Zurich Classic Teams Select Their Walk Up Music

One of the added “benefits” of the Zurich Classic’s genius team format is the pairs selecting their walk-up music on the first tee. Some are fun, some are mail-ins and one song by Metallica is the most popular being selected three times.

Enter the Sandman is that song.

PGA Tour’s Mike McAllister provides the reasoning for a few of the selections.

Zach Johnson and his partner, Jonathan Byrd, had been carefully weighing their options for a few weeks. “Do we go for funny and kind of dumb, or do we just go for motivation on the first tee and get a good rhythm going?” Johnson recalls.

That went for motivation, then narrowed the choices to as AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” Pearl Jam’s “Alive” and Eminem’s “Lose Yourself.” Since Johnson cheers for the University of Iowa — and the Hawkeyes football team uses AC/DC’s “Back in Black” at home games – the duo opted for the other AC/DC walk-up classic.

“Zach’s our team captain, so he has the final decision,” Byrd says. “Actually, we joked that his wife Kim really has the final decision.”

Metallica was equally popular. The team of Chez Reavie-Lucas Glover selected “For Whom The Bell Tolls” while at least two teams – Ryan Armour-Johnson Wagner and Ben Silverman-Matt Atkins — opted for “Enter Sandman,” the song made famous by New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera as he strode to the mound.

Rivera, however, was not the inspiration for either choice.

“Johnson went to Virginia Tech and that’s what the football team comes out to,” Armour says. “I wanted the Darth Vader Imperial March. But it’s OK. I was all right giving in this time because it has meaning for him. And I like the song.”

Silverman says the choice was golf-related for him. “Not too long ago when I working with my swing coach on adding a few extra yards with the driver, he was putting on a bunch of different music to try to get me pumped up and swing faster,” Silverman explains. “’Enter Sandman’ was the one that got me pumped.”

Here is the complete list.