Luke Donald Reveals That He’s ‘Keeping An Eye’ On Potential Ryder Cup Pairings At The Zurich Classic

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European Ryder Cup captain Luke Donald is back in action at the Zurich Classic of New Orleans—and he’s not just playing for fun. Donald reveals he’s closely watching potential Ryder Cup pairings this week, using the team-format event to evaluate chemistry, strategy, and performance under pressure.

Teaming up with Camilo Villegas, Donald brings experience and insight to a field full of future European hopefuls. Could this be a sneak peek into Rome 2025 planning?

Justin Thomas was our pick for the RBC Heritage on last week’s picks and preview show — and he delivered at Harbour Town! 🔥

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started. We’d like to welcome Luke Donald and Camilo Bejas here to the Zurich Classic in New Orleans. Uh Luke, we’ll start with you. This is your fifth start in this event in the team format. Your best finish here, T23 with Eduardo in 2023. If we can get some comments on being back here in New Orleans. Yeah, it’s it’s always fun to uh come here. We were talking a little bit about it uh walking down the fairways today. It’s just a fun different experience this week. um you know this team atmosphere the uh playing foroms playing four balls um it’s a different feel and um I think it has a great place on the tour um to to change up you know what we do week in week out and um you know the hospitality here is always great so it’s uh it’s always a nice week to be a part of all right Camo uh your third time in the team format uh your best finish uh T14 in 2017 with Morgan Huffman if we can get some comments on being back here and playing with Luke. Yeah, I got to put up with Luke this week. No, I’m kidding. Hey, no, Luke and I are really good friends. We spent a lot of time back in Jupiter. Our wife spent a lot of time together. It was one of those things uh hitting balls on the range at Bears Club. And I said, “Hey, you want to play Surirk together?” It was a quick yes and it it’ll be a fun week. It’ll be a little kind of familyfriendly week. Sur has done a great job over the years. I was very happy to see that they extended till 2030. So they they thanks to them to supporting our great tour. Um again, it’s different. It’s a different week. It’s a week where you got to think a little bit. H I got Captain Donald here next to me, so he’s taking care of all the stats and all the stuff and what we should do, which is good. And um hey, I’m really looking forward I’m really looking forward to having a good energy week, having a a fun out there, and trying to play some good golf. All right, we’re glad to have you guys here as a team. We’ll open it up to questions. You’ll raise your hand. We’ll get a microphone to you. Yep. Start with Brody. You can just cross it. Hey, you got one of this ones. Well, I mean, you joke about Captain Donald having all the stats and whatnot. Yeah. What is that dynamic of kind of like how you guys are are playing off each other and kind of what’s your your dynamic just being out there? Well, I don’t know if I have all the stats. This week’s a little different to most weeks because because of the format. So, uh Shotlink doesn’t have uh all the shots like you would of a regular event, but um you know, there’s certain things over the time you’ve played here. Um you know, the even holes are usually the the guy who’s a bit better driver. Um, you know, there’s some good iron uh holes, par threes, you know, for the odd holes. So, it’s a nice mixture this course. Um, and uh, you know, I’m sure most of the players would know all that stuff out there. But, uh, yeah, it’s just more about having having good time, having a good partner. Our wives are going to be both here out, which is unusual actually, you know, that they don’t travel as much as they used to. So, um, again, it’s going to be a kind of a fun fun week and hopefully we can play some good golf as well. Is that the norm here that kind of you know this is a week where you notice other players you wives or family might come a bit more because it’s a different dynamic? I think so a little bit a little more team and also people love New Orleans. It’s it’s a great place to come visit have some nice meals and and like I said has done a great job with this event and making it fun for us. Um in our case kind of funny story I mean we we got a good pairing too. We got Charlie Hoffman and Nick Wadney. We’re the four of us are on on the older side. I don’t think any any other group is going to be older than us out there. Uh so I quickly got my my my my tea time. I I I do this little text message with Luke, Charlie, and Wattney. And then like 20 minutes later, I find out that the girls did a chat together, too. So the four of them were together. Everybody’s going to be here. So it’ll be fun out there. It’ll be it’ll be a good We’ll share some stories and we we go way back with with Nick and and uh and um Charlie as well. So, should be should be a fun group. All right, Dave. Cool. At this point in your guys’ careers, how do you balance out what you’re trying to do inside the ropes for your own games and then also balancing the responsibilities you have with Luke, your team obviously, Camilo, you’ve been involved with the President’s Cup. How do you work those two things potentially at the same time? Yeah, personally, I I’ve I’ve struggled a little bit. I’ve decided um you know to play a little bit of a smaller schedule uh this year and you know playing one week and having two or three weeks off and then playing one week um it’s a a