LIV GOLF UNITED KINGDOM

July 26, 2026

Cam Smith

Lucas Herbert

Marc Leishman

Travis Smyth

JCB Golf and Country Club

Ripper GC

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Let's welcome to the media centre, our LIV Golf UK presented by JCB, team champions Ripper GC. Well played throughout the week. Lucas, another impressive wire-to-wire victory for you. You kept your foot on the gas from start to finish despite the conditions. Obviously you had a course-record performance on Thursday. But this morning with the wind picking up and the rain, did you envision a round out there like what you ended up delivering?

LUCAS HERBERT: No, absolutely not.

THE MODERATOR: As the day progressed -- elaborate on how things played out for you, 10-under.

LUCAS HERBERT: Yeah, Tyrrell was throwing down the hammer at me there. I think he was 6-under through 9, so it was kind of one of those days where I didn't want to take a backwards step. I knew both him and Bryson would come pretty hard at me. I just didn't want to take a backwards step and give them any freebies. It took a lot more birdies than I thought to not take a backwards step.

Q. Cam, you looked really comfortable out there this week. A T5 finish in Andalucía followed by a really strong performance this week. How good are you feeling about your game and how you've been playing?

CAM SMITH: Yeah, feels good. I feel like it's not kind of quite there yet. It doesn't feel automatic. But it's feeling -- I'm feeling more and more confident every week. I feel like my vision and my shots are coming back to me.

For periods of time, it feels like it can get on a roll, which hasn't been the case for a while. It's trending in the right direction. Just need to keep putting in the work.

Q. How proud are you of the three guys sitting next to you, after a strong start to the season, to be able to celebrate today?

CAM SMITH: Yeah, I mean, for Herby to do what he did this week was pretty incredible. To beat the field that we've got here by six shots, have a 61 and a 62 in the same week with the conditions we were playing in is pretty crazy. We kind of all just hung on the back of him this week, to be honest. Played some good golf myself, and that's kind of all it took. I feel like we got the team to try and bring this thing home.

Q. Marc, you had some big putts throughout the team to make sure that that lead wasn't relinquished, T12 finish for you this week. You've been right there the last few events. How proud are you to finish where you did but also see the Rippers back up on top?

MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, obviously great to see the Rippers back on the podium. It's funny, obviously a decent week for me, finishing 12th. But the great thing about this is you don't really think about the individual stuff when your team is right up there. You're looking at where the team is and what you can do to help the team.

Obviously that helps you individually, as well. Yeah, that's one thing I particularly loved about this week.

It's so much fun to be able to enjoy a good week with people who are equally as happy as you. Obviously Herby is going to be a little happier than we are, winning individually, but me, Trav and Cam, it's a good week. I think we're trending in the right direction, and hopefully we can finish off the year really well and see the Rippers back up there again at Bedminster.

Q. Travis, this is now the second team victory you've contributed to in the last three events.

TRAVIS SMYTH: I don't know if I contributed at all this week, but I'll claim it.

Q. I believe you should. Being part of the team, what is that experience like for you? How does that change the competition, whether it's extra pressure, extra excitement, the camaraderie, paying attention to the team leaderboard?

TRAVIS SMYTH: Yeah, I mean, I had it with the Crushers in Korea where I actually played decent golf, unlike this week.

As Marc said, you're just watching the team leaderboard so much. You don't want to be the guy that lets the team down, that he's the reason why they don't win.

I felt enormous pressure out there. Obviously I wasn't playing my best, and I was happy with pars, and I got about halfway through the round and I was just like, shit, how many holes do we have left; please can we just finish this.

Look, obviously I'm struggling, but to have the team win, I'm so proud of these guys. Yeah, I feel very honoured and very thankful that I'm a part of it.

Q. Lucas, what was the most stressful moment for you this week, or was there one?

LUCAS HERBERT: The carrot cutting was pretty stressful (laughing).

I think I drew a lot of parallels from Virginia to this week, scoring-wise, lead-wise. A lot of things were similar throughout. I dumped one in front of the green there on 8 today when Tyrrell was chasing me down, and those boys were pushing me pretty hard.

It sort of reminded me of 9 at Virginia where I hit one over the back there and made a double and kind of let Sergio back in it. I wanted to learn from that experience and not make a double and learn from that experience. Gave the one from down the valley a little extra to make sure it got up and made the one coming back.

I think it was probably around the time where it was starting to get the most stressful. Tyrrell was making a lot of birdies, and there was not a lot I could do.

Yeah, I would say that point. But then again, off the golf course, just sitting at night thinking about what you've got in front of you and what's going to happen tomorrow. That's probably the hardest bit, honestly. It's a nighttime just switching off between rounds. Once you get out here and you get in your warmup and start hitting balls, you kind of get into it and you get going and you free up. In between rounds there's nothing you can do and all you can do is think. That gets pretty stressful.

