Augusta National Golf Club opened in 1932 but in every regard, it is a state-of-the-art facility.
AUGUSTA, Ga. — Augusta National Golf Club opened in December of 1932, and it may look like everything has been there for decades, but in every regard, it is a state-of-the-art facility.
When rain falls in Georgia and threatens to make conditions too soft, the club can fight back by turning on a SubAir system to remove the water and keep the course playable.
SubAir Systems, LLC, is based just north of Augusta, Georgia, in Graniteville, South Carolina. Its main product is comprised of a series of pumps and blowers that connect to the drainage system below greens.
To work properly, the underground drainage system needs to be constructed as a “USGA spec green,” with a main pipe running along the fall line of the green with a series of lateral tributary pipes feeding into it. The perforated pipes allow water to enter and flow downhill to an exit area or drain.
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When it is activated, the SubAir system acts like a vacuum and pulls air and water down, into those pipes, much more quickly. This video, created by SubAir in 2010, shows how quickly puddles can disappear.
When the SubAir system is used to pull a lot of water off greens, supplemental pumps and drainage mechanisms can be added to pull the water farther away from the green and release it in areas away from play.
A SubAir system working at Augusta National Golf Club. (Photo: Golfweek)
When a SubAir system is switched to pressure mode, it forces air into the pipes and up, into the soil and root systems of the grass. This can help to control the temperature of the greens without interrupting play.
When the pumps are running, they create a dull, humming sound that is reminiscent of what you hear inside a plane when the engines are running.
The first green to have a SubAir system installed under it at Augusta National was the 13th green in 2001, but all 18 greens now have it. There are even SubAir systems in many crosswalks to keep them from getting too slippery for the patrons as they walk around the course.
Several other golf courses also have a SubAir system now, including Pebble Beach Golf Links, the site of the 2023 U.S. Women’s Open.
The Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets recently had SubAir systems installed on their baseball fields, and several professional and college football teams have SubAir systems on their practice and game fields.
All of Dustin Johnson’s 24 PGA Tour and major championship victories over the years.
Dustin Johnson is a straight-up winner.
The Coastal Carolina product turned pro in 2007 and has won every year since on the PGA Tour, except in 2014, where he still earned six top-10 and four top-5 finishes.
Johnson won his first major in 2016 at the U.S. Open at Oakmont and second at last November’s Masters. He also has six World Golf Championship wins, as well as six FedEx Cup playoff event titles. He’s also a two-time winner of the Saudi International in 2019 and 2021.
Take a scroll through Johnson’s career wins on the PGA Tour, ranging from the 2008 Turning Stone Resort Championship to the 2020 Masters.
(Editor’s note: This is the final piece of a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson.)
Given his enormous physical gifts, Dustin Johnson could shun the weight room and practice ground and likely still make do against the best pro golfers in the world.
Especially since one of his favorite hobbies is to kick back and float down a waterway. But when it comes to his occupation, the reigning Masters champion and world No. 1 eventually learned work isn’t a four-letter word.
“Dustin is freakishly athletic,” said David Winkle, Johnson’s agent his entire professional career. “I think it was a little bit of a curse early in his career that he was so athletic that he probably gets three or four hours of benefit out of an hour’s work of time.
“He became an extremely hard worker about four or five years ago and took his focus and his dedication to a new level. That’s when he made the leap from being a top-10 player in the world to being the best player in the world.”
About a decade ago, Johnson met uber trainer Joey Diovisalvi – Joey D as he’s better known – and gradually increased his workload in the weight room and on the practice range. Now he’s a beast in the gym and a machine on the range.
“He’s just big and strong with athleticism oozing from every angle,” Diovisalvi said. “I’ve been with him everywhere and the perception doesn’t match the reality.
He works as hard on the driving range as he does in the gym and he works as hard as he can. He puts in hours out there and sometimes too much.
“His work ethic is off the charts even though his talent is off the charts.”
Johnson discovered there are a lot more fruits that come with the labor and despite reaching the summit of golf – world No. 1, two-time major winner, FedEx Cup captain, future inductee into the World Golf Hall of Fame, reigning Masters champion – he isn’t about to put his feet up and lighten up.
“Having the success I’ve had, the feeling I get when I win, especially a major, all those things make my family proud and drive me to continue to work hard and continue to try and be the best I can,” Johnson said. “And I like being the best.”
Getting there included two pivotal discoveries.
The first took a few years to come to fruition. When Johnson started working with Butch Harmon in 2009, the coach quickly preached that Johnson should master the fade. Up until then, Johnson relied on a draw that much of the time he couldn’t control. As Lee Trevino said, you can talk to a fade but a hook won’t listen.
