THE AMERICAN EXPRESS

January 22, 2026

Jason Day

PGA WEST Pete Dye Stadium Course

Quick Quotes

Q. Great day today, 9-under but on the Stadium Course. Can you talk about what was working for you out here and getting this round out of the way early?

JASON DAY: I got off to a good start. I hit two shots close. That's kind of the thing out here. You can get after, 1, 2, 3. You can -- sorry, you can birdie 5, get through 6, and get a birdie on 7 and 8, and then see how that goes. Obviously fortunate enough to kind of roll some putts in too, which was nice. Irons felt great, the short game felt good, and I putted really nice today. Just got to work on the driver a little bit. Some of the drives were a little off. But overall I feel pretty solid.

Q. Was there anything you worked on in the off-season that you implemented this week that you noticed made a difference?

JASON DAY: I have new irons, and it's the third gen that I've actually worked on with Avoda. So they feel pretty solid right now. Once again, I was just saying earlier, that I'm still trying to learn what the irons like to do. Like, if I bring it in a certain angle or a certain direction, what does that actually equate to shot-wise. And when I mishit it, what does it do. So I'm really trying to learn how these clubs will react and what, how far I can actually push 'em. And then, yeah, they feel pretty good. This is my fourth set with them. I feel pretty solid right now. It's the first day, so I'm not really focused too much on obviously the rest of the week, but I've got some good chances out there, so I got to just keep pushing.

Q. You had pretty good success here before in the past. Last year T-3 finish. Is there something in particular about this event or this course?

JASON DAY: I love Palm Springs. I just love it here. The people are great. I feel like every day is like this, where it's sunny and perfect weather. And it's a good place to start the West Coast Swing for me. Typically in the past I would either, when we played the Tournament Of Champions, I would come back and play Torrey Pines and that was a brute (laughing) coming straight out of the gate. So this is a nice way to kind of ease your way into it. You don't have to overly be too quick out there, you can kind of take your time, especially because you're playing with amateurs. It's kind of more of a, it's not a lighter week, because you still want to play well. But it's a good week to kind of get your season started and see where things are and if you need to work out some of the kinks.

Q. What was your favorite shot of the day?

JASON DAY: Probably the second shot on 16. 3-wood, hanging lie, like kind of above my feet. The 5-iron was just as bad. So I just pulled a 3-wood, hit it to the front of green, chip shot wasn't that great, but I'll take the 3-wood.