Why Scottie Scheffler's viral 'what's the point?' speech resonates with Aussie snowboarding gun Scotty James

Scotty James and Scottie Scheffler are among the winningest sportspeople in the world, yet the Australian snowboarding champion and American golf star both have mixed feelings about the concept of coming out on top.

A few days after Scheffler gave a remarkably deep insight into his daily wrestle with fulfilment, James has admitted he's "definitely guilty" of sometimes thinking about victory in a futile light.

"What's the point?" Scheffler told reporters ahead of the British Open.

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"This is not a fulfilling life. It's fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment, but it's not fulfilling from the sense of the deepest places of your heart.

"There's a lot of people that make it to what they thought was going to fulfil them in life, and then you get there and you get to No.1 in the world and you're like, 'What's the point?'

"Showing up at the Masters every year, it's like, 'Why do I want to win this golf tournament so badly? ... I don't know, because if I win it's going to be awesome for about two minutes."

Scheffler, 29, is the No.1 golfer in the world, has won three majors — the Masters twice and the PGA Championship once — and has taken out 16 PGA Tour wins.

He's currently in the hunt for his maiden British Open title at Royal Portrush in Northern Ireland.

With the exception of Olympic gold, James has won everything a snowboarder could hope to win, and on multiple occasions.

The 31-year-old has won four world championship gold medals, four crystal globes and seven X Games gold medals.

He'll be gunning for a breakthrough Olympic gold medal in Livigno, a town in the Italian Alps, in February next year.

Scheffler's philosophical press conference answer — a response that lasted five minutes but was engaging the whole way through — was clipped up, posted to social media and viewed by millions of people worldwide, James included.

"Sometimes you go, 'Oh, but when I win, I'll feel better', or, 'When I win, this will happen'," James said in an interview with Wide World of Sports at Red Bull's Sydney headquarters.

"I think I'm definitely guilty of that.

"But 90-95 per cent of the time, actually, not really anything changes. In the short term, it might change some things, but long, long, long, long, long term, I don't think it actually is that hugely impactful on a personal level. So, like, your identity doesn't change, who you are doesn't change, and that's what I took away when he [Scheffler] said that."

Having said that, James cherishes his winning memories, as fleeting as the winning moments may be.

"I love winning. I love standing on top of the podium, I embrace it every time, I work hard so I can continue to do it, and I get to have those memories, which is incredible," James said.

"And I've never really cared too much for trophies and medals, to be honest, but I do like to be able to talk about the experience of winning, rather than the materialistic part of it.

"I do enjoy the hard work and the commitment and dedication to my craft paying off.

"But I do hear him when he says it lasts for two minutes because if I compete at the Laax Open [in Switzerland] and I win, by Monday I'm already thinking about how to win the X Games because it's back-to-back. So, like, you don't get to live in that winning mode too much."

Scheffler is married and he and his wife have a young boy.

James is also married — his wife is Chloe Stroll, the sister of Formula 1 driver Lance Stroll, who races for Aston Martin — and they also have a young boy.

Scheffler explained that winning was important to him in the sense that it allowed him to look after his family.

"I love being a father, I love being able to take care of my son, I love being able to provide for my family out here playing golf," Scheffler said.

"Every day when I am wake up early to go put in the work, my wife thanks me for going out and working so hard, and when I get home I try and thank her every day for taking care of our son."

James made a similar remark.

"There's a financial component," he said.

"You have commitments, you've got responsibilities from a family perspective, for me with my business I have a responsibility to the people that work with me, and I want to make sure that we can continue to do what we're doing, because I love it personally.

"So I definitely have a lot of incentive to win."