“We would work on it every practice session but he wouldn’t put it in play in a tournament. He just didn’t have the confidence. Try as I did, it took a while to catch on,” said Harmon, whose son, Claude, regularly works with Johnson while the elder Harmon stays in touch from afar. “And then one day he called me and he said, ‘Hey, Butchy, I was just playing today and I decided I was going to hit fades off every tee and man I drove it good. I think I’m going to play that way.’
“And I just laughed and said, ‘Yep, that’s a good idea.’”
That was in 2015 when Johnson was testing equipment
“It wasn’t like I couldn’t hit a cut,” Johnson said. “But if I had to cut one around a tree or something like that, it took me a while to trust it. Then when I was testing equipment, I hit a couple of cuts on the range and it felt really good. So the next three days I played and hit nothing but cuts.
“That was all she wrote.”
A few months later, another foundational moment occurred. At the 2016 Northern Trust Open at Riviera Country Club north of Los Angeles, Johnson won the morning wave of the pro-am with Janet Gretzky and Tristan Gretzky, his fiancée’s mother and younger brother.
Instead of celebrating, Johnson went to the range. There he hooked up with reps from TrackMan, a launch monitor that provides precise analytics concerning what a golf ball does after being hit.
At the time, Johnson was a middling wedge player. More harshly, it was a weakness, especially when he lived in the 50- to 150-yard range.
“He was leaving so many shots out there,” Winkle said. “If he could become even a medium-range wedge player, game over. He spent hours that day and then turned to me and said, ‘Wink, order me one of these.’”
It came in the mail three weeks later, and Johnson quickly developed a system where he’d spend hours working on half-, three-quarter and full shots with his wedges. Now he’s one of the best wedge players in the game.
“I knew I had to really work on my wedge game,” Johnson said. “Now I’m never surprised with whatever number I have to the green. I probably practice like 80 percent of my time on wedges.
“It took me a long time but as you get older, you figure out some things.”
(Editor’s note: This is Part VI in a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.)
The brilliance of Dustin Johnson is his uncluttered mind.
While many fellow pros can go on and on about course management and others can talk endlessly about the complex principles of the golf swing, Johnson’s simplistic approach to life and putting the golf ball in the hole does just fine.
He isn’t about to sit down with the Mad Scientist, Bryson DeChambeau, and converse about the relationship between mass and velocity or do a deep dive on air density and local slope adjustment. And he doesn’t have much to say about the psychology of handling the game’s mind-numbing disturbances.
But because of his unwavering and carefree demeanor, a few infamous gaffes over the years on the golf course and his distant appearance during press conferences – where he often responds to long-winded questions with brief frankness – many tend to question his intelligence.
He has served as a punchline for followers on Twitter, been disrespected by the media at times and even disrespected by a few of his colleagues. Thus, despite winning a U.S. Open and last November’s Masters, collecting 22 other PGA Tour titles as well as a FedEx Cup, and reaching No. 1 in the world, his mind is rarely credited as a strength.
Well, as the English idiom goes, don’t judge a book by its cover.
“People don’t think he’s the smartest guy in the room and I think it’s because he’s got the southern drawl and he kind of talks slow, but that’s just how he talks and if it makes him sound maybe not the smartest, then so be it,” said 2007 U.S. Amateur champion Colt Knost, who roomed with Johnson the first year they turned pro. “He might not be book smart but he’s smart. And he’s like Rain Man when it comes to his golf IQ. I’ll bet you he can go through and tell you every shot he hit last year on the PGA Tour.
“He knows what’s going on, he knows how to manage his game now as good as anybody, he knows what he’s looking for in his equipment and he knows a lot about the golf swing even though he doesn’t let on that he does.
“Sounds pretty smart to me.”
Johnson just shrugged when asked if he’s bothered by the unflattering perception that he isn’t the sharpest tool in the box.
“I don’t know. Don’t really care about what others think,” he said.
Others, however, do care.
“He isn’t stupid. He’s sly like a fox,” said swing coach Butch Harmon, who started working with Johnson in 2009. “He gives a lot of those short answers because he doesn’t want you to bother him. To me, that makes him pretty smart. Now, does he have a lot of book smarts? I don’t know. And he can say some pretty crazy things at times, but he is not dumb.
“He understands his game and he understands what he’s good at and he understands what to do in the heat of the battle. He’s matured golf-wise and he’s become an incredibly intelligent player. That was one of Tiger’s great strengths – he knew when to be conservative. DJ has come to understand that.”
