{"id":512086,"date":"2026-04-04T06:53:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T06:53:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/512086\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T06:53:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T06:53:15","slug":"masters-will-be-cool-but-i-miss-english-foggy-mornings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/512086\/","title":{"rendered":"Masters will be cool but I miss English foggy mornings"},"content":{"rendered":"

For a man who has ADHD and admits that overstimulation is a problem, Marco Penge has had an eventful year. It has involved moving to the United States, finding a new home but finding himself unwelcome at certain golf clubs, and then becoming a dad again in February but watching his son spend 21 days in intensive care. Now he faces his first Masters. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be a challenge,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Penge, 27, is generous company both in terms of his time and candour. His star is rising. In February, his peers on the DP World Tour voted him the player of last year, ahead of the Masters and Race to Dubai champion Rory McIlroy. Three wins built on mammoth drives, as well as a runner-up spot at the Scottish Open, earned him that accolade and it bookended a remarkable chapter. <\/p>\n

In 2024, Penge endured 19 missed cuts and saved his Tour card only with a birdie on the final hole to make the weekend at the Genesis Championship. The poor form was partly due to a protracted investigation that ended just before Christmas when he received a three-month DP World Tour ban for gambling on golf tournaments. He had not bet on himself and the wagers were small change, but the turmoil was enormous. It has been 18 months to remember.<\/p>\n

\"MarcoPenge won the Spanish Open last October before starting his new life Stateside Stuart Franklin\/Getty<\/p>\n

Romeo Penge only got out of Jupiter Medical Center in Florida on March 17. \u201cIt was different than with\u00a0our first child and we didn\u2019t expect or understand some of the things that can happen in pregnancy,\u201d Penge says. \u201cHis lungs were a little undeveloped and he needed some help to breathe for the first 2\u00bd weeks. It was a waiting game in terms of him deciding when he wanted to do it on his own, but the staff at the hospital were amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

His blossoming\u00a0last year resulted in the extra reward of a PGA Tour<\/a> card, but the move to the US is not always trouble-free. Bob MacIntyre was honest about his homesickness after his first US salvoes and Penge, Crawley-born and Horsham-raised with an Italian father, is a \u201cproud British-Italian\u201d.\u00a0Indeed, while you might think his suspension would have coloured his view of his home circuit, he says he will probably play three or four years in the US before going back to the DP World Tour. <\/p>\n

\u201cI miss foggy, cold mornings,\u201d he says. \u201cI miss the changing culture every week playing in Europe, the changing cuisine. I want to play majors, Ryder Cups, but my ambition is to go down as a legend in European golf and, ultimately, I\u2019d love to go back to Europe and live in the UK. I\u2019ve got a big attachment to the European Tour. There\u2019s probably a lot of three-times winners but not many ten-times ones and I\u2019d really like to get to double digits.\u201d<\/p>\n

That should not be read as a lack of commitment to his new life in Florida, where he loves the fact that you can go into a bar and golf is likely to be playing on the TV. However, he did not get off to the most auspicious start. After winning the Spanish Open in October, he flew to Florida with his wife, Sophie, the low amateur at the Women\u2019s British Open in 2017. Their mission was to find a home and a club.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat whole day me and my wife were here, there and everywhere,\u201d he recalls. \u201cWe were just in our casual, travel clothes and found that can be a little disrespectful to some clubs over there. I nipped into one, had a quick look around the range, and was only there for about five minutes because we had so much to see, so I was a bit surprised when I got the reply saying I\u2019d not got in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MarcoReceiving an ADHD diagnosis has given Penge a greater understanding of what makes him tickLuke Walker\/Getty<\/p>\n

He does not name the sensitive souls offended by a top-30 player\u2019s shorts, but he joined Old Palm and it may say much about an unburdened mind that days after Romeo\u2019s release he had his best result in the US, finishing fourth at the Valspar Championship last month. \u201cHe came out on Tuesday and my wife came up on Wednesday with both my boys and my dog. I\u2019d only booked it for me and my caddie so we were all crammed into this little Airbnb.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just went to play golf and came home and played with my kids and dog. It was great being there and hearing my oldest\u00a0[Enzo, who will be two in June] shout \u2018Dadda\u2019 rather than thinking, \u2018I\u2019ve got seven holes left and I\u2019m tied for the lead.\u2019 It helped my brain by being able to switch off.\u201d<\/p>\n

