At the Masters Champions Dinner, Rory McIlroy secured his future seat
The Masters Champions Dinner is a nerve-wracking experience for first-time hosts. You want to hit everything out of the park, from appetizers to dessert and drinks. But one of the biggest questions of the Champions Dinner isn't answered until a year after you first sit at the top of the table.
Where do I live?
The defending champion and dinner host sits between Ben Crenshaw, the unofficial emcee, and chairman Fred Ridley, at the helm. In the following year, it is up to the young people to find their future place. Over the years, different groups have been formed at the table. Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, and Tom Watson sit to the left of the head. Zach Johnson and Jordan Spieth rub shoulders, as well as Dustin Johnson and Bubba Watson. Adam Scott and Trevor Immelman sit in the far corner. And so it is.
“It's not assigned seating, but a lot of people are sitting in the same seats,” Scott said in 2023. “I love that, the absolute honesty. I love the fact that you feel like that's your place.”
After Scottie Scheffler hosted a dinner in 2023, he had to choose a place to stay.
“There's a bit of a protocol,” Scheffler said at this year's Arnold Palmer Invitational about seating arrangements at the legendary dinner. “I'm not going to sit where Tiger and Jack sit. Like, there's the kind of places where you feel like you're going to flow naturally.”
Scheffler used to be comfortable around his Dallas friend Spieth, but he didn't want to give the 2015 champion a chance to outplay him in front of everyone. “I definitely didn't ask Jordan to stay next to him, because he's doing something to make sure I don't have a place to stay,” Scheffler said, laughing. He ended up asking Johnson and now he's part of that group of people.
At the Champions Dinner, Rory McIlroy wowed with a menu that included wagyu steak, the players' favorite, yellowfin tuna carpaccio and a fine selection of wines from Augusta National's famed cellar. As McIlroy sat between Crenshaw and Ridley, he surveyed the layout of the table and noticed something.
“It's a big, long table. Like a U-shape,” McIlroy said in New Heights podcast with Jason and Travis Kelce. “And in the bottom left corner, you've got Trevor Immelman and Adam Scott. And they look like they're having the best time. They're having the night of their lives. And I said to Adam and Trevor, If I don't win this year, just save me a seat.”
Although McIlroy's trip to the corner of Scott and Immelman will have to wait at least another year, after he became the fourth player in history to successfully defend his title at Augusta National.
That historic victory now leaves McIlroy with a different question for the Champions Dinner: What's on the menu for next year?
“I think everyone enjoyed the dinner. I tried to make enough dishes to please everyone. And I'm a wine lover. I collect wine and have done so for the last 10 years, so the wine selection was very important to me,” said McIlroy. “I've been pretty good this year. It's always Tuesday night, so I was thinking I could do Taco Tuesday or something. We'll see.”
McIlroy's victory in the 2026 Masters was a different kind of victory than his cathartic 2025 victory. In 2025, McIlroy cringed until he found relief that he had finally achieved a lifelong dream. This time, McIlroy holed his winning putt and felt nothing but joy.
“Nothing is going to top all the fun of last year,” McIlroy said. “But this year was mandated. Like, I proved last year that I can do it in this place and come back without my best stuff – I built a big lead in two days. But to do it the way I did – I lost the lead on Sunday, I came back and played hard to do it – I made sure to myself that this is where I need to be. This is the level that I have to work on.”
McIlroy did that, and now, he has another dinner to plan ahead, perhaps, taking his place next to Scott and Immelman.
