Scottie Scheffler will participate in the American Express Championship in late January, marking his 2026 debut.
Scottie Scheffler will compete for the first time in 2026 at the PGA Tour’s American Express Championship, tournament organizers confirmed Wednesday. The event will take place from January 22 to 25 in La Quinta, California, with a total purse of $9.2 million. Last year, Austrian Sepp Straka won the tournament.
Scheffler Faces Tough Challenge in California
The American Express Championship is one of the few tournaments missing from Scheffler’s victory record. After finishing third in 2020, he had multiple top-25 finishes in subsequent years and missed the 2025 event due to a hand surgery. However, competition will be fierce this year, with players like last year’s winner Sepp Straka, Ben Griffen, and Robert MacIntyre expected to challenge the world number one.
The tournament is the PGA Tour’s second event of the year following next week’s Sony Open in Hawaii. The usual season opener, The Sentry, was canceled in October due to course conditions at drought-stricken Kapalua.
Will Scottie Scheffler Have Another Outstanding Season?
Scheffler aims to start the new season strong at the American Express Championship, building on his impressive 2025 season where he won six times in 20 tournaments, including the PGA Championship and The Open Championship. He finished in the top 10 in 17 of those events and never placed worse than 25th, earning him the PGA Tour Player of the Year award for the fourth consecutive time.
With two major titles in 2025, Scheffler now has a clear goal for 2026: after winning the Masters in 2022 and 2024, he needs to claim the U.S. Open to complete his career Grand Slam. The U.S. Open will take place from June 18 to 21, where Scheffler will compete for the title.