David Micheluzzi’s career takes a big step forward
David Micheluzzi – file photo Golf NSW
26-year-old David Micheluzzi has made some significant career progress over the past twelve months and over the next few weeks he gets the chance to take things to an even greater level with a debut on the PGA Tour and his first start in major golf.
This week he has an invite to play the AT&T Byron Nelson event in Dallas followed by next week’s PGA Championship and, in early June, the Memorial.
All this comes on top of his being crowned the winner of the PGA Tour of Australasia which not only earns him a start at the Open Championship in July, but a DP World Tour card for the 2023/2024 season.
In a media conference today ahead of the AT&T, Micheluzzi outlined his immediate schedule and his excitement for what lies ahead.
“Yeah, first PGA TOUR event, which is very cool. Yeah, just fortunate enough that they gave me an invite. My manager Ben did such a good job, and I’ve also got Memorial coming up with a couple weeks’ time, and just found out I’m in the PGA next week, so first PGA TOUR event, first major in consecutive weeks. There’s a lot going on, but really looking forward to the next few weeks.”
A couple of weeks ago Micheluzzi’s schedule on this trip to the US for the Memorial and US Open qualifying was looking limited but things have fallen into place to ensure a busy few months.
“I’m pretty sure back in the past, the Order of Merit winners usually get Memorial, so that was always kind of on the cards. Then the Byron Nelson was just a — it was just very fortunate enough to get it instead of just coming out just for one, maybe potentially two, because I’m doing a U.S. Open pre-Q, as well. Now I can actually make a trip out of it, and now I’m definitely going to make a trip out of it, which is really cool.
“I think I was in a pretty fortunate boat where I’ve been with my manager just before I turned pro, and he’s based in the States. He works with Sport Five, who managed Jon Rahm and Tom Kim and all these boys.
“I think having the success, he can now say, look, he’s done this over here. Let’s get him some starts. Where I think if I didn’t have a manager, I don’t know of this would be happening. I think I’d just potentially playing a PGA and potentially playing an Open, and that’s it.”
Melbourne’s Micheluzzi is aware that he will face a very different playing environment than he has been used to of late but is happy with his form and is looking forward to the challenge of playing different style of golf to that he has faced of late.
“Yeah, I think my game is feeling great. It’s felt pretty much very similar to how I was playing in Australia a few months back. Courses are very different to back home. It’s all carry and softer greens and all that kind of stuff. But I’m just looking forward to competing with these guys and seeing how I go, really.”
Micheluzzi is also looking forward to the chance to play practice rounds with some of the more established Australians on the PGA Tour.
“Yeah, now it’s like — yeah, next week is going to be very cool. Oak Hill is iconic. It’s such a great golf course. Hopefully we can tee up a couple games with — I’m not too sure, but hopefully a couple Aussie boys.
“I played with Min Woo today. It’s been a while. We played amateur golf together, and it was good to kind of just — really cool. We played amateur golf together, we played Interstate Series together, we played Eisenhowers together, now we’re playing on the same event on the PGA TOUR and next week playing the same event in a PGA Championship. That was a real cool moment.”
Next week’s debut in a major is shaping as one of the biggest moments in his golfing career to date.
“I was speaking to Min Woo yesterday. He said majors are just crazy if you have a lot of people around, and to be honest, I want to treat my first major as — obviously I want it to be special, I want to have a lot of family members and all that around, but at the end of the day it’s a golf tournament, and I feel like I do well when there’s not many people around, like around me, like off course and all that.
“I just want to go in, just me and my caddie, my manager, and just go straight ahead and just play like it’s another tournament, like I say, like the National PGA. Just go out and just cruise.
“I don’t know if my parents are going to surprise me and fly over. I’d highly doubt it because they’ve got a massive trip in Europe later in the year, so I don’t think they’ll be coming. But if they do, it would be pretty cool, but yeah, I just want to keep it as low key as possible and just focus on the golf, and that’s it.”
Micheluzzi will be joined in this week’s field at the TPC Craig Ranch in Dallas by fellow Australians Adam Scott, Jason Day, Aaron Baddeley, Min Woo Lee, Geoff Ogilvy, Greg Chalmers, Cameron Percy and Harrison Endycott.
