Inside the Grind of Pro Golf With Welsh No 1 Toby Hunt

Nish: 0:00

Every good story is about the journey. And this is the story of our journey trying to play the top 100 golf courses in the UK and Ireland in just 10 years. This is the top 100 in 10 golf podcast.

Toby: 0:13

So anyway, he’s rocked up just a driver. Turns out to be Matt Wallace. I’ve spent £42,000 athis year, and I’ve made £49. My first hole in one was when I was 11.

Nish: 0:25

You’re listening, Chris.

Toby: 0:26

Which was on the same day that Gavin Henson kicked that kick in um Welsh rugby to beat England in 2009.

Nish: 0:34

Now, why would you go and ruin good chat? Bonus episode. The one with the tour pro. It feels like everyone’s dream. We see the highlights reeled, we see the major tournaments, we see the shots that seem almost inconceivable, we see the clutch puts that always seem to drop. But what’s it really like being a tour pro? Our podcast is about our journey, but today we’re going on our guests’ journey. The journey that has led them led them to the DP World Tour. Before we carry on with the episode, I’d just like to ask if everybody can hit a follow or subscribe wherever they get this podcast. It would help us greatly. And going into the new year, let’s get those numbers up. So joining me today, I’ve got Harbs from Harb 7 Golf. He’s our longtime podcast friend. Podcast friend, an occasional co-host. And our guest, his name is Toby Hunt. Toby is uh, and he forgot this at the start, but he’s uh ranked number one in Wales. So that that’s the first one. That’s quite an impressive start to start with. He’s the 2018 and 2023 Welsh national PGA champion. He in 2024 he was a PGA Cup player and a challenge at all player in 2019 and 2025. He won the PGA West Region Order of Merit twice, and very recently he tied a 33rd at the DP World British Masters. Now I’ll bring up those Welsh Championships because in those in the Welsh Championships in 2023, the most recent one that he won, uh he only had 12 clubs in his bag and finished with seven birdies in the last seven holes to win by a shot against the guy that he was actually playing with. Tell us about that. How do you end up with just 12 clubs in your bag?

Toby: 2:27

Uh welcome, by the way. Both broken, uh both broken, not in anger. I just want to uh uh put that out there straight away. So I was playing a Pro Am in Exeter, and I’ve hit my drive to the right. Um and I’ve sort of hit like a hundred-yard chip out with a seven iron, and as I’ve hit the shot, I’ve gone into a tree route. Um I’ve subsequently got seven iron into the golf club half five and looked down and I’m like, looks a bit bent at the hossle there. Um, and it was I’d probably uh normally I’d be like a one degree upright, and it was probably about two degrees flat, but I was like, something’s definitely not right here. So I had to put that back in the bag and hit whatever I hit into the green. And then a couple of weeks later, um I was playing a PGA Order of Merit event here at St. Mellion’s, which was my home club at the time, and I’ve hit it a little bit right again, bit of tree trouble. Um, and on my follow-through, I’ve gone for the green with five iron. On my follow-through, I’ve hit it into the tree, and the shaft is just bent sidewards, nine sort of 90-degree angles. Um, and so that would have been in August, and right at the start of September, I’ve got Welsh National PGA championships at uh at McCunness. Um, and because they were I had limited edition, type this T100S irons at the time, uh black finish. Um, so it wasn’t a case of like, yeah, we’ve got loads in the factory, we’ll just send them out. I had to they had to find them, or there was basically a delay, so I didn’t have them. So anyway, went to played uh played first round, shot something like four under first round, played pretty solid, just didn’t hold much many pats, so I can remember. Um then uh I doubled the ninth hole. I birdied seven, uh I bird had seven birdies in a row from 12 to 18. He had five in the last five. Um, and you know the open with Stenson and Mickelson, they basically just like went off themselves. I think Stenson won at like 20 under, Mickelson was 18 under, and then somebody else was you know miles back. It was basically like that. We were just playing match play against each other. Um, so I finished at 12 under, he was 11 under. I think the guy who came third was like four or five under. And it was just crazy. Like it just every part we looked at, we were holding. I chipped in on 15 after he had knocked it really close in two. Um 16, like he’s holed from just outside me. I’ve holed like two of us have holed on 17, 18. I’ve got up and down, then just from the front edge of the green for birdie, and he’s hit it on the green two-parted for Birdie. Win by a shot, and you come off the golf course thinking, what the hell has just happened there? Like, yeah, golf for the gods sort of thing. Yeah, yeah, it was a great experience, but uh bizarre round, and I haven’t had the round like that since, I’ll be honest.

Nish: 5:37

I mean, so in the heat of the battle, uh I’m coming at this from I do not play any competitive golf. Uh do you have an appreciation between the two of you that this is really special, what’s going on here? Like, this doesn’t happen all the time.

Toby: 5:51

Yeah, I think I think it’s easier in my position where I made double and then I’m like, well, I got nothing to lose. I was like three shots behind, four shots behind, something like that. I kind of had nothing to lose. I didn’t think I was gonna win going into the back nine, like he was playing really solid. I’ve just made double out of pretty you know, I’ve hit bad T-shot on nine and lost ball, and and yeah, I I sort of hit a shot stone dead on 12 with a wedge in my hand, and he either bogeied that one, or he bogeied that one or the next, maybe. Um and then I’ve birdied the next, and all of a sudden it’s like, oh, I’m only like one behind, say now. Um, and then yeah, the last five holes, the two of us have basically, like I said, just basically playing match play against each other. You don’t you we I remember thinking like I’m not thinking about where I am, I’m just trying to make birdie because he’s just making birdie, you know. Like the two of us uh one of us is hitting it stone dead, so the other one’s got to hold the pat, and the other one holds the pat, then the other one has to hold it this the small one, you know. It’s I I distinctly remember out of that was like I’ve come off thinking, like, what has happened there? Because that that’s just it wasn’t a normal round of golf, you know. Like the the way it was going is just like everything that the two of us looked at. We were holding, and um, and yeah, it was pretty different, pretty different because most of the time when you’re sort of in the lead of tournaments or up there, there’s a bit of nerves, there’s a bit of like what if something goes wrong? Whereas I distinctly remember that’s probably the first time that I’d ever been on the golf course where I didn’t really have many negative thoughts because I just didn’t expect to win going into that back nine. I was just trying to make birdie on every haul, and when it actually happened, you’re like, Oh, that was kind of what I was trying to do, right? Um, so yeah, it was a pretty, pretty special, uh, pretty special, special event, really.

Harbs: 7:45

Toby, was there anything riding on winning that competition? Like, did it get you any additional accolades other than winning the competition?

Toby: 7:52

It didn’t. It used to, you used to get the the winner of that used to get a start in the Welsh Open uh European Tour event when it was um at the 2010, Kaltamana 2010. Um but no, nothing I didn’t really get into into anything uh in with that. Um and subsequently when I won it in 2018 was the same. The guy who won it in 2019, I actually another interesting story, I lost in a nine-all playoff in 2021, I think it was. It was Abdovie. Yeah, so Abba Dovey. Um I was nowhere after round one. I think I shot seven under or eight under second round. And I finished because I teed off earlier than most guys, because I like I said I didn’t play great round one, so it was middle of the field going out second round, and um the they had a thunder and lightning delay. Um, so I was in the clubhouse for about an hour and a half. Now, by this point, the hot the wind had completely switched, as I as many of you play, or if you’ve played Lynx golf courses, you would know that happens. So I hit driver five iron into the last hole, and I’m pretty sure the guy who won hit about three with wedge or three with nine-iron. Oh wow, and he’s um I think he might have birdied the last, I bogeyed the last after making eight on the last in the first round. So we go into a nine-hole playoff. Um we play eighteen about four times, I want to say. Then we played the first, then we played eighteen again, then we played the first, second, might have even been the third, however, many holes that is, and then 16. I ended up making bogey. He made he made par. And I remember on the 16th tea, the tournament directors was like, right, guys, this is probably gonna be the last hole because I liked. Bear in mind they’ve had an hour and a half delay of light, thunder, and lightning as well. Um, we don’t know whether to come back tomorrow. And I’m thinking, well, hang on, like this is up in North Wales, I haven’t got anywhere to stay. Um, so anyway, I made Bogey, missed out, and on an invite to the Wales Oakland.

Nish: 10:07

Yeah, so so essentially, Toby, what you’re telling me is that with a nine-hole playoff, they’re basically just making it up as they go along. It’s like this has got to be a way to try and separate these two. That can’t be prescribed, can it? Like, we’re gonna do 18 four times and then be the first time.

