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Jordan Spieth returns for AT&T Byron Nelson after contracting COVID-19

Since his T3 finish at the Masters Tournament last month, Jordan Spieth has been away from the golf course.

On Tuesday, as he prepares to return to the PGA Tour at the AT&T Byron Nelson, the 27-year-old revealed that he had contracted COVID-19.

“Not really sure when I got it, to be honest, because nobody I was around ever got it,” Spieth said, via Golf Digest. “It was a bad day and a half and then it was just kind of annoying for the next five days. Kind of lost energy and sinus stuff. And then after that I started to get full strength back, and I would say the last week to week and a half now I’ve been acting as if it never happened.

“I’ve just gone about my days, feeling full energy and being able to hit full workouts and practice sessions and all that kind of stuff.”

Spieth went MIA after comeback win, Masters

Spieth’s disappearance from the Tour came right as he seemed to get his game back on track for the first time in years.

Spieth, after four top-10 finishes earlier this year, won the Valero Texas Open in April — which marked his first win since 2017. The 11-time Tour winner, who also has wins at the Masters, the U.S. Open and the British Open, ended up going a brutal 83 starts without a win.

He then backed it up the following week with his best finish at Augusta National since 2018.

After that, though, is when he started feeling sick. After recognizing symptoms ahead of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, Spieth said he took coronavirus tests at home — which came back positive.

So, he withdrew from the Valspar Championship and then quarantined in Texas. He was, however, the only one in his home to get sick.

"If there's ever a good time during the season, it kind of worked out OK,” he said, via ESPN. “But I was planning to continue to play. I wasn't planning on taking a month off in the spring. So, at this point, it's get back to playing golf and try and get in the same rhythm I was in and just be patient with it."

Spieth will now jump back in at the AT&T Byron Nelson in the Dallas area, his hometown event and the place he made his first start on the PGA Tour when he was just 16 years old.

While that’s obviously a big event for him, it’ll also serve as a warm-up of sorts for next week’s PGA Championship. That major is the last one he needs to claim the career grand slam.

“Every year I go into that tournament — it’s like it’s the one that if I could pick one more to win, I would pick that one,” Spieth said, via Golf Digest. “But it doesn’t really … while I’m playing the tournament, it hasn’t really hit me and added any pressure or anything like that. It just kind of excites me a little bit more going into it.”

Jordan Spieth of the United States at the 2021 Masters
Though he contracted COVID-19 shortly after the Masters, Jordan Spieth is back on Tour ahead of next week's PGA Championship. (Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

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