Golf Legend Greg Norman: Major Wins, Business Success, and the Pain of Losing the Masters

30:32I mean, I can't give up our state secrets about what we've already got in the pipeline for it, but, you know, it's different. They want to take golf out of the box, but they still want to showcase what golf is all about. But they also want to showcase the players a little bit differently too. And technology nowadays allows you to do that. We're very, very lucky to be going to Chambers Bay. You know, it's the first time the U.S. Open has been on a Lynx golf course. Pinehurst number two, close to it, but a TrueLinks golf course. So we're really, everybody's interested about seeing it. There was a poll taken just recently.

31:08About 62 % of people are more excited about watching the U.S. Open this year than any other major because it's at Chambers Bay. So here we are. We have this platform of Chambers Bay. We have the platform of the USGA. We have the platform of the U.S. Open. And we have got a great team around us. And believe me, Joe is a consummate professional. He gets it. He knows exactly how to inject, step in, step out, let the experts take the lead on it. But he also knows how to open and close brilliantly. So it's a learning process by all of us. But at the end of the day, our trial run at the Franklin Tamlin shootout, we all came out with our thumbs up, not down, which was a very, very positive thing.

31:55You travel more than 300 ,000 miles a year, which is the equivalent of, I think, circumnavigating the globe like 12 times annually. The large majority of that, I believe, is for your business. You obviously were an incredibly successful golfer, but have even had more success in business. Your companies generate, I think, something like$300 million in revenue annually. Tell about, though, when you were in Turks and Caicos and you're on your boat, you know, and headed towards Cuba or in the general direction of Cuba and what happens. Right. I was having a bit of a corporate retreat down there and had some pretty interesting guests on my boat.

32:38And there was one atoll I've always wanted to either go dive or fish. It was, if anybody knows what Turks and Caicos is relative to Florida, relative to Cuba. it was almost in a triangle, the bottom part of the triangle going towards Cuba. And it was maybe about a 90-mile to 100-mile run from Turks and Caicos. And anyway, I wanted to go there. And the night before, a few of the guys wanted to join me. But it was a 4 a.m. push-off, you know, because we wanted to get there at daybreak and do some fishing and maybe dive on the atoll, which was completely infested with sharks. But so anyway, we take off and my sport fishing boat is a pretty quick boat.

33:18It does about 33 knots. And when you're doing 33 knots heading towards Cuba, you know, radars pick things up a little bit. And there's a big red blob put right on top of you. And unbeknownst to me, I'm running the boat because I love to run the boat. And I look at my radar because it's dark and I can see around about four o 'clock, I can see this boat catch me. and I think, oh my gosh, we're going, I look down and I see 33 knots and we're burning about 49 gallons per hour per engine. So I know this guy back here is going to be really singing pretty hard. So I'm watching it, watching the next minute the radio crackles on channel 16 and it says, you know, such and such vessel is heading southwest at 33 knots.

34:02Please identify yourself. So I identify myself, hey, this is the vessel, Aussie Rules, Now, what is called No Rules at that time, not Aussie Rules. This is vessel Aussie Rules, and it's owned by Greg Norman. And they said, who's captaining the vessel? I said, I am. My name is Greg Norman. And they say, can you pull back a little bit? We're coming up alongside. And they started, and the voice came back and says, is this the Greg Norman? I said, yeah. And they said, is this the Greg Norman, the wine guy? I went, yes, I made it. My life has changed for the better. So that was a story. no harm foul, no foul given, no foul intended.

34:41So we continued on with our trip and that was it. It already showed how far you'd come business-wise. You were repped by the famous sports management firm, IMG, which has represented everybody from Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer to Peyton Manning to Roger Federer, you name it. But tell about the plan you created in 1993 on the business end and why you really accelerated that. Pure and simple, when you're an athlete growing up and you get to a certain level, and there's very few athletes get to experience this, because I would say the top 10 maybe in the world get to experience it, where you actually get a significant uptick in your endorsement.

35:37And during that time where I was getting a significant uptick in my endorsements when I was under a management firm, I was starting to realize that I was putting a lot of value and equity in other people's brand for a reason. They were paying me, I was wearing their logo, blah, blah, blah, and they were getting great exposure because I was playing pretty darn good golf and I was on TV X number of seconds per day or minutes per day. So they spent all this money on you to get this exposure because you're on the golf course, but I really didn't get anything out of it except dollars. Like, great, that's what you want.