Toby: 10:22

Well, in fairness to to the PGA tournament director of the time, he’s probably never seen anyone, any two people go into a sudden death playoff and it’s still be going after nine holes. Um so I think they will have had in their tournament stipulations something along the lines of we’ll try and play the 18th hole three times until we get a winner. And then when that’s happened, and then they’ve gone down the first, both made par, go down the eighteenth again, both made par, go 18, one, two, three, whatever it was. And um, yeah, it was yeah, a bit a bit bit bizarre, really. You but I actually feel sorry for the people who had to stay. So in the PGA, I think it’s the last like three groups have to stay for presentation, like top three and last three groups have to stay for presentation. So you had guys there who were literally following us around. I had no I had no battery left in my in my um trolley either. Uh so I had an electric trolley, and of course, it’s probably lasted about 22 holes um because 18 hole batteries, so I had to push my trolley for the last like five holes of the playoff. Um, so yeah, a bit bizarre. But luckily, a year or two later, everyone. Well, I can’t remember, like I said, I can’t remember if it was 2021, I think it was. But yeah, two years later, I had a bit of redemption in that uh in that tournament, which was which is nice at McKenna’s.

Nish: 11:42

Yeah, oh it’s a lovely course as well, isn’t it? Aberdev. We’ve we’ve played Aberdevi and it’s uh cracking.

Toby: 11:47

Yeah, it’s actually one of my favourite courses in in Wales, to be honest. I I’m not actually a fan of Lynx Golf. Um, I really don’t like Lynx Golf, but I think that golf course is is a very, very good golf course, to be fair.

Nish: 11:59

Yeah, it’s lovely, isn’t it? And we had some fun on the signature holders at the 12th, the par three. Yeah, the par three up there. Yeah, so so it’s a cracking, cracking golf course there. Um I’ll give them a name check because they were very, very hospitable when we went over and and and played there. Um, so so what you’re essentially saying to me, Toby, is if you’re playing in a tournament, there’s bound to be some kind of uh fireworks going on somewhere and some kind of an easy finish.

Toby: 12:22

So yeah, quite possibly.

Nish: 12:24

I love all of that. I love all of that.

Toby: 12:26

A bit more stressful than uh than than a normal round of golf with a couple of birdies and and a bogey.

Nish: 12:32

Yeah, that’s that’s crazy. Um I mean, tell us how you got into golf um and kind of that journey into you turned pro in 2013.

Toby: 12:40

So uh so I started when I was four. My dad played golf, grandfather played played golf. Um I wasn’t allowed to join uh my local club until I was 10. Um I wasn’t that great as an amateur, to be honest.

Harbs: 12:56

Um what I remember compared to to us mere mortals. What does I wasn’t that great mean? What would happen at that point?

Toby: 13:06

So, in terms of references for like handicaps, I think I was off at 16, I would have been off about one, one or two, maybe. So, in nowadays, you know, you see some guys who are 15, 16 years on, they’re off plus three, plus four, and they’ve won all these tournaments. I did I did win um the club championship there as a 17-year-old, so I was a junior when I won the club championship. Um, but I turned pro off plus one at 19, not long before my 20th birthday. Um, so I won the club championship there twice. And I remember I’m actually working with a guy now, a guy called Hugh James, he was working in the shop. Um, I remember him saying to me, What are you you know, what are you gonna do? And I was like, Oh, don’t really know, like when to turn pro, that sort of thing. He was like, Well, are you gonna get in the Walker Cup squad? I was like, No, not good enough for that. He’s like, Well, what the hell are you doing being an amateur then? And you look at it and you go, Yeah, like what are you gonna achieve as an amateur if you’re not gonna get into the Walker Cup squad, you know? So um yeah, I decided to turn pro and to be fair, I’m really, really glad I did. I’ve had a lot of a lot of success, a lot of um failures as well. So yeah, turn pro 2013. Um started my PGA, started my PGA because I thought one, it’s a bit of a backup if playing um goes wrong. I see so many players now on mini tours and they don’t have anything apart from golf, and you’re like, there’s not many people who actually make it uh financially for the period of time at the top level of golf, and I see so many guys, and I’m just like, why don’t you do some sort of qualification? It doesn’t even have to be to do a golf, but so I did my PGA, always had that to as a backup, as able to earn a bit of an income coaching on the side. Also gave my gave me um opportunities to play in different tournaments. We’ve mentioned Rush National PGA championships, um, you know, PGA Cup 2024. I managed to get in get into that squad through the PGA, and ultimately, if I hadn’t done my PGA, I wouldn’t have been able to get the invites that got me into the DP World Tour events. Um, so the PGA deciding to go down that path has actually given me some of the best success I’ve had in my golf career so far.

Nish: 15:28

So, how do so how does that actually work? Because I will we sort of need we we want to and need to get into the mechanics of all of this because we just don’t quite see that, you know. You in in your head, you have kids started playing co golf at four, must be amazing by the age of 10, must be like ripping it up at 15, sponsors are trying to sign them up for you know, it’s just like this this path ahead of them, and and then oh it’s like well they’ve naturally climbed up some rankings somehow and that they’re getting in sort of you know, but you know, clearly you just went actually somebody said to me, if you’re not trying to be in the Walker Cup squad, just turn pro. So I mean, what did what did that involve? Is that is that just to wake up one morning and go, actually, I’ve got I can do it with my handicap?

Toby: 16:15

That sort of thing. Yeah, so when to do the PGA when I did it, you had to be off a handicap of four or lower to to join the PGA and start your training. And if you were off a lower handicap than scratch, then you didn’t have to do the playing ability test. Um, that’s changed now. It’s a lot easier to become a PGA professional than than it was when I did it. You have to then do three years university course and practical exams. Um, so you do coaching qualifications, you do custom fitting, you do business, you do rules of golf, um, you do club repairs um and that sort of thing. So you do all that over three years, then you become fully qualified as a you know, I was a level two PGA coach, and um, you know, you got a degree there that you can’t get taken off you, which is which is a good backup. Um, so I worked in the shop for the head pro at the time, Barry Thomas. He was a longtime coach of mine, um, and he had a lot of influence on me turning pro as well. You know, he’s won probably when nobody else believed I could actually make money out of this game um or be successful at this game. He was the one who um sort of always believed that I that I was good enough. Um so yeah, it was was working in the shop with him. He was fantastic where he would just allow me to play whenever I wanted, he saw the bigger picture. Um, and it was actually quite nice. You know, I know we’ll come on to the the um the Belfry experience DP World Tour, but he actually followed me um round there. So it was quite nice that he gave a full full circle, really, of sort of he was the one that um taught me into get into a position that I could turn pro and then coach me for a long time um before he retired. Um and then yeah, seeing him sort of walking the ropes uh for those four days was uh was nice to sort of come full circle and sort of have that moment where it’s like, yeah, I’ve actually achieved something, yeah, almost almost because of because of your guidance to be.

Nish: 18:22

Yeah, oh that’s amazing. That’s absolutely fantastic. The um you sort of sort of mentioned that uh it you know then led you onto the DP World Tour. So getting onto something like the DP World Tour, I mean, what is that? Do you have to meet certain criteria to be to get your card to play there, or is it invited to certain events and how how does that work?

Toby: 18:45

Yeah, so there’s a couple couple of ways, I I I guess. Like the most common way I would imagine is going through uh DP World Tour qualifying score. Um, so in 2018 and in 2024, I got through to the final stage. Now it’s quite grueling. Um you do one stage in around about September, October, um, and there’s like 10 different venues, four-round tournament cut after two and three rounds. Um then there’s around about 80 to 100 people, and you get around about 20 people qualify through stage one. Then stage two um is all in Spain, all four tournaments are in Spain. Again, around about 80 to 100 people and um get into that. Um so they would be made up of the guys who have qualified through stage one, but also the guys who haven’t played that well on Challenge Tour, Hotel Planetor, as it’s called now, which is like tier two um underneath the DP. Um, the guys who haven’t played that great, they get to skip stage one, but they go automatically into stage two, so it’s filled up with with with those those type of players.

Nish: 19:58

Like dropping into the Europa League for The Champions League.

Toby: 20:01

Yeah, similar, similar to that. And then you’ve got um again around about I would want to say 15 to 18 slots that go through to stage three. So I got I came where did I come third in 2024? Um so last year, came third in at Desert Springs, um, got through into the final stage. Um, and that’s basically um two golf courses on the same golf golf complex. It’s four rounds, then a cut, then another two rounds, and that’ll be made up of European or DP World Tour players who have lost their card, some of the challenge tour players who have a good category and just stable, you know, there to try and get up to to DP World Tour, and then guys like myself who got through going through stage one and stage two. Um there so there’s about 156 players, I think it is, on that one. Um top 70 make the cut after four rounds, which I failed to make the cut. So that gave me a category 15 on Hotel Planetor, so which gets gets you a handful of starts. It’s not it’s not a great category, yeah. Um, but if you make the cut, you get category nine and you get pretty much everything um for that season. So it’s quite an achievement if you get into that, yeah, make the cut after four rounds. You basically get full play and rights on Hotel Planetur, and from there, then you’ve got a great chance to get into the top 20 of the order of merits, and the top 20 of that order of merit gets you into DP World Tour.

Nish: 21:37

Right.