David Winkle, Johnson’s longtime agent, brought up the time six years ago when TaylorMade brought together their heavy hitters including Johnson, Jason Day, Justin Rose and Sergio Garcia for a few days of photo and video shoots. There also was a psychological profile examination with 144 questions.
“They wanted to get into the mind of a champion,” Winkle said. “And the expert who was analyzing the responses said there was one guy who has an innate ability to go into a cocoon of concentration like nothing he has ever seen.
“And it turned out to be Dustin’s profile. He gets into depths of concentration at times where he turns it on and turns it off, whether he’s ordering fast food or coming down the last hole of the Masters.”
Johnson’s state of mind certainly played into his record-smashing victory in the 2020 Masters. He dialed back his aggression when needed, trusted his top-flight precision and didn’t buckle in the final round when his lead nearly vanished and another tragic ending – such as his three-putt from 12 feet on the 72nd hole of the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay that cost him a chance at the title – seemed imminent.
“I think other than Jack and Tiger he has one of the greatest golf minds in competitive history,” said Claude Harmon, Johnson’s regular swing coach and son of Butch Harmon. “When he missed that putt at Chambers Bay and was walking off the green in ’15, and I would have told you all that would have happened from that point onward to here, would you have believed it? The scars are too deep, he’s never going to come back from that, all that.
“He’s just a very unique golfer. If you could design a golfer, you’d design him; no memory, just freak athlete, and we’re seeing an incredible amount of maturity from the last time that he won a major.”
Four-time major champion Rory McIlroy was equally impressed. McIlroy said he thinks Johnson has one of the best attitudes toward golf in the history of the game.
“And when he wants to engage with you and have a proper conversation about whatever topic it is, he can have it,” McIlroy said. “He just would rather not have it with you guys (media). That’s basically what it is. He saves that for his inner circle and the people he trusts and the people that he likes.
“When you are friends with him and you spend a lot of time with him, he’s much more engaging than a lot of people think.
“And he’s basically done everything there is to do in the game, and he’s done that by basically changing his game after turning pro. That’s a huge compliment. Not a lot of people can do that.”
Dustin Johnson and his brother Austin have been running together for 30 years. Now they’re among the strongest partnerships on the PGA Tour.
(Editor’s note: This is Part V in a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.)
Dustin Johnson wasn’t looking for a new caddie when he found the perfect bagman in the Land Down Under: his younger brother, Austin.
“He knows me better than anyone,” Dustin said. “And I can trust my brother 100 percent. Besides myself, no one wants me to win more than him. It’s cool to have that trust and that type of relationship out there with me.”
While Johnson turned pro in 2007, it wasn’t until the fall of 2013 that Johnson & Johnson became a team. The Johnsons were on a working vacation in Australia and Dustin’s fiancée, Paulina Gretzky, suggested that Austin take up the role of caddie for the Perth International. So Austin caddied for the first time and Johnson tied for 12th.
After a week of R&R, they headed to China for the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions. Johnson decided against flying out his regular caddie, Bobby Brown, and rolled to victory in Shanghai with Austin.
“He’s been on the bag ever since,” Johnson said.
The two have been running mates now for more than 30 years. While Dustin, 36, is three years older, they were rarely separated on the fields of play growing up. Both were outstanding athletes and fell in love with golf when their father, Scott, a club pro, took them to golf courses and driving ranges on a daily basis during the summer, where the two would spend most every minute of daylight and then sometimes even after nightfall hitting golf balls.
Dustin Johnson, left, and his little brother Austin. (Photo courtesy of Johnson family)
“It was pretty normal, the older brother, younger brother relationship,” Dustin said. “We hung out a lot when we were younger. He was a pretty good athlete but I always beat up on him playing sports because I was bigger.”
Austin wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.
“I guess not all brothers are close, but we’ve always been close,” he said. “We fought like crazy when we were growing up. You could always tell he was way better than all the kids in our area. I was one of the best golfers in my age so it didn’t bother me with him being better than me. It drove me more than anything.”
Colt Knost, who won the 2007 U.S. Amateur and was Dustin’s roommate throughout much of his latter days in amateur golf and his first year as a pro, said the two Johnsons are a perfect match – calm, collected and chill personified.
“Dustin doesn’t need a guy that’s going to jump on him or be intense,” Knost said. “They’re both just like, ‘All right, no big deal, we made a bogey.’”
To Joey Diovisalvi, DJ’s trainer, the two are basically one.
