Adam Hadwin finally seeing hope in 'hardest period' of golf career

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CALEDON, Ont. — The thing with professional golf is that, unless you’re Rory McIlroy or Scottie Scheffler, nobody pays much attention when you’re not playing well.

With the golf world’s eyes on the RBC Canadian Open this week, there is one native son quietly hoping that this trip home will be the turning point he has been searching for.

“This is the most comfortable I’ve felt with my golf swing in six months,” Adam Hadwin said after Friday’s round. “It’s been a while. I feel like I’m finally able to kind of set up over the golf ball and have some sort of clue of where it’s going.”

It’s been nothing short of a dreadful season for Hadwin, who has seen his world ranking drop from 59th at the end of 2024, to 105th entering the Canadian Open.

“It’s been hard. I’ve struggled,” he said after his Friday round of 68. “But I feel like every single week I have a good opportunity to play well, and it just never happens.”

Hadwin isn’t particularly close to the top of the leaderboard after two rounds at TPC Toronto, but he’s not near the bottom either. The 37-year-old Abbotsford, B.C. native is in the mix at five-under par, and for the first time in 2025 he is seeing results that have daylight in sight through the woods he has been lost in.

On the course, the camera hasn’t been following him much these days. Although there was a somewhat embarrassing moment of frustration at the Valspar Championship — the site of his lone PGA Tour win in 2017 — when he slammed his club, broke a hidden sprinkler head, and set off a dazzling water display he would quickly apologize for.

Admirably, Hadwin has never been one for making excuses. On Friday at TPC Toronto, after making the normal media rounds that follow one of Canada’s most popular golfers, Hadwin spoke to the Toronto Sun away from the bright lights.

“This has by far been the hardest period that I’ve dealt with in my career,” he said. “I’ve been through swing changes before but I’ve been able to put together results kind of working through it. With this one, for whatever reason, I haven’t been able to do that.”

Speaking with him after disappointing rounds at big tournaments in the past you would rarely know anything was bothering him: the smile was always there, the sense of humour intact, the professionalism never wavered.

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For years, Hadwin’s greatest strength on the golf course has been that he has no glaring faults. He won on the PGA Tour, he shot a 59, and he played in the Presidents Cup because he found a way to do a little bit of everything well and get the ball into the hole with whatever game he brought to the course. But recently, that last and most vital part has escaped him.

“Doubt, lack of confidence in what I’m doing, probably all of the above,” he explained as reasons. “Mixed in with the golf swing stuff.”

At home in Wichita, Kansas, Hadwin frequently takes a backseat to the popularity of his wife Jessica, whose often-hilarious insights into life on the PGA Tour have developed a cult following among golf nerds.

For the most part, Hadwin is fine with his private life gaffes often being made public. As the comedy straight-man in a social media life that he didn’t exactly sign up for, he happily does his part most of the time.

“If anything seems too egregious she usually checks with me first, just to confirm,” Hadwin said. “But no, it’s fine. I’m happy to be the butt of some jokes every now and then, I can take it.”

Hadwin says the quiet life in Kansas, near Jessica’s family, has been great for the couple and their daughter Maddox.

“We are around her family, I love that for us, especially for her and Maddox when I’m away. Certainly, not the best practice conditions January through April, but plenty of good and it’s a great setup for our family.”

The golf swing has been a work in progress going back four years when he began a swing change with top coach Mark Blackburn. In an effort to take some of the wrist rotation out of his swing, the pair set about to strengthen the clubface and have it square on the way down, so he could simply turn into the ball at impact.

“In doing that, I got super shut, very flat wrist, very DJ-esque,” he said, referring to Dustin Johnson’s unique move. “We like the wrist position coming down but I was doing some weird things with the wrist on 3D (video analysis). I was kind of super closed, and then opening it, and then closing it again on the down. So very inconsistent, basically.”

This past winter they began the process of trying to keep what they liked, and fix what they didn’t.

“I’ve never been a great iron player. I’ve been a decent driver of the ball but never been a consistent iron player. It’s good when it’s good, but otherwise it’s sort of blah,” he said. “We are chasing consistency.”

With just one top-25 finish so far this year, it hasn’t been easy. Social media has a way of sugarcoating things, and while the Hadwin family certainly can’t be accused of only putting their best moments forward, you never really know what anyone is going through until they tell you.

“I’ve had a hard time getting away from some of this at times, and not overthinking things during this past six months. I’ve had a really hard time not taking it off the golf course with me,” he said. “It’s great to be able to get away from the game, and just kind of focus on them at times. I love the simplicity of living in Wichita. So it’s really nice to go home and be around family in the off weeks.”

With just two bogeys through 36 holes at the RBC Canadian Open there is reason for optimism, and for the entire Hadwin clan, hopefully a weekend and summer of good golf ahead.

“I don’t know if I want to say that I found it, because we never really fully find it,” Hadwin said. “But I feel good this week.”