Toby: 21:38

Um, so that would probably, I would say, be the most common for them for most people. They would go to Q school, they would get some sort of category on challenge tour, and then they finish top 20 on challenge tour and end up on DP World Tour. That’s brutal, like high pressure goals. It’s really difficult. It’s really, really difficult. You know, it’s uh Q school, you have to be like you have to play your best golf in pretty much two weeks, stage two and stage three run week after each other. So if you can play your get best golf of the year in those two stages, you know, you can sort your career out going forward. Then you can spend a lot of time on challenge tour um and keep your card on challenge tour and and have a real good go at getting up to DP World Tour. The way I got to play the two DPE events I played is I played in the PGA playoffs um uh Aphrodite Hills at the start of the year. I came third in that, and the guy who came second, Graham Robertson, actually pulled out injured. Um so I was in uh Island for Challenge Tour event, which was a PGA invite from coming third um at the playoffs. I get a phone call on the Wednesday afternoon at four o’clock. So bear in mind tournament is Thursday to Sunday, all always on um Challenge Tour and DP World Tour. So four o’clock on Wednesday, I get a call from the PGA. Graham’s injured. Do you want to go and play at Trump International and DP World Tour? And I’d just been in Scotland the week before. So if that called tournament, if that call had come two days earlier, it would have been a lot better logistically, but anyway. Um so I was like, look, can you give me half an hour? Because I don’t even know if I can get there. So whilst I was on the phone then to my coach, because I had to weigh up, do I try and play a handful of challenge tour events and try and finish inside the top 125, which would guarantee me probably 10 starts on challenge tour for 2026? Or do I go and play a DP world event that I may never ever get the chance to play ever again? So I run my coach, he was like, You’ve got to go, you’ve got to do it, yeah. Right. And that was his first reaction. So we’re we’re lewing at um at Witchurch, he’s my coach now, and he’s like, You’ve got to go. I was like, right, okay. Um by that time I had a caddy sitting in the car with me. I was on the way back from Tesco when I received this call, going back to the the hotel.

Nish: 24:04

There are other supermarkets, by the way.

Toby: 24:06

There are, yes, apologies if we uh can’t mention those things. Um so uh yeah, just spent a bomb in uh MS for Christmas, but there we go.

Nish: 24:15

Um we’d love a sponsorship for MS, it’d be great, wouldn’t it?

Toby: 24:19

Uh so um, yeah, my caddy’s in the in the car, and he’s like, right, I can get flights at half past seven from um uh where was it, Dublin to uh Glasgow. We couldn’t get to Aberdeen, and it’s a three-hour drive from Glasgow. I was like, right, okay. So straight back to the hotel, half an hour to the airport, dropped the car off, waited about half an hour in the queue for this to drop the car off, finally got onto the um onto the plane, hired the car, three-hour trip up to up to Aberdeen, booked everything in the airport, then like overnight stays in Aberdeen. Uh, got to the hotel at half past 12. I was up at half past five and on the T for quarter to nine the next morning. Never seen the golf course, didn’t have a chance to go and walk a couple of holes, literally turned up, went to the tournament office saying, Hi, I’m Toby Hunt. Um, what do I do? Where do I go? Uh, right, these are all your credentials. This is your caddy’s credentials, this is where you have breakfast, blah, blah, blah. Tournament, the um uh practice facilities are over there, get given balls, people waiting for your autograph, all that sort of thing. I’m just like, okay, this is a bit new. But anyway, I’ve been playing, so you know, if I’ve been prepping for Island, played in challenge tour in in Roxborough the week before, and playing okay, hitting it on the range in 40 mile an hour winds, in straight into the face, and thinking, right, hitting it okay, let’s go to the first T.

Harbs: 25:52

But Tobes, how were the nerves like in that build-up? It seems so much stuff compact into a short amount of time. How were your nerves when you got there? Did that interest?

Toby: 26:04

I almost didn’t really have time to think with the way it was all just like straight on in one go. Um, but yeah, you stand on the first T and you shit yourself. Like, you know, you’ve got you’ve basically got two European tour players. Um, luckily, I’m not a big golf fan, so I don’t know many golfers, so I’m not really star-struck by many people. I’d be more star-struck by rugby players because I have more interest in rugby than I do with golf to certainly to watch it.

Nish: 26:36

I love this. I love that, but I’m just not a golf guy. I respect that Toby, actually.

Toby: 26:44

If Tiger were if must you know, paired with Tiger and Rory, I’d probably be a bit shaken, you know. But as paired with two guys, I didn’t really know with all due respect to them, but I knew they were um obviously DP World Tour players. Um first shot, snap hook in the bund. I’m like, where has that come from? I haven’t hit a shot like that in forever. The bad ones normally right, so I’ve just hit 50 shots on the range to warm up, and I haven’t hit one like that into a howling gale. Anyway, hit provisional straight down the middle. Playing partner finds my ball, have to play it off my knees because it’s on a mound in Jumanji, hack it out. Basically, I go zigzagging up this first hole at Trump, make eight, and I’m thinking, what have I done?

Nish: 27:31

Yeah, why have I let myself in for this?

Toby: 27:34

Yeah, why didn’t I just stay in Ireland, play the challenge tour event that I’d prepped for three days for, and take myself away from this? So, anyway, walking off the off the green, and my caddy Dan, he goes, Well, it can’t get any fucking worse, can it?

Nish: 27:50

Classic.

Toby: 27:50

So I was like, Okay, yeah, no, you’re right there, to be fair, it can’t get any worse. And the next hole, then wind is howling into out the left, out of bounds or down the left, water right, water through the fairway. And I’m standing there thinking, it can’t. Luckily, I’ve hit it, I’ve like squeezed one down the fairway. And to be fair, I played the next 15 holes two under par. Um played better than the two guys I was playing with for that that little stretch. I finished bogey bogey, finished, finished three over, which was like one shot off the cut line, I think, after after the round, one maybe two shots, but it was right right in the mix of making cut. Um, and you come off the course thinking after that whirlwind, and you’re like, I’m actually in a half decent position here to go and try and make a cut in my first ever DP World Tour event. Um, but I went out second round, didn’t play that ground. I had like three bad holes, so I I think I made like three doubles and finished a few shots off. But um, yeah, it was just uh a bizarre um couple of days, really. Um and sort of yeah, got a flight home then on a Saturday and uh yeah, luckily got a chance about three weeks later to go and play at the Belfry, which was uh a bit of redemption against the water.

Nish: 29:07

What did you think of the I mean you probably didn’t get a chance to soak it all in properly, but what did you think of Trump Aberdeen as a golf course?

Toby: 29:13

Uh as a golf course is phenomenal. I mean, I would love to go back there and play it when it’s not 40 mile-an-hour wins. Um we we did that we got very lucky.

Nish: 29:24

It was sunny and and just a bit of a gentle breeze.

Toby: 29:26

And I would definitely like to go back up and go and play because he’s just opened a new the new course up there as well. I’d like to go and play it, play them both. But it’s fantastic golf course.

Nish: 29:34

Like, um I just want to say too both the on the first two tee shots, mine went right down the middle. But you know, thanks for that. Just thought I’d throw that out there.

Toby: 29:42

My second one didn’t my second one, did anyway. So were you playing with Tor Pros as well, Nish?

Harbs: 29:48

Say that again, mate. Were you playing with Tor Pros as well? Uh yeah, yes.

Toby: 29:52

Um on TV as well, on those TV cameras.

Nish: 29:55

That first T at Trump um is fucking intimidating because it’s narrow, it’s really narrow. Yeah, but it’s weird though, and I I found Trump strange for this because when you got onto the fairway, and you were you know, if you were on the in the middle of the fair, like it didn’t feel narrow when you were down there, but just the visual bit like brought it all.

Toby: 30:15

Yeah, there was a lot of holes that sort of started narrow and then widened through the driving sort of um the driving distances, you’d hit it, um, or the landing areas, I should say.

Nish: 30:27

Yeah, that that 18th hole is just mad, it’s a mad hole of golf. Like you you bit, I mean it’s like 600 yards or something first off, and then you’re like you know, you the you where you’re driving, and there’s like three bunkers that are like diagonally across, and you’re like, okay.

Toby: 30:43

I mean I remember all down the left, I hit it in the water on the on the last last round. I guess I did you I actually I think I sort of started and finished with like my two worst drives on that first round. Like I’ve actually driven it so good from holes two to seventeen, and then yeah, one and eighteen. I’ve just hit it off the planet left, and you’re just like, Oh, you just must just be nerves. Like, that’s the only thing you can put it down to is your body and your arms just are not not working together, really.

Nish: 31:11

So we we couldn’t help, but the thing the main image that was burned in our memories was how massive that Scottish flag is.

Toby: 31:19

It’s just it also it also goes well with how massive the um putting green is because that’s definitely one of the biggest putting greens I’ve ever seen in my life.

