If there was a player with a big point to prove heading into 2025, it is surely Max Homa after an incredibly disappointing 2024 season for the American.
Max Homa looked set for a very good year after winning the 2023 Nedbank Golf Challenge, while he was one of the players with an outside chance of rivalling Scottie Scheffler at the Masters until he launched his tee shot on 12 over the back of the green on Sunday.
Unfortunately, Homa did not kick on from there. He would have just one more top 10. And he was unable to make his way to the Tour Championship. There was plenty of debate after Homa received a captain’s pick for the Presidents Cup from Jim Furyk.
Homa showed some better signs at Royal Montreal. And it seems that he has used the off season extremely productively, with the 34-year-old producing a superb first round upon his return to the Nedbank Golf Challenge.
Max Homa praised after his opening round at the Nedbank Golf Challenge
He did make two bogeys, but Homa’s round of six under par leaves him top of the leaderboard. And speaking on Sky Sports (broadcast on 5/12; 14:30), Trish Johnson lauded Homa’s display in his opening round.
“Yeah I was massively impressed with him all day long. From the very start, perfect drive down the first. He said you’ve got to hit the fairways, give yourself a chance of making birdies, of which he knows he’s got to make plenty to win this tournament,” she said.
“But do you know what, sometimes you just find, not just a golf course, but a place, an environment where you just feel really at home. And this is the place for him. You can see how happy he is. And when you’ve won on a golf course before, things just come very easily. Even the practice rounds, things like that, you don’t have to worry about it, you know where everything is. It’s like an inner sense of just ‘I feel comfortable here, I know exactly what I’m going to hit, I don’t have to think so much’. And he just looked like he’s enjoying every single moment.
“There were a couple of times, I think his driving was almost perfect, there were a couple of irons that were a bit wayward, a couple left – which is when he’s working on certain things. But that’s a guy that’s working on things, and he’s leading the golf tournament. Good luck to the rest of them.”
Homa’s driving stats in 2024
If there is a part of Homa’s game which needs to improve, it is certainly his driving. He was 164th for strokes gained off the tee during the 2024 season on the PGA Tour, while he was 111th from tee to green.
Of course, Homa winning the event last year meant that he was always going to be a favourite this time around, no matter how poorly he had played in the last few months.
But if there was any complacency leading into the 2023 event, there would not have been this time around. Homa is never afraid to issue a very honest assessment of his game. And he would have been extremely disappointed with how he played this past year at a time when he appeared to be on the verge of a breakout season.
It is clearly a small step at this stage, but Homa will be delighted that he can take a number of positives from his round.
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