Luke Donald Press Conference | 2025 PGA Championship Round 1

Watch Luke Donald’s Round 1 press conference at the 2025 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow Club.

Subscribe to keep up with the latest from the PGA Championship: https://bit.ly/PGAChampionshipYT  

Contested each May, the PGA Championship is the second major championship in golf’s annual rotation and perennially features the strongest field in the men’s game based on the Official World Golf Rankings. Known for dramatic finishes and notable champions, the Wanamaker Trophy—which has been awarded to the winner since 1916—is inscribed with names such as Rory McIlroy, Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Jack Nicklaus, and Gary Player. 
 
The 2025 PGA Championship is set to take place between 15-18 May at Quail Hollow Club. The reigning champion is Xander Schauffele. 

Website: https://pgachampionship.com/ 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pgachampionship 
X: https://twitter.com/pgachampionship 
Instagram: https://instagram.com/pgachampionship/

Luke Donald is with us now at the 107th PGA Championship. Luke, a nice 67 for you here on day one. How would you summarize your performance? Yeah, obviously uh very pleased with the score bogey free in a major. Someone just told me it was the lowest first round in a major I’ve had since 2004 or something. So, um you know, obviously I’ve been trending with all the miscuts uh coming into this week. Um but uh no, it was a it was a pleasant surprise. I got off to a really nice steady start. You know, I hit a a bunch of fairways uh on the front nine. Um which always makes me feel good about my game. Um I didn’t hit a ton of greens today, but my my putter was was really good. You know, the greens surprise not surprisingly, but they were uh infinitely quicker this morning, first group out, than than they were the last few days. Um, but I adjusted very well to them and uh made a lot of good solid putts out there. That’s great. Thanks. We’ll take some questions starting over on mic five and then seven. What’s it like to go through a press conference like yesterday when question after questions about John Rom’s game or live players game or anybody’s game but your game? Well, that’s what I signed up to. Um, you know, I, you know, as I said, I’m a I’m a I’m here only because I’m captain of the European Rder Cup team. I wouldn’t be in this field otherwise. It’s a nice infidation and a perk that the Ryder Cup captain gets. Um, so I understand that. I understand that my game isn’t uh where it used to be. Um, and that that is the focus. So, it really doesn’t bother me uh one bit. Seven. Hi, Luke. Yeah, I want to know how much fun you were having out there on the course today. And what’s it like um maintaining a healthy balance between keeping an eye on potential Ryder Cup players and of course your own game as well, which is looking really good at the moment. Well, it’s always fun bogey free in in a major championship on a course that you you wouldn’t have thought would be would be ideal for me. Um yeah, it was it was nice to I feel like I haven’t I feel like I’ve putted reasonably well the tournaments I played this year, but not seen much go in. and to see them go in dropping um you know was was a lot of fun. Um but the the balancing thing yeah I I I I don’t find it I found it more tricky the first uh go around for the captaincy for Rome had less time to prepare for that captaincy. Um this time I’ve had longer time and obviously second go around I I’m sort of familiar with what’s going on and what I need to do and the time frames and all that stuff. So, uh, I’ve been able to balance it quite well. Um, it’s been nice to play a minimize schedule. Uh, I I still love competing. I love being a competitor. Uh, but still given myself plenty of time to be prepared for, uh, New York. Mike six, please. Hey, Luke. Uh, I’m not sure if you check the leaderboard, but uh, Keegan’s three under. You guys turning this into your own little uh, Ryder Cup preview uh, duel here. If it’s tied 1414, is that what you’re talking? we we play off. It might be I I’ll grab the trophy and go back to Europe. But uh um Keegan’s, you know, he’s top 20 player in the world. Um you know, he he he can have one good week out here, win, which he’s very capable of, and you know, he’s absolutely in the uh the conversation of of being a playing captain. I I don’t think that’s quite um in my uh future. But uh Keegan’s uh I we live very close together. I see where he practices and he practices very hard. So, he’s uh still, you know, one of the top players in the world. Go down here to Mike’s one then two. Hey, Luke. Um, a bit of a nuts and bolts question here, but when you’re like approaching a green knowing there’s a good chance that you may miss it and have a chip like how are you setting yourself up to have a good chip upcoming and trying to get up and down when on some of these holes? Well, I think with in terms of this course, the greens are, as I said, they got quite quick today, much quicker than they were, and they have a lot of slope. So, you know, where your your aim points from the fairway. It depends. So, if you’re attacking it from the fairway or the rough, but you know, if you’re out of position, then you’re really trying to put yourself into a place where you feel like