Nish: 31:26

Yeah, absolutely. Uh yeah, it was just a magnificent facility, wasn’t it? To play. I mean, I suppose we were playing socially and casually, so it was a bit easier to enjoy the experience, I suppose.

Toby: 31:36

But yeah, and I gotta say, the food was fantastic because you go to a lot of these events. I don’t want to start slagging golf clubs off, but you go to a lot of these events and they don’t give a shit what they’re actually producing to you. Yeah, so some of the places you go to, I’m not gonna mention them because I quite like an invite to a couple of the golf courses next time in uh in some of the tournaments, so play quite well in them. But they just give you any type of food. But if in fairness at Trump, it was like one of the days was like, Oh, you can have pasta dish, you can have Sunday roast, or you can have this. They did like full English and um for breakfast. It was like they really, really spoilt you, you know. Um, yeah, like I’m a fussy eater, really, really fussy eater. I just eat meat and carbs, and that’s it. So I was able to actually go there and go leave being full, you know. I’ll have a bit of that pasta and some bread, or I’ll have some rice and ripe all the sauce off the chicken and just have chicken and rice or something like that, you know.

Nish: 32:35

So it’s uh another thing, you know, you you you just assume the the players are looked after really well, you could eat whatever you want, but obviously that’s that’s not that’s not reality.

Toby: 32:47

I I think it probably is on on top tour or main tour. Maybe um yeah, I think you play play DP week in, week out, you’re you’re pretty looked after, to be fair. But yeah, you go to a a couple of places and you’re just like I’m not quite sure this might agree with me when I got another three days of golf to play.

Nish: 33:04

Well, arguably you need it either way around, don’t you? Because when you’re at that top end, you know, if you if the food is terrible, like you just gotta pay somebody to sort it out for you. You know, obviously on the events, and we’ll we’ll get to the belfry uh in a minute, and maybe this will lead to it, but you know, that’s the point when you’re now hitting more names, household names, let’s call them, uh in golf. I mean, what’s that like? Because you you know, you’re on an equal footing, you’re competing, you’re you’re you know, you’re there as an equal, aren’t you?

Toby: 33:34

So so you talk about me not really knowing many people. So I go to the Belfry, like I said, three weeks later, DP World Tour event, British Masters, and again, I get the phone call. So I’m in Spain for my missus’ birthday, um, and I get a phone call on the Monday about an hour late for when I could get that that last flight on the Monday. So, anyway, first flight back Tuesday morning. We get back, me, my missus, and and my son. And um I drive straight from Bristol Airport up to Birmingham. I’ve got my coach and my caddy who have gone there. My caddy’s gone there on the Monday afternoon. Um, he’s then gone up Tuesday morning as well, walked the course Tuesday morning, waited for me to get there around about half past three. Um, I’ve hit come, like I said, come straight off the plane, bit of traffic, it’s taken me two and a half hours to get from Bristol to the Belfry. Got the last um practice round booked, which is up past three, four o’clock, somewhere around there. I’ve hit 15 shots on the range. So again, haven’t been able to sort of take in this thing in on the practice day or anything like that yet. Um rock up on the first T on my own, hit a T shot, got my caddy, my coach there. Rocks up this this guy just with his driver. Got his entourage with him, I assume. Well, he was one of him was definitely his caddy, um, sports psychologist, coach, short game coach, long-game coach, whatever it is. Um so anyway, he um his caddy goes, Oh, have you got any T’s? Yeah, you are. I’m thinking, who the hell is this guy who rocks up onto the first T, not booked a practice round. And like with the thing you’ve got to remember with the PGA, and with my old coach Barry’s quite traditional, everything’s done like by the book with a PGA. You know, there’s a rule book, and that’s what what you’ve got to follow, and you you accept that. So if you’ve got to book a practice round, you book a practice round. So anyway, he’s rocked up just with his driver. Turns out to be Matt Wallace. So I didn’t really recognise him at the time.

Nish: 35:42

So uh you need you need to give me some of those T’s back, mate, by the way. You know, so I’m not just gonna I’m not lending at you, you know, anyway.

Toby: 35:50

Walking, walking down the first. Um, I hit my shot into into the into the water, actually. Funny enough, um, for the second shot. He’s gone straight over onto the second T because he just wants to hit some drivers. I have a part out, go on to the second, he’s still on there. Anyway, so both hit shots, walking down there. Um, he goes, Oh, what what sort of things have you been playing in? And I’ve got to say, to be fair to Matt, lovely, lovely guy. So if he ever sees the this podcast, um, you know, really nice guy. Um and uh what have you been playing in? So I’m there going, oh well, I’ve just played a couple of challenge tour events and you know I played at Trump International trying to what about yourself? What have you what have you been playing? Oh well, I just played in the open and you know I’m you know going to the top 20 in the I think it was top 20 in the world, and you know, I need a couple of good finishes now to get in the rider cup. I’m thinking, yeah, this is oh right, oh yeah, okay. Rory McElroy looks really different in real life, yeah. So um, but one one one comment, one comment actually that stuck with me um that I didn’t know until after I finished the practice rounds. So I’ve played the practice rounds, and me, my coach, and and caddy Dan. So me, Will, and Dan, we’ve got into the Belfry, had a had a um some food, and uh we started chatting about that, being like, like, you know, Matt Wallace, not having any T’s to rock up onto a first T. Like, how is how bizarre is this, anyway? So um Will turned turned to me and he goes, Oh, well, he actually said to me on the second while you were putting, um, if this guy can putt, he’s gonna be a good player. And I was like, Really? I was like, why would he say that? And my caddy just goes, because he can see you’re a good player. The only person who doesn’t believe it is you. Oh, yeah. Right, okay. So so it was quite nice to if somebody as as good as as Matt was to give me a give me a compliment like that. And to be fair, he he didn’t have to say say things like that. He didn’t have to be a nice guy in the in those two holes, you know. So um you could easily have just waited another 20 minutes and gone off after me.

Nish: 37:58

Like we all we’re all thinking it now.

Toby: 38:00

Can you put on some days? Sundays I can.

Nish: 38:04

Fair enough. Yeah, that’s pretty pretty much pretty much everyone’s answer, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Toby: 38:09

No, to be fair, something that’s improved, but something can always be improved. I think you get you get days of putting that you have 25 puts you that you’ve cracked in, the next thing you know, you go out the next day and you you hit it pretty good and whole nothing, and you just think what the hell’s happened? I haven’t I haven’t changed changed too much here.

Harbs: 38:25

So uh I’ve seen the pretty cool putting gadget tapes on your social media following those guidelines.

Toby: 38:34

I’m not sure where the the putt view, yeah.

Harbs: 38:36

That’s really cool.

Toby: 38:37

Yeah, so so to be fair, a bit of a shout out to my uh to my coach here. He’s a he is a fantastic putting coach. Um, that’s probably his speciality. It’s not like he’s not good at any anything else. He’s he’s he’s a very, very good coach. Um, but he’s got um Zen Stage Green, the one that you sort of moves around, and you can just put whatever brake you want on there. He’s got the pack view, so it’ll show you all the brake, it’ll show you the where the ball’s gone and the pace that it’s gone and things like that. Um, and he’s also got the Sam Pat lab there as well, so he can measure all of your technique. Um, so in furnace, he’s got a fantastic setup up there. He’s got a lot of guys that go and see him, um, see him for putting. I you know, the the years I was I was coaching and and custom fitting, you get guys who would come come in and spend £550 on a driver because they found five yards, ten yards through the air, and you’re like in in true, yeah. Hops, there you go. Like it’s true, like hit hitting it 10 yards further in the modern day is definitely helpful. I’m not gonna deny that. But then you’ve got guys who won’t spend hundred quid on a patter.

Harbs: 39:46

And I’m just like I I’ll tell you why, too. I think a lot of people perhaps think it’s the easiest part of the game because I just think from an amateur level, there’s so much that can go wrong when you’re trying to hit a ball a long way.

Speaker 4: 39:59

Um

Harbs: 40:00

Leave yourself in so much shit and it’s on people’s minds all the time about recovery shots and playing shots they shouldn’t have tried and all the rest of it. But once you’re on the green, it feels almost like a safe zone. You realistically, you’re thinking, I should be able to get this down into obviously as amateurs, a lot of the time when you don’t have the right setup or the right skills as putting at putting, you probably are gonna end up with threes and four putts on your score, which is devastating, really, when you’re trying to break a certain score.

Nish: 40:26

It’s interesting, isn’t it, with the the the putting versus driving thing? I I just think ego plays into that.