“AJ has an amazingly high golf IQ,” he said. “AJ has this unbelievable sense of commitment to Dustin and himself, where he takes this sense of pride in everything he does on the golf course. As does DJ.
“There is a camaraderie that exists between the two that is sort of an unbreakable bond. They’ve gotten into it a few times but the uniqueness of both of them is they know how to move on from that.”
The caddie switch, however, was met with criticism. The thinking was that the change from an experienced caddie made no sense for the carefree Johnson, whose mishaps on the golf course had started to pile up. He needed a steadying, veteran influence, it was said and written.
But DJ does what DJ does. And the two have teamed for 18 titles, including major triumphs at the 2016 U.S. Open and 2020 Masters.
“I definitely heard all the noise about it being a bad decision, so I just put my head down, forgot the noise and accepted the highs and lows and went to work,” Austin said. “And I knew Dustin had my back.”
Dustin Johnson, left, and his brother Austin. (Photo courtesy of Johnson family)
AJ became a sponge during practice and tournament rounds, gathering up as much information by watching his new caddie colleagues such as Joe LaCava, Jim “Bones” Mackay, John Wood, Scott Vail, Mike “Fluff” Cowan and Mark Fulcher.
“I just learned from the best,” Austin said.
And became one of the best.
“Conservatively, he’s tied for the best on the PGA Tour and he very well may be the best at reading greens,” Mackay said. “That’s a huge thing. It’s so obvious that Dustin relies on him a tremendous amount. Dustin is winning more and he looks way more comfortable doing it with his brother out there.”
Austin has done much more than just read greens. Along with a few others, Austin convinced Dustin to work harder on his wedge play and his older brother found the light in 2016 when he discovered TrackMan, a launch monitor that delivers precise analytics for ball seed, spin rate, carry distance and much more.
“When he first got out there, he was always aggressive, hitting driver on every hole and going for every par 5 in two no matter what,” Austin said. “He didn’t really work on his weaknesses.
“I don’t want to take credit for it but when I got on the bag, I looked at the stats and he was the best driver in the game but he was driving it into his weakness – the wedges. So he started working on his weakness. And he’s gone from back of the pack to middle of the pack and toward the front of the pack with his wedges.
“Now we have a putting system and that’s been working. Now he has a chance to win every week. It’s not rocket science. It’s pretty simple. Attack your weakness.”
The two both say their relationship has strengthened since Austin started carrying the bag and won’t fade anytime soon.
“Our relationship is stronger than when we were kids,” Dustin said. “Having my brother on the bag has been incredible. Just to experience all these experiences with him, to travel the world with him, we play golf all the time, it’s just been really cool to spend so much time with him.
“He’s my best friend and he’s become one of the best caddies on Tour.”
Slipping on the green jacket was a career high for Dustin Johnson but seeing his kids blanketed in that jacket took it to a new level.
(Editor’s note: This is Part IV in a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.)
Dustin Johnson reached golf’s nirvana when Tiger Woods helped him slip on a size-42 long green jacket last November.
It was a fitting scene for Johnson’s record-smashing victory in the 2020 Masters.
A few hours later, his day got even better.
In the massive rental home a short distance from Augusta National Golf Club, family and friends, including fiancée Paulina Gretzky as well as Wayne and Janet Gretzky, began celebrating the triumph. Shortly into the merriment, the two shortest residents stole the show as Johnson’s sons, Tatum, 6, and River, 3, each put on golf’s most coveted garment.
“That was so great, the best. I don’t think I’ve ever been happier (than to) see their reaction to the green jacket,” Johnson said. “They love the green jacket. They were really excited and they were super proud.
“They tell everybody that daddy won the green jacket.”
Johnson met The Great One’s daughter in 2013 and he proposed six months later. A few months after that, Johnson took a six-month sabbatical from professional golf to deal with “personal challenges.”
Helping him on his new path in life were the births of Tatum in January 2015 and River in June 2017. The instant Tatum came into the world, Johnson changed. An overwhelming sense of transformation, love, responsibility and purpose took hold.
“Oh, wow, the kids mean everything in the world to me,” said Johnson, who, as a teen, endured his parents’ bitter divorce. “It’s been absolutely amazing being a father. You have no idea how great it is. You think you know before you have kids, but you have no idea until you become a father. It’s just amazing.”
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Since he returned from his leave of absence, Johnson became No. 1 in the world and won 17 tournaments worldwide, including a major for each of his sons.