His brain gets mentioned a few times because it was during his enforced hiatus that he had ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) diagnosed. The symptoms of being inattentive but also able to hyperfocus on an activity explained a lot, which is why he calls his ban a blessing. \u201cI was in disbelief that I\u2019d made that error [gambling]. A few years before, there\u2019d been a slideshow about what you\u2019re allowed to do and not do, but it was seriously boring. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you don\u2019t have much attention span you kind of switch off and [do] not pay attention to what you need. That can be quite penal, as I found out. I\u2019d felt something was not quite right for me to have made this mistake and there were other situations where I\u2019d struggled too.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I had a brain scan and they diagnosed me, and it helped me understand myself as a person, what makes me tick, and why I struggle in certain situations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It means his coach, Alex Buckner, knows he must get information across in the right way or \u201cit might go in one ear and out the other\u201d. There are a myriad of other situations that would seem to make a sportsman\u2019s life harder. <\/p>\n

\"MarcoPenge has warmed to aspects of life in the US but misses \u201ccold, foggy\u201d morningsJordan Bank\/Getty<\/p>\n

\u201cI just get overstimulated very quickly because I\u2019m always thinking about everyone else,\u201d he adds. \u201cI can\u2019t seem to store many types of reading and my brain doesn\u2019t deal very well with anxiety. I\u2019m either fully engaged or not at all, but there are a lot of positives about having ADHD too, like being able to hyperfocus. It explains why I was able to win three times last year because I have the capabilities to go somewhere else mentally that other people don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is not taking medication, but has worked out coping strategies with his wife, coach and psychologist. His caddie, Max Bill, needs a good understanding of ADHD but, Penge says, \u201cwe\u2019ve got a similar brain\u201d.<\/p>\n

All of which brings us to Augusta. The glare and pressure of the year\u2019s first major, hundreds of media, a fetish for rules and snaking queues for Day-Glo gnomes in the shop can coalesce into an assault on the senses. The prospect of being overstimulated seems all too real.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to visit before to get that first \u2018wow\u2019 kind of giddiness out of the way,\u201d he says. \u201cI was meant to do that but my son was born, so I changed plans. I\u2019m sure I\u2019ll be bouncing about, buzzing, like a little boy, but it\u2019s about finding the balance. I\u2019ll talk about it with my team at the start of the week, but I know it will be a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MarcoThe plain-speaking Englishman is searingly honest about the defects in his game Bradley Kanaris\/Getty<\/p>\n

Penge says the Masters<\/a> is his favourite tournament to watch and rattles off his highlights reel \u2014 Tiger Woods\u2019s chip-in on the 16th in 2005, his comeback win in 2019, Bubba Watson\u2019s hook in the play-off in 2012, Phil Mickelson\u2019s pine straw escapology on the 13th in 2010. \u201cIt\u2019ll be cool just to go and check out the areas where these great players hit those historic shots,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Many golfers can become bogged down in psychobabble or indulge in textbook speak, but Penge is brutally honest about his game. His driving has long drawn plaudits, but he does not resort to \u201ctaking-the-positive\u201d tropes about other aspects. \u201cMy iron play is so hit and miss,\u201d he laments. \u201cEven last year it wasn\u2019t great at times. I hit tee shots every day where I\u2019m like, \u2018That is world class.\u2019 But I don\u2019t do that with my irons. <\/p>\n

\u201cLast week was the last straw, so I\u2019ve started to make a couple of changes. It feels like a rebuild but, to be honest, it can\u2019t get much worse. I know I\u2019m one of the, if not the, best drivers in the world, so in the last three days I\u2019ve probably hit 1,000 iron shots and 25 drives.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is an Italian connection in his backroom team, with Edoardo Molinari providing his stats breakdowns, and he has dual loyalties when it comes to football, edging 55 per cent to England in head-to-heads \u201cdepending on who I\u2019m watching it with\u201d. He was a talented player himself, earning trials with Southampton and Reading.<\/p>\n

One of his stated aims is to \u201cstay humble\u201d, but do not underestimate the talent or desire of a man rated by many as the hottest prospect in European golf. Eighteen months have taught him a lot. \u201cNo matter what happens from now I\u2019ve kind of proved myself to the world,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve learnt I do well when I\u2019m up against it and I enjoy the challenge of overcoming setbacks.\u201d It is showing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For a man who has ADHD and admits that overstimulation is a problem, Marco Penge has had an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":512087,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[5904,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-512086","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512086","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=512086"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512086\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/512087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=512086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=512086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=512086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}