Toby: 40:34

It’s the feeling you get, but it’s also that if you’ve if you play with somebody, and like I get it a lot at obviously my level, like you you play with a couple of bombers and you play with a couple of guys who hit it nowhere, but most people will hit it around about the same distance as I do. You’re sort of 280 to 290 through the air. Um you know, your 300-yard drives, whatever it is, and there’s no better feeling when you have a couple of holes in a row where you’ve just like nudged it partially playing partner five yards, you know, and you’re sort of like, Oh, you know, on you, mate. Yeah, yeah, it’s on you. You know, there’s not really much better feeling than that, to be fair, and uh a bit of psychological advantage, but um hole impacts is is where it is, and to be fair, you look at all highlight reels with the exception of Tigers chipping uh uh 16 to the Masters, they’re all puts. You know, Graham McDowell’s left left to right uh down down the hill or right to left, whatever it was, uh down the hill at 16 to win the 2010 Ryder Cup. Like you could pick off loads and loads of um the adverts that you get on on TV, and and 90% of them are gonna be puts that were holes.

Nish: 41:42

Yeah.

Toby: 41:42

Um, yeah, it’s interesting.

Nish: 41:44

Is it well? I mean you mentioned sort of zen golf plug for an episode that’s coming up in the future is uh I’m actually going to have a putting lesson at Zen Golf in Sheffield. Right.

Harbs: 41:55

Um, when is this, Nish?

Nish: 41:58

I can’t tell you because I’m gonna I’m gonna I’m gonna wait to see if my putting gets any better or not.

Toby: 42:05

See if it’s worth putting on.

Nish: 42:06

Uh if I come back and I’m just like, oh no, what I’ve done is I’ve let my putting get worse before.

Harbs: 42:11

I’m not sure I like the thought of you getting all this extra training in before our society clash. I’d rather you wait it till after that.

Nish: 42:17

Oh mate, I know. Well, another another plug, yeah. Burnham and Barrow. Yeah, that’s gonna be good that, isn’t it? It’s Team Hobbs versus Team Nish. You we sort of touched previously about Q school and things like that. You’ve just come back from Q school, haven’t you? Is that right?

Toby: 42:33

Uh so I did DP world Q school and missed out on stage one. Yeah. Um actually a bit of an interesting last story to that as well.

Nish: 42:45

So uh had a bad what flight did you miss, Toby? What happened?

Toby: 42:49

No, no, no, it didn’t miss it more on the golf course, actually. So um, yeah, but had a decent enough first and second round, didn’t play very well third round, needed a shoot six under, really, to have a chance in um in round three. Um nearly so I was one under play in 18, which was my ninth hole. Um just short of the green and two, chipped it, hit the pin, square on, went to an inch. So nearly hold that. I think I bogeied the first, and then birdie’s a handful coming in then and got it to five under for the round. So I kind of knew you don’t have live scoring or anything in that, so I can’t, but I kind of knew like top 18, I think it was, get through. I was like, right, I’m right on the buffer here. If I make birdie, I’m pretty much definitely going to be in, but we’ll see. So anyway, hit driver down nine over the trees, dog leg left to right. I got 90 yards left into the into the hole. Lob wedge, I’m like, God, this looks good. This could be the birdie, smashes halfway up the pin, bounces about an inch short of the hole, and spins all the way off the front of the green. Right? Chip on, hold the park, make par, get in, miss by one. So I’ve had two shots where I’ve hit the pin square on and ended up having probably the worst possible score on it on each of the holes.

Nish: 44:14

May I mean that’s just brutal, isn’t it? They’re five margins, I suppose, aren’t they?

Toby: 44:20

You know, just it is, you know, at the same time, I should never have been in that position. I had such a bad third round that put me in that position, right? But then on the flip side of that, you get agonizingly close to get through to stage two, and then you just never know what happens, you know. Like you go and play well in stage two, like stage two, stage three, like I said before, and you can secure a secure a card. So yeah, highly pressurized, pressurized situations. Go on, sorry. I had Q school in um in Mina Tour, so Middle East and North Africa tour. Actually, in Portugal, which is a bit of a strange one because it’s not in North in North Africa or the Middle East, but um, yeah, so come over, went over to Portugal, played Q-school there, got a card there, and then had two top ten finishes, came fourth and seventh in the two tournaments after that. Then so I had a pretty good run up until till Christmas, no.

Nish: 45:14

Um we we sort of have touched on it uh previously, and more probably at the intro, and then we’ve glossed over it, but uh you know, we’ve talked about golfing pressure, but then we’re trying to make a living from this weirdly frustrating game of ours, right? Um I mean what you know I I did I alluded to it and we all see the highlights real, don’t we? We see that I tied 33rd at the British Masters, I finished third and qualified because somebody was injured, whatever, you know, you see all of that, but you know, what’s what’s it like in the background? You know, there’s what’s what what’s the what’s the life stress like? You just had a baby as well.

Toby: 45:53

Yeah, yeah. So I think so. This last this year um has been quite different to most years because this year I haven’t really been able to have a schedule because of the invites I’ve had and the last-minute trips going. I played um through the summer, I played 11 weeks running, and it was basically because I would get an invite into um challenge tour event, invite into DP World Tour event, then I would play my normal week on clutch because I was trying to get um into the top six or whatever it is to get a get challenge tour starts. So uh yeah, so played like 11 weeks on on a trot. Um and I got to the stage where I was so at the back end of the playing season, I sort of go uh belfry the week after that. I got into Poland, uh no, got into Sweden in Challenge Tour, came tied 12th in that, so I asked for an invite because top 10 on each week gets you into the next event. Right. Um, so if you come top 10 on challenge tour in Sweden, for example, you go to the Poland event next week. So I missed out by one shot on that. So I requested an invite um from what from the tour director, and fortunately he gave me an invite. Went to Poland, came seventh there, so got into the next week um to Portugal, missed cut there, and I only needed to kind of make one cut to get it finished in the top 125. I finished 132 in the end because I missed um the cut in Italy as well. So I managed to get an invite into Italy. So what I was ending up doing was go to the Belfry or go to the Belfry, come back for a day, fly to Sweden, come back on the Monday, fly on the Tuesday to Poland, come back on either the Sunday night or the Monday, have you know one um one night at home again, go over to Portugal again, one night back at you know, so I had no real structure at all. And by this point, as any professional golfer would tell you, really, once you have spent more than about six, five, six weeks on the road, you just need some time off. You need mentally to have that time away from the game and away from traveling, but also physically, like two practice or one or two practice rounds, four round tournaments, like it’s grueling. Like it is a lot, a lot on your body. I know a lot of people just think, oh yeah, you’re just walking around the fields, but you know, when you’re you’re playing with that level of concentration for five hours a day, um, working everything out, walking, you know, five, six miles every day for the for five days, plus then the traveling of getting up at certain times, and you know, traveling is obviously quite tiring. Um, you know, so playing 11, 11 weeks, those last two weeks, I was just fucked to be honest, like mentally, physically, um, and just couldn’t quite couldn’t quite get it done. But then you have a bit of time at home, um, which is obviously really nice with uh you know the uh my son’s 11 11 months old now, so being able to spend some time with him and watch him grow because obviously when you spend like one one of the Belfry, he was able to come with me, uh Danielle and and Miles were there, but like most of the time you’re you know you’re on your own or you’re just with a caddy and you’re away from sort of family life. Um, so it’s nice to spend time at home, but then it sort of gets to the point where you’re like kind of ready to go away now, you know. Um, so Mina Tor was a little bit different, so it’s it’s a tour that’s restarted, so organization isn’t quite there yet. I think it will get a lot better. Um, so we stayed the the qualifying school was basically it was in Troia in um in Portugal, fantastic fantastic golf course, but it’s just out of season. So they were I got there on the let’s call it the Sunday, whatever day it was, and there was just nobody there. Deserted island, like there’s nobody in my complex. My Airbnb took the the following the sat nav up through the Airbnb took me to like flat number 53, not 73. So I’m walking around in the dark with like four percent battery on my phone because my charger didn’t fit into the car higher, and like you know, just stresses you don’t really need, yeah. Um, and you’re just on your own because I don’t know many people around you know the different tours I play, you know, until you sort of play week in, week out on a certain tour, you don’t really get to know the same faces, so you’re sort of like I’m away from my family, I’m in the middle of what feels like the middle of nowhere is a lovely place, but just nobody around. Shops aren’t open and all that sort of thing, and you it is it is a lonely, lonely place, and mentally you can get some pretty dark days with it if you’re not you know, luckily I’m 32 now, and you know, I’ve been doing it for a long time, and you kind of realize how to get out of those sort of ruts when you when you’re sort of thinking those things, and then to be honest, when tournament days come and you’re playing with people and you’re in you’re having a chat with them, and you there’s 8,800 people at the golf course, there’s a bit of life to it. It’s like, oh, actually, this is good fun again, you know. And then you go back to having a couple of practice days where nobody’s really around, you don’t go out for food with anybody, and you’re like, oh, this is a pretty lonely couple of days again, and then you sort of go back up to getting tournament ready and sort of getting in that zone of being a professional golfer again. Um, so you do get a lot of a lot of mixed emotions, or certainly I do, you get a lot, I get a lot of mixed emotions when I’m away. Um, and it is you know, sometimes it helps being with some people, and then other times you can stay with somebody and you’re like, oh, they’re snoring or they’re not doing the right things that you want to do or your interests and things like that. So I’m always a bit wary on who I stay with and and things like that. Um, but yeah, you you you don’t always see the like I say, the next Netflix documentaries where they’ve got their family with them and flying on private jets, and their PA is sorting this, that, and the other out for them, and they get a big check and the big sponsors at the end of it, you know. It sponsorship-wise, I cover everything myself, and um you know that can that can be difficult at times.