“Dustin never came across to me that he would be super excited about anything, but when Tatum came into the world, it completely matured Dustin in a second,” said Johnson’s trainer, Joey Diovisalvi. “People say you’ll never know the feeling of becoming a father until it happens to you, and that happened to him in a very powerful way.
“Watching him raise two boys who are very much like him, and seeing him beyond being overjoyed, is special. He’s beyond committed. He explores things with those boys and they are not sheltered. The beauty about Dustin is everything in his life is about simplicity. He’s not on a clock. Whatever they want to do, he goes and hangs out with the boys.”
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By every measure, Paulina is Johnson’s equal as a parent, her impact on both her fiancé and sons immeasurable.
“Paulina grew up very much in the microscope of the first child of The Great One,” said David Winkle, Johnson’s agent. “She’s very accustomed to being in the family of a professional athlete and being in the spotlight and that helps because she understands what Dustin goes through.
“She loves the boys. She’s a great mother. There is nothing Dustin would rather do than hang with Paulina and those little boys.”
In turn, the boys make Johnson a better golfer. Wayne Gretzky said Johnson’s duty to his sons altered his everyday schedule for the better.
“Fatherhood changes all of us. What it does is it takes away that sort of free time you have, whatever age you are, because you have that commitment when you wake up in the morning,” the hockey icon said. “In Dustin’s case, he knows he has to practice, work out, put in his time for golf, and then he has family time and he loves family time. From what I’ve seen, the birth of his children got him really centered on a schedule that he was not only committed to his golf but he was committed to getting his kids ready for school, taking them to school, being a father and all that entails.
“One of the greatest thrills in his life is taking his boys fishing. He grew up fishing with his father, grandfather, brother, and I think he is truly at peace in those moments he has with his boys.”
Or as Johnson will tell you, he loves nothing more than gathering up the rods and reels and the two boys.
“They love going on the boat so we fish a lot. The first time they caught a fish, to see their excitement on their faces, that was so great,” Johnson said. “And when I saw how much they love to fish, well, I can pretty much fish whenever I want to now. I just say, ‘I’m taking the boys fishing.’
“And they love going to the golf course and hitting golf balls. Or whether we’re just playing around the house, it’s great being with them. They definitely keep you busy. But it’s fun and I wouldn’t change anything for the world.”
A common misconception is that Wayne Gretzky is a golf and life guru for Dustin Johnson. What the two actually have is a long friendship.
(Editor’s note: This is Part III in a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.)
Quicker than the puck hit the net off a slapshot during his iconic NHL career, Wayne Gretzky immediately wanted to make something clear.
“I am not the DJ Whisperer. I’m not some guru or anything like that for Dustin,” the Great One said. “People think I give him advice all the time. I don’t. I’m more like a grandfather, a father-in-law, a big brother. We just talk about the family, the kids, scheduling, TV shows, sports, just things most people talk about.
“We’re friends.”
So, no, Gretzky does not take on the role of Albert Einstein lecturing an entry-level class attended by Johnson. Instead, Gretzky from time to time lays out crumbs that have helped Johnson find higher ground that included becoming No. 1 in the world and his smashing victory in the 2020 Masters.
“I’ve encouraged him to raise the bar, sure, to set higher goals, and I’ve talked to him about the commitment to pay the price to be the best,” Gretzky said. “He’s in his own world in golf and I’m not a golfer by any means, and he was top 10 before we ever met. I’ve never given him a lesson plan.”
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Gretzky, who can hold his own on the golf course as a 10 handicapper, met Johnson in 2012 at a golf skills event for charity. They became much closer when Johnson began dating and then became engaged to Gretzky’s daughter, Paulina. And they’ve been frequent partners in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and playing companions at Sherwood Country Club in California.
“From the beginning I always thought he was a wonderful young man,” Gretzky said. “What fans don’t get is an opportunity to get to really know some of the guys in pro sports and there is a different perception of what people see on TV and what people really are and what they are truly about.
“In Dustin’s case, his demeanor away from the golf course is pretty much identical of what it is on the golf course. He never gets flustered, very easy going, extremely polite and very considerate. He was a joy to be around right from Day 1.”
Johnson said as much about Gretzky. The two hit it off immediately, in large part because they roll at a similar pace, share common interests, are extremely humble and their demeanors are very much alike.
“Wayne’s been great. He obviously has been a big supporter and believer in me,” Johnson said. “Having his support and just being able to spend a lot of time with him has been one of the best things ever. To listen to him, to see how he handles himself and what he did when he was playing and all the things he’s been through and done. That’s some pretty good experience to be around.
