Ever since he could remember, A.J. Ewart, the child of a teaching pro, has dreamed of being a professional golfer and making the PGA Tour. That dream is getting closer to reality as Ewart, a 26-year-old from Vancouver, is off to a fast start at PGA Tour Q-School.
Ewart rolled in a 35-foot birdie putt at the first and carded a 4-under 66 on Thursday, which tied for the low round of the day at Sawgrass Country Club.
“It was boring golf, but boring golf is good golf here,” he said.
Ewart, who is making his first appearance at Final Stage, is playing Dye’s Valley Course at TPC Sawgrass, the easier of the two courses, on Friday and was off to a fast start, including a hole-in-one at the fifth hole. Nothing boring about that!
Ewart turned pro in 2023 out of Barry University and has spent more time in the gym in recent years to fill out his frame. He’s always been a consistent ballstriker, but he’s compressing the ball better and his added strength has him hitting it farther. Distance is no longer a weakness. Derek Ingram, the head coach of Golf Canada’s national men’s amateur and pro teams, compared him favorably to Corey Conners.
This season, Ewart lost a playoff at the Victoria Open among four top-10 finishes and ranked No. 13 in the point standings on PGA Tour Americas, barely missing a card for the Korn Ferry Tour next season. He also missed the cut at the RBC Canadian Open. Learning what it takes to be a pro has him poised to make his childhood dream come true.
“I try to dumb it down. It’s just another tournament, right?” Ewart said of Q-School. “You don’t go to a tournament to finish in the top 50. Just do my preparation and treat it like any other week, as hard as that may be.”
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: A.J. Ewart grabbed PGA Tour Q-School lead with an ace
