🏌️ Jason Day reveals how close he came retiring & talks golf fashion 👕 | Fox Sports Australia

I'm pleased to say the man himself joins us now on our preview of this year's PGA Championship Jason great to see you thanks for your time and joining us and uh you must be looking forward to a return to Valhalla and the week ahead yeah no looking forward to a return I had uh some good memories uh from uh Valhalla you know back when we played back when Rory won um I remember uh you know being in the final group on Saturday there so it was just uh I think they made some changes but like overall I uh I'm looking forward to a good week hey Jay take us back to uh that final green uh the emotion that you and Cole swaton uh poured out of you guys what was that like that was a tough long week but the journey you know from the boy from Bo desert to that point take us to that point yeah so it was um yeah I mean obviously it was a long long journey you know you know going from I went through as a kid and then um having Cole you know coach me from like 13 on and then our goal was to get to number one in the world you know by 22 I think it was you know we ended up getting to like number five in the world at 23 and like it was like all these little steps along the way that we were trying to hit and then um in 2015 I I was playing some really really good golf going into into that week um just off the back end of uh the obbc Canadian uh win and and obviously playing well at you know uh at the Open Championship and I just felt like things were just kind of heading in that direction um and yeah like I mean obviously the emotions just poured out of me that week because you know how it is I mean Jeff and Paul were trying to you know do everything we possibly can to get ourselves in the position to win and um you know it's very emotional to to do that at at the top level nice stories mate um so after that obviously you I mean you played great for a long time number one in the world but your back started um troubling you a little bit more triggered some swing changes with Chris I mean I think your swing's looking amazing now how's that going and how's that sort of progress been and is it is it genuinely that much better on your back than it used to be oh yeah by far I mean it's it's like I mean there was Jeff there was a time where like I I would really pride myself on putting and I would really pride myself on on being saying how much time I would actually practice on my putting and I would I would know diligently and be disciplined about my putting routine I'd be two and a half two to two and a half hours a day of just putting alone and that was like very rarely did I ever miss a day and that's why I putted so well and it got to a point where I couldn't stand in place for more than 10 15 minutes um and you know it got to a point where I would go to a tournament I wouldn't really practice Monday wouldn't really practice Tuesday I'd try and get through the pram on Wednesday and then go okay let's just play Thursday and Friday you know if you make the cut great if you don't then you know you've just made another contract you know hit for your number for for the contracts off the golf course and I realized that I was playing for all the wrong reasons I was in pain a lot I nothing was really working and then finally I'm like okay well we got to come up with a plan because like I love golf and I I really enjoy playing golf competitively and it's like something that really is deep to me is is how much I really love and enjoy playing golf and I needed to make the change you know pretty quick um in regards to not only the body stuff um but also the the swing as well um to try and get me back to playing um where I feel like I should and um it has been a process it's been you know uh a good you know three three years of working with Chris and then um two to three years working with Chris and then I would say a good five to six years of working just hard on my body to get it to the point where you know I feel great I wake up every day and I don't feel a pain I like feel pain in my in my my body which is which has been crazy but it's also been a blessing in disguise um because it's almost like I use my body to a certain degree as a training aid when things aren't going well I get some aches and pains and I'm like okay well why does that happen then I learn something more about my body or learn something more about my swing and then um I kind of work myself out of it Jason you spoke there about Your Love of the Game and you rediscovered that love that passion for the game after maybe having a bit of a chip on your shoulder for a little while there and the game had become a bit of a chore for you yeah yeah um it definitely I mean I think you your spot on it just it felt like a chore it felt like it didn't feel enjoyable to me um to play golf not only injured but just to play golf for the wrong reasons um you know there was no kind of love and passion behind my competitive days during one the time that I was injured and it was just like okay well you know am I finally getting close to you know racking the clubs and you know what I think if I didn't if I didn't make the changes bodywise and I didn't make the change sling wise yes I think that there would be potential of me not being able to play again um but I had a really good support uh system around me not only through my agent and my my coaches but also my wife um Ellie and and my and my family they just I would talk it like I mean as a lot of as as Paul and and Jeff know that like when you're in dark times in golf you can get very negative um uh and have a lot of negative selft talk you can get it can get pretty dark and during those times of being hurt and injured it got pretty dark and I wasn't feeling great not only mentally but physically and it was hard for me to kind of push through but once again getting back to my support system of my family um my wife would always say you're not done yet you got to keep pushing and you know I'm happy to say that I'm on the other side now I just got to tidy some things up um on the golf course uh to kind of find you know that that success and find that confidence again it's fair to say jaay that you listen to ell to um which is a good thing hey five kids I've it's always got me you've got five kids now how do you manage your time seriously that's a lot of kids and you've got to go and play golf at the highest level and there's not a lot of professional athletes have worked that out yet I'm still trying to work it out if you got if you know any AD tips or advice but as you notice I'm in my bus right now I'm uh I don't have the family here with this week um like kind of prepping but um you know I you know during then I'm not going to be know with me you know at you know this coming up in this at the PGA but uh yeah I um it's it's difficult like I mean we we homeschool our kids so that gives them the opportunity to come on the road with me um and that was one important thing for me was to not uh miss my kids growing up um I know that it's important uh for for Ellie uh to have me around as well um I know there's I think there's no there's no right or wrong way of going about like whether you want to put your kids at school or or home school I just I really wanted to to make sure that I never like because as you guys know it's really easy to be on the road for 30 35 weeks a year and and not be around your family and and uh not be able to and and it's really it's even more