you can get up and down more so here than you would most places because of the severity of the greens. So, I think I did a good job of that. I just kept it sort of where the the up and downs were very manageable. Um, but you know, if you’re in the fairway, then you’re just trying to make pretty good aggressive swings to the to the right sides of the holes. It’s like a full like what in your mind is like a manageable up and down, you know, like how would you define that and how how are you chasing those? Well, one that’s um you know, I was disappointed on 18 to to hit in the right bunker. To be honest, I thought that was the bad miss, but it wasn’t quite as bad as I thought. I had a little bit of breeze into me. Um but I still needed a whole eight nfooter for par. So, um you’re not trying to think too much over the ball on your second shots about, oh, I I just don’t want to be here. you know, you’re you’re trying to be as um specific as what you’re trying to do and where you’re trying to hit it. I think more so when you’re out of position off the tea, that’s when you start thinking about, okay, two, three shots ahead where like, okay, this pin is here. If I can get it to right side of the green, I’m chipping up the hill, you know, something like that. And that’s going to give me an opportunity to get up and down. U Luke, when was the last time you played as well as that? Oh, uh, testing my memory, Jamie. Um, can hardly remember what I did last week, let alone this week. But uh you know again uh I only hit nine greens today. So I wouldn’t say um it was amazing but there was definitely highlights today that were an improvement on previous events. More fairways, a bit better driving. The iron play was decent. Um but the putting obviously was was very key in the short game. You know I got I got up and down and and made good putts when I needed to. And that was sort of the key to to my round today. And there’s already a few complaints about mud balls and the decision not to lift, clean, and place. Where do you stand on that? Um I don’t have any mud balls per se. I think when it starts to dry out even more, you could get some this afternoon. It was tricky. You know, I was a little bit surprised yesterday when I heard the news uh yesterday evening just because of how wet it was, but it had dried out quite well to be honest. two times I had to take casual casual relief from the fairway which helped you know you can clean it. Um the rest of the time um it was just sort of a a watery muddy residue on it at times. It wasn’t really lumps of mud which that’s when it gets um very dicey up to 13 and 14. Luke, to go back to the playing captain, just generally speaking, when we talk about Keegan possibly doing it, what are the demands of trying to do both of those jobs, which seem really hard to me? I think it’s more the demands during the week, you know, um you’re going to if you’re playing yourself, you’re going to be on the golf course and so you’re going to, you know, you’re going to have to give the um the choice making, the decision- making to someone else, you know, then you’re obviously have you have to instruct I guess that person, you know, what to look for, what you’re trying to accomplish. So there’s an an you know and if you’re trying to play as well that’s a little bit distracting I suppose. Um I don’t think there would be much distraction up until the Ricup. It’s just that the week of you know it’s just um you’re not watching the guys you’re not but you do have you know assistant captains vice captains to to to do all that and relay that message to you. It’s just yeah, it’s uh an an extra step in in what you wouldn’t usually have to deal with. Uh Luke, um right here, as a man of a certain age, you were probably up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom anyway, but if not, what time did you have to set the alarm for the uh 7:00 tea time? Uh I think I made it through uh the night last night. Um but I was 4 4:40 this morning. My alarm went off. Yeah. But how did you feel about being first off? You you okay with that? Yeah, I was in the first group last year. Got um you know, solid pairing with two two major champions and I suppose it’s a nice little honor to hit the first T-shot to get the tournament underway. So yeah, I was good with that. The Greens were very nice the first nine holes and the pace of play was quite nice, too. And we’ll wrap it up right here on three. Uh Luke, um this clearly um is an unusual way for you to prepare for a major championship, but is there anything uh that might have helped you uh play today the way you played today in the fact that you were not able to prepare as you would have wanted to at one point? Um playing last week is probably the first time this year I’ve had two weeks in a row. Um playing a minimized schedule sounds nice, but it’s it’s quite difficult uh to get in that competitive mode. So, you know, playing one week, three weeks off, one week, you know, all that stuff. Um, hasn’t uh hasn’t been very easy for me. It’s just like stop start, you know, um it’s it’s it’s nicer to play two, three weeks in a row. Um and kind of get a rhythm. That’s always what I I enjoyed when I was at the top of my game as well. So, I think just uh having Yeah. consecutive weeks playing is was uh was helpful. Thanks for your time, Luke. Thank you.