Chris Gotterup’s path to the 2026 Masters was a long and winding one
Chris Gotterup will be making his Masters debut this year, marking a significant milestone in his career.
Over the past seven months, Gotterup has made remarkable progress in the professional game, climbing up the ranks at an impressive rate.
During The Masters in April 2025, he was still outside the world’s top 200, playing in an event where most people wouldn’t have recognised his name.
At that point, playing at Augusta seemed like a distant hope rather than a realistic goal.
Chris Gotterup breaks self-imposed Augusta ban following Masters invite
And he’s not heading there just to make up the numbers – the way he’s been playing, Gotterup will genuinely fancy his chances of pulling off a major upset.
He’s got every reason to back himself, too. If he did pull it off, it wouldn’t come as a shock to anyone who’s followed his journey this season.
The topic came up recently when he was asked if he had any plans to get in some early rounds at Augusta before The Masters proper.
Gotterup responded: “Yeah, I haven’t been over there yet. I’ll try and go after Cognizant or Valspar during one of those weeks where I’m not going to play.”
“I haven’t been yet,” he continued. “I’ve done a couple of sponsor things during the tournament but they would always ask if I wanted to go over and I would say no because I didn’t want to go on property until I played for real. This time I’ll happily go over.”
“Well, I haven’t been invited to play in general, but I would go down — one of my sponsors would do a dinner down there every Wednesday before and they would ask if I wanted to go over on Thursday and watch,” said Gotterup.
“I don’t know, I feel like it would ruin my — like one, I don’t really like watching other people play unless I’m not playing that week. It’s just my, kind of weird in that sense. Like it’s the most hyped up tournament in the sport and didn’t want to go over there and be a spectator.”
“I had faith in myself that’d be able do it as player. Now that am going to be able step on first tee rather than being fan.”
New Jersey roots behind Chris Gotterup’s Augusta National decision
Nothing has ever come easily for Gotterup. He’s had to earn everything along the way, and back in June, before the US Open at Oakmont, he spoke about why he and fellow New Jersey native Ryan McCormick had worked their way into the tournament.
“I know he takes great pride in that, and I take great pride in it,” Gotterup said.
“There are good players who grow up in Jersey and go away to college. We’re two of the only guys who have toughed it out and climbed through the ranks in a place where you wouldn’t think you could do it.”
The 26-year-old also talked about his mentality as a player, which again is rooted in where he grew up.
“I like to describe myself as someone who is gritty, and I know Ryan would say the same thing,” Gotterup said.
“That’s just part of our New Jersey roots.
“There were so many stepping stones for me that, even if I was good enough at Rutgers to turn pro, I would not be in the same position I am now.
It has been a long journey to get there though. He turned professional out of Oklahoma University nearly three years ago but had a very slow start on both PGA TOUR Canada and PGA TOUR Latinoamérica.
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