July 28, 2024 • 38 mins
Cristian DiMarco, who turned professional in 2018 after an impressive collegiate career at the University of South Florida, is my guest on the latest episode of the Accelerate Golf podcast, where we explore player improvement and the business of golf through insightful conversations.
Cristian shares his experiences of growing up in a golfing family, watching his father Chris DiMarco, a 3 time winner on the PGA Tour, compete at the highest level, and the lessons learned along the way. He talks about his journey from college golf to the professional ranks, the challenges he faced, and the dedication required to succeed.
Listen in as Cristian discusses his recent victory at the 78th Florida Open, the importance of consistency, and the nuances of practicing under pressure. He also discusses topics like ground forces, speed in golf, and the significance of mental fortitude in achieving success on the tour.
Whether you're an aspiring golfer or a fan of the sport, this episode offers valuable insights into the world of professional golf and the relentless pursuit of excellence.
The podcast is presented by QSchool Sports https://qschoolsports.com/
Intro and outro music: “Silent Night” by Infraction Music.
Previous podcast episodes https://accelerategolf.com/podcast/
University of South Florida https://www.usf.edu/
USF Men’s Golf https://gousfbulls.com/sports/mens-golf
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Yeah, I won the 78th Florida Open, which was huge.
It was good for me. It was the biggest paycheck I've made. It was cool to kind
of see some hard work come to fruition.
And, you know, I played a lot of good players and I beat them all,
which was great, which is what we strive to do every week in, week out.
(00:20):
And for it to happen, I know it doesn't happen a lot in golf,
but for it to happen, it was a huge confidence builder for me.
Music.
(00:44):
In audio. In audio. In audio. Welcome to the Accelerate Golf Podcast,
where we explore player improvement and the business of golf through conversations.
I'm your host, Bikram Kapoor, and today I have the pleasure of speaking with
Christian DiMarco, who turned pro in 2018 after winning several accolades as
a standout on the University of South Florida golf team.
(01:08):
Without further ado, welcome Christian.
Thanks for having me. Appreciate you having me on. And yes, folks,
if the name does ring a bell, Christian is the son of Chris DiMarco,
a three-time winner on the PGA Tour, who gave Tiger a run for his money at the 2005 Masters,
before losing in a playoff.
(01:28):
Christian, were you at Augusta at that time? I was. That week was always something
special for us and our whole family.
I actually made a putt on number nine at the
part three contest which I look forward to all the
time when I was that age and yeah me and my mom were walking the grounds and
we were there on 16 when Tiger made that chip and we were standing by one of
(01:51):
the pine trees and the volume it was so loud that like the pine tree was vibrating
from just how loud it was it was it was unbelievable.
So what was your how old were with you at that time? I was nine.
So I was born in 1996 and that was 05. Yeah, I was nine years old.
I wish I was a little bit older to understand like the gravity of the situation.
(02:13):
I definitely, like it was, that week was the first time like emotions moved
me to tears other than like, I'm sad or I want something tears.
It was like, it was such a
surreal moment when he made the putt to go to force
the playoff to go in five feet and he went nuts
and crazy like i started just bawling crying tears
(02:33):
of joy and i had never felt that before i was nine years old and
it was kind of one of the things that solidified for me i
was like wow this is what i want to do that's but
people do forget about that all the time because the chip
went in and it was like oh it's over and it was far from over
and i mean we it it's
funny every time masters runs around there's recaps
(02:55):
of the 05 masters just because it was such a great battle and i mean tiger's
chip was amazing on 16 but my dad had an unbelievable chip in regulation in
18 that hit the pin and if that goes in it's it's over and god it would have
been crazy it's yeah he had he had one arm in that green jacket.
And, you know, he tied for second in a couple of other majors as well.
(03:19):
Were you there for those majors as well?
So he tied for, he lost in the playoff in the 2004 PGA.
And then obviously at Augusta in 05, I don't think I was at the PGA at Westling Straits in 04.
I was at Augusta. And then when he finished second at the British Open in 06, I was there.
It was a couple months after my grandmother had passed away.
(03:42):
So it was kind of a boy's trip. my grandfather my dad's
dad went my mom's dad went I believe a
couple uncles went and it was it was
a really cool time so you basically grew up on
the tour so you had a very much in-depth look
at life on tour when you were very young yeah I I mean it's it was amazing it
(04:05):
was like wanting up growing up wanting to be a professional golfer and having
Bubba Watson be a friend that that would FaceTime me when I'm 10 years old,
when the new iPhone became FaceTime.
It was the coolest thing in the world.
And yeah, and seeing it up close and walking practice rounds when I'm young
and being on the range Friday morning at 11 years old,
(04:26):
watching the greatest players in the world warm up before the tournament and
then hanging out in the locker room and all the cool things. It was amazing.
So naturally, you know, that sparked an interest in the game.
And when did you start taking it really, really seriously?
Yeah, I think I've always been super competitive. competitive and I think my
(04:49):
dad, my dad never let me win anything, whether it was playing catch or playing
ping pong or certainly golf.
And I think just watching him,
how competitive he was and how he could scratch that itch playing golf.
And then I luckily have good genes and was talented enough to be pretty good at golf at a young age.
And I just, I loved it. And it was obviously what my dad did.
(05:11):
So what kid doesn't want to be like their dad.
So I just, I think from a very young age, probably probably eight or nine I
was like man this is like really cool and then I mean fly from the age 10 to
16 my parents would drop me off at the golf course at 8 a.m and pick me up at dark.
Wow and was your dad your coach or was
there somebody else yeah so I get that question a lot he
(05:34):
if you told him to break down the golf swing I don't
think he could do it I he's not a very technical player he's
not swing position wise he obviously influences
my game management course management
way to think out there as in a coach role but definitely not like hey you need
to get your club face here you need to this is where like he's big on fundamentals
(05:56):
ball position alignment but certainly wasn't my swing coach by any means more
of like just this is how you hit this chip This is what you do in this situation,
which is, as I'm a professional now, I just feel like my golf IQ is so much
higher than really anybody I'm around.
And I attribute a lot of that, all of that to him just by watching him play and.
(06:18):
Having him be top five in the world he obviously knows
what he's talking about and using those lessons that
he taught me certainly helped now so he
it sounds like taught you how to score better
for sure and that's the only thing
they go by in this game not if they only go by score doesn't matter
how it looks and i think his whole career is kind of based on that i mean he
(06:41):
wasn't the longest wasn't the straightest wasn't really the best at anything
he just he wanted to get in the the hole as quick as possible and that's all
they go by so by what age were you a scratch golfer,
not i would say 14 or 15 i do remember the first time i beat him which i think
i was i was 15 i think i shot four under at our home course he threw a country
(07:04):
club and was playing with him and
he let me hear about it on 12 13 oh you're getting close mind games all of it
he did not want to he He did not want to lose.
It was one of those things where he's like, he always told me,
because when you beat me for the first time, you will have beaten me.
I will throw everything in the book at you.
So he did, and I was 15 years old.
(07:27):
I mean, to beat someone who's played on the PGA Tour for that long.
What did you feel at that time?
Well, I mean, it's different when it's your dad, you know?
I mean, I never look at him as like, oh, wow, it's Chris DeMarco,
by the PGA Tour player just because that's not...
He's my daddy. I don't look at him that way. It's funny. My friends,
(07:48):
I think when they first meet him, they look at him that way and then they realize
he's just a normal dude and then they don't anymore. But...
I didn't really think much of it. And I think that kind of hurts you a little
bit because it's like, yes, you did just beat somebody on the PGA Tour.
