Aaron Rai will tee off on Sunday at the 2026 PGA Championship at 4-under, two shots back of leader Alex Smalley, looking very much like he has a chance to lift the Wanamaker Trophy. He will do it wearing two gloves and using padded headcovers over his irons, the same way he has done since he was a child in the West Midlands. For everyone watching for the first time, it can look like an affectation. To Rai and his family, it is a tribute.
The 30-year-old Englishman, born in Wolverhampton to parents of Indian heritage, has carried the two-glove habit since the age of seven. The reason is simple, sentimental and goes back to a father who introduced him to the game and the principles of caring for what you own.
'I couldn't play, I couldn't feel the grip, so I've always stuck with the two gloves ever since,' Rai told the Irish Star in a piece on his major championship debut last year. The habit, he explained in a Birmingham Mail interview, began on a cold morning when his father slipped a second glove onto his other hand to keep him warm.
'Then, a few weeks down the line, my dad forgot to put the two gloves in the bag so I had to play with one,' Rai said. 'It was terrible. I couldn't play.'
The iron covers tell a parallel story. As a young player from a family of modest means, Rai's father drummed in lessons about looking after his equipment. Cleaning irons was a household ritual. The padded headcovers, an oddity in a professional bag in 2026, are an extension of that lesson — protect what your family has worked to provide.
The two-glove method has practical benefits. Rai uses MacWet gloves that are designed for grip in damp conditions, providing consistent feel through wet and dry rounds. Whether or not the second glove offers a measurable performance edge, what is undeniable is that the routine works. Rai is the only player in the field this week to have broken par in two of his rounds while gaining strokes on the field with his iron play across all three. His total of 4-under at the most demanding test of the year so far ranks him fifth in approach play in the championship.
He carries that consistency in part because he refuses to tinker. Rai's swing coach Frazer Mearns has spoken in past interviews about how steady the player's setup, grip and routine have been for years. While the upper levels of the game often watch their gear, sponsors and statistics shift week to week, Rai has been the same player visually since he turned professional. The two gloves, the iron covers, the calm walk between shots — none of it has changed since he was a teenager grinding through the EuroPro Tour.
The story has resonated with English fans following his climb to global recognition. Rai's win at the 2024 Wyndham Championship in Greensboro made him a regular on PGA Tour leaderboards, and his name appeared in the conversation about Ryder Cup selections through 2025. A second tour victory at Myrtle Beach earlier this month — a 10-under wire-to-wire margin in a depleted field — left him as the only top-50 player in that event and reaffirmed the form he has carried into Pennsylvania.
What he has not done yet is win a major. With Smalley, Rahm and Aberg jostling around him on the leaderboard heading into Sunday at Aronimink, Rai has a chance to change that. And if he does, he will hold the Wanamaker Trophy aloft in a pair of gloves placed on his hands by a father who told him, more than two decades ago, that the way you look after the small things shows the world how you intend to play the game.