36:11I didn't want that. I wanted to build equity in my own brand. So how do you build equity in a brand when you don't even have a brand? Then lo and behold, Reebok comes along and they want to start Greg Norman Collection Clothing. we formulate the shark logo one thing leads to another Paul Feynman who owned Reebok at the time he says that is your property you own that logo I'm going to license that off you and you're going to you're going to go and build that into your future this is your equity and you're going to put value in your own equity so that's how it all started so when my contract with my management company was coming up 1992-93 I decided not to renew and at that moment I had to step out I had to capitalize everything myself I had to start my own office I had to start payroll I had to do fine people I had to do this I had to do that he had to do 401ks you had to do healthcare you had all of a sudden your head starts spinning because whoa and now you better be a believer in yourself right Because once you open that door, that cash is going out.

37:24You better stab yourself pretty darn quickly to get some cash coming in. So I did. And I stayed the course. I committed to a basic business model that I wanted. And that was to be vertically integrated with the game of golf. Everything I did in the beginning was completely attached to the game. So it was easy for me to bolt on and bolt on and build and build and build. But at the same time, I wanted my base to get wider. And once I built a fantastic foundation underneath me, then I could kind of move off in a different direction. And look, everybody asks me, you know, is it easy to do? And heck no, it's not easy to do.

38:04A lot of players, you know, want to go out there and replicate it. It's not easy. It's truly not. You have to, A, be supremely committed to the course you take. you have to be supremely committed to the human resources you be you get in and human resources are the hardest part about business i can tell you that um and then you have to look into the future you have to be there for the long haul in golf when you go out there and tee it up on thursday you know the end result is going to be four days later right okay four days is easy to focus your mind around and work on it when you go in there and you look at opportunities in business and you want to understand what the exit strategy is, that exit strategy might not be until 15 years down the line, 20 years down the line, or it may go on in perpetuity.

38:54You just don't know. So there's this plethora of new information coming, flooding your way about your opportunities, what you can or can do, or how you want to position yourself. So all of a sudden you have to be very compartmentalized in your thoughts and you've got to make sure each compartment is purely, well, this is the way I do it anyway, I should say, that each one of my compartments that I have to focus on, I focus on 100 % for that 15 minutes. Or if I don't do it, I'm not giving my people the right respect and I'm not going to be able to give the right answer on a yes or no, shall we do this?

39:38But at the end of the day, quite honestly, I'm not the be-all and end-all. I mean, I have great people around me. And my great people have been with me for over 20 years. So they know my DNA, they know my nature. I give them a little bit of rain to let them run off and run something to ground for themselves and then bring it to me when it's 85 yards down the field. I don't want to get involved with the minutia of stuff, even though it's difficult for me to let it go. just bring it to me give me a summarization of what has taken place to get to where we are and then let me make the decision whether we're going to go forward on it.

40:17Tell about your 30-30-30-10 strategy. Well I learned that when I was a kid as an assistant pro at Royal Queensland Golf Club and I was making$27 a week was my first salary and then I moved up to a whopping$32 a week. So that's not a whole lot of money to play with. So I decided to do that strategy then. And I've always had a little bit of money and a little bit of money when you break it down. And I kept that going forward my whole life. Even when I won my first golf tournament, the West Lakes Classic, I won$7 ,000. I thought I was the richest guy in the world. And I took that philosophy and I broke it down.

40:56And you had to pay taxes and you had my expenses, you know, and my cost of living. And then I had at the end of it that 10%,$700 was my little slush fund that I could go out there and say, congratulations, Greg, you just won your first golf tournament. I didn't, but I had that opportunity to go do it. So I kept that. Even to this day, I've taught my kids to do that. One of your first big deals was investing$2 million in golf club manufacturer Cobra. How did the deal come about and how well did it end up working out for you? Well, it worked out fantastic, but before we get to the fantastic side, I had befriended a gentleman from Australia called Tom Crow.

41:42Tom Crow was kind of like the patriarch of our golf from our country. He was just passionate about the game and passionate about designing golf clubs. And he had designed a golf club called The Baffler. and it was a small headed wooden golf club with very heavy rails underneath and it allowed us to get the ball out of the rough very easily in those days it was brilliant design so that baffler he parlayed it into a company called cobra and one of my first set of golf clubs growing up Tom Crow sent me a set of Cobra irons. And I won a couple golf tournaments with him. So, and then I go off and sign with Wilson and go on and move on to other things.

42:27So, I think it was like the 87, 86, 87, Tom came to me and asked me if I would like to invest into his company. And his company at that time was doing about$43 million a year gross revenue. But they didn't have enough capital to invest into research and development. So they came and they offered me a piece of the company for not the exact amount of money you said, but it was very close to it. And I was also going to be representing Cobra. So I was going to get an endorsement fee on top of it. So in a period of three years, I was going to get my investment back if everything else fails. So to me, it was a bit of a no-brainer decision, quite honestly.