But like your dad, you don't think anything of it. Whether if it was Carter
(08:10):
Tom's dad, David Tom's, and I beat him, I'd be like, oh, my gosh,
I beat David Tom's, you know, but it's it's different.
I mean, obviously, you were part of your high school golf team.
Yeah. Talk to us about your experience there and the recruitment into college.
Yeah so we were really good in high school I
went to Lake Mary Prep in Orlando and our
(08:31):
team was stacked I mean I was I
wasn't even the number one player on the team we had a kid named
Austin Truslow who plays on the Asian court right now he played
on Corn Ferry so it was me it was Austin trust
low it was chase ibbotson linus
low and i mean we won we
won regionals by 150 i mean 150
(08:54):
strokes and 18 holes i i shot 63 in regionals
and awesome press was about 64 we were playing in the same group so
it was it was awesome and i mean
i wasn't i was a little bit of a late bloomer i wasn't highly recruited
i always obviously wanted to go to the university of Florida because
my dad went there and the coach at
the time when I was coming out of high school was the same coach
(09:16):
that he had so I wanted to play for his coach Buddy Alexander and but
I always was like I don't want you just
to take me if you're taking me because I'm Chris's son like
that's not if you don't think I'm good enough don't take me and I probably
wasn't and he didn't take me and I
think that was a huge moment for me where I was pretty motivated
(09:36):
I was like all right well I'm gonna prove to you that I'm I'm pretty
good at this game and you missed out and so Brian
Craig from Kentucky played with my dad
at Florida and he gave me a spot at Kentucky which I
went there my freshman year and ended up transferring to the University of South.
Florida Kentucky was fantastic it just was really really cold like we had snow
(09:59):
on the ground for four months that year and granted it was a bad winter for
them but I just I went back in January and I told coach I I was like,
there's no way I can do this for four years, not playing golf in the winter.
So you transferred over to the University of South Florida. I did.
You played under Coach Steve Bradley.
Yes. Yeah, it was. And that was such a, I didn't realize it at the time,
(10:22):
but it was everything I was looking for.
Coach Bradley played for Buddy Alexander. He worked as an assistant coach under Buddy Alexander.
And he had the, I had the opportunity to play for him and it was,
it was awesome. It was an hour and 45 minutes away from my house in Orlando,
which was just far enough away, all few rounds, great facility, great.
(10:44):
Schedule we played and it was really not as
like not as much of a party school like I got
to actually hone my craft and not get too caught up
in everything else and just was another
another situation where I could grow my game and compete and we had a really
good team I mean Chase Koepka was on that team and I was a young sophomore coming
(11:06):
in trying to make that team they had just gone to nationals and gone to match
play the year before so it was a stacked team and I knew I had to play good to make the lineup.
Yeah. And for our listeners out there, Coach Bradley spoke with me in one of my previous episodes,
and I came out of that conversation really, really impressed with his focus
(11:27):
on developing the player,
not just as a player, but as an individual so that he or she could be successful
in life after college. Was that your experience as well?
Absolutely. That's one of the things that I tell recruits that come into to
USF or every time I talk about coach Bradley, it's, he taught me more how to
(11:48):
be a man than to be a professional golfer or anything like that.
It's doing the little things, right.
Holding yourself accountable, knowing that it's okay to screw up.
Just if you screw it up, admit that you screwed up and let's work to fix it.
And I think I, I mean, I definitely butted heads with him my first couple of
years and trying to be a little bit of a bad boy or partier or whatever.
(12:11):
And And like he kind of set me straight and I definitely would not be where
I'm at without Coach Bradley.
And I think he was exactly what I needed at that time.
So talk to us about the work you have to put in as a college player.
Is it you go to class and then you spend the rest of the day in the golf facility?
How do you balance academics and golf?
(12:32):
Yeah. So, I mean, it's funny. I tried to major in business my freshman year
and a little bit into my sophomore year.
And in order to do that, you have to take calculus.
And with how much you travel, going to tournaments, that wasn't going to be
it for me. So I always kind of joke around and say I majored in golf,
but I actually majored in communication.
(12:53):
And any college you go to, the academic advisors on the athletic side are crucial.
They help so much. They get you in touch with your teachers and you get a sheet
of these are the days I'm going to be gone.
So you can turn things in late. You have tutors that really help you.
But yeah, I mean, they schedule all your classes around practice.
(13:16):
So for us, we always practice at one o'clock. clock so we had class in the morning
and then we always usually have Fridays off so we could go play or qualify but
yeah I mean it's workouts at 6 a.m then you get some breakfast and you go to
class for four hours and then you're at the golf facility 12 30 12 45 and you're practicing.
Practice from 1 to 3 30 and if you need to do extra you do extra which I was
(13:40):
always a guy who who did extra a bit of a golf junkie and wanted to get as good
as I could so I was I was there till dark pretty much.
So at what point in college did you realize that maybe you were better than
let's say 80-90% of the other collegiate golfers out there?
I think I've always had the self-belief whether it's blind self-belief or a
(14:04):
bit of delusion which I think every great successful person has.
In order to achieve something in a sport or transcend and send some sort of
business opportunity, I think you need to have a certain delusional confidence
in yourself where you have to turn nothing into something.
Because that's how it happens, not looking at things in such a big picture like,
(14:28):
oh, I want to be in the PGA Tour, so I need to do this, this, and this.
No, you don't. You just need to stay the course and believe that you're going
to end up there one day and things will fall in line.
So I think I always had that belief, but I really found it my senior year when
I started actually putting scores together and finishing high in tournaments and winning in college.
(14:50):
And like i don't i think i finished outside
the top 10 my senior year twice so
i think that was a huge confidence builder for
me but then once you leave college and knowing that hey if i go shoot 200 every
round in college i'm going to be near the lead then you turn pro and you go
(15:11):
to canada event my first canadian tour event i shot 500 through two days and
i missed the cut so it It was like all that went out the window and it was like,
okay, these guys are really good.
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(15:33):
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You know, there are so many different levels to golf and you just touched upon
one of the big things is that if you think you're at the highest level,
well, there's another level on top of that, right? Correct.
(15:56):
And what is the difference between where you were coming out of college and the guys on tour?
Like what was, what drove that difference?
I think it's just consistency, obviously, but I think it's, it's just being a pro.
I mean, I think it's, it's just doing the little things correctly and you can
(16:18):
get away with not doing them correctly in college and whether that's nutrition, hydration.
Working Working out, making sure your body's physically fit and ready and you're
not going to have aches and pains.
I think the professional level guys are just on top of that because it's now
for the money that the guys in the PGA Tour are playing for.
It's big business out there.
(16:38):
So, I mean, it's they have a team like my dad always talks about when in his
day they had no teams. It wasn't a team. It was you.
And now it's it's such big business. If you can get one percent better on all
fronts, you're going to have people to help you out.
And I think just the consistency of not so much the physical,
actually hitting a golf ball, but it's more of just the mentality and the belief
(17:01):
and putting yourself through the grueling practice that may take less time,
but it's more, it's higher quality and you complete something and you, you achieve,
you leave the golf course achieving something every day that is ultimately going
to help you get to your goal.
So in that period when you were transitioning or
graduating from college and getting on to the tour did you
(17:23):
lean upon your dad for advice i did
i did but i struggled for a while i mean i had i had conditional status in canada
my first summer out and i i didn't make a cut out there and which was kind of
tough and i mean i had a little success in some mini tour events and got out
through first stage of Q school,
(17:44):
but missed at second stage and then had full status in 19 in Latin America. I think I made one cut.
