I’m in the double digits of tour wins out here. When I first turned pro about 20 years ago, the physio room was nonexistent. Massages, before or after the round, were uncommon. The tour had a trailer that maybe a couple of guys would be in, but it was nothing like today. Now, in any given week, there’s probably 10 full-time masseuses that pros hire on the side for physical therapy, plus the tour has its own physios that the non-superstars will use. Basically, if you’re ranked in the top 70, you probably have a private guy.
Monday is a busy day in the physio room when everybody travels in. This is when you want to get back to full flush or somewhat normal. Immediately get the massage so that you can work out and be full strength for when the work week really begins on Tuesday. On tournament days, some guys get treatments before and after the round. Pre-round is to stretch and make sure everything in your body feels all right; post-round is to get all the bad stuff out. Some will do it after a workout in gym clothes; others will strip down to their underwear as you would for a normal massage.
The physio room has kind of become our little sanctuary, the one place nobody can get to us or hear us. It’s our safe space. You’ll hear plenty of chirping and talking about the round. We make fun of the physios, too, and they give it right back to us. It’s a lot like locker rooms used to be. Other than at Augusta where the locker room is strictly for players only, the locker rooms week in and week out aren’t actually our locker rooms. They’re overrun with, how do I say this … people. Not that that’s a bad thing because most of these people do a ton of work for us. We just have to be more careful. In the physio room, I can say whatever I want without repercussions.
The player who pays for “priority access” is going to get the table first. Fair’s fair.
The physio room is different than the fitness trailer, which is an 18-wheeler with walls that expand to turn into a traveling gym. Where the physio room is depends on the availability of spaces at each club. Sometimes a couple of tables are tucked away in a corner of the locker room; sometimes it’s in the women’s locker room; sometimes it’s in some random room of the clubhouse; and sometimes it’s just a tent set-up. Typically, the tour does a good job of making it private, even as our need for a larger space has increased.
The physio I work with has about six or seven other pros as clients, so we’re each always fighting for our spot. The key is when everyone’s tee time is. One year at the Genesis—I was using a different guy at the time—there was a long rain delay, and he had a line of five pros wanting to get work done before we had to go back out. Watching everyone try to schedule him for a few minutes was quite funny.
Some guys pay extra for preferential treatment. If a private physio works with five guys and they all come off the course at the same time and want to be treated, the player who pays for “priority access” is going to get the table first. Fair’s fair. As for the physios the tour employs, their services are complimentary to us—and we don’t have to tip them either. Same goes for the medical trailer, which will also have physical therapists, chiropractors, osteopaths, etc.
For me, it’s been eye-opening realizing how critical physical therapy is for golfers. With the number of balls we hit, we make such a repetitive motion at high speeds. I used to get a lot of minor injuries early in my career, and they all stemmed from not doing enough physical therapy before and after rounds. When I was young, my trainer and I would do a brief warmup before the round, some stretching and some movement stuff that I still do today. But after the round, I was on my own. I might do a workout that night, but I was never doing a 30-minute PT session, getting massaged, doing cupping or dry needling or sauna or cold plunge. All that stuff, you do it, and you realize, man, my body does feel much better. The physios have reinvented how we warm up and cool down, and it’s all in the name of injury prevention. I’d bet money there’s been a lot fewer guys with major “soft tissue” injuries the past five years, whether it’s back, rib, wrist or shoulder issues.
The top guys gravitate toward private physios for consistency of care. You want to see the same people every day, get the same hands on you. We’re all creatures of habit. —With Christopher Powers
