A star is reborn: How Bryson DeChambeau became the People’s Champ and, again, a major winner

Seconds before beginning his final round of the 124^th U.S. Open, Bryson DeChambeau nodded his head as he thumbed through his phone, his earbuds in and his spirits high.

Life was good. The first tee at Pinehurst No. 2 was overflowing with officials and dignitaries and media, all fixated on him. The grandstand and clubhouse balcony were packed, shoulder to shoulder, all there to witness him.

DeChambeau looked around at the buzzy scene. “Whatever happens today,” he smiled at his caddie, Greg Bodine, “it’s still going to be OK.”

The nonchalant attitude took Bodine by surprise. Before linking up with the polarizing superstar in spring 2023, Bodine knew all about DeChambeau’s quirky tendencies and underlying perfectionism. How he’d float his golf balls in Epsom salt to determine which were out of balance. How’d he hired a 3D-motion app operator to collect data from each practice swing. How, just for fun, he’d slap lead tape on his 3-wood to see how it affects the spin, and, at 11:30 p.m., give a dissertation on the Vector green-reading method. But now, 18 holes away from a career-changing victory, there was not even the slightest hint of tension.

Fifteen minutes earlier, as he was swatting drivers on the range and eliciting cheers and chuckles, DeChambeau discovered something was amiss with his most lethal weapon. He took out a level, scrutinized the angles and – ah-ha! – discovered that the 9 ½-inch curbed face on his Krank driver head had been flattened. This had happened before – it’s the cost of his repeated Hulk smashes – but not minutes prior to his final-round tee time at the U.S. Open. But still, even in the midst of the equipment emergency, DeChambeau calmly swapped out the head with a backup. When he didn’t approve of the replacement, he unwrapped a different one, with less loft, straight out of the packaging. Satisfied after just five mighty lashes, he returned the brand-new big stick to his Crushers-logoed bag and strode toward the first tee.