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PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. – Whenever I get near professional golfers, I start to get delusional.
Insane notions enter my head.
When I’m living the grinding, jet-setting PGA Tour life, will I have any pre-tournament weekly rituals? Post pro-am sushi on the eve of every first round, perhaps?
Will I be as engaged with my pro-am group in my 250th tournament as I’ll be in my first?
Will my hand get sore from signing autographs?
What’s the best sushi place in Augusta, Georgia?
Knowing I will probably (there I go again…) never tee it up in a tour event doesn’t stop me from fantasizing, especially when forced to simultaneously consider that professional golfers are a) superheroes, and b) just regular guys.
The exact same golfer I saw briefly struggle to pry open a bag of potato chips in the lobby of PGA National Resort on Wednesday afternoon, I saw lace long, majestic tee shots down the fairways of The Champion Course like it was nothing on Thursday morning. The pros: They're Just Like Us™.
Staying onsite during a PGA Tour event is a trip.
As someone who has loved tournament golf since a young age, I have attended relatively few professional golf tournaments in my life. I did get to play in the pro-am for the Bass Pro Legends of Golf, a Champions Tour event, in 2019, but I left town before the tournament began. Other than that, my entire PGA Tour attendance record comprises eight or so appearances in the crowd at TPC River Highlands in my native Connecticut for several Greater Hartford Opens and, later, Travelers Championships. I don’t count the time when I tried to catch a day of the Wyndham Championship and the weather horn blew literally 30 seconds after my wife and I walked through the gate.
The 2024 Cognizant Classic was, therefore, a new experience, and a special one.
How to turn a PGA Tour event into a golf vacation
Several annual tour events take place at resorts, which often welcome overnight guests along with touring pros, caddies, coaches and other support staff throughout tournament week. From Kapalua to Harbour Town (Sea Pines) to Innisbrook to TPC San Antonio (a J.W. Marriott) and more, the PGA Tour calls on several resorts that welcome buddies trips aplenty the other 51 weeks per year. In the past, we have ranked the 10 best golf tournaments to attend as a fan, both for the men and the women.
PGA National, which hosts the Cognizant (previously called the Honda Classic) is a sprawling facility that is so used to welcoming large events that at least at the beginning of the week, that it was tough to tell that a multi-million-dollar golf tournament was happening onsite.
When I arrived on Wednesday, I drove straight up to the resort as one normally would and valeted my car without incident. Skipping over the process of parking offsite and a 10- to 15-minute shuttle ride to the course did not help dissolve my temporary insanity - Yeah, I could get used to this...
After dropping my bags at the front desk, I made the ridiculously easy walk through the hotel to the main gate and meandered out onto the course. Wednesday being pro-am day at most tour events, the atmosphere couldn't have been more casual. Other fans on the course numbered in the dozens. Because there was only one pro in every group (sorry, Mr. VP of Sales, no one's here to watch you hack it around), watching the action from the course is a bit of a patience test.
That said, there is no better spot to introduce a kid to a tournament than Wednesday's waning hours. The golf course becomes a beautiful, emerald park space, and as long as your youngster doesn't sprint inside the ropes, it's ideal. I saw several parents toting kids in strollers, carrying them on their shoulders or walking hand-in-hand with the next generation of golf fans.
If you're a serious golf fan, though, the best place to hang out was the practice facility. There's a lot to take in about how the best golfers prepare for competition. Who is searching for something on the eve of the tournament? Who is just trying to stay loose and maintain an already-high level of confidence? Who is obviously just killing time before dinner?
One of the last three players on the PGA National practice range late Wednesday afternoon was Chan Kim, who seemed to be searching for confidence off the tee. He ended up finding it, finishing in a tie for 28th after playing his best golf over the weekend.
For someone like me who suffers around the greens at times, the short-game area wedged between the driving range and the first tee was a perfect place to spend some quality time. Recent Ryder Cup captain Zach Johnson was back working on 40-yard pitch shots. The structure he maintains through impact with his forearms is a joy to watch. Young Brit Harry Hall meandered over and began his session in an interesting way: by hitting several shots with just his right (trail) hand on the club. He was paying particular attention to the way his wedge interacted with the closely-mown Bermuda turf. Grainy green surrounds on Florida courses can even make pros look silly - perhaps the rest of us should take heed of Hall's process.
The only slight disappointment was that my Wednesday evening pre-dinner stroll around the resort revealed no pros hanging out among overnight guests. I'm sure in years past, I would have found several pros drinking at PGA National's excellent lobby bar, but today's competitors' the-body-is-a-temple approach likely means fewer Wednesday-night cocktails. Still, there was a lively crowd lounging in the resort's recently refreshed (to the tune of $100 million) public spaces and sharing battle stories from the day’s pro-am.
Before dinner at PGA National’s excellent new omakase outpost Sushi by Bou, I chatted with Tyler, a Jupiter local who had taken part in the day’s festivities. He had entered the pro-am on his own and ended up on a team that included Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, as well as pros Min Woo Lee and Nick Dunlap (nine holes each). Tyler's squad ultimately won the competition - not too shabby for a first-ever pro-am experience.
As laid-back as Wednesday felt, Thursday brought the seriousness of game-time golf that makes attending a PGA Tour event exciting, even in the early rounds. I posted up in the Taittinger Champagne lounge behind the 10th tee just after 7 a.m. and felt the crowd swell around me as the 7:40 group of Rory McIlroy, defending champ Chris Kirk and Mexico Open champ Jake Knapp approached. All the featured-group trappings accompanied: Suzy Whaley and Mark Immelman in their ESPN+ headsets, a gaggle of photographers and other inside-the-ropes dignitaries crowded in. The moments after the threesome strode off the tee box after their piped tee shots felt like a great exhalation. It's a sensation one can only really feel at a tour event; very cool.
For as tough as it is to play, I have to give The Champ props as a solid spectator golf course. The compact routing makes it easy to bop between holes, finding a gap along the gallery ropes to get an up-close view of groups striding by. The stadium-style seating around 17 is fun, but my favorite spot was a large platform that enabled the public to look at the action from 12 green, 13 tee and 15 green practically all at once.
Staying at PGA National Resort also had its spectating privileges in the form of a dedicated special-access chalet beside the 18th green for resort officials and guests. It combined a pleasantly air-conditioned manufactured reception room with a covered outdoor balcony providing great views along the Champion Course's exciting finishing hole. An open bar sat in one corner inside, while on the opposite wall, a buffet showcasing PGA National's restaurants' fare on a rotating basis provided plenty of food.
Just before I left to drive home, a waiter laid down a platter of finger-sandwiches consisting of a breaded cutlet of Wagyu steak, lobster and a dollop of caviar, a creation of The Butcher's Club, the resort's over-the-top awesome steakhouse. It was one of the best bites I'll have all year, and a lasting reminder of the somewhat unreal pleasures of visiting a PGA Tour event as an overnight guest.
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