For me, I would say how hilly it is out here. I don’t think that I played a course that’s this hilly. Well, at least walking. And how tight it is. I don’t feel like people talk often how tight it is and how hard it is to hit some fairways. But it’s very hard.

My preparation’s been the same as any other tournament that I have been playing. I’ve been obviously very busy with college. I think I played four tournaments after the LAAC. So preparation is still the same. A lot of homework, for sure. Also just talking a lot to the people that’s around me and my family, trying to stay in the present.

Jose Maria Olazabal was very kind of letting me play with him. I learned a lot from him. He gave me a few tips, more around the greens than on the greens. But it’s just special to play with a past champ and getting that information from past years.

So, I’m very grateful to have that opportunity.

If you’re going to play well, it’s like saying like, if you’re going to win here, you need to putt it well. Well, of course, right?

If you drive it well it becomes a lot more stress free. Then obviously into the greens, that’s probably — I’ll say it differently: I would say maybe leaving it in the right spots because there’s certain places you can hit it and you can’t go to within 15, 20 feet.

Like if you go — let me use an example. If you go right on 16 there’s just nothing you can do, right? Or if you go long on 17 then the pin’s back right, there’s nothing you can do.

So I think thinking your way around the golf course, which is a really tough thing to put a statistic on. Like if you look at some of the guys who have won here it’s really elite golf IQ guys that think really well around the golf course and are able to kind of play their game, be really into what they’re doing, but at the same time, think better than everyone.

I stayed here (Sunday) night. It’s really cool. It was a really, really cool moment. Yeah, I was the only person upstairs. I had dinner. I had a cocktail and a cigar. It was great. No, it’s a cool, intimate place. It’s a cool spot. Obviously historical for all the important reasons. If someone wakes up, everybody wakes up.

The older you get, between magnesium and melatonin, falling asleep and staying asleep is hard enough. I don’t need to make it any harder than it already is.

It’s my first time coming to the Masters, I promised myself the first time I come here is when I play, not come and watch. So this is so cool. It’s so fun. I have a bunch of friends from home that flew over. It’s fun to have some family and friends around. It’s pretty special.

If you’re out here by yourself, and there’s not a single person out here except two other groups maybe playing, you have this whole place to yourself and you can’t hear a thing, all you can hear is birds. Now it’s just all the noise, and it’s awesome. You can see people everywhere. It’s pretty cool. I’m here to take it all in.

Yeah, back nine tomorrow, same kind of time. I’ve seen a lot of guys over the last couple of years, especially amateurs, play this golf course three days in a row, you wear yourself down. Especially me being 6’8″, I’ve got to watch my body.

So nine holes today was great. Nine holes tomorrow again. For me the emphasis is around the greens here. So I’m going to do a lot of chipping and putting the next couple of days. Yeah, that’s kind of my process.

 I feel ready. It’s not — obviously a little bit of nerves over the first tee shot of the day, but having crowds here, it’s fun. I like to feed off this energy and just really enjoy the moment. I don’t feel uncomfortable at all.

After my semifinal match and getting through that, obviously you want to win the final, but the U.S. Amateur is definitely the best tournament in the world to finish second in, there’s no doubt about that.

It’s starting to get crispy out there. I don’t know if they’re starting to get this firm within anticipation of the weather coming on Thursday, but it’s getting firm. It’s fast. It’s going to get firmer and faster these next two days. That just makes hitting greens really important and just working on your landing spots on chipping and your second shots in because landing spots are starting to get pretty small with it being this crispy. Certain greens are getting really firm like 2, 3 and a few others. Those are the ones on the front that I really noticed.

All my visits I took here, I was kind of surprised actually with the greens, how sloped the edges are, but also it seemed like every green had a good amount of flat space in it, too, which I had always imagined that was just a lot of slope everywhere. That was a pleasant surprise because I felt like there was actually places you could hit your golf ball to.

But then being here today, it’s just how the patrons frame the golf course. It’s so cool. Holes like 2 are just completely different when the patrons are all around it. I’m really happy to have them all here, and it’s exciting to have all the crowds and hearing roars down 16 from the ball skips and everything. It’s cool.

Gosh, around the greens there’s just tons of different shots, high, low, putting draw or cut spin on different shots just to kind of fit what the golf course gives you. Off the tee it’s really — a straight ball works out here everywhere pretty much, but you’ve got to be able to work it a little bit both ways if you want to optimize yourself on some of the holes.

I feel prepared to hit all those shots. I’m really an experienced tournament player, especially at the amateur level, and I’ve had to deal with conditions and hitting all these different shots before under pressure. This week is going to be no different. It’s just golf. But definitely a little different being out here.

I think, yeah, coming to Augusta, it’s obviously always spoken highly about how perfect it is, and I think it definitely lives up to that expectation. Magnolia Lane with the flowers out is an amazing sight. I think the crowds is the thing that’s going to be the biggest eye opener for me that’s going to be different to any other week that I’ve ever experienced.

The experience has been amazing. I got to come back over here in February, and I played, yeah, three days in a row here, around Valentine’s Day. Yeah, it was an amazing, different experience to what it is this week. Obviously the course was empty, and I pretty much had it to myself. So it was something very special to have the difference between the two.

Then, yeah, just enjoying being back here again this week.

I played with Cam Davis this morning. He was pretty cool. He’s already given me a few tips before this week about what to look out for, which was great. We played a round back in December.

Yeah, just looking to play with a few of the Aussies as well. So Cam Smith, going to look to play with him on Wednesday. I think I’m confirmed to play with Hideki (Matsuyama) tomorrow, which is pretty awesome. Ryo (Hisatsune) just reached out and, yeah, it was pretty cool. So we’re going to play together tomorrow morning.

Viktor Hovland was the low amateur in 2019. He was asked Tuesday about his memories from that week:

That’s hard to pick just one or two, but having Coach (Alan) Bratton on the bag was really special, staying in Butler Cabin one night was pretty cool, obviously becoming a low amateur and sitting there with Tiger Woods, he won in 2019. I hit a couple of really, really nice shots on 15 that I’ll always remember, just hooking a 6-iron around there, hitting the green two out of two times. I was pretty happy with that.

Other than that, I mean, it’s — as advice for amateurs, it’s a really special week and just enjoy it. I think, obviously, you want to do well and show everyone what you can do because if you’re an amateur playing here, yeah, you’re an amateur, no one really expects you to play that great, but I know that if you get in here, you are capable of playing some great golf. But I think the more you put pressure on yourself, I think it goes against you. Just kind of show up and enjoy the week and try to be as calm and just enjoy yourself as much as possible, and I think it will be easier to play your best.

Obviously, I think it’s very smart to get together with a couple of veterans that have played out here a lot of times and get some practice rounds in with them. I remember I played with Bernhard Langer at one of my first few practice rounds in 2019 and it was just really cool watching him go about his business and watching him play. Certainly, I learned a lot and just you can really pick some of those guys’ brains and it will really help your game.

If you remember, Nick Dunlap was going to be in the field as an amateur until he won the American Express and turned professional. He missed out on all of the special perks for ams.

“No. It’s going to suck, but I think it will be really cool to stay in the Crow’s Nest for a night or two and experience that. Fortunately and unfortunately I’m in a new position and grateful to be here, but, no, I wish they would let me pop in there for a second, but it is what it is.”