Justin Hastings is back “home” this week, in the city where he spent four years playing at San Diego State, ready for his first Farmers Insurance Open, surely holding some sort of home-course advantage at Torrey Pines.
Then again …
“I feel like it’s a pretty common misconception that SDSU plays out here all the time, and we don’t,” Hastings said Tuesday after signing autographs for a group of teenagers at Torrey Pines. “I played here one time in four years, and that was my senior year.”
That doesn’t mean he’s unfamiliar with the cliffside layout. He’s seen it many times on TV and besides, there’s not much mystery to it.
“Nothing’s hidden,” Hastings said. “You can’t fake anything out here. It’s hard, but it’s not because things are hiding around the corner. It’s hard because you’ve got to hit every golf shot exactly how you want to. So, I’m just gonna come out here, try and execute at a really high level, and I think things will go well.”
If it’s true that momentum matters, Hastings certainly is carrying it into the Farmers. He finished in a tie for second last week at The Bahamas Great Abaco Classic on the Korn Ferry Tour, shot four rounds in the 60s the previous week at The Bahamas Golf Classic at Atlantis — and that’s not even getting into what he did in 2025.
The Cayman Islands native began last year by winning the Latin America Amateur Championship, graduated from SDSU, played in three of the four major championships, turned pro, appeared in four regular PGA Tour events — including a tie for 13th at the Mexico Open and two other top-30 finishes — and earned full status on the Korn Ferry Tour for 2026.
“A lot of things happened,” said Hastings, who just turned 22 in September.
Justin Hastings plays a shot on the 13th hole during the pro-am ahead of the 2026 Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines North Course on Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026 in San Diego, California. (Meg McLaughlin / The San Diego Union-Tribune)
The highlight was at the U.S. Open at Oakmont, where Hastings finished as the low amateur, allowing him to appear at the winner’s ceremony with champion J.J. Spaun, a fellow Aztec.
“It was kind of just like what dreams are made of,” Hastings said. “And playing Augusta and the Masters … I didn’t make the cut, so that week wasn’t even about success looking back on it. Just to be a part of that and to understand what that’s about.”
The goal now is to take advantage of his limited opportunities on the PGA Tour through sponsor exemptions, like the one he received this week, and primarily to finish in the top 20 on the Korn Ferry points list, which would earn him a PGA Tour card for 2027.
Hastings is off to a good start with his runner-up finish last week, but he knows how thin the margins are; the previous week, he was three shots from finishing in the top 20 — and three shots from finishing outside the top 50.
“Now that I’ve experienced it all, it’s so unbelievable how thin the margins are,” he said. “It’s really hard to put into words. Everybody is just so good at golf, and there’s just not enough spots for how good people are anymore. So we’ve ended up with this product that is just extremely, extremely, extremely cutthroat and tight, and one swing is the difference in just so many things.
“There’s so much volatility. It’s crazy.”
If he looks around this week, he’ll see plenty of friends from his college days. And if he looks two groups ahead of him, at least for the next two days, he’ll see Spaun and another fellow Aztec, Xander Schauffele. Tournament officials missed their chance for an all-Aztecs grouping.
“My caddie was saying he thought that could have been a pretty cool group just with three Aztecs,” Schauffele said.
Hastings said he understands, but added: “Maybe a couple more years into my career, hopefully they’ll give that a thought.”