Top 66 Quotes & Sayings by Tony Finau

It's a cool thing to see Polynesians - there's not too many of us, period - but especially doing well in American sports. It's pretty cool.

We didn't have cable TV. We just couldn't afford it. But you don't need cable to watch the Masters. In 1997, at the exact moment I started out, I watched Tiger Woods win the Masters.

I definitely take time to smell the flowers because I feel like my upbringing was quite a bit different than most guys on Tour.

The crazy thing is, the last club I ever learned to hit was my driver. My brother and I ended up being known for our distance, but we had no idea how far we could hit the ball because we hit it the same, and all of a sudden, we're going to tournaments, and we're driving the par-4s. At 10 years old, I was hitting it, like, 240.

We grew up in the Rose Park section of Salt Lake City. It's a good neighborhood but a tough one, on the poor side but proud. Sports are big. You learn to fight.

It's the Tiger Woods effect. What he was able to accomplish at such a young age - he drew me to the game, and I can only speak for myself, but a lot of the players that are my age saw Tiger in his prime when we were all teenagers. We all wanted to be like him.

I wear green on Sunday because it's my mom's favorite color, but green goes pretty well on Sunday at the Masters, too.

I think the biggest challenge when I'm on the road is being away from my family.

Having a family, taking care of your kids and people outside yourself, maybe it's motivated me more to give that extra something.

I generally mark my ball with a quarter, but sometimes I'll use a Canadian one-dollar coin. I have a bunch from when I played on the Canadian Tour. I'm not superstitious.

I had a chance to win $2 million, a week after high school graduation, and if I turned pro, the sponsor was going to financially support me.

I don't really get to attend church. That's definitely one of the challenges. I'm always playing on Sunday, and that's tough because I really never get to take the sacrament - maybe once every three or four months when I'm home and have a week off.

Golf is an extremely expensive sport, and growing up, I didn't come from a lot, but my parents sacrificed a lot for me to compete, and my goals were their goals.

I enjoy the challenge of being a father... I try to do my best to be there for my children.

When I was on the Ryder Cup team and I surrounded myself with the other 11 guys and our captains, being in that locker room, it gave me an extra sense of confidence.

The things that transpired in my life, they didn't happen in the order that they're supposed to, or are ideal. Everything just kind of fell in my lap at a young age. Things were thrown at me very fast.

Mini-tour life isn't a glamorous, professional golf life. If you're not on the PGA Tour, it is very tough financially.

I use the low-spinning Pro V1 left dot. I mark it with the logo for the Tony Finau Foundation.

It's something that I dreamed of since I was a kid - to be able to represent my country and play in the Ryder Cup is what dreams are made of.

As a rookie, I need to play a lot. I need to know what courses I like and adjust to the atmosphere and the lifestyle of playing at the highest level.

One of the things I learned growing up, a rule that I go by, is just never give up. That's one thing that I had to keep telling myself.

At the heart of every slice is an open clubface. And it usually goes with a steep swing that cuts across the ball from out to in.

Essentially, my parents directed me in the right path. They were all for me turning professional and starting that journey as a family with my golf career.

It's cool to be able to dunk. I'm pretty tall and pretty long. My body's probably built more for basketball than for golf.

I think the Polynesian people and the gospel are in harmony. We're very respectful people, and very humble people... and I try and let that shine through as much as possible.

I'm not an alcohol drinker. Instead of the real beer, I just go with root beer.

In 2013, I changed to left-hand low, or cross-handed. And it's helped a lot. At the time, the reason I switched was just a lot of inconsistency with putting. I was either making a lot of putts, or I was missing a lot of putts.

The No. 1 institution in the world is family. It's so powerful.

I feel like listening is a huge part of life - not only listening to people, but listening to people that you believe in, people who you think are wise.

When I got on tour in 2014, I was hitting a slice off the tee. No joke. Yeah, I had plenty of power, and I knew how to play the curve, but I was a tour player who was watching his tee shots peel 30, 40 yards to the right.

