Chris Kirk insists that fixed reminders about his battles with alcoholism and psychological well being points take nothing away from his resurgence again to PGA Tour success.
Kirk made a profitable begin to the 2024 marketing campaign with victory at The Sentry, the primary of the PGA Tour’s signature occasions, the place he birdied two of his 4 final holes to say a one-shot win over Sahith Theegala in Hawaii.
The 38-year-old’s victory is his sixth PGA Tour title and second as many seasons, having beforehand needed to step away from the game for almost seven months in 2019 to deal with his off-course struggles.
“I hope it [the recovery journey] stays with me forever,” Kirk informed reporters after his victory. “It’s a huge part of my life still now. Definitely the best thing that I’ve ever done in my life is to get sober.
“I do not really feel prefer it’s taking away from something that I am carrying out. It is 100 per cent the explanation why I can do what I do.
“I’ve said that a lot, but there would be – my PGA Tour career would have been over a while ago, had I not gotten sober. So, yeah, I’m fine with that staying with me for until the day I die.”
The autumn and rise of Kirk
Kirk reached as excessive as world No 16 after profitable the Colonial Match in 2015, his fourth PGA Tour victory, then struggled for kind within the following years earlier than asserting his “indefinite leave” from the game in Might 2019 to start out “a new and better chapter” in his life.
He dropped out of the world’s prime 500 till a win on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2020 on the King & Bear Traditional began his rise again up the rankings, with a runner-up end on the Sony Open the next January – the final begin on his main medical extension – then seeing him regain his PGA Tour card.
The American certified for the FedExCup Playoffs that season and the next yr, earlier than ending his eight-year winless run on the PGA Tour by beating Eric Cole in a play-off on the 2023 Honda Traditional.
Kirk’s win places him because the early chief within the FedExCup standings and earns him $3.6m (£2.8m), plus ensures an invitation to The Masters and can see him function in all the majors once more this yr.
“I had it [enjoyment for golf] for a long time and then lost it,” Kirk defined. “I lost the joy of most things in life for a while there, but yeah, it’s certainly back.
“I believe I simply love how laborious that is. Like, it is so laborious to be nice at this and I like the method that it takes. I like the work that it takes to attempt to be one of the best model of myself.
“I definitely have fallen back in love with that process and sometimes you get rewarded for it, like today [Sunday] and sometimes you don’t. That’s just part of the deal. I think to be successful and to really enjoy your life as a PGA Tour player you’ve got to love the work.”
Kirk was recognised final yr with the PGA Tour Braveness Award, an accolade given to an individual who has overcome extraordinary adversity to make a big and significant contribution to the sport of golf, with the brand new world No 25 happy with how he has tackled his sickness.
“It certainly has been helpful and beneficial to me to be open and public about it,” Kirk added. “I live a decent amount of my life sort of in the public view, somewhat anyways,
“The biggest thing for me was waking up every morning and looking at myself in the mirror and knowing that I’ve got nothing to hide, and I can be proud of who I am. So, I didn’t feel like that was really going to be quite as possible if I was not open about it.
“It was extra of simply the liberty of not mendacity to myself and mendacity to different individuals, that is what it was. There may be some sense of accountability there, for positive, however, yeah, it is undoubtedly extra about simply feeling free for the primary time in a very long time.”
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