more difficult to once you have a week off to go back and switch off it's like it's almost impossible because your mind is always constantly going back okay well I got a prep for the upcoming tournament I've got um you know like you know I played terrible last week and like why did I play terrible so like you're kind of there but you're not there um and it's really hard to stay present and and and you know be with you know everyone and your family um so that's something that I've always like I struggle with always but like I'm I'm getting better at it but like it having you know Ellie and the kids on the road with me um that definitely helps a lot being able to uh be around them as as I'm playing tournament because I don't think a lot of players could handle five kids on a bus um with a wife and and go through that chaos and go and play tournament golf and um I actually thoroughly enjoy it like it's almost like to the point where sometimes it gets a little crazy here and I go to the golf course and it's like completely calm for me wow I mean you making have five kids uh look pretty easy Jason but we all know it isn't um I found three really tough um so most importantly I mean there's three Majors to go and maybe an Olympics but um president Cup this year our team is uh pretty excited with the idea of having Jason day back on the team you been given much thought to that and are you excited yes very very much excited um I'm looking forward to to Mike we and you boys actually um getting getting all of the vice captains and the captains and getting the boys uh you know going strong up in Montreal I know that uh we we had a great win last week uh in Taylor penrith um winning he's a fellow Canadian and I play with Mac uh McKenzie Hughes uh I'm talking about on the last day and we're sitting in the we're sitting in the uh the scoring Hut after and he's like he has I'm contemplating on whether to stay or not um you know just to see if he wins or not I'm like and and I was thinking I'm like man it's gonna be interesting to see if he stay stays around and then he ultimately stayed around and Taylor won and and it just they those guys go back a long way when they were playing at Kent State at University of Kent State so you know they got a lot of history together so it it was nice I think Taylor did that for for Matt when he won woke up super early um drove from at 3 A.M or something like that to to go and watch ma wi so it's nice to be able to uh to watch some of the guys you know uh more so recently have a lot of success on the tour and um I'm looking forward to get like Montreal is one of my favorite cities to go and visit um it's it's superb uh the the whole place feels almost uh you know kind of old school European type of feel uh City but it's like it's just two hours from my house um which is fantastic and you know getting back to Mike we who's had a lot of success as a Canadian player but also up up you know in Montreal as well so I'm I'm excited by that um you know I'm I'm GNA do everything I possibly can to get on the team and then I'm also looking forward to the Olympics as well so if I if I get the you know if I qualify for that and and get to go ahead I'm going to the Olympics as well he Jay this this week Val how's this course set up for you they made some changes um I haven't I haven't seen the changes yet but um the last time we played it it was severely wet uh you had to hit it long and straight I shouldn't say you had to hit it long and straight you just had to hit it as far as you possibly could just because of how soft the conditions were you just like the fairways were way over wide open because of that that reason um and I remember playing with Rory this you know on the Saturday and I mean the guy was he was carrying at 340 yards he was hitting it so far it was unbelievable of him I've never seen anything like it and he he was just driving it so well hitting such crisp IR shots with how like wet the you know the fairways were he was just I was like man he's got a pretty good shot at winning you end up winning um but you know what I I enjoy the grass um that we're going to be playing on um I I enjoy the Kentucky Blue uh grass rough that we play you know that that whole vibe of um you know that it's it's just a big long golf course that we get to play on um that we know that it's going to be pretty thick rough like the PJ does a really good job of making it strong and difficult but fair um so they're not too worried about keeping the the score around even but typically it's somewhere majority of the time it it hits high single digits to you know low teams in in regards to the the winning score so um yeah I mean I I've got I feel like coming into this week like I haven't the the game hasn't quite been where it needs to be but like I'm you know quietly confident on what I'm seeing not only in practice but what I'm seeing at the golf course uh currently the setup will be a big talking point as will be fashion script which has always been a bit of a topic in golf over the last decade or so now take me back to Augusta and what you've got in store for valh because your fashion and your new uh link with malborne became a real talking point at Augusta National yeah yeah um the the vest I mean a lot of people are invested in you know talking about my fashion whether it's you know positive or negative I just don't understand how people uh have the time to sit and comment on it all day but uh it's it's nice that the it's getting subraction and getting a lot of you know people looking at uh at mour golf and and it's it's good that's kind of like what they did they accomplished uh what they were set out to I actually quite liked the vest um obviously Augusta did not um so but like once again like you respectfully you know take it off if they ask you to take it off you don't want to step on anyone's toes but um I still I still have the vest here in the in the bus um still waiting for a perfect time to pull it back out but uh yeah I um I don't know scripting wise what we got coming up because typically Mullin if like they're like late but I think we're going to go more Tech techy kind of Slimmer fitting um you know outfits uh for the PGA so not as baggy as a guust and uh it'll be more in line which I told Stephen I said look we we got to kind of te her along the edge there you know what I mean like of you know having some traditional stuff shocking it up with some uh you know some kind of newer baggy stuff and then going back and forth between the two so you keep people guessing and like what you're going to wear um and you know you got to try and do it in a way where it's you know the kids these days definitely wear a lot more baggier stuff um and you know the fashion fashion World for for a lot of these kids that are watching golf is is huge for them so you'll start I I shouldn't say you'll start to see more baggy stuff but it'll be interesting to see in like a year two three years to see if like the baggier stuff comes back in fashion and it's all cyclical but um it'll be interesting not to the point of like maybe tiger early 2000s but or 90 late 90s but we'll see see how it goes well my 20-year-old son and his mates are all wearing really big baggy jeans so you're ahead of the curve as usual Jason thanks for your time it's been great to have a chat and I'm sure you'll look a treat no matter what you're wearing on Sunday if you're holding up the want to make a trophy once again at Valhalla I appreciate it guys thank you so much