Staying in the Moment with Ben An | Excellence in Process

For Ben An it’s all about staying in the moment and balancing expectations with results.

Get an inside look at Ben’s journey in this episode of Excellence in Process presented by Titleist.

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I’ve been playing golf for a very long time. So I had a lot of expectations and and looking ahead at the result never never never helps. And you know I have to keep telling myself you know stay in the present. I think that’s the hard part about every sports is that you think about the result and I don’t think that ever helps. So you know I try to not worry about the result and you know working your way to get better. So I see you got the new three iron in the bag. How do you like it? You guys the 250U? Great. Yeah, I um I tried it at the Memorial tournament this year. I think only took me five balls to hit and I’m like, “Okay, this feels pretty good. It’s in.” Same for one iron. Impressive that you’re probably the only couple people on tour that play a one iron. Yeah, exactly. So, I I just got a new one. So, it’s good enough. Yeah. My full name is Bang Hunan. That’s why my Korean friends call me. And American names is banan. It’s much easier for u my American friends. So, club head there was 115.6, carry 300.8, total 324.4. I’m one of the first guys getting to the golf course every day and he’s the first one back here on the range every morning. He spends hours hitting wedges and then you see him on a, you know, on the other side of the chipping green, you know, hitting chip shots and then he comes back and hits long irons and he’s hitting drivers. Ben still puts in that grind every day like he’s, you know, still grinding for his tour card. That’s what makes him great. [Music] And on is on the cusp of history. That will do it. Yon wins the biggest amateur championship in the world. At age 17, you become the youngest winner ever of this championship. Your thoughts on that? It’s a great title to have the youngest winner. Um, yeah, it’s pretty cool. Yeah, it is pretty cool. Yeah, it’s pretty cool. Yeah. And then looking back, it was an amazing achievement. You know, that’s when I knew maybe I’m pretty good at golf. I turned pro 2012, played three years in Challenger Tour. The following year at European Tour, I won the BMW Wentworth and then played the majors. You know, everything was kind of slowly stepping up and then next year I got my card. 2020 at the end of it I missed the torch by one or two shots and then next year kind of lost it a little bit and then lost my card. The year that he was losing his card was the first year that I’ve ever seen like been devastated not wanting to go to golf course at all like waking up in the morning he’s already signing you know dressing up he’s like I don’t want to go to golf course like I don’t want to go. I wasn’t looking forward to playing golf tournaments because I wasn’t playing well. You know, that’s the only time when I said I didn’t enjoy it. He knew that he was struggling, but he also knew that he can work through it. And he was like, “Well, if I’m as good as Cornfairy, I’ll play Cornfairy, and when I’m better than Cornfairy, I’ll be back here.” There’s something you sit next to your daddy. Yeah, that’s your water. Oh, no. It’s okay. Let’s spill everything. No. No. It’s okay, son. It’s okay. Just the water. That never happened. That never happens anymore. It happens when there are cameras. The heartbreaks only took about a half a day to go through. As soon as you see the kids, you’re going back to the daddy moment. You know, they don’t know if I lost or won. They’re just happy to see me. Ready? Both is tough because he’s had some great weeks on BJ Tour, but he’s never won one. So, we talk a lot about his emotion, but definitely having kids was a big plus for us. It added so much to our life, so much to Ben’s life. You know, sometimes that last putt doesn’t matter if you see laughing children. Yeah, I was lucky enough where right after I lost my card and I came back corner tour and won my I think my third event and it couldn’t be any better cuz I had a confidence in my mind. It’s like okay I I’ll be back on the tour and I’ll play better. And I sometimes play like courses up here. There are a lot of um the tour stops on this uh simulator. Ben once mentioned to me that golf was always easy. That’s how he won US Amateur. He was just so talented. Like golf was never hard. And then that year when he was losing card was the first time he felt like golf was hard. He was lost kind of at in the beginning. But then him and his coach decided to invest more time into his day-to-day routine. Like, you know, it’s like we call them banker’s hour. You show up at 8, go home, whatever, like 3, 4, 5, practice that much. And I put more time in there, take care of my body a little bit more, trying to eat healthier. I didn’t want to chase the result, but when the result shows and you can see it, you know, you believe what you see. So, you know, my hard work off season, it paid off. And then that gave me a lot of confidence, you know, say if you put the time in, you’ll definitely will see the result. I’ve been playing pro golf for, you know, more than 10 years. At the highest level, you know, playing the PGA Tour, I was very fortunate to play this long. And I think it was needed in my life where you have a real struggle. maybe we need some change, you know, let’s get it out of the comfort box and trying to make some changes. And it paid off. Being in America, everything was new to me. But I love every sort of challenge. And golf is something where there’s always a challenge. If you’re going to half ass it, then there’s really like no point. Give it 100%.