Like, so yeah, it was a struggle and it was tough.
And yeah, I mean, I definitely leaned upon my dad to be like,
Hey man, like this is, this is tough.
This is hard. And I think he always instilled in me that this game will beat you down.
(18:05):
You just got to keep doing the right things and it'll happen.
And I think I'm starting to see the results now.
So, you know, talk to us about the technicals. You play golf left-handed, right? I do. Yeah.
But you, you putt right-handed. Yes.
And are you left-handed in normal life?
No. So I'm righty in everything that I do. I batted baseball righty,
(18:28):
play tennis righty, play pickleball righty, throw, kick, everything righty.
My dad just gave me a club that went both ways when I was young and I always swung it lefty.
And he was like, that's, can't teach that. that's
really good so we're going to keep you the lefty and then i guess
he had putters laying around the house that were righty and i just picked
him up and when i was young and he's like that stroke's pretty good righty we're
(18:51):
going to go with that too so he never he never tried to change anything which
is i think why i am the way i am that's great i mean there's another famous
lefty golfer who is a righty in real life yeah his name is phil mickelson yeah
you're in good company there.
Yeah. I think I honestly think it's an advantage.
I mean, Jordan's piece right-handed golfer, but he's left-handed.
(19:13):
I think if there's something to be said with the short game,
especially chipping that if you can have your lead hand be dominant,
you can control that leading edge way better than guys who, where the trail hand is dominant.
And I think, I mean, short game is probably my strength and yeah,
I think it really, really helps.
(19:33):
You know, just so many numbers floating out there and everybody talks about
ball striking is the difference between a pro golfer and let's say an average
golfer along with speed.
So just to level set the listener, how far do you hit your driver?
I'd probably carry it 290 to 295, but I feel like I'm pretty, my, I spin it pretty low.
(19:57):
So if it's firm out, I can get it out there 315, 325.
But yes speed's very important so how
at what point did you realize that
you had to do x to get to the
speed you wanted was it very young when you were
very young or no i so i actually hit it
(20:18):
pretty short in high school and in college i probably only carried it to 65
in college stranded at 104 miles an hour but i was really really straight so
i was it was i didn't Didn't really worry about it too much in college because
I just hit driver where guys hit two iron and it didn't really matter.
Because just the level was a little bit less it didn't need
(20:41):
speed and then I was doing my
turn pro and realized that okay speed is you can't
hit a 265 and plan a pj tour it's just it's not feasible so I chased speed a
little bit with certain coaches and I got longer but I got more erratic and
didn't really I wasn't long enough to where I could miss a bunch of fairways
(21:02):
I I gained speed and I hit it 290 through the air,
but 290 landing in the rough goes 292 and you're not in wedge distance on most par fours.
So I actually work with a guy named Rich Abel now for two years now who's been a godsend to me.
I was actually, I was probably ready to quit the game three years ago and he's changed the game for me.
(21:23):
Just being more athletic, more, I kind of move over the ball now and that's
so stagnant and really tap into my athletic ability,
which I think is huge because I'm a pretty athletic guy, but I wasn't using
any of that in my golf swing.
I was very technical and trying to be in certain positions and that kind of
hamstrings you, especially for speed.
(21:45):
So yeah, I've gained probably and at 12 miles an hour clubhead speed in the
last two years just by having less thought really and just being a little bit more athletic.
And did you use like any system or i have to do this i've tried when i did chase
some speed before i met rich i tried the stack system and it definitely makes
(22:07):
you faster but it doesn't.
It doesn't really make you faster in the right ways for me personally i think you need to be.
I guess i'm so competitive that i was looking at the number and i was just trying
to make it go faster and faster any way i could and it kind of got my swing
out of whack it's a lot of hand speed A lot of throwing the stack system at
(22:28):
through the hit to try to get as much speed as you can.
And that didn't transfer well for me into the golf swing.
So I think those things are great. As long as you're under supervision of a
coach that kind of keeps you like, because the stack system also says like,
Hey, make a normal golf swing, which I wasn't doing.
I was swinging like Tim Burke, long drive guy, trying to get it as long as I
(22:49):
could. So that didn't transfer well for me.
But so I think just for me being more athletic and using the ground more helped me.
Again, just to inform the listener, you're a pretty tall guy,
right? You're what? Six, one, six, one.
Yes. and and like what 200 pounds
or i know not 200 probably 180 okay okay so you're pretty lean and tall kind
(23:13):
of in the dj mold if i would say that yeah sure you can say that so you know
you're blessed with that natural physical structure which you know normally.
Most lay people would say that you have these long levers
to yeah bring faster so if you just
close your eyes and visualize the perfect fast golf
swing what would you say is
(23:36):
the sequence of events for the for the listener well i
think number one is you need
to hit the ball on the side of the face that is you're going
to get the most bang for your buck there but again i would
just say like a fluid motion i think
syncing it up is more important when things
work together other and you're not rigid and pulling the golf club and it's
(24:00):
able to move kind of with you and athletically i think the club will snap in
the right position and the speed will be in the right place which is kind of
halfway down on the backswing on the downswing and in through the hit.
So I think kind of smooth to the top and kind of allowing the club to kind of
be with you on the way down.
(24:21):
I think that's going to be the best bang for your buck with speed as well as
hitting the center of the clubface.
Talk to us about the ground forces you harness to get faster.
Most people don't understand ground forces.
What is a ground force? I'm not sure I totally understand ground forces either.
And I'm not going to dive into it because I know how I know how I operate and
(24:45):
I'll try to go on some rabbit hole to try to get longer.
But I think I mean, the way I would I would say it is it's it's a bit of like a jumping motion.
But in golf, it's different than doing a jump squat.
Like if you're doing a jump squat in the gym, your arms, your arms swing down
with you when you squat down and they swing and they jump up when you jump up
(25:07):
in golf. it's completely different.
As you push off the ground in golf, your arms go down because they're swinging
the club to the golf ball.
So, I mean, for me, I think what's best translated for me is throwing a medicine
ball at a wall in kind of golf motion and using my body and my feet and my legs
(25:28):
to have the medicine ball throw harder into the wall.
That's kind of been my theory on it
great thank you for that and let's
talk about speed in in your irons because you know most of us we think speed
with the driver but hitting your irons long is also crucial on the pro tour
(25:52):
so just level set the listener again you know seven iron what's your your carry distance?
I carry a 7-iron 188 yards.
Wow, that is long.
But it's not, I mean, I would be okay with carrying a 7-iron 180 yards as long as that's consistent.
And I think it is great to be able to hit a 7-iron that long,
(26:16):
but it's, I think it's more important to be
able to hit a 7-iron 178 yards when you
need to into the wind and fighting it and controlling
your distance with your irons opposed to just hitting them as hard as you can
because yes length is great but being pin high and being able to control how
(26:37):
far how far your ball is flying and where you want to land it in relation to
the pin i think that's most important.
Wow that's that's actually great insight and did your irons also get longer
over the last They did. They did. Okay.
Yeah, I've probably gained probably a full club of length with my irons.
(26:57):
And again, that's not all speed.
I'm definitely swinging it faster, but with a seven iron, maybe three miles
an hour faster than I would.
Normally but it's more just a consistent strike full
compression more compression with the irons and
then that's obviously hitting him right at the.
Center of the face the ball goes further so naturally.
(27:18):
A question pops up you know at least in my mind and i'm.
