TRAVELERS CHAMPIONSHIP

June 26, 2026

Viktor Hovland

TPC River Highlands

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Viktor, you tied your career low on tour with a 61. If we can get some comments on an excellent round.

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, it was awesome stuff today. Obviously been kind of battling some stuff. You know, my golf swing had not felt all that comfortable. But, you know, I felt like things stabilized a lot more today, and I was able to put the ball in the fairway, hit some great iron shots, and putter finally cooperated a little bit more today.

So it was overall a great round of golf.

Q. I was on the range while you were getting ready to warm up, and it felt like today if there was going to be a really low round, today was going to be the day. No wind, soft conditions. Were you under that impression when you were getting ready to go out today that today was the day?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, for sure. The greens were definitely a little bit softer today, but some of the pin locations, they're tricky. I mean, it's tough to get close to a lot of them, and you have to kind of play a little bit passively on some of them, trying to give yourself a 20-footer instead of trying to go right at it.

Yeah, I think, as you're seeing, I think Scottie is taking it low today, and a lot of guys are playing well. Certainly it was more gettable today than it was even yesterday.

Q. For those of us who are never going to shoot 61, what's the difference besides maybe a putt or two going in here or there between something with what happened today and, say, like a 65 or 66, which is still really good, but is there that big a difference for you guys?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, I mean, obviously in the score it's a big difference, but in the way that you're doing it, maybe not so much.

The margins for error are so small. Like, for example, on 13, I eagled it today. I pulled my 5-iron just a little bit, and it stayed on top on the left. I had about a 20-, 25-footer for eagle. It was probably 3 feet from taking the slope and going in the water, and I might make bogey. It's like a lot of those small things.

I could hit the exact same shot, and two very different results. So you have a lot of things like that going your way. Then the 20-, 25-, 30-footers, you might make a couple of them as opposed to sometimes you hit a great putt, it lips out, and you might even miss the come-backer, and that's a two-shot difference. You're not a worse golfer. It's just sometimes it's your day, and sometimes it's not.

Q. When you have had a hot run like you had going today and you get to, for example, 15 tee where you can make a score or things can go off the rails; 16, you're over water; 17 the tee... Is there a different kind of pressure that maybe you put on yourself knowing that you want to keep the momentum going? You're firmly in the tournament. You're going to be spoken about going into the weekend. Does that finish and the way that those holes are set up create different kind of tension?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, it's awesome, especially the pin locations today. Like 15, that pin location, you can kind of be a little bit aggressive with. I hit a nice 3-wood, but it came out way too knuckley and didn't stop on the green.

I had a trick up-and-down from over the green, but 16, it's a very gettable hole, but it's so close to the water. When you're in between clubs, and there should be herd up there, you just can't really go for that pin. So I hit it 20 feet past.

Then on 17 tricky shot when it's straight downwind, because that pin is not -- it's sitting very close to the water. You want to stuff it in there, but at the same time, you don't want to hit it in the water and give away the tournament.

Q. Finally, by your standards, it's been a tough year off the tee. You came up, when you were pro, one of the straightest, longest drivers on tour. You've had some struggles. What today either clicked, or what has been sort of building up that got you to today where you hit a lot of fairways?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, I've obviously been working a lot on my swing to try to get back technically to where I can, you know, not think about the swing as much and just step over the ball and expect to see a certain shot shape. I feel like I've gotten a lot closer to that in even recent weeks.

I thought in Canada it was a lot of promise, and even U.S. Open I drove it a lot better. I just had one OB ball on the worst time possible. I hit one bad shot in the left-to-right wind, and it was gone to the right.

It's just been I'm seeing the good shots are really good. It's just the bad ones have been punishing me a lot. I feel like what my feel was in my swing and what I've been working on is starting to kind of get the shot dispersion a little bit tighter.

Q. Starting to trust it a little bit more?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: For sure.

Q. Mentally anything different seeing Scottie on top of the board as opposed to anybody else?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: I mean, obviously he's the best player in the world, and you know he's not going to give anything up. But yeah, it's just kind of excitement, to be honest, to have a chance to go up against a guy that's playing some amazing golf, and should be a really fun weekend.