BySteve Todd, europeantour.com
He is the most decorated Olympian in history, with 18 gold medals and 22 in total, but even swimming legend Michael Phelps admits to nerves when he plays golf in front of a crowd.
The American, who is an Omega ambassador, joined defending Richie Ramsay in the Pro-Am ahead of this week’s Omega European Masters, as he continues his quest for self-improvement in a notoriously challenging, and often frustrating, sport.
Whilst clearly more comfortable diving into a pool than teeing it up amongst The European Tour’s finest, Phelps is far from a fish out of water on the golf course.
The last time he played in a European Tour event, the 28 year old holed a monster 150ft putt at Kingsbarns in the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, believed to be the longest putt ever televised.
Since then he has starred on The Haney Project, a Golf Channel show aimed at helping him with his golf game, and last week he shot his lowest nine-hole total of 41 around Caves Valley Country Club in Baltimore.
So, is the transition from the most successful Olympian in the record books to accomplished golfer as smooth as his famed swimming stroke?
“Sometimes my game is really good, and sometimes it looks like I just learned how to play,” he said.
“It is a very frustrating game. I’m still in the process of learning so being able to play with Richie will be great. I always try to pick people’s brains and see what information I can get out of them to help my own game. Hopefully I can ask him a couple of questions today and improve a bit.
“I’ve started to relax a little more in front of a crowd when playing. At the beginning, I didn’t like it when people watched me play, but I have started to tune it out and try to remember some of the things I learned on the Haney project.”
As a 23-handicapper, Phelps is striving for consistency above anything else, but for a man used to the adrenaline rush of Olympic glory, repeating mammoth putts like his record-breaking effort in Scotland last year also holds its appeal.
“I should have retired after I made that putt,” he joked. “It’s never going to happen again! I got super lucky and one of the guys who is playing today, Paul Casey, I played with then. Paul Casey. I’m looking forward to seeing him throughout the week. Hopefully I can just go out and hit as many good shots as I can.”
“In a lot of other sports I’ve been able to do, I’ve picked it fairly easy. This is a sport I haven’t been able to do that. I’m not as consistent as I am in other sports. It is a challenge for me. A lot of my friends can destroy me and it is very frustrating. I’m trying to catch them a little bit and a couple of them haven’t had a hole in one, so I’d like to have one before them as it would fire them a bit. It’s just the competition I love.”
