THE TOUR’S TECHNICIAN Meet Bryson Dechambeau

Bryson Dechambeau is a Tour pro turned physicist who’s winning PGA Tour titles based on analytics

Bryson Dechambeau is the antithesis of your average sportsman. Geeky, polite and engaging, he has the brain of an engineer and the look of Ben Hogan. Puma flat cap and all. He’s a marketing man’s dream with a passion for technology and degree in physics. From building his own set of singlelength irons at 17, doing the same thing for Cobra and then partnering with Microsoft on A.I. technology for golf, his approach is about as unconventional as his attire. In doing so, he’s thrown out the rule book and shown everyone that sometimes it pays to be different. Two PGA Tour titles and over $4.4 million in prize money are proof of that, and now he’s on a mission to convince you to embrace technology and transform your game...

My swing is inspired by ‘The Golfing Machine’, a book written in 1969 by an aircraft mechanic. There’s a bunch of different ingredients that are there, but ultimately it tells you how to make the cake. That’s the way I describe it. You’ve got 24 components – the ingredients – but there’s 144 variations. Those components make up the cakes, and once you put them all together, you get this beautiful arrangement of desserts. It’s really the reason I know my golf swing so well, because it literally laid out every single little thing and then told me, ‘these are all potential options of how to swing a golf club’. What’s been super beneficial to me is my ability to explain my golf swing on a whole other level that most people really can’t.

Not that you have to do that, but I wanted to do it so that whenever something broke down, I could easily go back and say ‘oh, this is what’s breaking down’ and fix it.

I test every ball in Epsom salts and water before using it. It’s a little science project. We’re measuring the consistency of the centre of mass in the ball. If the centre of mass is off, it can act like there’s mud on the side of a ball. We get it to the point where the density matches the ball so it can float, and then we just spin it until it slows down and the heavy side presents itself and wobbles to the bottom. I always want to be rolling it over the heavy spot. If it’s outside a certain parameter, we’ve got to fix it. But any golf ball out there is going to have its imperfections. You can’t make a spherical golf ball. It’s very, very difficult.

I’m at the leading edge of technology in regards to the game of golf, at least from a playing standpoint. The data analytics aspect of golf has helped me understand, from a percentage standpoint, where to hit shots, how to play a course, what clubs to use

based on conditions, etc... It’s also very helpful in regards to machine learning. Once a machine learns what’s happening on the course, it can tell you the optimised route.

People always scrutinise me, saying I’m too technical, but it just makes me feel more comfortable in more difficult situations. The tougher the situation gets, the more I can rely on numbers to be able to aid my feel. At the end of the day, if you can calculate every variable – which you can’t – but if you can at least try and bring it back to some sort of understanding of what’s going to happen, or predictability, that can allow you to have a little more confidence out there consistently.

Everybody is curious about the Cobra One Length irons I’m playing with. They’re like ‘what is this, how do I even swing?’ But I think of it like you’re swinging a tennis racket from the ground. It’s a great learning experience for anybody. To try something different is not necessarily a bad thing. I remember the first time I went out to test them. On my first shot I had 160 yards in, an 8-iron. Now obviously that’s relatively close to a 7-iron, but it went the exact number and I thought ‘that’s progress’. On the next hole I had 210 yards and I’ll never forget the shot. I pulled out a 5-iron and knew this was the moment of truth. It seemed like an eternity when the golf ball was in the air, and sure enough it landed right next to the hole. And the first thing I thought was: ‘This could potentially change the game.’

I realised that using Jumbomax grips stopped me gripping in the palm and allowed me to control the club better. Because I had more surface area across the whole hand, I was able to feel it a lot better and ultimately it’s made me the player that I am today. Do I think they’re a huge benefit in the long run for everybody if they ever started with it? Yeah, absolutely.

Installing sensors inside clubs themselves and tracking each shot in the cloud could be the next big step in technology.

I’m not sure how it will work in competition, but at least in practice, you’ll be able to understand what is happening. When you pulled that shot on hole 16, you can find out the exact reason why it happened and what happened to your body and be able to improve from there. That’s

the next quest.

There will be a monumental leap in sport because of technology. There will be a couple of people who come out, just like Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan, and make a huge leap that people won’t expect because of technology.

I’ve thought a lot about people’s perception of me on Tour. I don’t want to be thought of as this guy trying to change the game. I’m just trying to do it for myself. But I want it to be easier for everyone so we can get more people playing.