Life on tour is not all that it is glammed up to be.
Sure, the Rory McIlroys and Nelly Kordas of the world will happily bring in millions of dollars per year, but for your average professional golfer; that sort of stability is a luxury that can only be dreamed of.
Whether you are fighting it out at Q-school, or trying to make it to the weekend on the LETAS; every drive, every wedge, every putt could cost you a career – or at least a healthy salary.
Happens to the best of us
You just have to watch the recent Netflix series ‘Full Swing’ to realize how life on tour can take its toll on even the best of golfers.
Ben Griffin is a three-time PGA Tour winner, has racked up almost $20 million in winnings, and can also say that he is part of an elite club of Ryder Cup golfers.
But there was a time, not so long ago, where it looked like his future was away from the golf course.
In 2021, Griffin was forced to walk away from professional golf, after amassing a credit card debt of $17,000 on caddies, accommodation, and travel. He went on to work as a loan officer for almost a year.
Fortunately for the American, he was granted a new lease of life by a sponsor who funded his way back to the PGA Tour, after qualifying through the Korn Ferry.
As the men’s game boasts a significantly greater budget than the women’s, the burden to perform week-in-week out is even more critical on tours such as the LET, LPGA and the LETAS (LET Access Series).
Professional athletes will always have to endure pressure, that’s just part of the job. But in golf – a game centred around individual excellence – the stakes are so much higher.
Golf Today caught up with one golfer that knows all about these particularly unique pressures. Thalia Martin, fresh off a closing 68 at the MCB Ladies Classic – Mauritius, sat down to chat all about life as a professional golfer.
Early career
For Martin and her family, golf was never the endgame – “We’re actually a tennis family, no one in my family plays golf”, she explained while cooling down after a sweltering round on Championship Sunday in Mauritius.
“I remember in primary school, there was a guy that played golf, and I always thought: Ah, what is he doing with his life?”, she jokingly continued.
How she fell into golf was purely by chance. At twelve-years-old, waiting for a table to open at a restaurant, Martin noticed a driving range next door, and ran across to hit a few shots with her Dad. As with all golfers, it didn’t take long for the Brit to fall in love with the sport.
“I just got hooked. I mean, the ball didn’t go in the air, but it went straight. It was like a tiger stinger.”
Fate was working its magic that day, as a local coach – who Martin is still in touch with today – offered her some lessons.
Coming from a tennis family, Martin initially chose to go down the racket sports route, preferring to have greater control over results – as opposed to golf, where “You can’t control anything”.
But a resultant back injury forced her to step away from the court, and eventually Martin made her way up to Preston, where she plied her trade for a few years while becoming a two-time BUCS champion.
A successful amateur career saw her turn pro in 2021, and she has since won on the LET Access Tour, before joining the LET itself.
Success at an amateur level, while proving prodigious talent, in no way ensures success at the top level – and Martin has had to work tirelessly on her game to persist with life on the LET.
Life on tour
“The girls on tour are so lovely, and everyone gets on”, Martin began by explaining with regards to her life on the LET.
“Life on tour is not what I thought it was going to be. I thought it would be like in tennis, where it’s very individual – but here it feels more like a team. We’re all in it together, and we’re just trying to beat the course”.
While camaraderie booms on the road, the pressures of playing for a livelihood are inescapable: “It can get hard when you’re having weeks in, weeks out, where you do miss cuts by one or stuff like that. It does hurt a little bit more”, Martin acknowledged.
“I remember during a hard time when my dad was really ill, in 2023 – that’s when I was looking into money, because normally he handles the accounts and everything.
“When you put money into your head, in terms of your career, it puts on that extra pressure, because you’re thinking, ‘Oh, you need to afford to pay for this, or this, or this’, and then you have to try to look for sponsors.”
Weekly dilemmas
Financial rewards are all the more imperative due to the nature of travelling on tour. With the exception of last week – where the golfers are treated to premium hospitality and facilities – individuals have to make their way around the world themselves, if they want to compete in the top, lucrative, events.
So you are forced to consider a pointed dilemma each week: if you don’t play a competition, you can’t make any money or boost your brand – but if you do play and miss the cut, then you’ve spent all that money in vain.
Martin is meticulous in her preparation for tournament weeks, and consults her checkbook to focus on the four main ingredients: “flights, accommodation, and car rental”… “Oh, and airport parking. I always forget that one.”
Martin’s Mum has been caddying for her for the past four seasons, so they will typically share accommodation. Otherwise, players tend to pull together to split the costs of Airbnb’s and smaller details such as groceries and transport to the course.
A pragmatic approach
When asked whether monetary anxieties ever follow her out onto the golf course, Martin kept it simple – “We don’t really look at it that way. Like, ‘this shot could cost me money’. It’s more the score itself, really. We never really think about money on the course – only afterwards, then we’ll start to realise.”
On missing cuts, Martin shows an admirable pragmatism: “It’s just part of the game. (Look at) Justin Rose, how many cuts did he miss at the start of his career? And then look how he is now, so you’ve just got to think of it that way – just keep at it, and it will come.”
The 29-year-old also uses Rose’s European comrade as inspiration. Having struggled on moving day in Mauritius, shooting +6 on the back nine to just make the weekend cut, Martin admitted that “I didn’t control it (her emotion) as well.”
“I was way too nervous about everything. But then today (pre the final round), I was listening to Rory McIlroy actually, and he was talking about how he thinks of the worst case scenario… Okay, well, if you hit it out of bounds, what do you do next?
“You just hit the next shot, and then you might make bogey, but then you can bounce back on the next one for birdie.”
Martin’s final round of 68 at the MCB Ladies Classic awarded her best finish on tour this season, finishing the week at T32.
But the nature of professional golf means that rest comes at a cost, and for Martin – who still has to fight for crucial mid-season rerank points on the LET – the grind continues.
“I’m still trying to chase for reranks and everything, so I can’t really afford to miss out on any competitions at the moment. So we’ll see how the rest of the weeks go, and then go from there”.