Sure for many of our listeners is like you're a pro you
have a practice setup at home what do you
do like when you're not playing in a tournament to stay
sharp yeah i mean if i can play golf with other
pros in the area and have money games that is that
is what i would love to do but when guys are traveling and
(27:41):
i'm like today i was i'm the only one in town unfortunately
but so i would i would
make a plan i would write down in my notes on
my phone kind of first thing in the morning of what i want
to accomplish that that day and then whether it
be wedges or i kind
of work on all aspects of my game but i'd make a plan
and so today i i went to the range and
(28:04):
just kind of worked on some fundamentals warmed up
to like a seven iron and then i have this i
guess it's an alignment aid where you've seen
ian polter use it and some other guys it's it's a
line for your feet and then a line for ball position and club
face and I'd probably hit 20 to
30 balls with that just making sure the alignment's correct that
(28:26):
ball vision is correct and just kind of working
my feels with my swing and then from there maybe hit a couple five irons a couple
three woods and then I found for me that just beating balls in the range is
is not conducive for my game I I'm way too picky and way too hard part of my
cell phone range if it's not going right at the target that I've picked.
(28:50):
I start looking for other things to fix and that's just that's not good for
me so i from there i work really hard on my wedges i have a track man and i
pick three gaps a day whether it's 70 yards to 80 like today i did 70 to 80
95 to 105 and then 115 to 125.
(29:10):
So the 70 to 80 yarder was with a lob wedge i'll
take five golf balls the first golf ball will
be 70 yards that ball's got got to land three yards
from that number so if it lands
anywhere from 73 to 67 that's my
window that's a pass and then i go to 73 yards
the second ball same thing three yards on
(29:32):
either side 70 79 yards and
then from there i've got to get four of those
five golf balls inside those numbers or else
i have to do it again so again just
playing games with myself and so complete that
drill and then obviously go to chipping where i
think there's so many cool things you can do with chipping obviously
(29:54):
if there's another person there you can play a ten
dollar chipping game which i think is the best because it's
kind of simulates golf there's something on the line
you don't get a do-over so that's obviously great
but if not i i like to just kind of throw balls around the
green and check the different targets every time i don't i don't think chipping
to the same target get from a perfect lie is
(30:16):
translates to the golf course at all
i mean maybe if you're working on mechanics sure but i
like to kind of randomize my short game practice and
just give myself weird lies weird shots trying to.
Where you have to read the lie and read how the ball is
going to react on the green and just give yourself different
looks because you don't know what you're going to get on the golf course and then for
(30:37):
putting i've got a on a
roll of decks of drills that i do but the one i always do to
start is i've got the putting plates from puttingplates.com
not an ad but i do like them it kind of is a start line drill you know you're
rolling your ball on your intended line so i'll do that for maybe 10-15 minutes
(30:58):
and then it's either some sort of drill obviously if somebody's there and you
can play a putting match for 10 bucks that's that's great That's what I'll do for sure.
If not, I like today, I did a three, four, five drill where there's three tees
on north, south, east, west of the hole, three feet, four feet,
five feet, and you've got to make all 12 putts in a row.
(31:21):
And if you don't, you got to start over. So that's kind of a pain in the butt
when it's 105 degrees in Florida.
I missed, I think, the second try I did today. I missed the last putt.
And you got to go all the way back to the three-footers and do it again.
So you basically are simulating pressure in your practice session.
Correct. Yeah, I think that's the most important. I think, obviously,
(31:44):
as human beings, we like to do things that are comfortable.
Comfortable and obviously the practice trying
to make your practice as much as close to
the game it's the best it's hard to
get that level but doing things that is a path fail where you need to complete
it is what helps me for sure you mentioned at the beginning of our conversation
(32:06):
that this was a good week for you i mean last weekend was a good weekend for
you it was can Can you talk to us about that?
Yeah, I won 78th Florida Open, which was huge.
It was good for me. It was the biggest paycheck I've made. It was cool to kind
of see some hard work come to fruition.
And, you know, I played a lot of good players and I beat them all,
(32:30):
which was great, which is what we strive to do every week in, week out.
And for it to happen, I know it doesn't happen a lot in golf,
but for it to happen, it was a huge confidence builder for me.
Yeah. And congratulations for that. you know, winning at any level at golf is
great, but at your level to win must be truly satisfying.
Yeah, it was good. And then, you know, I mean, I shot a lot of really good scores to do.
(32:52):
I shot 69, 67, 64 in the final round to win, which was huge.
It's something that I'll be able to draw back on going forward.
And just another piece of validation that, okay, you're on the right track,
you're doing the right things.
Just kind of stay the course and see what happens.
So what is in the future for you i mean what are your goals in the in the short
(33:15):
term yeah so i mean obviously yeah i mean my dream is to plan a pj tour but
i'm just trying to give myself any and.
Get better and play as many things as I can to help me ultimately get there.
So I'm going, I'm actually going up Saturday to Windsor, Canada to do a Monday
qualifier for the Canadian Tour event.
(33:36):
Probably play a couple mini tours in August.
And then I'm going at the end of August to Italy for DP World Tour Q School.
And then Corn Fairy Q School, October 15th, I believe, in West Palm.
Well, good luck to all your endeavors there, because you're clearly a very,
very smart, intelligent person.
(33:58):
Appreciate it. You know, I also
wanted to delve into a couple of questions which keep coming to my mind.
You know, there's about 25 million golfers in the United States.
Let's call 100 million golfers worldwide.
You know, all the major tours put together, it looks like there's only about maybe 500 spots,
you know 150 on the pga tour yeah you know japan tour asian tour dp world tour
(34:24):
why doesn't golf broaden out the opportunity probably just because you want
to see the best i mean and it's such a,
it's a good question i mean i think opportunity is great but we all want to
be on pga tour and there's only a limited amount of spots.
And I mean, I don't know much about the whole system of how all the tours work
(34:50):
with money-wise and how it goes, but I know all the money goes in the PGA Tour.
That's where the best players in the world, that's the TV deals, that's the sponsors.
And I think in order to have an elite tour like the PGA Tour, it needs to be limited.
And whether that's, I don't know how you'd go about it, but whether I think
125 guys keeping their card every year is a lot.
(35:12):
Especially just because there's a lot of good guys on corn freight tour who,
finished in the top 30 and don't really get every start because there's still
125 guys in the PGA tour keep their card.
I look, don't get me wrong. I I'm not there yet and I don't have any sway or
any say of how it should go, but I think maybe if a hundred guys keep their
(35:33):
card and there's more turnover, more relegation and promotion, like.
Other sports like my wife played professional soccer and relegation over
in in europe that concept's pretty cool so
i think more of that would maybe help with seeing
different guys but at the end of the day like i don't
know if people want to see would rather watch me play
(35:53):
golf on tv or watch jordan sweet play golf i mean it's it
is what it is and i think you have to just you ultimately
want to get to the highest level which is the pj tour and
i think once you get there it'd be great yeah yeah i
mean and to answer your question i mean i would love to
see good golf on tv whether it's you or
jordan speed uh yeah you know because you guys
(36:14):
play golf at a level which you know we only dream about
many of us so it's it's
great to kind of tap into your mindset you
know learn more about your perspective on golf and thank
you for all the insight and advice you've have given our listeners
as they as they heard you talk as we
leave is there anything else you would like to say to
(36:38):
the aspiring professional out there
well yeah i mean i think you
have to just in this game there's there's no coach or or team it's all you so
you have to set your hours you have to hold yourself accountable for what you're
doing and and how you achieve your goals i would I'd say just make a plan,
(36:59):
figure out what kind of golfer you want to be,
figure out where your strengths and where your weaknesses are.