43:12and part of the stipulation was I wanted the money to as I said go into research and development now at that time there was a unique opportunity because Callaway just came out with a big Bertha driver the oversized driver but they weren't following it up with the oversized iron so we looked at this opportunity if we can come up with a great oversized iron let's go to the with it straight away. We did and we came up with the King Cobra oversized irons not just for the general public but for the seniors and the ladies and it was a massive hit. So good luck, good judgment, right money at the right time, combination of everything.

43:55It just took the company to another level. All of a sudden we had this huge momentum going away and I was playing well and I was number one player in the world. And all of a sudden, Cobra was like the name. King Cobra was the name. It was out there. And then we were eventually acquired by another company for, I think,$750 plus million. So we actually, we all did pretty good out of it. Experience a membership that backs what you're building with American Express Business Platinum. Enjoy complimentary access to the American Express Global Lounge Collection and apply to find out your welcome offer, which could be as high as 300 ,000 membership rewards points.

44:38American Express Business Platinum. There's nothing like it. Terms apply. Welcome offers vary and you may not be eligible for an offer. Learn more at americanexpress.com slash business dash platinum. Got a Sam's Cafe pizza order up. You know the best part about this spicy Italian sausage? I voted for this topping. Yeah, just another perk of being a member. Come join us. Sam's Club. How much did the couple million bucks translate to? Wasn't it like some 40 million? And then you used that to then invest into the business that you were in the process of building up? Building up. I reinvested the money.

45:25And it obviously takes a lot of pressure off, too. But at the same time, in those days, it was a massive deal. I mean, it was a massive deal to see a company that Tom Crow had started with one golf club turn up just three quarters of a billion dollars in a period of maybe less than 10 years. So it was an eye-opener for all the other manufacturers, which was fantastic, because at the end of the day, the consumer are the benefactors, right? So all of a sudden now you see technology at that moment just go through the roof. And then in 1996 the technology went through the roof through the golf ball.

46:06The specification of the golf ball changed and that blossomed out again. More yardage was picked up. So now all of a sudden the combination between hard goods and the golf ball, the masses out there were starting to see the technology benefits that were coming their way coming out in their scores and their play. I want to take you back to when you were growing up. You grew up in Australia. You played just about every other sport it seemed like growing up except golf. And then you're 16 years old. For the first time you decide to caddy for your mom. And what was it about caddying for her that all of a sudden got you so interested in the game?

46:51Well, the fact that my father had changed jobs. He had gone from a town up in the northeastern part of Queensland called Townsville and moved down to Brisbane, which is like 600 miles away. So I left all my mates behind at the age of 15, 16, you know, all the guys you hung out with when you're knee-high to a grasshopper. So I was down in Brisbane, had nothing to do, and I was actually kind of bored. and my mom was playing a competition one day and I said, I'll come out and caddy for you. Now my mom's like 5 '3", 100-pound, wringing wet, right? And she was a three handicap at the time. She was a very, very good player.

47:31And so I pulled her golf carts around and when she had finished, we were at Virginia Golf Club and the last four holes are like straight out, back, out and back. So it was going to be easy. She was having a cup of tea with her playing partners and it was easy for me to take her golf clubs and see if I could emulate her. And the bug bit me. And my first handicap was 27. My first official score was 108. And I got down from 27 handicap to scratch in 18 months. And then three and a half years later, I won my first professional golf tournament. So everything happened very, very fast. How much did you start practicing after that?

48:15initial time getting? Oh, all the time. Before school, after school. I used to have a code with mom that, you know, I'd call to come pick me up. Three rings on the phone, I'd hang up. It's time for you to come get me and take me to school or come get me when it's pitch black and I can't see a golf ball when I'm hitting it anymore. She'd come pick me and have dinner. So I was really passionate about it really I was committed to it and because the acceleration of my improvement being what it was I was so excited because all of a sudden I'm shooting even par, all of a sudden now I'm shooting sub 70s, all of a sudden now I'm shooting in the 60s on a regular basis so you go wow yeah this is cool and then I had to go through a strange process about getting become a professional because in Australia you just couldn't turn pro you had to become an assistant pro and you have to do a three-year course which I didn't want to be in a club professional I wanted to be a professional golfer touring pro so I just convinced the powers to be and asking if I could do the three-year trainee professional course in two years and I did I passed it and in 1976 I got an invitation to play a couple golf tournaments the first one I was I finished third I believe and then the Queensland open I finished fourth or third and then I won my third ever event and that was a West Lakes Classic and I was gone.

