SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, France — When you’re 23 years old and playing on as big a stage as you’ve seen, yet in a completely different world from your day job, it helps to find experience wherever you can get it. Like a guy who knows a thing or two about French restaurants.

Nicolai Højgaard’s course-record tying 62 that thrust him into medal contention in the third round of the Olympics actually started the night before. The key might have been the wisdom of Team Denmark’s captain Thomas Bjorn. The winning mind that led the European team to Ryder Cup victory at Le Golf National could have given the burgeoning Danish star some tips on navigating the treacherous final four holes on the Albatros course. He could have counseled him on a swing adjustment after back-to-back lackluster opening rounds of 70. He might have even regaled him with stories of his 21 worldwide wins and 11 team golf appearances.

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He didn’t. Instead, he introduced him to the world famous roast leg of lamb at Le Limousin. The French restaurant, near the team hotel in Versailles, was just what the young man needed, said the veteran Bjorn. More of the tour pro normal in a decidedly heightened, non-normal week.

“You know that when you come in as a professional golfer into the world of the Olympics, and you know there’s a lot of new people, different people around from our own federation, from our own Olympic Committee, it was just good for them (Højgaard and teammate Thorbjørn Olesen, who also turned his best round of the tournament with a 66) to see a face they knew,” Bjorn said. “They are both great at understanding that it’s not a normal golf tournament. It’s the Olympics. A lot of other things come with that. But they also want to have their space and do their work. I think having somebody like me for those things and that they know so well, helps them just to go out and feel comfortable that things are not going to get away from them.”

Højgaard got comfortable early on Saturday after a chip-in birdie on the third hole led to five front-nine birdies, including a tricky up and down on the par-5 ninth hole’s decidedly unreceptive pin position. He came back with a rousing 31 on the closing nine, highlighted by a 222-yard laser to 3 feet on the par-5 14th for eagle. At 11 under, Hojgaard is tied for fourth, three strokes off the joint lead of Xander Schauffele and John Rahm.

Bjorn called it the best he’s seen Højgaard play, and that’s in a young career that includes four professional wins, but no top-10s thus far in majors.

Still, Højgaard was walking the course when his twin brother Rasmus was runner-up at the Cazoo Open de France at Le Golf National in 2022, and said that experience helped, as well. “I saw it all, how he handled things and how the course was playing,” Højgaard said. “It’s playing pretty similar. It was cool to see that I convinced myself to play a really good round today, and see myself hit good shots coming in after a couple of tough days.

“I made a few birdies to start with. That makes the next few holes easier and that way you can relax a little bit into the round. I was playing with more quality today, hitting the fairways and the greens, and that’s the difference on this golf course, hitting fairways and giving yourself shots into the greens. I was in control today.”

That control comes from the normalcy that only a veteran mind can see. Bjorn navigated the European team in the same way in winning the 2018 Ryder Cup. It’s the ability to sense a big moment and yet compartmentalize it at the same time, he said.

“I think something like going out for dinner last night puts them in an element of what they do week-in and week-out, instead of staying in a hotel and having a lot of people around them, Bjorn said. “I always said, that’s what we try to do in Ryder Cups and all our team events, we try to build an environment where they can perform and the only way you can build that environment is create an environment that they are used to.

“I think that kind of helped both of them to come back to the hotel last night. They came down this morning with a different look in their faces. All the credit is on them. It’s not on anything else.”

All that said, Bjorn was rushing to make another reservation at Le Limousin tonight.

This article was originally published on golfdigest.com