And really just hold yourself accountable and work harder than everybody else,
and good things will happen.
Thank you, Christian. That was a great conversation. Thank you for taking the
time to speak with us and tell the listeners all you know about the Pro Tours.
(37:20):
I wish you luck personally, and
all the best in all the Q schools you're going to go through this year.
And i hope to see you at the masters chipping in on the 16th one day that is
my goal i appreciate you having me thank you you got it and folks that is a
wrap for today thank you for listening.
(37:42):
Music.
Yeah, I won the 78th Florida Open, which was huge.
It was good for me. It was the biggest paycheck I've made. It was cool to kind
of see some hard work come to fruition.
And, you know, I played a lot of good players and I beat them all,
which was great, which is what we strive to do every week in, week out.
(00:20):
And for it to happen, I know it doesn't happen a lot in golf,
but for it to happen, it was a huge confidence builder for me.
Music.
(00:44):
In audio. In audio. In audio. Welcome to the Accelerate Golf Podcast,
where we explore player improvement and the business of golf through conversations.
I'm your host, Bikram Kapoor, and today I have the pleasure of speaking with
Christian DiMarco, who turned pro in 2018 after winning several accolades as
a standout on the University of South Florida golf team.
(01:08):
Without further ado, welcome Christian.
Thanks for having me. Appreciate you having me on. And yes, folks,
if the name does ring a bell, Christian is the son of Chris DiMarco,
a three-time winner on the PGA Tour, who gave Tiger a run for his money at the 2005 Masters,
before losing in a playoff.
(01:28):
Christian, were you at Augusta at that time? I was. That week was always something
special for us and our whole family.
I actually made a putt on number nine at the
part three contest which I look forward to all the
time when I was that age and yeah me and my mom were walking the grounds and
we were there on 16 when Tiger made that chip and we were standing by one of
(01:51):
the pine trees and the volume it was so loud that like the pine tree was vibrating
from just how loud it was it was it was unbelievable.
So what was your how old were with you at that time? I was nine.
So I was born in 1996 and that was 05. Yeah, I was nine years old.
I wish I was a little bit older to understand like the gravity of the situation.
(02:13):
I definitely, like it was, that week was the first time like emotions moved
me to tears other than like, I'm sad or I want something tears.
It was like, it was such a
surreal moment when he made the putt to go to force
the playoff to go in five feet and he went nuts
and crazy like i started just bawling crying tears
(02:33):
of joy and i had never felt that before i was nine years old and
it was kind of one of the things that solidified for me i
was like wow this is what i want to do that's but
people do forget about that all the time because the chip
went in and it was like oh it's over and it was far from over
and i mean we it it's
funny every time masters runs around there's recaps
(02:55):
of the 05 masters just because it was such a great battle and i mean tiger's
chip was amazing on 16 but my dad had an unbelievable chip in regulation in
18 that hit the pin and if that goes in it's it's over and god it would have
been crazy it's yeah he had he had one arm in that green jacket.
And, you know, he tied for second in a couple of other majors as well.
(03:19):
Were you there for those majors as well?
So he tied for, he lost in the playoff in the 2004 PGA.
And then obviously at Augusta in 05, I don't think I was at the PGA at Westling Straits in 04.
I was at Augusta. And then when he finished second at the British Open in 06, I was there.
It was a couple months after my grandmother had passed away.
(03:42):
So it was kind of a boy's trip. my grandfather my dad's
dad went my mom's dad went I believe a
couple uncles went and it was it was
a really cool time so you basically grew up on
the tour so you had a very much in-depth look
at life on tour when you were very young yeah I I mean it's it was amazing it
(04:05):
was like wanting up growing up wanting to be a professional golfer and having
Bubba Watson be a friend that that would FaceTime me when I'm 10 years old,
when the new iPhone became FaceTime.
It was the coolest thing in the world.
And yeah, and seeing it up close and walking practice rounds when I'm young
and being on the range Friday morning at 11 years old,
(04:26):
watching the greatest players in the world warm up before the tournament and
then hanging out in the locker room and all the cool things. It was amazing.
So naturally, you know, that sparked an interest in the game.
And when did you start taking it really, really seriously?
Yeah, I think I've always been super competitive. competitive and I think my
(04:49):
dad, my dad never let me win anything, whether it was playing catch or playing
ping pong or certainly golf.
And I think just watching him,
how competitive he was and how he could scratch that itch playing golf.
And then I luckily have good genes and was talented enough to be pretty good at golf at a young age.
And I just, I loved it. And it was obviously what my dad did.
(05:11):
So what kid doesn't want to be like their dad.
So I just, I think from a very young age, probably probably eight or nine I
was like man this is like really cool and then I mean fly from the age 10 to
16 my parents would drop me off at the golf course at 8 a.m and pick me up at dark.
Wow and was your dad your coach or was
there somebody else yeah so I get that question a lot he
(05:34):
if you told him to break down the golf swing I don't
think he could do it I he's not a very technical player he's
not swing position wise he obviously influences
my game management course management
way to think out there as in a coach role but definitely not like hey you need
to get your club face here you need to this is where like he's big on fundamentals
(05:56):
ball position alignment but certainly wasn't my swing coach by any means more
of like just this is how you hit this chip This is what you do in this situation,
which is, as I'm a professional now, I just feel like my golf IQ is so much
higher than really anybody I'm around.
And I attribute a lot of that, all of that to him just by watching him play and.
(06:18):
Having him be top five in the world he obviously knows
what he's talking about and using those lessons that
he taught me certainly helped now so he
it sounds like taught you how to score better
for sure and that's the only thing
they go by in this game not if they only go by score doesn't matter
how it looks and i think his whole career is kind of based on that i mean he
(06:41):
wasn't the longest wasn't the straightest wasn't really the best at anything
he just he wanted to get in the the hole as quick as possible and that's all
they go by so by what age were you a scratch golfer,
not i would say 14 or 15 i do remember the first time i beat him which i think
i was i was 15 i think i shot four under at our home course he threw a country
(07:04):
club and was playing with him and
he let me hear about it on 12 13 oh you're getting close mind games all of it
he did not want to he He did not want to lose.
It was one of those things where he's like, he always told me,
because when you beat me for the first time, you will have beaten me.
I will throw everything in the book at you.
So he did, and I was 15 years old.
(07:27):
I mean, to beat someone who's played on the PGA Tour for that long.
What did you feel at that time?
Well, I mean, it's different when it's your dad, you know?
I mean, I never look at him as like, oh, wow, it's Chris DeMarco,
by the PGA Tour player just because that's not...
He's my daddy. I don't look at him that way. It's funny. My friends,
(07:48):
I think when they first meet him, they look at him that way and then they realize
he's just a normal dude and then they don't anymore. But...
I didn't really think much of it. And I think that kind of hurts you a little
bit because it's like, yes, you did just beat somebody on the PGA Tour.
But like your dad, you don't think anything of it. Whether if it was Carter
(08:10):
Tom's dad, David Tom's, and I beat him, I'd be like, oh, my gosh,
I beat David Tom's, you know, but it's it's different.
I mean, obviously, you were part of your high school golf team.
Yeah. Talk to us about your experience there and the recruitment into college.
