WEB.COM
MONEY LIST
#20
$166,689, plus made another $54,348 in
the tour’s four-tournament playoffs, hiking
his haul to $224,037, which ranked 20th on
the circuit’s 2017 money list.
MUSIC CITY JUMP START
Lanto Griffin loves country music. Maybe
that’s why his game was so in tune for the
June 29–July 2 Nashville Open.
Griffin staggered into town locked in the
throes of an abysmal start that had seen him
miss seven cuts in 11 starts, with a top finish
of T19th the week before in Wichita, Kan.
“I was pretty fed up and I went into
Nashville and the only goal was just not
to have swing thoughts and just have fun,”
Griffin said.
“My short game was pretty good the
first two days, but I really didn’t make any
putts. I had a really good up and down on
17—the 8th hole on Friday—just to make
the cut on the number (2-under 142).
$224,037
“I go out on Saturday in 53rd place
... and I shoot 62 with 20 putts and
I chipped in twice and made three or
four putts outside 20 feet. And I had the
low round of the day by four shots and I
went into Sunday tied for second in the
final group.”
In the final 18, Griffin was a pedestri-
an-like even par through seven holes.
After he hit his approach shot on No. 8,
the players were sent off the course for a
weather delay.
“We went in and we sat there for about
two hours,” he said. “Then we went back
out and I had about a 50-footer uphill,
right to left about 5 feet, and I poured it in
dead-center with perfect speed.”
Following a second rain delay, Griffin
stood fifth on the scoreboard. He proceeded
from there to tour the final eight holes in 4
under to finish at 16-under 272. He then
rolled in a 15-foot birdie putt on the first
Lanto Griffin
and his caddie,
Chris Nash, at
the Shriners
Hospitals Open
for Children.
22
V I R G I N I A G O L F E R | N O V E M B E R / D E C E M B E R 2 0 17
$166,689
WEB.COM
TOUR
+
$54,348
TOURNAMENT
PLAYOFFS
hole of a playoff to beat Abraham Ancer
and collect the $99,000 winner’s paycheck.
Talk about some turnaround for a guy
who had won a paltry $11,650 in 11 previ-
ous starts.
A confident Griffin continued from
there, making cuts the next eight weeks to
bank another $59,039. Then he knocked
down another $55,000 in the four-event
Web.com Playoffs.
SETTING THE MINDSET
Griffin credited work with mental-game
coach Dr. Greg Cartin of Boston for a
chunk of his sudden about-face.
“Greg was a big help,” Griffin said. “The
fear of failure and just basically looking
into the future … the whole philosophy is
thoughts are normal for humans in general
to have the will to live.”
“It goes back thousands of years to when
they were being attacked by bears. Well,
the fear of a bear killing you, we don’t have
that anymore in day-to-day life, but the
fear of failure and just basically looking
into the future and being scared of what
might happen.
“Basically, he just kind of told me that’s
a normal feeling and so don’t just sit there
and say, ‘man, what’s wrong with me?’ Just
sit there and say thoughts aren’t real. No
thought hits a golf shot.”
Cartin, who first met Griffin at PGA Tour
School last December, loves what he sees
out of his pupil.
“Like most guys who have been banging
around out there for a few years, they start
to question whether or not if what they have
is good enough,” Cartin said. “When that
happens, usually guys start looking the other
direction, trying different things, thinking
they should be swinging like someone else or
making changes.
“I’ve seen a lot of guys, I’ve been fortu-
nate enough to be out on Tour quite a bit
and see these guys and Lanto is talented.
It’s been fun to watch him progress and
put it all together.
“And he’s figured it out pretty fast,
especially for a guy his age ... I don’t want
to say 29 is old, but when you’ve been out
there for a few years and nothing is hap-
pening, it can really beat you down. He
stuck with it and he’s earned it.”
vsga.org
2017