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You don\u2019t have to be a professional golfer to know it\u2019s an expensive sport.\xa0

New Zealand\u2019s highest-ranked men\u2019s golfer, Ryan Fox, has lifted the lid on the pressures he\u2019s faced this year\xa0dealing with a hip injury\xa0while working to retain his PGA Tour card for 2025. Despite the financial challenges, Fox emphasises that money isn\u2019t the be-all and end-all of his career.\xa0

It\u2019s been a tough year for Fox after\xa0two very lucrative years\xa0in which he made $11 million. Over that period he had three DP World Tour wins, five runners-up placings, two thirds and three top-10 finishes. On the DP Tour alone, Fox brought home $6m and $5.4m in 2022 and 2023 respectively but has just $735,574 in prize money this year (plus $1,845,332 on the PGA Tour).\xa0

Asked whether the difference impacted him psychologically, Fox told\xa0The Mike Hosking Breakfast\xa0on Newstalk ZB that money wasn\u2019t the goal.\xa0

\u201cI don\u2019t play golf for the money and I\u2019m in a pretty good place in that sense.\xa0

\u201cYou do think about it if you miss a few cuts in a row. It is a pretty expensive way to make a living if you\u2019re not making money \u2013 golf\u2019s pretty brutal that if you miss the cut, you don\u2019t make anything. In the US, it\u2019s probably been in excess of six or $7000 a week spent to do it and, if you\u2019re not making money, it does get expensive quickly.\xa0

\u201cI know I\u2019m good enough to compete and at some point it\u2019s going to turn around \u2026 This year I\u2019ve still had a couple of really good results and covered myself quite easily in the US. Obviously, the last couple of years have been very good [in regards to prize money]. It\u2019s still been a good experience and I\u2019m not worried too much about the money side of things. It\u2019s more about trying to compete and trying to win tournaments.\u201d\xa0

This week Fox is\xa0defending his 2023 BMW PGA Championship\xa0at Wentworth Golf Club. Fox remarkably recovered from a triple bogey seven on the third hole after starting two shots off the lead in the final round, but then went eight-under including six birdies on the back nine to claim a one-shot victory.\xa0

Currently ranked 106th on the FedEx Cup standings \u2013 the top 125 retain their card \u2013 Fox said the past year had been tough.\xa0

\u201cI\u2019ve done a lot of travel the last couple of years. The US has been difficult this year in that respect,\u201d he said.\xa0

\u201cI think we spent 30 weeks travelling out of a suitcase with no base, 20 of those weeks are with the family and two young kids. So there was definitely a fair bit of a grind in there but I still get to do what I love for a living. We\u2019ve had some great experiences \u2026 I got to play on the PGA tour. That\u2019s been a dream of mine for a long time. I certainly wouldn\u2019t swap any of the experiences I\u2019ve had the last couple of years being able to do that.\u201d\xa0

Last week, Fox told the\xa0Herald\xa0he has been\xa0dealing with a hip injury for most of the year\xa0which he hadn\u2019t given much thought to, but recently learned the extent of the issue.\xa0

\u201cI got some testing done on that when I was at home and there\u2019s potentially some stuff I need to sort out with that at the end of the year as well,\u201d Fox said of his injury.\xa0

\u201cSo, it\u2019s a little bit about managing that going forward with the schedule. Once I get back to the States and if I get the job done pretty quickly, then I\u2019ve got to figure out if I\u2019m going back to Europe [or] if I\u2019m coming home and getting the hip sorted; there\u2019s a fair bit to sort out there, but I certainly can\u2019t make it any worse than it is. I\u2019ve just got to manage it; manage the workload a little bit on it, that\u2019s about it. It\u2019s nothing too serious, so it\u2019s a little bit flexible at the end of the year, let\u2019s put it that way.\u201d\xa0

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