Yeah so we were really good in high school I
went to Lake Mary Prep in Orlando and our
(08:31):
team was stacked I mean I was I
wasn't even the number one player on the team we had a kid named
Austin Truslow who plays on the Asian court right now he played
on Corn Ferry so it was me it was Austin trust
low it was chase ibbotson linus
low and i mean we won we
won regionals by 150 i mean 150
(08:54):
strokes and 18 holes i i shot 63 in regionals
and awesome press was about 64 we were playing in the same group so
it was it was awesome and i mean
i wasn't i was a little bit of a late bloomer i wasn't highly recruited
i always obviously wanted to go to the university of Florida because
my dad went there and the coach at
the time when I was coming out of high school was the same coach
(09:16):
that he had so I wanted to play for his coach Buddy Alexander and but
I always was like I don't want you just
to take me if you're taking me because I'm Chris's son like
that's not if you don't think I'm good enough don't take me and I probably
wasn't and he didn't take me and I
think that was a huge moment for me where I was pretty motivated
(09:36):
I was like all right well I'm gonna prove to you that I'm I'm pretty
good at this game and you missed out and so Brian
Craig from Kentucky played with my dad
at Florida and he gave me a spot at Kentucky which I
went there my freshman year and ended up transferring to the University of South.
Florida Kentucky was fantastic it just was really really cold like we had snow
(09:59):
on the ground for four months that year and granted it was a bad winter for
them but I just I went back in January and I told coach I I was like,
there's no way I can do this for four years, not playing golf in the winter.
So you transferred over to the University of South Florida. I did.
You played under Coach Steve Bradley.
Yes. Yeah, it was. And that was such a, I didn't realize it at the time,
(10:22):
but it was everything I was looking for.
Coach Bradley played for Buddy Alexander. He worked as an assistant coach under Buddy Alexander.
And he had the, I had the opportunity to play for him and it was,
it was awesome. It was an hour and 45 minutes away from my house in Orlando,
which was just far enough away, all few rounds, great facility, great.
(10:44):
Schedule we played and it was really not as
like not as much of a party school like I got
to actually hone my craft and not get too caught up
in everything else and just was another
another situation where I could grow my game and compete and we had a really
good team I mean Chase Koepka was on that team and I was a young sophomore coming
(11:06):
in trying to make that team they had just gone to nationals and gone to match
play the year before so it was a stacked team and I knew I had to play good to make the lineup.
Yeah. And for our listeners out there, Coach Bradley spoke with me in one of my previous episodes,
and I came out of that conversation really, really impressed with his focus
(11:27):
on developing the player,
not just as a player, but as an individual so that he or she could be successful
in life after college. Was that your experience as well?
Absolutely. That's one of the things that I tell recruits that come into to
USF or every time I talk about coach Bradley, it's, he taught me more how to
(11:48):
be a man than to be a professional golfer or anything like that.
It's doing the little things, right.
Holding yourself accountable, knowing that it's okay to screw up.
Just if you screw it up, admit that you screwed up and let's work to fix it.
And I think I, I mean, I definitely butted heads with him my first couple of
years and trying to be a little bit of a bad boy or partier or whatever.
(12:11):
And And like he kind of set me straight and I definitely would not be where
I'm at without Coach Bradley.
And I think he was exactly what I needed at that time.
So talk to us about the work you have to put in as a college player.
Is it you go to class and then you spend the rest of the day in the golf facility?
How do you balance academics and golf?
(12:32):
Yeah. So, I mean, it's funny. I tried to major in business my freshman year
and a little bit into my sophomore year.
And in order to do that, you have to take calculus.
And with how much you travel, going to tournaments, that wasn't going to be
it for me. So I always kind of joke around and say I majored in golf,
but I actually majored in communication.
(12:53):
And any college you go to, the academic advisors on the athletic side are crucial.
They help so much. They get you in touch with your teachers and you get a sheet
of these are the days I'm going to be gone.
So you can turn things in late. You have tutors that really help you.
But yeah, I mean, they schedule all your classes around practice.
(13:16):
So for us, we always practice at one o'clock. clock so we had class in the morning
and then we always usually have Fridays off so we could go play or qualify but
yeah I mean it's workouts at 6 a.m then you get some breakfast and you go to
class for four hours and then you're at the golf facility 12 30 12 45 and you're practicing.
Practice from 1 to 3 30 and if you need to do extra you do extra which I was
(13:40):
always a guy who who did extra a bit of a golf junkie and wanted to get as good
as I could so I was I was there till dark pretty much.
So at what point in college did you realize that maybe you were better than
let's say 80-90% of the other collegiate golfers out there?
I think I've always had the self-belief whether it's blind self-belief or a
(14:04):
bit of delusion which I think every great successful person has.
In order to achieve something in a sport or transcend and send some sort of
business opportunity, I think you need to have a certain delusional confidence
in yourself where you have to turn nothing into something.
Because that's how it happens, not looking at things in such a big picture like,
(14:28):
oh, I want to be in the PGA Tour, so I need to do this, this, and this.
No, you don't. You just need to stay the course and believe that you're going
to end up there one day and things will fall in line.
So I think I always had that belief, but I really found it my senior year when
I started actually putting scores together and finishing high in tournaments and winning in college.
(14:50):
And like i don't i think i finished outside
the top 10 my senior year twice so
i think that was a huge confidence builder for
me but then once you leave college and knowing that hey if i go shoot 200 every
round in college i'm going to be near the lead then you turn pro and you go
(15:11):
to canada event my first canadian tour event i shot 500 through two days and
i missed the cut so it It was like all that went out the window and it was like,
okay, these guys are really good.
And now folks, I wanted to mention that this show is brought to you by QSchoolSports,
a technology company that offers thoughtfully designed point of sale, bookings, payments,
(15:33):
omni-channel retail, and customer management software that accelerates your business growth.
Visit QSchoolSports.com for more information. Thank you.
You know, there are so many different levels to golf and you just touched upon
one of the big things is that if you think you're at the highest level,
well, there's another level on top of that, right? Correct.
(15:56):
And what is the difference between where you were coming out of college and the guys on tour?
Like what was, what drove that difference?
I think it's just consistency, obviously, but I think it's, it's just being a pro.
I mean, I think it's, it's just doing the little things correctly and you can
(16:18):
get away with not doing them correctly in college and whether that's nutrition, hydration.
Working Working out, making sure your body's physically fit and ready and you're
not going to have aches and pains.
I think the professional level guys are just on top of that because it's now
for the money that the guys in the PGA Tour are playing for.
It's big business out there.
(16:38):
So, I mean, it's they have a team like my dad always talks about when in his
day they had no teams. It wasn't a team. It was you.
And now it's it's such big business. If you can get one percent better on all
fronts, you're going to have people to help you out.
And I think just the consistency of not so much the physical,
actually hitting a golf ball, but it's more of just the mentality and the belief
(17:01):
and putting yourself through the grueling practice that may take less time,
but it's more, it's higher quality and you complete something and you, you achieve,
you leave the golf course achieving something every day that is ultimately going
to help you get to your goal.
So in that period when you were transitioning or
graduating from college and getting on to the tour did you
(17:23):
lean upon your dad for advice i did
i did but i struggled for a while i mean i had i had conditional status in canada
my first summer out and i i didn't make a cut out there and which was kind of
tough and i mean i had a little success in some mini tour events and got out
through first stage of Q school,
(17:44):
but missed at second stage and then had full status in 19 in Latin America. I think I made one cut.
Like, so yeah, it was a struggle and it was tough.
And yeah, I mean, I definitely leaned upon my dad to be like,
Hey man, like this is, this is tough.
This is hard. And I think he always instilled in me that this game will beat you down.
(18:05):
You just got to keep doing the right things and it'll happen.
And I think I'm starting to see the results now.
So, you know, talk to us about the technicals. You play golf left-handed, right? I do. Yeah.
But you, you putt right-handed. Yes.