difficult dynamic uh to keep the momentum going through the competitive sort of momentum you get from playing uh two or three weeks in a row. But um you know I’m I’m certainly uh enjoying being Ry Cup captain again. Uh it’s great this week to see so many Europeans here. Obviously a little bit of a dynamic from the the alliance we have and the 10 court cards. You know, it seems like more and more Europeans are coming and playing and uh and uh be interesting to see how they do. Uh certainly be keeping an eye conversations early in the year about potential partnerships amongst some of these Europeans that thought that might work. Um but um outside of that, yeah, I’m really, you know, once Thursday goes off, um I’m just here to play and play as good as I can and hopefully make some good swings for for my partner. In my case, it it has been one of my main goals for the year is to be more efficient. Uh why? Because I got a lot of stuff in the on the table. I mean, just not only playing, but the family stuff, the foundation stuff, and then uh and then being involved with the PJ tour board. So there is quite a quite a lot of stuff and uh but it it can all be done. I’ve been having a lot of fun and learning um in all the new things I’m doing which is great but yes you have to be more aware of your time, your schedule and just you keep getting better and better with the calendar, the family, the this that and it’s it’s a you got to juggle it around but it’s it’s it’s it’s part of life. It’s it’s that’s what we do. Luke, and I know that with the qualification system, the way the European Rder Cup team has it set up, guys get points if they’re paired with another European player, which obviously is encouraging them to to do that. You’ve got a number of players who are relatively high up on the point list at this point. There’s a long way to go, but how much you sort of mentioned that you had spoken with some players potentially getting together. How much can you encourage guys realistically given everybody’s schedule to come and compete in an event like this where there’s a long way to go between now and Beth Paige? But I would imagine it’s it it can be beneficial to sort of see how people, relationships, things work out at this point. Yeah, it’s it’s another opportunity to play some sort of team golf, to play some foresomes, which is a a format we don’t play very often. Um certainly at the team cup earlier in the year in January um you know there was some some chats sort of during that week uh about possible guys playing with who uh and and you know whether they would want to play in the Zurich. Um so again I don’t like to tell them what to do. That’s certainly not my place uh their schedule. They need to do what’s best for them individually and where they feel like they’re going to perform at their best. But certainly no. I you know I’ll send the odd friendly text. are you thinking about playing Zurich? Who are you playing with? You know, maybe if you want play with this guy. There’s there’s a little bit of that going on. Uh because I think it’s it’s another opportunity to sort of, you know, find a partner that you might feel very comfortable with and find a little bit of comfort in forms, which is a very uncomfortable uh um kind of format. All right, Scott. Oh, I’m sorry. I guess uh Luke strangely another points related question but now that you’re two cycles into this I’m just curious have you kind of gathered any opinions on your own on the qualifying system and you know maybe a guy wins a major 18 months before the Ryder Cup and he’s getting a ton of points for that orers like do you ever have you kind of formed any opinions on the point system and do certain things maybe gain too much too little I’m not sure yeah we we always take a look at our points uh schedule and try and figure out the best way to create the strongest team. Um our point system is only a year from um you know a pretty much a year worth of points. It started at the British Masters I think last year and and that’s where it finishes. So um you know we look very highly at so we don’t count any majors the year before. So it’s all in this year for us um which is important. We want we want current form. Um but we want to give more uh um you know more points to those bigger events with the stronger field. So we think we have it pretty good. I think six and six works well uh to again form the strongest team we can possibly have. All right, Scott. Look, it probably pleased you to know that when Rory and Chain were in here, there were Rory mentioned how winning at Beth Page would really cap off the year. So, so obviously they’re already thinking about that, but you got to be thinking about European players playing a lot more of this kind of golf than American players, forsomes and four balls, stuff like that. Do you think this has been something that has been an edge for for the Europeans, you know, throughout the years in the in the writer Cup? Well, I certainly think it’s it’s helped. It’s something we grow up we grew up we grow up with uh as juniors. uh we play quite a lot of matches within county matches within country versus country uh in that format but you know once the professional once you turn professional you don’t really play a lot so I mean it’s it’s something you’ve grown up with as a junior but you know some of these guys haven’t probably played in that format for for many years so it’s nice again to have an event like this where they kind of get to refresh some of those memories and um you know there’s little things that you can do in match play. It’s not match play, but it’s foresomes, you