49:53I don't know if this is true but I read it somewhere that you told your friends shortly after you were out high school that by the time you were 30 you were going to be the best golfer in the world a millionaire be and be married to an American yeah that's true I did say that we're in the back of a bus we had this inter-club competition between Virginia Golf Club and Grafton I believe it was and it was a long bus ride a seven or eight hour bus ride and we always played uca in the back of the bus and and he always had a few beers back in those days and and that's what I did say to him yeah it had been a dream of yours as you mentioned to join the Royal Australian Air Force and you're in their office with your dad getting ready to sign papers committing and all of a sudden you have a change in heart why I don't know why I think deep down inside something told me don't do it deep down inside something was saying to me you know I was in love with the game of golf challenge yourself and try and see if you can figure figure out what it is I don't know what it was I all I know is I got up and and I walked away from a career my father wasn't impressed because he didn't know whether I'd be any good at the game of golf nobody did nobody did and so I knew I was walking away from a career that was there sitting in front of me But, you know, trust your internal instincts sometimes, they're right.

51:22You spend a year after high school surfing and you come back from that and tell your parents you want to become a professional golfer. What's their reaction at the time? Well, I would say if I put myself in their shoes today being a parent, if my child came to me saying he or she wanted to do something that they've never experienced before, not a never experienced before but never knowing that you're going to be any good at it, I'd be sitting there with a bit of a dumb look on my face too. But I was adamant. I've always been that nature, a pretty driven guy. They just had to accept it. They could see my commitment to it was second to none.

52:12I was into it more than anybody else at that time, quite honestly. Even when I was out on the tour, I practiced more than anybody else. Because I figured that if somebody was practicing for eight hours and I practiced for ten, I'm going to be that much better than that person. Was it tough to go against your parents then? Look, it created a rift with my dad and myself. There's no question about it. My dad was a professional. He owned his own business, and he was hoping I would go into the business and follow in his footsteps, which every father would want, just like my kids. I want them. They work for me now, and I would love them to be running my business when I'm pushing up daisies.

52:55Sure. I think that would be a fantastic feather in your cap. And so at the end of the day, we kind of separate a little bit, I think, because it just creates a little bit of tension in there. So when I started to win, I won early. Okay, great. Now back it up. And then now I started winning on a regular basis consistently. You know, I think the little bit of damage was done then. But now it's totally different. You know, I've had my dad sit on a board of a company I owned in Australia. He's a very intelligent guy, and he taught me a lot about business as well, you know, in the latter part in the last 15, 20 years.

53:37So I've learned a lot from him. And now it's great because, you know, I explained to him what's going on in my life and business. And, you know, quite honestly, he invests in a couple of companies I've been involved with. So he's happy. He's getting a good dividend return. And you've been open. I mean, about this growing up, he was tough on you. How long did it take for him to tell you that he was proud of you? Look, my father, I truly believe every generation is different in how they express themselves, and how you express yourselves is directly affected by how your parents or those parents have expressed themselves onto you.

54:22and my father's parents were tough you know my grandparents and they weren't affectionate and they weren't close that doesn't mean to say that was the reason why dad was you know had those barriers up all the time but maybe it was so you got to give him the benefit of the doubt that the environment he grew up in as a child was different than the environment that my children grew up in rest children because I truly believe that I wanted to make sure that you know you address the situation for what it is and you want to make sure your children are embraced you've got to be a parent number one and a friend number two fine line you got to walk sometimes being a tough parent is the hardest thing you can be and being a being your best friend is really easy because if you have a great relationship with your kids it's it's very easy to shower them with everything you can shower them with, but at the end of the day you have to make sure that they have their solid foundation underneath them and that they can structure something for themselves for their future without having this parachute sitting there ready to protect them if they fall.

55:35and I'm a big my father in his strange ways of going about it was really

55:44a great driver for me at the end of the day because it drove me on to the fear of failure because if I failed not only do I let myself down but I let my family down so the fear of failure was a massive driving influence behind me because I wanted to prove me right and everybody else wrong because there were a lot of doubters out there thinking that I wouldn't be able to do it. And actually I did a commercial for a Swan Brewery way back, way, way back and the caption for the commercial was, they said you'd never make it. And still one of my favorite commercials I ever shot actually. And at the end of the day, that fear of failure was probably the tip of the spear that drove me the hardest.

56:32What do you think is responsible for your success? Look, I'm a huge believer in myself. There's nothing that I don't think I can't do. If I have questions, I'll go ask. I'm so humbled enough to ask somebody who's way more intelligent than me, what do you think? give me your assessment and I've been extremely lucky like that and I've surrounded myself with some wonderful wonderful people I've been very lucky where I can pick up the phone and call the President of the United States or an ex-President and say how are you feeling or some of the great CEOs of the world, I've been very lucky like that but it's mainly because I've been open too, I'm not like I said to you minutes ago, I'm not the be all and the end all and quite honestly now I found my find myself in this position where you have so much information you have so much experience it's so good to give back so when I was a kid coming up and going through my life and I needed help and advice I'd pick up the phone and these people in the position where I am today where they've got all the experience and knowledge and can't handed down are so willing to do it.