And are you left-handed in normal life?
No. So I'm righty in everything that I do. I batted baseball righty,
(18:28):
play tennis righty, play pickleball righty, throw, kick, everything righty.
My dad just gave me a club that went both ways when I was young and I always swung it lefty.
And he was like, that's, can't teach that. that's
really good so we're going to keep you the lefty and then i guess
he had putters laying around the house that were righty and i just picked
him up and when i was young and he's like that stroke's pretty good righty we're
(18:51):
going to go with that too so he never he never tried to change anything which
is i think why i am the way i am that's great i mean there's another famous
lefty golfer who is a righty in real life yeah his name is phil mickelson yeah
you're in good company there.
Yeah. I think I honestly think it's an advantage.
I mean, Jordan's piece right-handed golfer, but he's left-handed.
(19:13):
I think if there's something to be said with the short game,
especially chipping that if you can have your lead hand be dominant,
you can control that leading edge way better than guys who, where the trail hand is dominant.
And I think, I mean, short game is probably my strength and yeah,
I think it really, really helps.
(19:33):
You know, just so many numbers floating out there and everybody talks about
ball striking is the difference between a pro golfer and let's say an average
golfer along with speed.
So just to level set the listener, how far do you hit your driver?
I'd probably carry it 290 to 295, but I feel like I'm pretty, my, I spin it pretty low.
(19:57):
So if it's firm out, I can get it out there 315, 325.
But yes speed's very important so how
at what point did you realize that
you had to do x to get to the
speed you wanted was it very young when you were
very young or no i so i actually hit it
(20:18):
pretty short in high school and in college i probably only carried it to 65
in college stranded at 104 miles an hour but i was really really straight so
i was it was i didn't Didn't really worry about it too much in college because
I just hit driver where guys hit two iron and it didn't really matter.
Because just the level was a little bit less it didn't need
(20:41):
speed and then I was doing my
turn pro and realized that okay speed is you can't
hit a 265 and plan a pj tour it's just it's not feasible so I chased speed a
little bit with certain coaches and I got longer but I got more erratic and
didn't really I wasn't long enough to where I could miss a bunch of fairways
(21:02):
I I gained speed and I hit it 290 through the air,
but 290 landing in the rough goes 292 and you're not in wedge distance on most par fours.
So I actually work with a guy named Rich Abel now for two years now who's been a godsend to me.
I was actually, I was probably ready to quit the game three years ago and he's changed the game for me.
(21:23):
Just being more athletic, more, I kind of move over the ball now and that's
so stagnant and really tap into my athletic ability,
which I think is huge because I'm a pretty athletic guy, but I wasn't using
any of that in my golf swing.
I was very technical and trying to be in certain positions and that kind of
hamstrings you, especially for speed.
(21:45):
So yeah, I've gained probably and at 12 miles an hour clubhead speed in the
last two years just by having less thought really and just being a little bit more athletic.
And did you use like any system or i have to do this i've tried when i did chase
some speed before i met rich i tried the stack system and it definitely makes
(22:07):
you faster but it doesn't.
It doesn't really make you faster in the right ways for me personally i think you need to be.
I guess i'm so competitive that i was looking at the number and i was just trying
to make it go faster and faster any way i could and it kind of got my swing
out of whack it's a lot of hand speed A lot of throwing the stack system at
(22:28):
through the hit to try to get as much speed as you can.
And that didn't transfer well for me into the golf swing.
So I think those things are great. As long as you're under supervision of a
coach that kind of keeps you like, because the stack system also says like,
Hey, make a normal golf swing, which I wasn't doing.
I was swinging like Tim Burke, long drive guy, trying to get it as long as I
(22:49):
could. So that didn't transfer well for me.
But so I think just for me being more athletic and using the ground more helped me.
Again, just to inform the listener, you're a pretty tall guy,
right? You're what? Six, one, six, one.
Yes. and and like what 200 pounds
or i know not 200 probably 180 okay okay so you're pretty lean and tall kind
(23:13):
of in the dj mold if i would say that yeah sure you can say that so you know
you're blessed with that natural physical structure which you know normally.
Most lay people would say that you have these long levers
to yeah bring faster so if you just
close your eyes and visualize the perfect fast golf
swing what would you say is
(23:36):
the sequence of events for the for the listener well i
think number one is you need
to hit the ball on the side of the face that is you're going
to get the most bang for your buck there but again i would
just say like a fluid motion i think
syncing it up is more important when things
work together other and you're not rigid and pulling the golf club and it's
(24:00):
able to move kind of with you and athletically i think the club will snap in
the right position and the speed will be in the right place which is kind of
halfway down on the backswing on the downswing and in through the hit.
So I think kind of smooth to the top and kind of allowing the club to kind of
be with you on the way down.
(24:21):
I think that's going to be the best bang for your buck with speed as well as
hitting the center of the clubface.
Talk to us about the ground forces you harness to get faster.
Most people don't understand ground forces.
What is a ground force? I'm not sure I totally understand ground forces either.
And I'm not going to dive into it because I know how I know how I operate and
(24:45):
I'll try to go on some rabbit hole to try to get longer.
But I think I mean, the way I would I would say it is it's it's a bit of like a jumping motion.
But in golf, it's different than doing a jump squat.
Like if you're doing a jump squat in the gym, your arms, your arms swing down
with you when you squat down and they swing and they jump up when you jump up
(25:07):
in golf. it's completely different.
As you push off the ground in golf, your arms go down because they're swinging
the club to the golf ball.
So, I mean, for me, I think what's best translated for me is throwing a medicine
ball at a wall in kind of golf motion and using my body and my feet and my legs
(25:28):
to have the medicine ball throw harder into the wall.
That's kind of been my theory on it
great thank you for that and let's
talk about speed in in your irons because you know most of us we think speed
with the driver but hitting your irons long is also crucial on the pro tour
(25:52):
so just level set the listener again you know seven iron what's your your carry distance?
I carry a 7-iron 188 yards.
Wow, that is long.
But it's not, I mean, I would be okay with carrying a 7-iron 180 yards as long as that's consistent.
And I think it is great to be able to hit a 7-iron that long,
(26:16):
but it's, I think it's more important to be
able to hit a 7-iron 178 yards when you
need to into the wind and fighting it and controlling
your distance with your irons opposed to just hitting them as hard as you can
because yes length is great but being pin high and being able to control how
(26:37):
far how far your ball is flying and where you want to land it in relation to
the pin i think that's most important.
Wow that's that's actually great insight and did your irons also get longer
over the last They did. They did. Okay.
Yeah, I've probably gained probably a full club of length with my irons.
(26:57):
And again, that's not all speed.
I'm definitely swinging it faster, but with a seven iron, maybe three miles
an hour faster than I would.
Normally but it's more just a consistent strike full
compression more compression with the irons and
then that's obviously hitting him right at the.
Center of the face the ball goes further so naturally.
(27:18):
A question pops up you know at least in my mind and i'm.
Sure for many of our listeners is like you're a pro you
have a practice setup at home what do you
do like when you're not playing in a tournament to stay
sharp yeah i mean if i can play golf with other
pros in the area and have money games that is that
is what i would love to do but when guys are traveling and
(27:41):
i'm like today i was i'm the only one in town unfortunately
but so i would i would
make a plan i would write down in my notes on
my phone kind of first thing in the morning of what i want
to accomplish that that day and then whether it
be wedges or i kind
of work on all aspects of my game but i'd make a plan
and so today i i went to the range and
(28:04):
just kind of worked on some fundamentals warmed up
to like a seven iron and then i have this i
guess it's an alignment aid where you've seen
ian polter use it and some other guys it's it's a
line for your feet and then a line for ball position and club
face and I'd probably hit 20 to
30 balls with that just making sure the alignment's correct that
(28:26):
ball vision is correct and just kind of working
my feels with my swing and then from there maybe hit a couple five irons a couple
three woods and then I found for me that just beating balls in the range is
is not conducive for my game I I'm way too picky and way too hard part of my
cell phone range if it's not going right at the target that I've picked.
