Food is fuel so it’s not that surprising that whatever the red-hot Chris Gotterup is eating is worth an examination.
What is empowering this high-performing sports vehicle? Time to take a look under the hood.
At least that’s the banter being passed around ahead of this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am where Gotterup enters as the No. 5-ranked player in the Official World Golf Ranking coming off two wins in the PGA Tour’s first four tournaments of 2026.
“We were joking around, Scottie was following me at lunch and he’s like, ‘I’m just going to eat what you’re eating,’” Gotterup said in his pre-tournament press conference Wednesday.
Scheffler and Justin Rose — No. 1 and No. 3 ranked, respectively — are the only other players to have won this year.
“He’s doing pretty good on his own so I’m not too worried about him,” Gotterup said of Scheffler, whom he played with last week at TPC Scottsdale.
Putting the lunch plates aside, there might be something to the idea of following Gotterup’s routine. He won in a playoff over Hideki Matsuyama at the WM Phoenix Open last week and opened the season with a victory in Hawaii at the Sony Open.
The 26-year-old New Jersey native skipped the American Express in Coachella Valley which means he’s technically batting .667 this year.
When asked about how he was navigating the sudden surge in confidence in his game, Gotterup pointed back to the guy who’s been following him in the Tour cafeteria — and how emulating Scheffler has helped him over the last couple of weeks.
“After Sony I took a week off and kind of just hung out and practices and played,” he said. “It’s nice to just be ready for that next week ... a little bit to what Scottie was saying last year, you get your moment in the sun and then you have a new tournament next week and it’s kind of ready to roll.”
Gotterup, who is not unfamiliar with winning on Tour after taking home the title at the 2024 Myrtle Beach Classic and topping No. 2 Rory McIlroy at the Genesis Scottish Open last year, won’t have the benefit of a week off this time around.
He enters Pebble Beach, though, still plenty hungry — there’s a $20 million purse at the Tour’s first signature event of the season.
The No. 5-ranked player in the world has never played in the tournament before but did share with reporters his first time out to NorCal.
“I played [here] once for fun,” said Gotterup, who also competed on the course in college when he was at Oklahoma. “Me and my dad had a bet when I was growing up that once I broke par, he would take me out here.”
He couldn’t remember the name of the college events that brought him to Pebble Beach but knows where that par-breaking scorecard is kept.
“My mom’s got it framed and it’s in the basement somewhere at the house,” said Gotterup, who entered the year ranked No. 28 in the OWGR.
He said the sport is good at keeping you humble, whether you’re on top of it or on the ascent (he was No. 206 in January 2025, for perspective on the meteoric rise).
“You literally reach the pinnacle of the sport for a week and then it’s like, an hour later — you’re packing your bags and making sure you’ve got everything and don’t leave anything behind,” Gotterup said. “It’s a nice reality check after a big win.”