“He’s never gone, ‘Hey, Dustin, let’s sit down and talk for a bit.’ We spend a lot of time together talking about a lot of things and we play a lot of golf together. But we don’t talk about me doing this or doing that. There hasn’t been one specific thing he’s told me about something. The time, the quality of time, that we’ve gotten to spend together, means something.”
There was one time, however, when Gretzky made sure to drop some wisdom. One of Johnson’s crushing defeats came at the 2015 U.S. Open when he had a putt to win on the 72nd hole from 12 feet but missed. Then he had a putt from just over 3 feet to force a playoff but missed. He tapped in to complete a demoralizing three-putt and lose by one shot to Jordan Spieth.
“I grabbed him afterward and I told him I knew he wanted to get out of there but he needed to give the media 10 minutes and it would be the greatest 10 minutes he ever did,” Gretzky said. “I told him it’s easy to walk out of here with your tail between your legs, but you’ll be a bigger person and you’ll win over a lot of people by standing there and telling the truth. And tell them how much it hurts.
“And he did it.”
Dustin Johnson on the 18th green in the final round of the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay. (Photo: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports)
At the rental home that night, Johnson let out his emotions. Even though he did his best to put the defeat behind him as quickly as possible, it stung. Then he and Gretzky and a few others boarded a plane that night and headed to Coeur d’Alene in Idaho.
“A bunch of us were going to tee off at 8 a.m. Monday. He told me to wake him up,” Gretzky said. “I wasn’t going to wake him up, come on. He’d just lost the U.S. Open. Well, he was up the next day.”
And played golf with buddies for 21 consecutive days.
“Either you love this sport and have a passion for it, or you don’t. And Dustin truly loves golf,” Gretzky said. “But I told him if I had lost Game 7 of a Stanley Cup final, I promise you I wouldn’t be playing pickup hockey with my buddies the next three weeks.”
Speaking of the Stanley Cup, Gretzky won four of them with the Edmonton Oilers. But not one of those was won on the road. After celebrating Johnson’s Masters triumph last November, a small group of Johnson’s family, team and friends flew to Florida that night. On the flight, Gretzky pulled Johnson aside.
“I told him that one of the dreams I had as an athlete was to win a Stanley Cup on the road,” Gretzky said. “I never did, though. But that night while he’s wearing the green jacket, I told him I felt like I was part of a championship team.
“It was the trip I never got as an athlete. I retired at 39 and I never thought I’d get the feeling again of being part of a winning group. It was so special.”
Johnson said that exchange between the two might be their best one.
“It was awesome. Pretty cool,” Johnson said. “Emotional, too, something I will never forget because he means so much to me.”
In this special edition of Forward Press, Golfweek’s David Dusek chats with Steve Dimeglio about all things Dustin Johnson, from his family and relationships to his golf game, ahead of his Masters title defense next week. This week, DiMeglio is releasing a series of stories on Johnson, the first of which was on his Masters emotions and the second his mental island.
(Editor’s note: This is Part II in a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.)
As Dustin Johnson sauntered up the hill toward the 18th green on Masters Sunday last November, he turned to his brother and caddie, Austin, and asked him where he stood on the leaderboard.
“What do you mean where do you stand?”
Austin then told his older brother that he was five shots clear and just minutes away from polishing off a remarkable, record-setting romp to win the green jacket.
“I told him I could win the Masters from where he was,” Austin said. “And he did the same thing at Oakmont on the final hole on Sunday when he won the (2016) U.S. Open. That’s DJ.”
Yes, through and through, that’s DJ. As much as his video-game physical gifts separate him from most everyone on the planet, his uncanny knack for focusing on the matter at hand or escaping to another world where there is no noise and distraction is pure, enviable genius.
“I call it DJ Island,” Austin said. “I remember so many times that he’d be watching a TV show and I’m having a full-on conversation with him and then he’d just look at me and go ‘What?’ He just has this ability to check out and go to his own little island. It’s him there and no one else. He puts things in the rearview and just looks at the upcoming road. No matter what has happened.
“It’s unbelievable.”
And helpful in the world of golf.
His fleeting memory allows him to move on like no other golfer, no matter how tragic the result. And there have been many soul crushers, starting with the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, where he blew a three-shot, 54-hole lead with a final-round 82. Two months later in the 2010 PGA Championship at Whistling Straits, he grounded his club in a bunker he didn’t think was a bunker on the 72nd hole. The resulting two-shot penalty cost him a spot in a playoff.
In 2011, he was in contention deep into the final round of the Open Championship at Royal St. George’s before he hit a 2-iron out of bounds. In the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay, he three-putted from 12 feet on the 72nd hole and finished one shot behind Jordan Spieth.