(28:50):
I start looking for other things to fix and that's just that's not good for
me so i from there i work really hard on my wedges i have a track man and i
pick three gaps a day whether it's 70 yards to 80 like today i did 70 to 80
95 to 105 and then 115 to 125.
(29:10):
So the 70 to 80 yarder was with a lob wedge i'll
take five golf balls the first golf ball will
be 70 yards that ball's got got to land three yards
from that number so if it lands
anywhere from 73 to 67 that's my
window that's a pass and then i go to 73 yards
the second ball same thing three yards on
(29:32):
either side 70 79 yards and
then from there i've got to get four of those
five golf balls inside those numbers or else
i have to do it again so again just
playing games with myself and so complete that
drill and then obviously go to chipping where i
think there's so many cool things you can do with chipping obviously
(29:54):
if there's another person there you can play a ten
dollar chipping game which i think is the best because it's
kind of simulates golf there's something on the line
you don't get a do-over so that's obviously great
but if not i i like to just kind of throw balls around the
green and check the different targets every time i don't i don't think chipping
to the same target get from a perfect lie is
(30:16):
translates to the golf course at all
i mean maybe if you're working on mechanics sure but i
like to kind of randomize my short game practice and
just give myself weird lies weird shots trying to.
Where you have to read the lie and read how the ball is
going to react on the green and just give yourself different
looks because you don't know what you're going to get on the golf course and then for
(30:37):
putting i've got a on a
roll of decks of drills that i do but the one i always do to
start is i've got the putting plates from puttingplates.com
not an ad but i do like them it kind of is a start line drill you know you're
rolling your ball on your intended line so i'll do that for maybe 10-15 minutes
(30:58):
and then it's either some sort of drill obviously if somebody's there and you
can play a putting match for 10 bucks that's that's great That's what I'll do for sure.
If not, I like today, I did a three, four, five drill where there's three tees
on north, south, east, west of the hole, three feet, four feet,
five feet, and you've got to make all 12 putts in a row.
(31:21):
And if you don't, you got to start over. So that's kind of a pain in the butt
when it's 105 degrees in Florida.
I missed, I think, the second try I did today. I missed the last putt.
And you got to go all the way back to the three-footers and do it again.
So you basically are simulating pressure in your practice session.
Correct. Yeah, I think that's the most important. I think, obviously,
(31:44):
as human beings, we like to do things that are comfortable.
Comfortable and obviously the practice trying
to make your practice as much as close to
the game it's the best it's hard to
get that level but doing things that is a path fail where you need to complete
it is what helps me for sure you mentioned at the beginning of our conversation
(32:06):
that this was a good week for you i mean last weekend was a good weekend for
you it was can Can you talk to us about that?
Yeah, I won 78th Florida Open, which was huge.
It was good for me. It was the biggest paycheck I've made. It was cool to kind
of see some hard work come to fruition.
And, you know, I played a lot of good players and I beat them all,
(32:30):
which was great, which is what we strive to do every week in, week out.
And for it to happen, I know it doesn't happen a lot in golf,
but for it to happen, it was a huge confidence builder for me.
Yeah. And congratulations for that. you know, winning at any level at golf is
great, but at your level to win must be truly satisfying.
Yeah, it was good. And then, you know, I mean, I shot a lot of really good scores to do.
(32:52):
I shot 69, 67, 64 in the final round to win, which was huge.
It's something that I'll be able to draw back on going forward.
And just another piece of validation that, okay, you're on the right track,
you're doing the right things.
Just kind of stay the course and see what happens.
So what is in the future for you i mean what are your goals in the in the short
(33:15):
term yeah so i mean obviously yeah i mean my dream is to plan a pj tour but
i'm just trying to give myself any and.
Get better and play as many things as I can to help me ultimately get there.
So I'm going, I'm actually going up Saturday to Windsor, Canada to do a Monday
qualifier for the Canadian Tour event.
(33:36):
Probably play a couple mini tours in August.
And then I'm going at the end of August to Italy for DP World Tour Q School.
And then Corn Fairy Q School, October 15th, I believe, in West Palm.
Well, good luck to all your endeavors there, because you're clearly a very,
very smart, intelligent person.
(33:58):
Appreciate it. You know, I also
wanted to delve into a couple of questions which keep coming to my mind.
You know, there's about 25 million golfers in the United States.
Let's call 100 million golfers worldwide.
You know, all the major tours put together, it looks like there's only about maybe 500 spots,
you know 150 on the pga tour yeah you know japan tour asian tour dp world tour
(34:24):
why doesn't golf broaden out the opportunity probably just because you want
to see the best i mean and it's such a,
it's a good question i mean i think opportunity is great but we all want to
be on pga tour and there's only a limited amount of spots.
And I mean, I don't know much about the whole system of how all the tours work
(34:50):
with money-wise and how it goes, but I know all the money goes in the PGA Tour.
That's where the best players in the world, that's the TV deals, that's the sponsors.
And I think in order to have an elite tour like the PGA Tour, it needs to be limited.
And whether that's, I don't know how you'd go about it, but whether I think
125 guys keeping their card every year is a lot.
(35:12):
Especially just because there's a lot of good guys on corn freight tour who,
finished in the top 30 and don't really get every start because there's still
125 guys in the PGA tour keep their card.
I look, don't get me wrong. I I'm not there yet and I don't have any sway or
any say of how it should go, but I think maybe if a hundred guys keep their
(35:33):
card and there's more turnover, more relegation and promotion, like.
Other sports like my wife played professional soccer and relegation over
in in europe that concept's pretty cool so
i think more of that would maybe help with seeing
different guys but at the end of the day like i don't
know if people want to see would rather watch me play
(35:53):
golf on tv or watch jordan sweet play golf i mean it's it
is what it is and i think you have to just you ultimately
want to get to the highest level which is the pj tour and
i think once you get there it'd be great yeah yeah i
mean and to answer your question i mean i would love to
see good golf on tv whether it's you or
jordan speed uh yeah you know because you guys
(36:14):
play golf at a level which you know we only dream about
many of us so it's it's
great to kind of tap into your mindset you
know learn more about your perspective on golf and thank
you for all the insight and advice you've have given our listeners
as they as they heard you talk as we
leave is there anything else you would like to say to
(36:38):
the aspiring professional out there
well yeah i mean i think you
have to just in this game there's there's no coach or or team it's all you so
you have to set your hours you have to hold yourself accountable for what you're
doing and and how you achieve your goals i would I'd say just make a plan,
(36:59):
figure out what kind of golfer you want to be,
figure out where your strengths and where your weaknesses are.
And really just hold yourself accountable and work harder than everybody else,
and good things will happen.
Thank you, Christian. That was a great conversation. Thank you for taking the
time to speak with us and tell the listeners all you know about the Pro Tours.
(37:20):
I wish you luck personally, and
all the best in all the Q schools you're going to go through this year.
And i hope to see you at the masters chipping in on the 16th one day that is
my goal i appreciate you having me thank you you got it and folks that is a
wrap for today thank you for listening.
(37:42):
Music.
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