Texas Children's Houston Open

Memorial Park Golf Course



The Loop

Video: The (much) lighter side of Ben Crane

January 14, 2011

Ben Crane first opened eyes to his comedic flair with a video examining his unorthodox workout routine (see below).  Three months later, the latest installment in the series is out.

Adorned in the same helmet and skin-tight suit, the player sheds a light on his curious pre-round preparation.

#iframe:|||="" height="385" width="470">

__In October, Matt Ginella spoke to Crane about his initial video effort.

__


"If you have something bottled up inside of you, go straight to the snake shaker."*

That's a quote from Ben Crane in a workout video recently released on his website (bencranegolf.com). Crane is a nine-year veteran on the PGA Tour, who has three wins, career earnings of more than $13 million, and a reputation for having as much personality as a dollar bill. So who knew he had a spoof video worthy of Saturday Night Live bottled up inside of him?

"People think of me as being Christian and a slow player," says Ben Crane. "And both of those are associated with being no fun."

Which is why Crane, his caddie, Joel Stock, and a close friend, Sam Martin, went to the gym at Vaquero in Westlake, Tex., and cut a 70-second takeoff of Crane working out. The goal: help tear down his dull image.

"If the image of tour players is X, my image is X times two," says Crane. "I'm serious about my relationship with Christ, walking with Jesus, my wife, my family and I play slow, but ask people close to me, they'll tell you there's more to me than just that."

Crane says his mini-production team took a day in May for the shoot, and then sat on the release of the video for a few months, until they were able to show it to Crane's sponsors. "Sam and I make a perfect team," says Crane. "He's creative and very good at what he does; I have a rock-solid image of being boring."

The feedback from sponsors was unanimous -- it's hysterical. But the video wouldn't have floated the stream of social media if it didn't get the approval of Crane's toughest critic, Heather, his wife. "My wife is the best judge of funny," says Crane. "There's no courtesy laugh in her. When she said it was funny, we knew we might have something."

Crane said he first enjoyed some measure of comedic success when he made a video short for a friend's birthday party. The friend was Mike Meldman, CEO of the Discovery Land Co., and the party was well attended by celebrities, including George Clooney.

"(Clooney) must've have told me three times how much he liked it," Crane said. "He said we made the party."

Crane gives credit to Greg Rose of the Titleist Performance Institute for coming up with the idea of shooting a workout video. Look for more to come. "This will not be a one-hit wonder," says Crane. "Maybe not every one will be this funny, but we have more in the pipeline."

Crane spoke to me as we speak, "from the now, in the middle of now." Watch the video. It will all make sense.

*--**Matt Ginella *