By Peter Owen
THE biggest challenge facing Travis Smyth, the up-and-coming Aussie professional about to compete in his first major championship, is finding somewhere to play.
The 28-year-old, in the best form of his life and healthier than he’s been all year, plays on the Asian Tour, which is basically in recess until August.
So, Smyth is preparing for this year’s Open at Royal Liverpool by practicing every day at the Beverly Country Club in suburban Chicago, where he lives with his girlfriend Alisa, and trying desperately to chase starts wherever he can.
While his fellow competitors honed their games against the best on the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour and the LIV Tour, Smyth lined up against a field of hopefuls trying to pre-qualify for the US Open.
Missing out on that opportunity, he turned to the Korn Ferry Tour, hoping to pre-qualify for some of its event.
And he’s definitely planning to get to Liverpool earlier than most, to play as many of the courses on England’s north-west coast as he can, and regain his feel for links golf.
Such a light preparation for the world’s most famous golf tournament doesn’t particularly concern Smyth, such is his confidence in his game.
The young Australian burst onto the world scene last year – largely as a result of LIV Golf, which not only gave him an unexpected opportunity to test his game against world-class players, but significantly boosted his bank account.
An outstanding amateur golfer, Smyth turned pro in late 2017 and earned a spot on the Asian Tour the following year by finishing third in Q-School. After a couple of moderately successful seasons, he followed the Asian Tour to the UK in June 2022 where he contested the International Series England.
It was a career-changing moment for the young man from the NSW beach town of Shellharbour, south of Sydney. He finished second, collected $US220,000 and qualified to play in the first LIV tournament in London the following week.
There, things got even better for a man whose only other tournament win had been the 2017 Northern Territory PGA Championship. He shot 10-over-par in that 54-hole event at the Centurion Club, earning prizemoney of $US146,000.
But his real stroke of luck was to be named part of the group – which included Peter Uihlein, Richard Bland and Phacara Khongwatmai – that finished second in the team’s event, returning him another $US375,000.
Do the sums. That’s $US521,000 for the Centurion event, on top of the $US220,000 he earned the previous weekend in the International Series tournament – $US741,000 for seven days’ golf.
Smyth went on to play another two LIV events – at Portland and Bedminster in the US – where he finished 29th and 22nd, and collected another $US300,000.
He invested the prizemoney back into his career – flying business class rather than economy, staying in comfortable hotels rather than backpackers, paying his coach Dean Kinney enough so they could spend more time together, and securing the services of an expert team.
“It just took a huge financial pressure off my back,” he said. “I’ve used a fair chunk of money to put that team environment around me.”
The plan paid off almost immediately.
With Kinney on his bag, Smyth won the Asian Tour’s Yeangder TPC in Taiwan last September, picking up prizemoney of $US126,000. So far, in 2023, he’s been sixth in the Saudi International, seventh in the Qatar International and third in the World City Championship in Hong Kong, a performance which earned him his spot on the Open field.
He’s now in the top 10 of the Asian Tour Order of Merit.
Those performances came during a period when Smyth was suffering ill health – continual flu-like symptoms, head colds and body aches that left him tired and run down, a condition he puts down to a combination of frequent air travel and poor nutrition.
“Getting access to decent food can be tough sometimes,” he said. “I’ve been surprised, really, that I’ve played well because I’ve felt really average in almost all of my events.”
He consulted Sydney-based gastroenterologist Dr Pran Toganathan, who put Smyth on a high protein diet that immediately paid dividends.
“I’ve been feeling much better for the last two or three months,” he said.
After the Open, which will be played at Royal Liverpool at the end of July, Smyth will remain in the United Kingdom for the Asian Tour’s International Series England, at Close House from August 17, and the St Andrews Bay Championship, at Fairmont St Andrews, the following week.
He’s looking forward to playing the Australian Open and Australian PGA at the end of the year, and has plans to contest the Korn Ferry Q-School tournaments.
Smyth sees his future in the US, ultimately on the PGA Tour, where the thought of competing against the world’s best golfers appeals to this confident young man.
“And after living in Australia and making all those long flights to compete, how good would it be to just hop onto a domestic flight to get to the next tournament?” he said.
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