Dechambeau risking Ryder Cup with own ‘drive’?
The game of golf requires certain mental and physical disciplines. Longdrive competitions require a different set of disciplines.
It's the difference between a tactical boxing match — or, to use a phrase that is more than 200 years old, “The Sweet Science” — and a single, highly leveraged blow to the chin.
“The subtleties of the swing, or what you have to do to create and release the power, are absolutely different,” Mike Bauman said. “It looks the same to the average eye, but it's absolutely different.”
Bauman, 49, of Galena, is a former PGA teaching pro and a scratch golfer. He has a short game. He has been competing in professional long-drive championships for 20 years. He can bomb it. Last year, he was the world's champion long driver in his age division of 45-up.
“You train for long drive to go fast,” he said. “Now, to play regular golf, you go slow. That transition is very difficult. One month — that's as fast as I can turn the switch off.”
Bryson Dechambeau, the No. 7ranked player in the world, is trying to flip the switch heading into the Northern Trust, the opening event in the PGA Tour's playoff season.
Dechambeau has been training for the Professional Long Drivers Association World Championship, which is Sept. 27-Oct. 1 in Mesquite, Nevada. Earlier this week, a GOLF Magazine feature on Dechambeau and his regimen got a much wider circulation due to one of the money quotes:
“‘My hands are wrecked from it,' Dechambeau said as he showed off the calluses on his palms.”
Bauman spent the summer collecting trophies on a local (regular golf ) tour. He nailed down a victory in a big event with a driver, a five-iron and an eagle putt on a 607-yard, par 5. He took a month to flip the switch back to fast. Thursday, I caught up with him just prior a pro longdrive event in York, Illinois.
“What Dechambeau is doing is beating balls as hard as he can into a net,” Bauman said. “He's messing with his hands. That can't be good. I should know.”
Bauman has met Dechambeau and likes the man, as far as he knows him. Bauman thinks Dechambeau, a former U.S. Open champion, is “great for our sport,” meaning pro long-drive competition.
“He's going for it, and I love it,” Bauman said. “People who are criticizing him can't do either one (win a U.S. Open or average 323 yards per drive on the PGA Tour). He has the talent and loves to compete.”
That said, Dechambeau's ball speed is up to around 210 mph and the best pro long drivers get it cranked to 220-230 mph. If you figure each mph is worth about 2.5 yards, Dechambeau is due to get his clocked cleaned in Mesquite at the end of the month.
But that's not the point. This is: Dechambeau is messing with his posture, pivot position and swing angle — programming new muscle memory, essentially, with different equipment — as the Ryder Cup approaches.
“No way I'd ever do that to my teammates,” said Bauman, who was a star baseball player in high school and played varsity volleyball at Ohio State.
The Ryder Cup, which pits the U.S. against Europe, takes the mental of physical disciplines that golf requires and mates them with the permutations of a team competition. There is no boxing analogy to be had. It is utterly unique.
Once every two years, 12 of America's best golfers are asked to step away from themselves and to play for one another, on a global stage, while carrying the flag.
The latest Ryder Cup clash will be
Sept. 24-26 at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin. It's the week before the PLDA World Championship in Mesquite.
Team USA has lost to Europe in seven of the past nine Ryder Cups.
And Dechambeau is preparing for Mesquite.
“If I'm (U.S. captain) Steve Stricker, I can't be happy about that,” Bauman said.
Bauman is not the No. 7 player in the world. Not even close. He has, however, won multiple professional long-drive events and maintained a zero handicap. He has been flipping the switch from fast to slow for 20 years. He knows how difficult it is.
The “Mad Scientist,” as Dechambeau is known, has only just begun experimenting with these physics. It'd be one thing if it blew up in his face. It'd be something else if he took America's team down with him.