TRAVELERS CHAMPIONSHIP

June 25, 2026

Ben James

TPC River Highlands

Quick Quotes

Q. Probably not the finish you wanted, but how would you assess your first round today?

BEN JAMES: It was good. I played great. I did a lot of good things. Hit it good, rolled it good. Had a ton of lipouts. I played nice. Had a little just made one mental mistake and just an unfortunate lie that I had on the last. But overall it was a good day.

Q. How much is become being familiar with the course help in this tournament because you played it several times?

BEN JAMES: Yeah, I mean, it's just pretty simple. You got to hit the fairway, the rough's thick. The greens are in great shape, so you can make a ton of putts. It's just golf, you're going to have to hit it good and putt well like any other course.

Q. Did you recognize a lot of friends and family out there?

BEN JAMES: Oh, yeah, it was amazing. I had an amazing crowd. It was great. I had an amazing day. Played some nice golf. Funny, the only people I could hear are my high school buddies, I knew their voices. But it was awesome, amazing experience.

Q. Are you feeling good? Are you tired, able to get some rest some time this week before you came out?

BEN JAMES: A little bit. I'm fine. I feel great. Ready to play really good the next three days.

Q. Is the challenge making the transition now to the PGA TOUR is it more mental or a more physical challenge?

BEN JAMES: That's a good question, I mean, it's been my, I don't know, ninth round out here. I don't know, I'm just kind of riding the wave, I guess. But I guess logistically it's a little different because I do some of the work and I got to coordinate it, versus I just get told what to do, so that's different. But it's just about playing good golf at the at the end of the day.

Q. What did you do in school to prepare for that, where coaches set up practice, all the travel, all the different logistical things about being an elite golfer taken care of for you. Now, like, you're your own business, how did you prepare for that?

BEN JAMES: You can't really prepare, I don't think, perfectly. I had a job to do when I was in college. We had to win as a team. I had to try to earn that No. 1 spot. So that's all I was focusing on. I wasn't focusing on anything else.

Q. What are some of your goals for this summer? What are the things that you set out that you want to try to achieve?

BEN JAMES: Just to learn as much as I can, make a lot of friends. I was pretty comfortable today. I surprised myself a little bit. I started off really nice. I played a nice front nine. Tony was a great guy. Very much enjoyed playing with him. Looking forward to playing with him tomorrow. It just was a good day.

Q. Had you met him before?

BEN JAMES: Nope.

Q. It's been a couple years since you played in this event, what felt different, did anything feel different more comfortable being out there today?

BEN JAMES: Yeah, I knew playing the U.S. Open was going to help. I knew I was going to have probably the second biggest crowd out here outside of Scheffler's. Maybe, I don't know, but one of a -- a pretty big crowd. So I knew getting into the U.S. Open was going to help a lot. So that was an extra motivation to qualify. I think just like I was just more comfortable and I think I just grew, my game grew a little bit from the time I was in school until now.

Q. Were you nervous today?

BEN JAMES: I mean, yeah, but like not like too bad. I settled in, it took me about a hole and a half, I would say. But I striped a drive down the middle of the fairway and was off and going from there.