THE AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP

June 20, 2025

Gavin Tiernan

Quick Quotes

Q. Gavin, you're a finalist here at the 130th Amateur Championship. How does that sound?

GAVIN TIERNAN: It sounds pretty cool, to be honest. If you'd told me at the start of the week I'd be in the final, I would have been over the moon.

I'm just really enjoying it, taking it one shot at a time, and just having fun out there. That's all I'm trying to do.

Q. You've played well over 130 holes of golf this week. You've taken the long road here, but it does show in match play anything can happen.

GAVIN TIERNAN: Yeah, I knew I was well capable to get here. Doing it is a different story.

I think that having that belief and -- belief is a huge thing, just believing you can do it. Your mind can take you to crazy places if you let it. I'm just really happy to have a chance to get the trophy in my hands tomorrow.

Q. This crazy place is Royal St George's. You've got another 36 holes tomorrow. Do you feel like you've figured out this layout?

GAVIN TIERNAN: Into the greens, you just have to be very disciplined. You can't go at a lot of pins. It's hard to get it close, but it's easy to get it to 20, 25 feet if you use the right slopes and stuff. It's just been accepting 20 feet is a good shot rather than thinking you have a wedge in your hand, you need to hit it close, especially with how it's firming up now.

I assume it's going to be playing even more difficult tomorrow. Yeah, discipline was probably the key to my golf today.

Q. You said it's hard to hit it close here but not for you on the 6th.

GAVIN TIERNAN: Yeah, some holes, yeah. When you pull draw it right on the pin, you'll take that. That would have been nice if that one dropped. Still haven't had a hole-in-one, so that would have been a nice one.

Q. You've never had a hole-in-one, not in your whole life?

GAVIN TIERNAN: Not once.

Q. Obviously you said your mind can take you some crazy places. Is it hard to not already be thinking about what lies in wait for the champion?

GAVIN TIERNAN: Well, the thing is not to try and avoid it. I think if you try and avoid thinking about it, you're just going to think about it more. I think you acknowledge it, you know that it's there, but just accepting it. If I want to get that, I need to take it one shot at a time and control what I can control. Looking ahead and getting ahead of myself is not going to do any good.

Obviously you know it's there, but just trying to stay grounded and in the moment.

Q. Can you talk to us about your match this afternoon because I think it was a 4 & 3 win in the end. It looked like you were just kind of in cruise control. Is that how it felt?

GAVIN TIERNAN: A little bit. I hit it way better this afternoon. Off the tee I was way better. I hit a lot of fairways, hit a lot of greens. I think this morning it was a little bit scrappier but this morning was tighter, as well. Like coming down the stretch, I wasn't up the whole match until 18.

I was kind of up most of the way there in that match and then just had a nice strong finish coming in. Just hitting good solid shots, putting pressure on. You don't need to go and take a ton of birdies. If you're hitting it to the middle of the green all the time, you're just going to bore them to death. That's what I've been trying to do this week, and it's worked so far.

Q. I know that WAGR isn't the be-all and end-all of everything in amateur golf, but tomorrow you are going up against Ethan Fang, who is the seventh highest ranked player in the world. Do you feel like -- does that make things harder in your mind, or do you think that takes the pressure off of you and places it more on him?

GAVIN TIERNAN: That doesn't really mean much to me, to be honest. In my head, I'm the best player here. Might not be the truth, but that's what I believe. It doesn't really matter who I'm playing against. Really I'm just playing against the golf course. Playing against myself really.

As long as I've done all that I can to win, if I don't, fair play. I don't mind that. But yeah, that doesn't really do too much for me. Like I'm just playing golf against myself, against the course, and see what happens.