Losses like that leave scars and create demons who set up shop between the ears. But not for DJ. Without question, the losses hurt Johnson, some more than others, but they don’t remain haunting – and certainly not lasting – memories.
“I always jokingly use the phrase he was dipped in Teflon at birth,” said David Winkle, Johnson’s longtime agent. “At Chambers Bay, we get in a car to go up to the makeshift clubhouse area and it was about a minute and we get up and he gets out of the car and goes immediately to a place where kids are yelling for autographs and he signs all their stuff.
“We get in the car to leave. And it’s kind of quiet. And Dustin pulls the car over and says, ‘Guys, lighten up. It’s just golf.’ And I thought, good lord. Here we are trying to lift him up and he lifted us up. This guy is unbelievable.
“And I’ll never forget the 2011 British Open. I think he’s devastated. But he walks out of scoring and high-fives me and goes, ‘Best finish in a major, Winky.’”
But that’s the way Johnson has always been.
“Even as a kid or a junior golfer, I’ve always had the ability to get over things right away, especially with golf,” Johnson said. “I don’t know where exactly it comes from, but obviously it’s good for a golfer because there are so many things that happen, and weird things that happen, especially to me.
“At the end of the day, it’s still a game. I love the game. But there is zero I can do to change something that’s already happened. I just keep trying to push forward.”
That’s what he did in the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont, which is an 18-hole migraine-level headache. Johnson, with all his immense talents, had yet to win a major, but he was well within reach of winning his first. And then chaos erupted.
On the fifth hole in the final round, Johnson had a 6-footer for par but his ball moved a hair at address. Johnson knew he didn’t cause the ball to move, the rules official agreed and no penalty was administered.
But as he walked to the 12th tee with a two-shot lead, he was met by USGA officials who told him the incident was being reviewed and he may be assessed a penalty. Thus, Johnson and others chasing the title didn’t know where everyone stood on the leaderboard because the governing body’s determination was on hold.
Dustin Johnson talks with USGA official Mark Newell after Johnson’s ball moved on a green at Oakmont in the 2016 U.S. Open. (Getty Images/David Cannon)
“I don’t think it could have happened to a better player out there. Maybe Adam Scott,” Austin Johnson said. “But Dustin just looked at me and said, ‘I guess we have to win by two,’ and ripped a drive 370 yards. Lee Westwood’s caddie, Billy Foster, had to calm me down. But Dustin just went about his business.
“I still get blown away by what he’s able to do sometimes in situations like that.”
Johnson played the last seven holes in even par, with his towering 6-iron from 191 yards to 4 feet for birdie on the 72nd hole cementing victory. The USGA decided to dock him one stroke, but it proved meaningless as he signed his corrected scorecard of 1-under 69 to finish three shots clear of Jim Furyk, Scott Piercy and Shane Lowry.
“Dustin was the class player of the day,” Foster said. “For the USGA to come out on the 12th tee and say you may or may not have a penalty, I thought was disgraceful. Respect to DJ. That’s why I bowed to him on the 18th hole.”
Paul Azinger, the victorious Ryder Cup captain in 2008 and the 1993 PGA Championship winner, was the lead analyst at the time and called Johnson’s triumph one of the greatest wins in the history of golf.
“When you consider having your gut ripped out the previous year in the U.S. Open at Chambers Bay and then the following year he has to deal with that ruling thing in the final round and he wins, that’s something next level,” Azinger said. “DJ has that intangible. That’s the way Tom Watson was. They put the past behind them and are always moving on. It’s extraordinary.”
DJ’s post-Masters tears revealed a new side of the 24-time PGA Tour champion. But what was behind them? DJ and those closest to him explain.
Dustin Johnson made grown men cry.
The soft-spoken, gentle giant of the south turned the emerald valley of Augusta National Golf Club into his own octagon and battered and bruised not only the field of play but all of his 91 foes last November.
In becoming the first player in Masters history to card multiple rounds of 65 or better in the same tournament – his previous career low had been 67 – the world No. 1 tied the 54-hole scoring record of 16 under after three rounds and then went where no man had gone before by reaching 20 under in the final round and finishing there for a five-shot victory, the largest winning margin since Tiger Woods won by 12 in 1997.
