 15th or 16th. In this case, the sequencing guarantees that players contest the course’s most risk-reward and treacherous holes, many of them lining Lake Kadijah.

American Patrick Cantlay, who is playing in his fourth Presidents Cup, took a different view of Medinah’s opening stretch this week, calling the trouble “not a big deal.” 

“There's plenty wide fairway out to the right,” he said of the first. “We play all sorts of holes that have trouble, whether it be water or even trees that were dense.”

U.S. Captain Brandt Snedeker still remembers his debut in international team competition here at Medinah in 2012 fondly, and the words of wisdom that his partner, Jim Furyk, next year’s U.S. Ryder Cup captain and a vice captain for Snedeker this week, offered him. 

“I kept thinking no matter what I do, I'll never hit it as straight as he does; this is not going to go well. So every time I hit a tee ball, I was freaking out a little bit,” Snedeker remembered. “Jim was great. He kind of put me under his wing and told me, hey, just go be you. Don't try to play golf like I play golf. Go play your style of golf. That's the challenge of these team events.” 

Adam Schupak is a senior writer for Golfweek, covering the PGA Tour and the business of golf.