Harbs: 52:21

Um I’ve just been thinking about this, Tobes, because everything you’ve said sounds like it’s a real financial drain on you, even just taking part in these competitions. There’s so much travel involved, there’s so much accommodation requirements, and then you’ve got food and you’ve got you know any supplies you might need, and you know, there’s all sorts of things you’re probably buying just to make sure you’re always set up for these tournaments. So, how what how well are these tournaments paying you when you are finishing seventh in Poland and things? Is it’s is the income from these tournaments sustaining you being able to continue as a golfer or you having to rely on working full-time?

Toby: 52:56

Yeah, so I’ve I’ve got um obviously that PGA qualification allows me to coach. So fortunately, if I have a couple of bad weeks, I’m able to get an income through there. I don’t have a huge clientele, I I don’t want a huge clientele because I want to focus on playing at the moment, and I think you know, I can in later on in my golfing career, I can turn into into coaching if that’s what I want to go and do. But right now, playing at 32, I’ve probably got a couple of years left of playing in my prime. Um so you know, I’ve got that, I’ve got a couple of other investments that are able to give me some income, not huge, but but you know, allows me to go and play knowing that you know household bills and things like that are covered. But that’s not uh an endless pit either, you know. So for just to give you an example, so obviously financial year is April to March. Um I’ve spent £42,000 a share and I’ve made £49, and I’ve still got January, February, March to go and play a Minotaur, which is in Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, the UAE. Like, so that’s gonna be another, I would say, minimum 10 grand, possibly closer to 15, I would say, to go and play those events. So I, you know, I’m gonna be spending the thick end of 60 grand to go and play golf this year. And again, I’ve done a lot more traveling than I probably would normally because I’ve played Challenge Tour events, I’ve played two GP events, I’ve gone to MENA Tour through the winter. Um, a lot of guys then who just play UK stuff for six, eight months of the year and don’t do an awful lot through the winter. Um, the expenses are probably down to 15, 20 grand. But it’s expensive to play golf. Like your entry fees are four or five hundred pounds these days. Whether you play on clutch, you play on Mina Tour, they’re four or five hundred pounds. Only when you get up to Challenge Tour, European Tour is it 60 to 90 pounds because they get their income from sponsors, whereas the mini tours get their income from the players paying the money and you play for your own money basically. Wow. Wow. So a lot a lot of did not know that. Yeah, yeah. So again, it goes back to my point earlier on where when you sort of reach the top, you you you’ve you’ve got so much, or I say so much, you’ve got a lot of a lot more sponsorship opportunities because your reach is so much bigger. You’re worldwide as a DP World Tour. When you take something like a Clutch or a Minotaur, which is very much based in a certain area, and you don’t have your Rory McElroy’s playing, it’s very difficult for them to probably get a lot of sponsorship. Now, in fairness to Minotaur, they’re doing $100,000 prize funds and it’s $550 to enter. So it’s pretty good payout. Yeah. Um, you know, I I did three weeks in in Mina Tour in Portugal. I think I spent around about four grand, three and a half, four grand. And out of my fourth and tied seventh, I picked up around about five and a half, six thousand. So top tens, it actually made I actually made a bit of money, which these mini tours you don’t really. I don’t go expecting to make money on the mini tours because you’ve got the same expenses as whether you’re playing on DP or Challenge or Mina Tour. It’s still the same, same expenses. Um, but obviously the prize funds are are a lot different. So as long as you’re cover the way I look at it, as long as I’m covering my costs when I go and play on these tours, when I go and play, hopefully play more events on DP World Tour in the future, and hopefully get some sort of category on Challenge Tour that’ll give me enough events to play regularly, um, then you can earn a decent income from it. Yeah. Um, but it kind of goes back to what I was saying earlier about I see so many guys on mean on mini tours, um, on the development tours that have no backup and they will go and spend 20, 25 grand. Because and again, Q school, DP World tour Q-School. Last year, when I got all the way through to the final, it cost me about eight grand. I didn’t have a caddy, my dad caddium for me, and I didn’t, you know, actually got it. He he paid for a couple of the a couple of the food, um, a couple of the dinners that we had, so it actually saved me a lot of money.

Harbs: 57:26

Really argument to them picking their own clubs.

Toby: 57:30

Uh no, to be fair, actually, we didn’t argue, which was uh which is pretty good. He he was very good, actually, to be fair. Um, very, very good.

Harbs: 57:37

Um I played golf with both of them mission at Pro Am in Portugal. That was fun.

Nish: 57:47

Yeah, I like that. Yeah, that’s that’s that’s a good way for a son to describe it.

Harbs: 57:51

Well, Job, don’t be surprised if this time next week you’ve picked up a massive sponsor from the Reach you’ll get from the top 100.

Toby: 57:59

If there are any sponsorships out there, I’ll I’ll just about do every do anything you want me to.

Nish: 58:04

There’s a slight slight limit, but can I can I just re-echo exactly what Toby’s just said? I’ll do anything for a sponsor.

Toby: 58:13

Uh no, and to be fair, you get you you you know, I’ve had I’ve had some guys help me out a few years ago, and um you know, you it you do appreciate guys who you know, we’re in a climate now where businesses probably aren’t making as much money as they used to make 15 years ago. You know, it’s getting more difficult to to run a business in the UK um and without going into too much politics and things like that, you know, people just don’t have the the spare five, 10, 15, 20 grand they can throw at somebody to go and try and make it. Um, and it’s a bit more difficult for me as well, as a 32-year-old who’ve been playing it for quite a while. You know, I had that had a bit of a break where I was a head pro for a couple of years and now decide to come back playing full-time. But like you st you it is still really appreciated, people who are able to to fund um fun guys to go and play. Um and yeah, it is a it is a massive help on a on a serious note.

Nish: 59:13

Yeah, and and I suppose it’s interesting you said about the the the people who don’t have the fallback, you know, you sort of think yeah, the you said it at the start at the top, didn’t you? So the percentage of people are gonna make it to the really top end is very, very small, and you’ve got nothing else that can sustain what you’re doing. Um I suppose the frustrating thing with that is it’s like you can have you can have all the talent, can’t you? But then sometimes the brakes don’t go the right way and then you know, yeah. It’s gone.

Toby: 59:48

Yeah, there’s a number of things. You see you also see a lot of uh elite amateurs that don’t really make it as pros. It is it is different, it is different playing for money, I think. Standard wise, it’s different without you really realising. I think when you’re an amateur, or certainly when I was an amateur, you play a lot of golf courses around Lynx golf courses where the standard scratch is very high, or the the old traditional standard scratch is very high. So you shoot level power and you’re dropping your handicap by four like by 0.4 back in the old old system. Well, you haven’t shot four under, and level power in a pro game is going to get you absolutely nowhere unless you’re playing a trumpet 40 mile an hour wins, you know. Um, but I think you play when you go to when you go to to professional golf, you do you’ve got to shoot six, seven, eight under par to be able to even think about competing for for wins. Like you know, you look at winning scores and some of the events I played in in um on Challenge Tour, and you know, four-round tournaments, you’re not winning unless you shoot 16 to 24 under par. You know, you you very rarely are you gonna be able to just shoot, oh, I’ve I’ve played well, I’ve shot four rounds under par, I’ve got a good chance of getting a top three, top four. It just doesn’t happen, you know. Um, so I think that’s that’s the big thing as well. When a lot of people go to um turn professional, like you you realize you’ve got to play, you’ve got to be shooting low, low scores to have chances of of winning, and then it’s just so competitive now. When you go to Q school, you like I said earlier, you’ve just got to have your best game at Q-school to get onto that.

Nish: 1:01:29

You’ve got to just peek at that time in the year, which again is that subconscious pressure that you’ve got like to get to a certain, you know, I’ve got to do it now. Like it’s now, it’s now or I’ll wait another year, you know.

Toby: 1:01:42

That’s and I’ve got I I’ve had times where I’ve sort of peaked at the wrong wrong times, and you go and peek in a where you play a PGA pro am and PGA order a merit event and not being disrespectful to the PGA, but then that’s not gonna change my career. You know, shooting seven, eight under in in a in a pro am is great, it picks up a bit of money for the for the day that you’re out, but like you need to be shooting six, seven under a Q score or open qualifying, and they’re the things that are gonna help to change change your career. Yeah, um it is difficult.