57:56It's an amazing thing to see. And if you have the ability to embrace it, and to any young kid out there in any sport or in any aspect of life, if you have the access and the ability to reach out to somebody who's got 35, 40 years of experience above you, God, you better do it. Because it'll help you untap so many unknowns within yourself. And I enjoy doing that now. I don't do a lot, but I'm enjoying working with a couple of guys right now that I really, really enjoy seeing their success just get a little bit better, a little bit better. Maybe just because of one thing I said. And that to me is as rewarding as winning any golf tournament.

58:48Your son has said before that when you were playing golf, you could be gone traveling for four weeks straight. You'd come home, immediately spend eight hours practicing, get back to the house, then putt till the sun goes down. How difficult was it to be away from the family like that? Well, it's a huge sacrifice. I mean, one of the greatest, I mean, everybody sees all the great things that happen, but here, okay, on this side, the bad things that happen, I mean, I travel 35 to 40 weeks a year every weekend. So that's 35 to 40 weekends. You're gone from home. So you're gone from seeing your kids playing soccer or football or doing what they love to do.

59:35You're gone from their most important growth cycle in life. So you try and immerse yourself into it as much as you can. So when you're home on a Sunday night, you know, you go Monday, Tuesday, and then you're gone again, you try and get in there as hard as you can, but it's very difficult. There's huge sacrifices. And, you know, a lot of people, you know, in my life, I've paid the ultimate sacrifice, quite honestly. Why do you say that? Well, because, you know, your family's not together, you know, because of the level of my schedule and the level of commitment and the level of dedication I had to the sport.

1:00:22That was number one. And if you put something number one ahead of everything else, something's going to happen, right? So nowadays, my kids, we talk about it openly. You know, it's good to have that conversation because at the end of the day, if you are going to choose a career and that career is going to take you away from your home life, then you have to somehow, if I had to do all over again, I would redo my schedule big time. You would? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Do you think it's possible to have great success professionally and have a great personal life? Tomorrow morning is knocking. Stock your fridge now.

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1:01:55The answer to that is yes. I do believe that. But I was a global traveler. If you're talking about domestic USA, okay, yes, 100%. If you're talking about a global travel system where you're one week over here and next week in China and next week in some maybe in Japan and another week somewhere else, it's a massive drain because you are constantly on the move. So if your choice is your backyard is the world, it's going to make a big difference on how you approach things. But at the end of the day, if I didn't do that what I did then, my business wouldn't be where it is today. So for all the things I did for the game of golf, making it priority number one, establishing a certain credibility and benchmark without cheapening my my logo and my positioning here I am over here that I have this business where my son in law and my daughter work for me and my son works for me and all of a sudden now you've given them an opportunity of doing something that if I did it differently over here they might be off somewhere else so there's so many different twists and turns to it.

1:03:18But if you're aware of them, and if you could sit down, I would love to sit down and have a conversation with the last 10 number ones in the world in golf. Just have a bit of a summit, just this rare chat. Just like you have a CEO summit of the top 100 CEOs in America. Or even in tennis, the best players get together to discuss how tennis is going to go forward. In golf, I would love to sit down with the last top number one, number one, 10 number one players in the world and say, okay, guys, what did you do differently? Did you do this, this, and this? Or what would you do to recommend to a Rory McIlroy or to an Adam Scott or to, you know, or any future young kid coming out with all that?

1:04:09Imagine that knowledge for the game of golf and forget all the egos and all that do it for the betterment for the future of the game that would be a really cool summer to be sitting in your first major victory as you're walking up to the 18th the enthusiasm of the crowd that's encircling you what was that like um well I was I was fortunate because I had a five shot lead so I could absorb it all you know and And you still have to get the ball in the hole and you still have to concentrate on making sure your scorecard is signed correctly. And then you can let it go. But quite honestly, that was one of the unique experiences of the British Open where the people would come in around you and feel the experience of what you were feeling and seeing the big bleachers up there.

1:05:02I loved it. I loved every step, even though you got whacked in the back a few times and, you know, you had to really stay focused. but embrace the moment. At that time, I'd worked extremely hard for 71 holes of golf and got myself in a position to win, so I enjoyed it. I embraced it, and I was the type of player anyway who wore my heart on my sleeve. I wanted people to see how much I enjoyed it, and I wanted them to see how much, if I failed, how much I hated it. So I was probably the last of those guys to do that. You won two majors. I think you had the lead and a dozen others going into the last day.

