Michael Block 3 back in Champions debut, said he dreamt of winning U.S. Senior Open

It’s a Block Party on the PGA Tour Champions and Michael Block is near the top of the leaderboard. Block, playing in a PGA Tour Champions event for the first time and doing so with his son on the bag, shot 6-under 66 with seven birdies and just one bogey in the first round of the Dick’s Open on Thursday.

Block is tied for fifth and is three shots back of the lead, held by Dicky Pride at En-Joie Golf Course in Endicott, New York.

“I’m really more nervous today than I was even at the PGA Championship a month ago at Aronimink, Block said after his round. “It’s just because this is like my debut. Dick’s gave me a spot, which is a lot of pressure. I need to come up here and show up, and shut up, right?”

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Block played the PGA last month for a seventh time. After his round at En-Joie, a talkative Block referenced a story about finding confidence in himself.

“It’s kind of like what I said at Aronimink, which was the same thing happened this morning at the driving range over there at En-Joie where I walked in there and I went to the bathroom, and I was warming up next to Miguel Angel Jimenez and Retief Goosen. So two guys that I’ve looked up to my entire life. I went in the bathroom. Once again, there was no mirror. It’s weird, I’ve been in a lot of bathrooms with no mirrors lately, which is strange. I walked in there, I said you know what, you’ve got this. This is a thing where you have to absolutely, whether you are a weekend warrior or you’re going for the club championship or whatever it is, you have to go there with all the confidence you can. Like, if you’re wife’s giving you crap or not, you want the wife like, building you up before you go play in the club championship, and that’s what I need and that’s what I think everyone needs and that’s what I’ve had. My wife, my family, my membership at the club back at Arroyo Trabuco Golf Club supports me. Without that support, there’s no way I’m shooting 66 in my debut on the Champions Tour.”

So it’s on to the weekend for Block but he clearly can’t help but look ahead.

“The fact that I have this week here in New York at Endicott and then I have next week at Columbus in the U.S. [Senior] Open, and I had a dream. I’m just letting you guys know this dream. I’m going to say it out loud for the first time. My family’s known this for a while. It happened about a year ago. I literally, and hate me for it, I don’t care, but I literally had a dream that I was going to win the U.S. Senior Open the first year I turned 50. That’s something I’ve had in my head for a long time.”

This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Michael Block 3 back in Champions debut, said he dreamt of winning U.S. Senior Open