A lot of times, college can get you sidetracked. I was ready to turn my full attention to golf.

Needless to say, the Masters is the tournament I'd like to play in and win the most. I've never seen it in person and wouldn't go even if you gave me tickets, because I made a promise to myself as a kid that I wouldn't go until I played my way there.

My irons are three-eighths of an inch longer than standard.

My most important goal is to set myself up on every Sunday to have a chance to win, and I know if I do those things, then everything else will take care of itself.

I've taken two weeks off before I've played a major, and I've played two straight weeks before a major as well. I definitely feel it's important, whether I've taken time off or played right before, that I take necessary rest time in the weeks before the tournament.

I do my best on the golf course. I am learning about the business side of it. But I have a lot of great partners that help me with all those things.

I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would have turned pro at 17.

I didn't have really much of a social life in high school, and I'm not really a partyer, so college wasn't super appealing to me at the time.

If the rules aren't going to protect the integrity of the game, then they're wrong.

It was tough, and sometimes you had to find some sponsors for a percentage of your winnings. There are a lot of variables to playing mini-tour golf because of the finances. If you don't play well, you're often losing a lot of your own money.

It will be a great accomplishment if I become the best player in the world. But if my children can grow up with great core values and become great people and do good things and are happy, then, man, that would bring me great joy.

If you make the effort to address the moves that cause a slice, you can straighten out all your shots. It won't happen overnight, but if you're systematic about it, the process will work.

I just had different circumstances than most players, and I think that has been an advantage - maybe I carry a little chip on my shoulder with just how tough it was for my parents to overcome some of those financial situations.

I'm from Samoan heritage, and with the rugby in our blood and everything, I always felt I've been tough, and that my tolerance for pain is pretty high.

Staying in the moment is not worrying about the outcome but just focusing on the process on the next shot.

There are a lot of great athletes on the PGA Tour and a lot of good basketball players. But I can definitely put my name in the mix as one of the best.

This whole golf thing was so left field for us, as Polynesians, but he had a lot of knowledge about sports in general. My dad was a genius, really. He was an absolute genius.

The Ping 51-degree makes for a nice transition from the irons. On my 60, it says 8 degrees of bounce, but I grind it to about 5 or 6 degrees. I tried a head with less bounce, but it just didn't look right.

Rose Park is a community I'm very proud to be from.

It was tough to fail year after year. I never even got to the final stage until I got my card on the Web.com Tour. But I always believed that I could be something special. I just had to prove it to myself.

It's a privilege to be in a position to give back, and one that I take pretty seriously because I know what it's like... to be less fortunate, to be less privileged.

I'm really proud, just seeing a lot of the kids that have been inspired by me. There's a lot of great athletes all over the world, and some of them don't have the access or opportunity to play the game of golf.

I knew when I got on tour that if I had the opportunity to give back to my community, which is Rose Park, I would.

I have a half-court in my house. If you saw my house, you'd think I was an NBA player. I have no golf setup at all inside, just a half-court for me and a volleyball setup for my wife, who plays.

Everything I do is deeply rooted in my faith and especially in Jesus Christ.

How you think, and how much you think, is so important in golf. There are countless things we can work on and think about in the swing, but when it's time to play in competition, you don't want to think too many thoughts.

I have a little different perspective on this whole golf thing than maybe some other players. So I definitely take time to realize where I'm at in my life. And I know that I'm blessed.

I find that my upbringing in the Church and my relationship with God are huge benefits to me in helping me become the kind of person that I want to become.

When your hands are cold, and you're hitting with old, low-quality irons - my first one was a Merlin model with a green shaft - you learn what to do to hit the ball solid.

I think there's too many rules in golf. And I mean that's easy to say for a player, but putting together a rule book is a tough thing in this game because there are so many different parts of the game.