Q. 30-under doesn't come along every week. What was it like to be you this week?

LUCAS HERBERT: It was pretty fun. It was a good week all around. We obviously all stayed together. I think everyone commented this week that it was the best week of the year in terms of the vibes we had, players, caddies, physios, everyone staying together.

Obviously the carrot cutting contest was the thrill of the week.

But we just had a lot of fun. It wasn't just me that enjoyed the week. Everyone enjoyed the week quite a bit. It was nice to have us all win and obviously me play well on top of that, too, to kind of validate having a lot of fun and that being a good thing. It was nice to be me this week.

Q. Cam, Marc, can you just talk about how Lucas has evolved, progressed since he first joined LIV until these last few weeks where he's won twice?

MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, I think you can see, obviously, the results have gotten a lot better. He's always worked extremely hard, and he ticks all the boxes. What works for Herby or what works for Cam might not necessarily work for me or Trav or what they do might not work for each other. But Herby is very good at ticking all the boxes. He's worked really hard on his equipment over the last year to -- well, two years, I guess. I think he's done a really good job with that. He's got a great lineup in the bag.

But just the way he goes about things, the way he prepares, he just ticks all the boxes. I think that's what you have to do. He ticks Lucas Herbert's boxes, not mine or not Cam's or not Travis Smyth's. He does what works for him. Obviously his results have spoken for themselves this year with two wins and a chance to win The Open Championship and chances to win other events out here.

I know he really wanted to win on the LIV tour, and he's managed to do that twice. Congrats to him for all the hard work.

CAM SMITH: Yeah, I mean, when Herby joined the team, he was already a great player. You could tell he wanted to improve when he joined the team. He was out here asking questions, and he already had the skill set that made a great player. You could see him just slowly grinding over time to make himself 1 percent better, 1 percent better and 1 percent better.

At the start of this year, maybe even towards the end of last year, those questions kind of stopped and you could see him being himself again. You could see him going out there and hitting shots and just getting -- it's like he took in the answers and the knowledge and then just went out there and made it his self, like Leish said. It's been really cool to watch.

When Herby gets on a roll, like he did this week, it's awesome to watch. I almost wish I was on the lounge having a beer watching it, to be honest.

But he's a great teammate. He wants to do everything to make the team better. He's a great golfer, as well, and he showed it the last few events. The confidence that he has at the moment, I wouldn't be surprised if he ticks off another one or two before the end of the year.

Q. What are your boxes?

LUCAS HERBERT: This is far too many compliments. Let's change the subject here. I mean, I've learnt so much off these two sat on either side of me. I've had an absolute blessing having been invited to join Ripper GC and be a part of this team. I've done everything I can to absolutely soak in everything these two boys have offered up, and it's been awesome.

As Cam said, I've tried a lot of stuff the last couple years, and they've been sort of good detectives as to whether I'm barking up the wrong tree or not. I'll say that politically the best I can, basically. And I've benefitted from it so much. I'm so grateful to be in this position, sat with these boys, being able to learn off them every week. And I'm very aware of how lucky I've been to get in this position, too.

Q. Before you won in Japan, you were ranked 324th in the world. You came into this week ranked 69th. For any of you, where do you think Lucas ranks in the world right now?

CAM SMITH: I mean, after the last couple of weeks it's hard to say he's not inside the top 5, 10 in the world. Like I said before, he's just so confident at the moment. Like nothing scares him. I've been there before. Leish has been there before.

It's a cool place to be. You can see when someone is in that zone, and he's in that zone.

Q. Travis, you've celebrated two team victories. One involved a shoey, one didn't. How would you describe the differences between the two victories?

TRAVIS SMYTH: I mean, a win is a win. I'll take any of them. Obviously to win alongside a bunch of -- I don't want to say which one is better, but politely speaking, this one is better. I'm with Australians here, and this is the team that -- this is where my heart is. Definitely winning this week.

CAM SMITH: Good answer.

Q. The carrot cutting has been mentioned a couple of times. Cam, would you just share kind of how that started, the genesis of that, and just --

CAM SMITH: It's really silly. I think I was laying in bed one night this week, and it just popped up on my Instagram Reels as I was doom scrolling. I'm like, that would be really fun with the house that we've got this week and the people that are there.

Put it into play the next night, and it was a hit. Then we did the big playoff on Friday night.

Yeah, it was cool to kind of get the team together and our minds off golf and just having a laugh and a bit of team camaraderie never hurts. It was fun.

MARC LEISHMAN: There was no carrots wasted in the carrot-cutting game. We ate them all, just to clarify. We had a roast dinner last night that Alan cooked up for us, so no carrots were harmed.

LUCAS HERBERT: Well, they were harmed. They were just eaten afterwards.