Nish: 1:02:16

Yeah, I mean it’s it it it it’s tough, and I suppose anybody with uh half their head screwed on probably does appreciate the that strain and that stress that you’re uh that you’re under. And you know, you’re asking somebody to perform at the best of their sporting ability, or if not beyond that, in a highly stressed scenario of like I I need this because I need to earn money to support my family, I need this because I need to peak at this time. This is the one chance I’ve got this year to get myself in and get my card and all that kind of thing. And then yeah, in the midst of that, you’ve got to pull out these miracle shots as well that we all see. Yeah, you know.

Toby: 1:02:53

I I’m also I’m in a very, very fortunate position in terms of the fact because I’m not relying on anybody at the moment, you don’t have that extra pressure of like if you’re using somebody else’s money and you’re you’re having a bit of a bad spell, which all golfers do, you’ve almost got to justify it to them of like, oh yeah, you know, you’re giving me money to go and play, but I’m not producing the goods, and it is that extra sort of bit of pressure. Whereas for me at the moment, because I’ve been you know I’ve done all year off my own back, um, you know, it’s just me, I’ve got to answer myself.

Nish: 1:03:27

Yeah, accountable to yourself, and that’s it.

Toby: 1:03:29

Yeah, yeah. I’m very fortunate that you know Danielle’s got her own job and and she she’s fine, and it’s not like I’m in a position where I’m like, right, I’ve got to make a check that every single week to put food on the table. But yeah, um, you know, she understands that this is gonna be the next you know, our relationship for the next couple of years. So I haven’t got that added pressure at home, which is which is quite nice because again, a lot of other people have got a family life and their missus will be going, hang on, what are you doing over in that country? And you know, you haven’t earned any money again. Why are you doing this? Why are you doing that? Whereas, you know, I don’t have any of that at home, which is which is a huge help. So yeah, like the position I’m in I’ve probably got the touch wood, probably got the least amount of uh stressful situations compared to some other pros who are sort of trying to make it to the top level.

Nish: 1:04:18

Yeah, we’re now hitting winter time. Um golfer’s favourite time to get out on a course and uh figure out how many temporary greens you’re on and all that kind of stuff. But um how do you, as a tour professional, how do you keep your set your swing in the groove and what what do you do to maintain the game?

Toby: 1:04:36

You’ve got to in the UK you need to have a venue with a simulator, otherwise it’s an absolute waste of time because the weather we get in the in the in the in the UK is not really good enough to be going out on courses and because you know if they’re anything like similar to my golf course with a Parkland golf course, you know, it’s shut quite a lot. So we’ve got actually two simulators now at our um our our golf club. So I think for me, I keep on top of my swing with my coach um with Will. Um like I said, we use the simulator in terms of he’s got Trap Man Simulator in there, and we also use the um the Patton Studio there. Um, and then it’s a case of when I’m out on playing on Mina Tor for this year, it’ll be constant videos back and you know having you know voice noting back and forth most of the time, to be honest, of sort of debriefs of how it’s gone.

Nish: 1:05:34

Um go go somewhere sunny is what you’re saying.

Toby: 1:05:38

That’s how you keep if you can afford to go somewhere sunny, just go there. And to be fair, before before Minotaur, like you know, me and Harves have played a couple of um Proams, PGA programs, they they’ve been great to go over. You go to Portugal, and you know, they they tend to be the golf courses are as good in the winter as some of the UK ones are in the summer, you know. Um because they just get better weather than us, they’ve got more money, they’re charging way more than what we do in or most courses do in Wales for green fees. Um, but also it keeps the programs have been good and I’ve had quite a bit of success in programs, really. They’re good in terms of it’s relaxed, it’s not really going to change your life, but you can also keep your swing sharp, you get to know where your game is, and you can earn a little bit of cash from it if you’re one of the better players. Yeah, and then you go and spend it all on the last night by having a few drinks like we’ve we’ve done on a few occasions.

Nish: 1:06:30

Not like I can remember many of them. Right, well, yeah, that’s that’s that’s all the money gone, then isn’t it? Yeah, absolutely. No, it’s a yeah, it’s it’s interesting, isn’t it? I suppose and it’s a different uh because you have that um access to be able to go to these sort of mini tours and and and be able to yeah, chase the sun, as we say.

Toby: 1:06:49

Yeah, and and also through some of these tours you can get invites on to challenge tour and and dp world tour as well. So, you know, there is trying not trying to play 12 months of the year without obviously playing every day for 12 months, um, but trying to be competitive all year round is is quite important. I think like I’ve had a couple of winters where I’ve probably had finished Q school and then you have November, December, January, February off, not doing an awful lot, and then you come to like the start of the season in in April and you and you you feel like your swing is kind of there, but you feel really rusty on the golf course, right? Okay, yeah, and I’ve had that a little bit playing pro-ams like January, February time where I might have had December and January off for Christmas, and then you play a pro am at the end of January, start of February, and you’re like you just you’re not sharp on the golf course. You don’t mentally some of the club selections, some of the t-shots you decide to hit, um you know, just some of the way the way you sort of play the game is just not quite as sharp as is that that noticeable to you then you’re just like actually not made a good decision there. Definitely, so confidence is probably a big thing, like seeing where your golf swing is on a simulator is one thing. Putting it on a golf course when we go back to right, if I fuck this shot up, I’m gonna miss the cut, or if I fuck the shot up, I’m I’m gonna lose the ball here. Whereas when you’re on a simulator, you get a bad shot, you just peg it up again, you watch whatever you’re watching on TV or listening to whatever music you’ve got in the background, you know. So it’s quite hard to create that in that competitive environment. And the best way to create a competitive environment is just go in into a competitive environment, you know.

Harbs: 1:08:30

Yeah, go and do it again, Tobe, but you’ve you’ve just admitted to why we never won any of the programs now. You’re obviously taking personal blame for being a bit rusty rather than it be the amateur’s fault.

Toby: 1:08:41

Yeah, I’ve always I’ve always used I’ve always used yours as a warm-up because I never knew you never thought you’d take it that seriously.

Nish: 1:08:46

So I love that, yeah. Everything always comes down to you, Harps. Always comes down to you, my friend.

Harbs: 1:08:56

But Nish, have you ever played in a Pro arm?

Nish: 1:08:58

No, I haven’t.

Harbs: 1:08:59

I haven’t recommended it because it’s the first time I ever played a round with a professional golfer. So it’s first I’ve got to play with Tobes. It’s like playing with aliens, like the way they hit obviously. You’ve been to watch the pros play and you’ve seen it, and you can you can stand in watching, but standing behind a couple of you know yards behind Toby watching him hit the ball, you’re just like fucking hell, how yeah, it’s like the energy that goes into it, yeah. And he just makes it look so easy, and then you get obviously play. I’ve I’ve played a few rounds with Toby now, and you get to kind of see his thought process. And I think one of my favourite things is me and Michael fans, Tobes would hit a shot, let’s say he’s 190 yards out, he’ll land it on the green, he’ll probably leave himself a 30-foot putting. Me and Michael are clapping, going, Oh, great shot, Toby, and he’s marching up the fairway in a piss because he’s he’s not 10 foot closer. It’s so it’s so visible. I was gonna go. Better stop now. But yeah, we’re we’re high-fiving each other over on the green. We we might stand a chance of getting some points on this hole, but yeah, it’s interesting playing with somebody of Tobe’s caliber in a tournament like that because it’s so helpful being around somebody that really understands the game and can it he helped me out massively. I think the second time we went, I was really struggling with my driver. And on day two, Toby went, Do you mind if I just mentioned something? And I was like, Please mention something.

Nish: 1:10:30

Tell me what he didn’t do this yesterday.

Harbs: 1:10:33

Honestly, mate, he just made like the most minor tweak to my setup, and all of a sudden it made a massive difference to just my general enjoyment for the rest of the round. Which is awesome.

Toby: 1:10:44

But you know, you play you know, some of the programs I play in. I say, Oh, you’re nervous. Well, with all due respect, you’re never gonna see me again because I may not not ever play in this, you know, a bit different with Hobbs, but like some of the programs I have played, played in back back in the day. Like, you don’t need to be nervous playing with me because I’m not one of you know, okay, number one in Wales at the moment, but I’m not one of the best golfers on I’m not one of the best golfers in in the world. It’s like you’re not gonna know me, you’re you’re probably gonna forget about this in a couple of years’ time. So it’s quite interesting. Like a lot of people you play with, they get wrapped up in like the situation of playing with a pro, having your name announced on the first T, and you’ve you actually forget the reason you’re there, which is basically to go and have a laugh, go and enjoy it, because you’re you’re supposed to enjoy golf. And like, this is what I find it quite funny when amateurs get really, really pissed off on a golf course because it’s like, look, you’re you got a decent job, you’re gonna go and earn money like nine to five Monday to Friday, you come and play an act on a Saturday, and you beat yourself up on a Saturday. Like, imagine what I’m like, where you know, and people in my situation where you’re like, you you genuinely have to play well, otherwise you yeah, you don’t you know have the relaxation of of having a 50 grand a year income coming in or whatever it is that you that you earn outside of playing golf on your on your Saturday, you know? Yeah, um but there you go.

