GENESIS SCOTTISH OPEN

July 7, 2026

Jon Rahm

The Renaissance Club

Quick Quotes

Q. Back here in Scotland, five-time Rolex Series Champion. How to be back at these pre stages events and Genesis Scottish Open for the first time since 2022

JON RAHM: God, it's a lot of fun. It's great to be here. Every time I come to play links golf, and we're driving in, especially my driver took me through the towns and I got to see Gullane and North Berwick, it was something special.

It's always something special. You get lucky enough for it's not raining like today, it's very hard to be a walk through a links golf course, honestly. Having a great partner like Genesis makes it even better. It's always been a fun week.

Q. It's been labeled as the start of links season with the The Open coming up. This is a modern links and you have not been shy about your love of this side of the game. What is it that you enjoy most and what do you feel that really challenges your game, especially?

JON RAHM: Quite a short links season, right, with two weeks. The Irish Open is later in September. It's just the purity of it. I think a lot of times the game worldwide has become a hit it long, hit it high, try to make as many birdies as possible.

I think the sentence, play golf, actually playing this great game becomes more alive here where you can't just do that. You have to actually play certain shots and understand how the ball reacts and understand how it reacts on the fairway and on the bounces on the green. I think the game comes alive over here. It's different and I don't think you can replicate it anywhere else. It's something special.

Q. What is the most misunderstood element to playing links golf?

JON RAHM: I think it's very well-known at this point. Most people that haven't played in this sort of wind before is putting on the wind. When you're exposed and there's no trees, on a golf course like this when you're hitting putts on 13, 12 and 14 right here in the water and the wind is coming in, how much it can affect the speed and the line is something that a lot of viewers probably don't understand correctly, and it's one of the harder parts. For the most part when we are playing, it's not a factor that you need that much.

Q. A lot of talk about National Opens. You've won The Irish Open plenty of times and your home Open and here at The Scottish Open. What makes these events so special to be part of and how valuable are they to the schedules?

JON RAHM: It's just the history of it is what makes them so special. No secret why the Spanish Open special to me. When I was able to win The Irish Open and I lifted the trophy for the first time, I start seeing the names and it's filled with all the legends of European golf. It's something special to hopefully be regarded as one of them. Not many people say that and I hope I can get to that point.

Like The Irish Open, The French Open, the German Open, the Spanish Open, The Scottish Open, all of them have pretty much the same list of champions and probably many more Opens that I'm missing. I think it's what connects us to the past. Some of these tournaments have been going on for such a long time and I know The French Open at one point was the longest-running event in the amount of editions, I can't even think of how many. It's what makes them special, the connection of the past to the present.

Q. You haven't played the full course but they have rerouted it for this year. What do you see as maybe the challenges and opportunities the new layout is going to present this week?

JON RAHM: First thing I can say, there's no par 5 on the back nine. So that obviously can change things a little bit. You don't have a par 5 down the stretch, and 16 is not the easiest hole in the world, but if you do get it downwind, it can become a birdie hole.

I think they did it mainly for the spectators and the sponsor value, right, all the back nine holes besides 4, 17 right next to the clubhouse, you don't have to walk far. And if you can be on one of the terraces on the clubhouse, you can probably watch most of them and enjoy the show.

But when it comes to scoring -- should be the same. Just getting used to when you are walking off 16 going to, I guess it would be 7 now going to 18, that's the main thing for us. But I think it's going to become a better event, the back nine on Saturday and Sunday is going to be more electric.

Q. Great summer sport with golf, Wimbledon is going on at the moment and obviously Spain is still in the World Cup. Did you watch the game last night and with Belgium next, how far can you go?

JON RAHM: I did watch the Belgium/U.S. game. I obviously saw the score. U.S. has been doing really good and they have been investing in football for a long time and doing a lot better but obviously still a little bit to go. You play a good national team like Belgium, I think some of the inexperience might show but they have done a great job to now.

With Spain, I feel like it took us a little bit to get going on the match. Portugal didn't close themselves pretty about and tried to defend all time but that's hard to do for 90 minutes or stoppage time or overtime. Unless you're playing defensively, somebody of the quality of Spain is going to score.

But we'll see how it goes. It does remind me a bit to the Euros a few years ago where they seem to hang on, 1-0, and end up with a trophy, so I hope it repeats itself.