Aaron Rai of the United Kingdom looks on from the second hole during the third round of the RBC Heritage at Harbour Town Golf Links, on April 15, in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, the United States. (AFP/Getty Images/Andrew Redington)
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ntry into the most demanding golf tour in the world is reserved only for the few who are determined, gritty and gifted. The 28-year-old Englishman Aaron Rai is one such player who has successfully endeavored to reach the PGA Tour.
He finished in the top-100 in the Fedex Cup points list, his rookie 2021-2022 season earning US$1.3 million. Rai is of Indian descent; hails from Wolverhampton, the United Kingdom; and is currently contending in his second full season on the PGA Tour.
His journey to golf is fascinating in that it began by accident. At age four, he struck himself in the head with his brother’s field hockey stick. “To stop me from doing it again, my mum went to buy a plastic stick, which turned out to be a plastic golf club, and I was just obsessed with it,” he says.
He then went on to win his first tournament in the UK at age four. He secured his PGA Tour card for the 2021-22 season after finishing high enough on the money list in the PGA Tour’s feeder Korn Ferry Tour.
He has won twice in the past on the European Tour including his most-recent win at the 2020 Scottish Open, overcoming fellow British Tom Fleetwood in a playoff. Rai stands out on the PGA Tour since he wears two gloves when playing.
“It started when I was eight years old,” he explains. “I just happened to be given these two gloves. The guys who actually makes them sent a pair over. Then a few weeks down the line my Dad forgot to put the two gloves in the bag so I had to play with one. It was terrible! I couldn’t play. I couldn’t feel the grip, so I’ve always stuck with the two gloves ever since.”
Rai has a likeable, unassuming manner about him. As I followed him at the recently concluded RBC Heritage in Hilton Head where he finished 48th, he acknowledged fans for applause even when finishing a hole with a less-than-desired result. In frustrating instances such as these, most Tour players would just ignore the fans. In search of his first PGA Tour win, Rai is currently positioned 86th in the Fedex Cup rankings after the RBC Heritage event, with three top-25 finishes including one top-10 finish at the Houston Open.
He posted a noteworthy 19th-place finish in the high-profile Players Championship. He scored a spectacular hole-in-one in the third round on the iconic, par-3, 17th hole featuring an island green.
"Hit it great, looked great in the air and very pleased to see it go in. That was an incredible moment," he said about the feat. Rai also made Players Championship history that day becoming the first man ever to play the last three holes in four under par.
He realizes there is a great need for improvement in his game, specifically his short game. Although he has made 13 out of 17 cuts so far this season (earning $1.1 million), his play on the weekend leaves a lot to be desired. He was tied for fourth after the third round of the Players Championship, and as mentioned earlier finished in 19th place. In the recently concluded RBC Heritage, he was tied for 30th before falling all the way down to 48th place after shooting a disappointing three over par 74 in the final round.
When asked if improving his weekend play involves mechanical or mental adjustments, he responded: “I think it’s a little bit of both for sure. I’m not playing quite as freely over the weekend either; outside of my mechanics, that’s something that’s a little bit off right now, that’s something we’ll have to try and figure out, something in the past that I’ve felt very comfortable with toward the back end of tournaments, but yeah more recently something that I haven’t been quite as good at, the good thing is we’re putting ourselves in good positions but there’s still a lot of room for improvement.”
The fact that he is of Asian Indian background is not lost on him either. “Seeing men from an Indian background, like Jeev Milkha Singh and SSP [Shiv Chawrasia], competing on the European Tour was definitely memorable for me because naturally you are drawn to someone who is of your ethnicity, doing something you aspire to do.”
He is currently in stable standing on Tour but working on taking the next steps to determine what his true potential is against the best in the world.
The good news is he appears to have a grasp of the elements holding him back and is fully aware that overcoming these will take his game and results to a much-desired level.