Nish: 1:12:06

Um, what what would you say? We’ve gone to top 100 courses. What would you say is your favourite? I’ll say Welsh. You sort of you mentioned ABW before, but I’ll maybe Welsh and maybe your favourite UK course.

Toby: 1:12:19

So favourite Welsh one is gonna be Celtic Manor 2010. Yeah, I know a lot of people, also a lot of pros just particularly don’t really like it. Um, but I uh it’s one of the few in Wales where for me I would hit every shot, every club in my bag. Um, you know, a lot of a lot of golf courses in Wales now of sort of the modern day equipment has outgrown it. Right. Um so you know, a lot of the lot of the good, certainly good Parkland golf courses at 6’2, 6’3, 6’4,000 yards, they they got houses all around them, so they can’t extend them. Um, and the modern day game has just made them a little bit short, a little bit quirky, a little bit easier. Yeah, a little bit easier in places, whereas again, Celtic Manor, if I go off the yellows, none of the bunkers are in play for me, so I hit it all over the top of them. So it’s I find it very, very easy. You go off the whites, and all of a sudden it’s a very difficult golf course because you play into the corner of the dog legs rather than taking it over bunkers, things like that. Um, I haven’t played there for a few years, but um when I was a member there for a couple of years, and um you know the greens were very good. Yeah, they obviously got unlimited money, or they did at one point have unlimited money what they would spend on their golf course. So you know your golf course was in was in really good, Nick. Top one in England or the UK.

Nish: 1:13:49

Um you could go you could go England and Scotland if you wanted to.

Toby: 1:13:54

I mean, I’ve not played a huge, huge amount in in Scotland. I quite like Archerfield. Okay. Um, I’ve not played any of like the real renowned golf courses like St Andrews, Carnou Steel, those I haven’t played those. Um so I would like to do a bit of a trip to Scotland. So Archerfield is probably would be my number one in uh in Scotland and Trump International, although I didn’t play that great. It is a quality, quality. Um number one in England. That’s gonna be. The thing is, I’m not like I said earlier, I’m not a fan of Lynx golf.

Nish: 1:14:50

Yeah.

Toby: 1:14:51

So when when you you know, and as much as I can appreciate, I’ve played Royalism and St. Anne’s, I’ve played um Burnham and Barrow like a number of times. Like in terms of like my favourite courses, because I don’t like Lynx golf that much. That’s why I would say more the Surrey belt, because my I feel my game is more suited to those type of type of golf courses, you know.

Nish: 1:15:13

I’m quite the same, Toby. Um I’m like I’ve I’ve during doing this challenge, I’ve learnt to appreciate Lynx courses more. But you know, for me, trees, hearing birds, things like that, that’s what might gets me going on a golf course.

Toby: 1:15:29

Uh so for me, my like when I play golf, I uh and certainly visually I like to to see trees down sort of either side, and I can sort of funnel the ball flight in between the trees. Whereas you don’t get that on Lynx golf, you’ve just got fairway, loads of rough, sometimes mounds, but just a bit of an open field around a lot of Lynx golf.

Nish: 1:15:50

I don’t know what you’ve just tried to describe there, Toby. Fuddle the ball between the what?

Harbs: 1:15:54

Nah, when you thin it, visualization, you know, when you’re getting Lebanon 300 yards because you’ve just thinned it. That means it’s like flight.

Nish: 1:16:04

Uh yeah. It’s amazing how the terminology changes between hackers and and pros, but yeah. Anyway, carry on.

Toby: 1:16:12

So but but yeah, play play in those sort of like surrey sort of golf courses where they’re a bit more bit more tree lines, tend to be in really good condition. Again, comes down to money as well. Like they got a lot of money they can they can spend on their on their courses. Um, so that yeah, they tend to be in good condition, fairways are cut lovely, and T-boxes are good to play off. Yeah. Um, so yeah, they’re what about a world venue?

Nish: 1:16:38

Is there a world course that you’ve played and you’ve or you’ve yeah, you’ve uh it’s saw grass, yeah.

Toby: 1:16:42

Sore grass without a shadow of a doubt. I played played Valderarmour in Spain as a young when I was young, and I then I played it in a pro am a few years later as a pro. Um and that is a fantastic golf course, but it can be a little bit quirky in places with some of the the cork trees, you can get yourself into the fairway and not have a shot to the green. Um but there are some quality holes there and really famous holes there. But yeah, I played saw grass, and like there’s just there’s just an aura about the place. Like you turn up, there’s not a blade of grass out of place. Um, I’ve actually been to the masters to watch it, and it’s a similar feel to Augusta in play in you know that it was you recognize all of the golf holes, it’s just not a blade of grass out of place when I played it, played there around about May time. Um, and it was just unbelievable. Prax facilities of quality, you get treated so well. Um, the caddy was a good laugh as well, to be fair. And I and I made a two on the on the 17th at Sawgrass, so that was uh that was big as well. So nearly hold it. Job done. Did he nearly hold it? Yeah, and it was on camera as well. I’ve got the caddy shouting in his American accent, and uh filming it, nearly hold it.

Nish: 1:17:56

And then actually, we we should we should bring this up a little bit. You’ve you’ve had a hole in one or or two.

Toby: 1:18:02

I’ve had I’ve had two. I had my first hole in one was when I was 11.

Nish: 1:18:07

You’re listening, Chris.

Toby: 1:18:08

Um so yeah, 11 years old. I hit a hit a hybrid, all of about 90 yards, because I was very small when I was I was a kid, which was on the same day that Gavin Henson kicked that kick in um Welsh rugby to beat England in 2005. Now, why would you go and ruin a book of a lovely pack to me with two English players? Um so that was uh that that was a bit of a memorable day, and then the next holding one I had was 16 years later, and it was my first round after COVID. So I hadn’t played again. We go back to quite competition ready, I hadn’t played, hadn’t hit a shot in god knows how long. And um, yeah, go and play uh play the third hole at St. Mellon’s and it’s it’s seven-on in the whole third hole back in uh yeah, it came 16 years later. So and haven’t had one since I’ve come close, but not haven’t had one.

Nish: 1:19:02

I mean, imagine if you’d I mean uh look, a two is unbelievable on the 17th at Sorgrass, but imagine if you did not turn in there.

Toby: 1:19:08

I mean that I mean yeah, that would have been been pretty impressive.

Nish: 1:19:11

Pretty much retire at that point, couldn’t you? Could live off that.

Toby: 1:19:13

If I’d had it on video as well, I could have sold it for a bit of money on that Zire Golf on Instagram, I think.

Nish: 1:19:18

So uh absolutely absolutely uh Toby, look, it’s been absolutely wonderful chatting to you today. Uh thank you for giving us an insight um into you know a life that we all probably think we we want to have because we do see the highlights real, but it’s really good to to to understand you know what what actually is entail in that. And this isn’t our attempt to try and dissuade people from wanting to play this great game professionally. Quite the opposite. I think if anything, your enthusiasm for the game still shines through. So it hasn’t uh worn you down, which is always a nice thing to know.

Toby: 1:19:55

Not just yet.

Nish: 1:19:56

Yeah, not just exactly not just yet. But um, but yeah, me and me and Harbourser, we’ll uh at some point we’re we’re gonna challenge you to a challenge you to a game, so we’ll we’ll test out your credentials. I think I feel like I’ve I’ve trash taught my game too hot too much here, haven’t I? I was like, shit, I’m about to deliver.

Harbs: 1:20:15

Toby’s gonna be our first beat the pro challenge, so we’ll look forward to that next year.

Toby: 1:20:19

Absolutely, absolutely on a long golf course, go you off the back teaser, play right into my hands then.

Harbs: 1:20:24

That’s alright, we’re gonna pair up as a two-man scramble, so you’ll be on your own.

Nish: 1:20:29

Yeah, you know, I’ve I’ve I’ve I’ve done the old I’ve done the odd 300-yard drive right down the middle, haven’t I, Arbs?

Harbs: 1:20:34

I’ve seen it a few times, mate. Yeah, yeah, just you’ve not mentioned it many times after.

Nish: 1:20:39

Just once. Do you know what? It happened. Like this is how seldom it happened, Toby. I sort of just went, what the fuck have I just done? This is brilliant. Because it was dead straight and everything. I was just like, this is perfect. This isn’t like a it’s taking a lucky bounce or anything. It was actually it was as I intended, uh, which happens very, very rarely. But um, yeah, thank thank you, Toby. Really appreciate that. And uh, yeah, we will we will uh update everybody on how our beat the pro goes. Go easy on us.

Toby: 1:21:09

No chance, yeah.

Nish: 1:21:11

I’m going back for my putting lesson anyway, so it’s fine. I’ll be alright after that. Um, wonderful. Thank you, and thanks, Harps, for for joining us today. Until next time on the Top 100 in 10 Golf Podcast.