know, things to think about encouraging your partner. Um, you know, just little reminders that might remind them from stuff that they did uh when they were juniors. But I’m not sure how much of a a benefit that is in the long run because most of these guys, you know, would have gone quite a few years without playing that from junior golf. Dave Camila, I’m not sure if this sort of urban legend is true or not, but I had heard that your yardage books were used by the University of Florida team for a few years after you had left because you were so detail oriented and kept such copious notes about that. Is that true? It is true. Yeah. With I’m sorry, but with that in mind, how much do you sort of observe your partner in this case, Luke? I know you guys have a very good relationship. You’ve been a vice captain been involved with President’s Cup in a number of different ways. What do you look at how he has handled the situation the last couple of years that you may want to sort of scribble or file away for yourself, you know, for an opportunity to sort of lead a team yourself in the future? What do you see in him that you don’t that you can learn from? Trust me, I’m always picking his brain. I’m always asking questions about Ryder Cup. I was supposed to be in in Rome last year. Unfortunately, I had to cancel the last minute. I will be there this year. Just both Luke and Keegan are great friends. I think it it’s a good opportunity to see a a just being involved with President’s Cup. It’s important to go to a Ryder Cup. I mean, Ryder Cup is is is is huge. I want to experience it being there watching two of my good friends and then a lot of the other players just battle it out. And and and back to your question, I I always pick Luke’s Rain. I always ask him what they’re doing. Uh we’ve discussed our previous two president’s cups being involved in assistant captain, what we did, what can we do better and and and stuff like that. I’m hoping to continue to be involved with President’s Cup. And yes, hopefully in the future they if I can if I can be a captain of one of the teams, it will be an absolute honor for me. It’s it’s a really fun week of the of every two years. And uh uh when Trevor gave me the call, it was it was it was a blessing. When We gave me a call, it was it was it was fun. And and I’m just trying to keep learning. And uh Lucas Luc has done such a great job. I mean, I’ve watched it firsthand how many books he’s read, how much time he spent, how much less golf he’s played just because he wants to do what he calls his his his his true job well, which which he did back in Rome. And I’m sure he’s going to do a great job again. So, we keep learning of each other. Would you call the job being Ryder Cup captain fun or being a Rder Cup week is being fun? Yeah. Uh, it’s fun. Uh, when you’re lifting that trophy, but there’s a lot of pressure. There’s a lot of anxiety. Um, it’s, you know, most nights you’re getting 4 hours of sleep. Um, it’s just a lot. There’s so much going on. And that’s why for me, and I’m sure Camo is the same, you know, preparation is is key. You know, making sure before you even get there that week that you have pretty much a good idea of what to do and you have a plan A and you have a plan B and maybe a plan C if things aren’t going the way you want. So, you know, that’s that’s where the leadup for this this whole 18 months, 2 years, that’s that’s the buildup to try and get myself in a position where I feel reasonably prepared. You never can be totally prepared, but uh you know I feel like uh I certainly feel more confident and more calm the more prepared I am and that’s why I try and put in the work. But uh it’s still a very stressful environment. Um and New York playing away will will be really stressful. But uh you know again we’re going to go it’s a very tough challenge to win a Ray Rider Cup. We know that it’s uh never easy. The US will um certainly be looking for revenge from Rome and they will um be be a tough team to beat. All right, back to Scott Camilo. I was intrigued to see that the PJ Tour America is playing this week in Kito, Ecuador, and the elevation is 9350 ft. The elevation here is two. Uh what what is the have you I just wonder if you had any any stories or anecdotes about playing some you know in South America or elsewhere at some really high elevation. How different is it from playing at sea level? Yeah, very different. I mean I grew up in Medin Colombia which is about 2,000 meters above sea level. But the the highest I’ve played was in Bolivia in La Pas. We played a South American championship there and it is I forget how high it is but it is high. And um I think technology these days uh allows us to be a lot more precise when it comes to elevation. I think there’s all kinds of different formulas and trackmans and stuff like that where you can kind of kind of get to the the get on point with how far the ball goes and but yeah, you got to control your trajectory a little bit different there. I mean the low low shots don’t travel as far high shots travel forever. It’s fun. It’s different. ball goes very straight. But um yeah, I mean I’ve I’ve I’ve been blessed to play all over the world and including in a lot of tournaments in South America and K2 is up there. had a chance to play there. And uh yeah, I mean the just hoping the PJ tour Latin America keeps growing and we keep just bringing more players from that region to the to the cornfairy and then following to the PJ tour and uh hey it’s nice to see just kind of the Latin flavor out here. All right, anything else? All right, gentlemen. Time to practice here when it rains. Thanks, guys.