1:05:42And I thought it was interesting. I read a quote you gave somewhere where you said, you believe you would have won more if you weren't so stubborn. The 1996 Masters, you have a six-shot lead going into the final day. It was a foregone conclusion in everybody's mind that you were going to win the night before. so that you know Saturday night you're in the locker room what are you thinking about? I was thinking about just getting home and getting something to eat and go to bed honestly it was late and the press conference went long and I still had to do some practice and I was walking out of the locker room and Peter De Bruyne a British writer was sitting at the bar on the way out standing on the corner of the bar and he says to me, not even you can screw this up tomorrow.

1:06:31That was not goodbye Greg, good luck tomorrow. He says that comment. I go, okay, why would you even say that? But anyway, you try and block it out as much as you can, but at the moment your mind was fatigued because of the day. And I'm not saying that was the reason what happened, but it's It's amazing when you look back and you see all the little things that happened from that night to the next morning. Waking up, my back was really bad. Maybe I shouldn't hit balls that night before the next day as much as I did. But I was really stiff. I got up and I was walking around the community where I rented a house and I couldn't loosen my back up.

1:07:16So now I don't tee off until 2.30 or something like that in the afternoon. and I've got basically eight hours to kill. And so I was a bit worried about that. So anyway, it's all part of it. You have to make that adjustment. As the lead's going away on that final day, and ultimately Nick Faldo ends up winning, what are you thinking about? Look, I didn't think, I never gave up right to the 15th. So when that chip shot in 15th for eagle didn't go in, that was a tough one because I was still believing that I could. And it was that position where if I made three and Nick made five, it was a totally different ball game.

1:08:02At the end of the day, you're fighting with every bit of intensity you've got in you. You're fighting for it. You're fighting for it. You don't dare admit that things are slipping away to yourself. you keep grinding you keep focusing you keep doing stupid little things yourself I used to stick my thumb up underneath my ribcage here and just give myself so much pain to focus on the moment instead of not thinking all this other stuff and that helped oh I used to do that all the time all the time little things like that would trigger you to think about staying the present and forget all the crap that's going through your head and you're flushing the toilet mechanism.

1:08:41Yeah, I used to do that a lot. So you're just fighting for it. Just fight, fight, fight. Winners never quit and quitters never win. So that was one of the great sayings that I always said to myself walking down a fairway. You said losing had those 96 Masters had more of a positive impact on you than winning could have ever had. In what way? Well, first of all, people totally respected the way I dealt with the failure. And when you're expected to do certain things and execute in a certain way, and when you don't and how you handle that failure is to me the most important thing outside of winning because what you do is you actually instill a value to every mom and father out there because the number of people I mean I still have boxes and boxes of fan mails that people wrote me in my house but I went to Benjamin's school the next day and my one of my kids was playing soccer and another parent came up to me and said I want to tell you, you taught me the greatest lesson in life about how you handle that now how I can teach my son and how I should conduct myself going forward and you go, sit back and go wow that's pretty powerful that I've affected another human being as powerfully as that but when I started getting receiving all the letters it resonated through 80 90 percent of the letters that the impact of how I conducted myself sent a huge message to many many many many parents so I said okay you did win you won in life you didn't win the tournament which you I was selfishly so passionate about wanting to win but at the end of the day I actually won in life and the people had more respect for me and the consumers who were going to buy my products looked up to me and say you know what this guy's pretty classy guy you know he took it on the chin I could have not gone into that press conference and walked away in the locker room and said forget everybody I'm going to go home and cry no I gotta take it on the chin that's the responsibility you put yourself in if you want to be in the arena.

1:11:21If you want to go out there, you've got to accept the accolades just as much as accept the punch in the stomach or the face or whatever it is that you self-inflict. So you've got to step up to it. You're going to be man enough to do it. And if you don't, shame on you. And I can name quite a few professional golfers today who've run away from that responsibility, which really, really pisses me off because their responsibility is to the game and is to that tournament. And we're just a pass-through entity. There it is again. We're just a pass-through entity. And yes, you're good enough to put yourself in a position to do it.

1:12:00But when you pass through, you better leave back behind you some legacies and some pretty powerful stuff for the next generation to be able to say, OK, he did a really good job of playing the game of golf but he or she did a really good job of instilling certain values for all of us to study. And in the remaining moments I have with you I want to ask you a little bit about golf today and then the president's the first thing what do you think of the state of the game today? I think I made a very open comment statement in the last year I've never seen the game of golf so healthy on a global front as where it is today.

1:12:39I love it that there a lot of great players have a chance to win any golf tournament. Major championships or PGA Tour events or anywhere you play, there seems to be like I was in the 80s when I had the Ballesteros, myself, the Faldos, the Price's of the World, the Couples of the World, Jose Maria Lathabel, Ian Woosnam, Sandy Lyle, to some degree, Asae Aoki, Jumbo Ozaki. We had 10 or 12 players, and I probably missed out on five, and I apologize for that, but we had 10 or 12 players, no matter where we went in the world to play, we were always going to be up against five or six of those, 10 or 12.

