Jon Rahm vowed to "get over" his 2025 US PGA Championship near miss and insisted: "It's been a while since I had that much fun on a golf course."
Rahm ended up in a large group tied for eighth on four under par, seven behind winner Scottie Scheffler - but not before moving level with the World Number One early on the back nine and mounting the most serious challenge for victory.
Three birdies in four holes around the turn took Rahm to nine under and, with Scheffler playing his front nine in two over par, hopes were growing for him to become the first Spanish player to complete three legs of the career Grand Slam.
Scheffler found his form after the turn though and, needing to push late in his round, Rahm had an unlucky bounce into a bunker to bogey the 16th and then finished with a pair of double bogeys.
But he said: "It was really close. God, it's been a while since I had that much fun on a golf course, 15 holes - even the first seven where I was swinging well and things weren't happening, but I kept myself in and made the pars that I needed and played really good golf from the eighth to the 15th.
"The last three holes, it's a tough pill to swallow right now. Sixteen was tough. Never an easy shot but even though it was really close to being a good swing, it was just bad enough to end up where it did.
"At that point, 18 was just rough, the same mistake I did on 16. It wasn't that bad of a swing, the result is horrendous but feeling-wise it's not that far off.
"A lot of positives to take from this week. Pretty fresh wound right now. But there's been a lot of good happening this week and a lot of positive feelings to take for the rest of the year.
"I think it's the first time I've been in position to win a major that close and haven't done it. The only times I think I've been in the lead in a major on a Sunday, I've been able to close it out, and this is a very different situation.
"Luckily I'm going to get home maybe on time to get the kids to bed - or not, I'm not sure. To them, whatever I did today, win or lose, they don't care. So that's always a good perspective."
On the battle going down the back nine, Rahm said: "You know what position you're in because even if you don't want to look at leaderboards, the crowd lets you know. They're so excited, it doesn't matter, they'll tell you.
"Even when you don't know exactly what's going on on a hole, if you hear a cheer, you do know what's going on. Like on 12 when I hit my putt, at the same time I heard a cheer from 10; I was fully aware that was a Scottie birdie. I just could tell, you're there enough times.
"Even then, I knew that if I parred 13, if I finished the five holes under par, I was going to give myself a really good run to possibly win it.
"If there's ever a time where it felt like it was slipping away to an extent, it was not birdieing 14 and 15; that was definitely the mistake, before, obviously, finishing poorly."
Rahm's brave effort still resulted in a significant boost to his Ryder Cup points tally along with his prize money, helping him to maintain a positive outlook on his week.
"I always like to go back a little bit on something that Charles Barkley likes to remind basketball players all the time," he said.
"Like, I play golf for a living. It's incredible.
"Am I embarrassed a little bit about how I finished today? Yeah. But I just need to get over it, get over myself. It's not the end of the world. It's not like I'm a doctor or a first responder, where somebody if they have a bad day, truly bad things happen.
"I'll get over it. I'll move on. Again, there's a lot more positive than negative to think about this week."