Johnson threw haymakers from the beginning of the 84th Masters, made just four bogeys (the fewest of any champion), and hit 60 of 72 greens. When his lead was trimmed to one after two early bogeys in the final round, it spawned fear another major tragedy was at hand. Instead, he knocked an 8-iron from 185 yards to 6 feet for birdie on the sixth, added another red number on No. 8, then scored again at Nos. 13, 14 and 15 to leave his pursuers with nothing to do but weep and wave a white flag.
His master work was so staggering that Cameron Smith lost by five despite becoming the first player in Masters history to shoot all four rounds in the 60s.
“I proved I could get it done on Sunday with the lead at a major, bro,” said Johnson, who previously had been 0-for-4 with at least a share of the 54-hole lead in a major. “There were doubts, for sure. I was proud of that round. After the bogeys, it wasn’t like I was frustrated. It didn’t bother me. Just had to stay patient and take it to the house.”
While others left the grounds to tend to their wounded souls, Johnson headed to the terrace putting green for the abbreviated closing ceremony. There, Woods, the five-time Masters champion, helped Johnson slip on the 42-long green jacket.
And then Johnson lost it.
The indestructible force who pulverized Augusta National broke down during an interview and as hard as he tried to hold back the tears and collect himself, the waterworks flowed and his words ceased.
“The tears came from all the joy, knowing all the work that went into it, the team around me,” Johnson said. “Being the Masters champion in that moment, I was just so happy and proud. And having (fiancé) Paulina (Gretzky) there and my two boys and the family were across the street, and it was just a special moment. I was at a loss for words. I just couldn’t say anything there for a while.
“It’s still kind of a little surreal when I see the jacket and know I’m a Masters champion. All the memories come back.”
It was an understandable outburst of emotion. Growing up across the Georgia-South Carolina border on the outskirts of Columbia, about an hour’s drive from Augusta, the Masters was his Holy Grail. He went to Masters practice rounds with his dad before he turned 10, played the course for the first time in 2008, played in his first Masters in 2009. And long into the nights of his youth, he was making putts to win the Green Jacket.
“The Masters will always be in my heart, with the history and growing up so close,” Johnson said. “It’s pretty cool when a childhood dream comes true.”
There was more behind the tears than a childhood dream fulfilled. Johnson thought of the heartache he endured in squandering victory in five previous majors, some with tragic tones attached. And he was just two months removed from the most recent major disappointment when his one-shot 54-hole advantage in the PGA Championship at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco vanished as Collin Morikawa raced by everyone.
Or the time he rolled down Magnolia Lane in 2017 having won his last three starts but was forced to miss the Masters after he slipped and fell and injured his back in his rental home.
He thought of the six-month sabbatical in 2014 he took from the PGA Tour to deal with “personal challenges” and how he worked to overcome them. Since then, he’s won 16 of his 24 PGA Tour titles, including two majors.
Put all that together and Johnson let his guard down on this rare instance and let the world see what only a few of his closest friends and family had seen.
“I was surprised that he cried and lost it,” said younger brother and caddie, Austin. “I’ve seen him get emotional about other things but not golf. But that tournament means so much to him. It humanized him a bit and everyone else got to see that.”
Colt Knost, the 2007 U.S. Amateur champion who played a bunch of amateur golf with Johnson and later roomed with him on the road the first year they turned pro, was moved by Johnson’s victory and post-round interview.
“I started crying when I saw him cry,” Knost said. “He’s got the biggest heart in the world and he’ll do anything for anyone that’s in his circle and those tears show you how much that tournament means to him and how much working his butt off to be the best means to him.”
The Masters masterpiece also came a month after Johnson spent 11 days in quarantine in a Las Vegas hotel after testing positive for the coronavirus. Johnson, as is his nature, dealt with it and moved on without missing a beat.
The Masters capped a 13-tournament, post COVID-19 tour de force to end 2020 in which he won four times, including the Tour Championship that earned him the FedEx Cup, and an 11-stroke romp in the Northern Trust where he shot 60 in the second round and finished at 30 under. He also finished runner-up three times.
The victory solidified his perch atop the world rankings; he’s now spent more time as the world No. 1 than anyone not named Tiger Woods and Greg Norman.
“The way he was playing at the end of 2020 I think is the closest thing to what Tiger Woods was,” said elite swing coach Butch Harmon, who has worked with Johnson since 2009 and was with Woods from 1993 to 2004. “The only difference is Tiger was on for 20 years. When DJ’s on, and he’s firing on all cylinders, and everyone else is on, DJ wins.
“He is the closest thing to Tiger Woods I have ever seen.”
Editor’s note: This begins a seven-part series on the life and career of reigning Masters champion Dustin Johnson. Check back to Golfweek.com each day for the next part of the story.