1:13:25So it wasn't like a fait accompli, like you're going to play in some tournament down in Australia and because you're number one in the world and the next one is number 30, they're automatically going to win. No. So for a group of us, we all pushed each other to the limit. Every week, no matter where we were, we knew we were up against three or four other guys that could just take you to lunch and just spit you out, right? So you always had to be on your game. You always had to focus. You always had to be ready for it because I loved that, going there. And now the game of golf is about where it was in the 80s.

1:14:05So no matter where you are in the United States, you're going to go up against the Roy McElroy's, the Henrik Stenson's, and the Tiger Woods' of the world, and the Jordan Spieth's of the world. And you can go down the list. The Patrick Reed. All of a sudden, this base is spreading out. And that's why I think golf is so healthy. And it's going to be great for television. It's going to be great for corporate. and it's going to be great for growing the game of golf. What was it like for you to watch Adam Scott, your fellow Australian, win the Masters to become the first Australian ever to do so and then to thank you the day he won it?

1:14:42Well, I think that was the second time I've actually had a tear in my eye because of the game of golf. I was so happy for him. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I was so happy for him because, you know, I know what it's like to carry that banner of responsibility for your nation. Charlie Earp, my greatest mentor really, said to me, Greg, when you go out and play, you represent two things. You represent the game of golf and your country. So when you go play and everybody was saying, how come an Australian has never won the Masters in all these decades since the tournament's been inception? And you go, wow, how come that is not to be?

1:15:20And I came close enough times, right? And everybody says, well, how come the Australians can't win it, right? And then when an Australian does win it, you go, yes, we've checked that box because we should have won it. Before me, it should have happened. And then it happens to a great mate of mine who, fortunately for me, came up through my foundation. And all of a sudden you go, well, that's even more of a cooler story. And that's why I shed a tear for him because A for my country and B for Adam and C for the game of golf. and the rest is history. Rory McIlroy, what do you think of him? Look, I love his attitude.

1:16:02I love that he says something and realizes he made a mistake in saying it or the wrong inflection, and he'll come out and apologize. He's a human being, and I love it. I love that where instead of having your guard up all the time and just not answering the question the right way and just say the way it is. You know, he shows it with his play. He has no fear. He's going to step up the plate and he makes mistakes. He can call top a three-wood. He can take a seven. But, you know, at the end of the day, he walks off with that beautiful Irish smile and does the interview and doesn't blame anybody except he may have just had a bad day.

1:16:46You know, and I love that attitude he has. What do you think of Tiger as a player and then personally? Personally, I don't know him. Even though we live half a mile from each other, I wouldn't have said one word to Tiger Woods in 10 years. Which is unusual because when you moved to... President's Cup at Royal Melbourne, we probably said four words and that's it. Which is kind of strange. Because when you moved to the area, Jack Nicklaus was here, you reached out. Yeah, to me it was my responsibility if I'm going into a person's backyard that is the figurehead of the game of golf, I'm going to go knock on his door and say, hey, Jack, I'm here.

1:17:29Can you give me some advice on how I can boom, boom, boom? And Jack opened his arms up to me. Jack embraced me. Jack helped me big time and took a lot of pressure off him. He welcomed me to the area. And I went on to winning major championships. And I complimented Jack for it because that's what it's all about. That's what camaraderie and sportsmanship and team spirit's all about. And look, I'm not looking for it, number one, but I kind of surprised myself that as close as we live, and I don't have anything against Tiger Woods. There is a perceived drift between the two of you. Do you know what the kind of genesis of that is?

1:18:14I think that's just the media making it up. But look, at the end of the day, like I said, I haven't had a conversation with Tiger Woods for anybody to predetermine there is a barrier there. I'm willing to, happy to, you know. But that's his choice. People have their choice in life. That's it. It's not going to take any skin off of my nose. I'm just going to keep doing my life and enjoying Jupiter Island that have been here since 1991. How many presidents have you golfed with?

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1:19:28Three. Three. Both Bushes and Clinton. Did you tell about when the White House called when President Clinton was in office? Yes, that was his first term in office. And the President was going to go down to Australia to have his first presidential visit there. And it just happened to be the week of the Australian Open. I get a call from the White House saying, you know, President Clinton's going to be in Australia and he would really love to have a game of golf with you. and I go, well, it's a week of the Australian Open. I don't know whether I can, so I hang up the phone. I said, I'll get back to you.

1:20:08I just didn't hang up the phone. So the first person I called was President Bush 41. I said, Mr. President, I just had a call from the White House and I really don't agree with, I'm not a Democrat, I'm a Republican and I don't agree with some of the decisions and where President Clinton is taking the country, and he's asked me to play golf with him, and I really don't want to play with him. And President Bush says to me, Greg, he said, just respect the position of the President of the United States. You play golf with President Clinton. I said, yes, sir. That's exactly what I said. I said, yes, sir.

1:20:50And then I called back the White House the next day, and I said, okay, here's the situation. President Clinton is going to be there on a Thursday. I normally play in the Australian Open because of my tee times of a schedule around getting the most people to the golf course. I normally play early on Thursday and late on Friday because people get off work Friday and they want to come and watch the last two hours of golf. So I said I can play with him Thursday afternoon. I normally would get done off the golf course around 2 o 'clock. I can play with him around 3. And they said, great, he'll love to do that.

1:21:24where? I said okay New South Wales Golf Club which is our pebble beach of Australia. So boom it all happened right. I play golf go out to New South Wales and meet him he's on the tee waiting and we take off the whole golf course is closed down except for the Secret Service and the cat team are out there and and I've got my caddy Tony Navarro with me and we just take off. And we're playing golf, shooting the breeze, you know, just like you would any other thing. And Air Force One's sitting there and Hillary Clinton's sitting on the plane waiting, waiting, waiting. I only thought we were only going to play about six or eight holes.

1:22:02Well, lo and behold, we make the turn and he wants to keep going. And Air Force One is still sitting there and Hillary's ready to go and we just keep going. And we get around to the 16th hole. It's getting dark now, right? and we're just having I'm having one of the funnest days I've ever had on the golf course because now it's not the president of the United States now it's just Bill Clinton and so we walk off the 16th tee and he says to me show me all your stretching exercises you do so we lay down in the middle of the 16th fairway and we're doing all these different we're on the grass and we're stretching and doing rotations and all that stuff and I looked at my caddy and I said can you believe Tony Navarro said, can you believe we're doing this right now with the President of the United States?

1:22:49He goes, I won't say what he said, but anyway, we chuckled away and we finish. And I said to him, I was open to him. I said, Mr. President, I got to tell you one thing. I said, you have changed my attitude and philosophy about how I approach people from now on. And I was open and honest to him. I said, I had prejudged you. I said, I prejudged you on your political viewpoints and not you as a person. And I said, it taught me a huge lesson. Never prejudge anybody on anybody else's opinion. And we've stayed best friends ever since. I mean, we'll pick up the phone and just say, hey, how you doing?

1:23:27What's going on? Or he might hear I'm over in the Middle East doing something. He'll call me up and say, hey, I know who they're blah, blah, blah. And it's just an incredible relationship. I'm still a Republican. He knows I'm that way. And I give him a little bit of stick too now. And I said to him, you know, as well as I do, your wife would have made a better president than the existing one right now. And he can't say anything, but I can. So it's interesting how, and if I had made the decision on a bad judgment, shame on me. And I have never to this day prejudging anybody and that's why I don't prejudge Tiger Woods because I don't know the guy you know and that's his choice in life I can only go on what I see and that's his golf game and I'll make a comment on his golf game and and how he swing looks I'm just as much as a professional at the game is what he is and if I am asked a question I will give an honest answer that's no slight on him that's just a comment that I see on his game of golf so you know I don't prejudge anybody.

1:24:35What were you thinking when he was famously taken away from your house in an ambulance? The sitting president? Yeah, it was just a shock, really, quite honestly. Expect the unexpected is probably the... I've developed a lot of great friendships from that moment in time, from the head of the counter assault team um you know two individuals that you know it's amazing what two seconds will do to a person's life you know when he got his heel caught and fell down the stairs and i mean i've had three knee surgeries because he landed on my knee so oh really yeah i had to catch him so and uh you know so he fell on my knee and my knee had buckled down and i I couldn't move because we didn't know what was wrong with him.

1:25:31And so his entire weight was on my knee. It was just... But I took one for the team. And you didn't want to move because... Well, I couldn't. I couldn't, you know. And he's down. He can't move. He's hurt. You know, he's in a lot of pain. And now all of a sudden, in a matter of seconds, we're surrounded by the team. And the doctor comes running down and trying to make a quick assessment of what was going on. You've obviously have and continue to have a fascinating life and have a lot of great stories. It's really been a treat. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I enjoyed it. Yeah, appreciate it.

1:26:06Thanks for listening to the In-Depth with Graham Bensinger podcast. You can also find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter at Graham Bensinger and visit GrahamBensinger.com for TV times in your area. Also, don't forget to check out our YouTube channel at YouTube.com slash Graham Bensinger for hours of extra content. If you enjoyed this episode, please give us a rating and review on iTunes or wherever else you listen. This has been the In-Depth with Graham Bensinger podcast.