Modern professional golf looks very different from the game it was 20 years ago. Today’s players travel constantly, train like elite athletes and rely heavily on support teams to stay healthy and competitive throughout a relentless season. At the heart of that support system on the HotelPlanner Tour are Therapy Lead Poora Singh and Strength and Conditioning Lead William Wayland. Between them, they help players manage everything from recovery and rehabilitation to training, sleep and workload management — all while navigating the unique pressures of life on tour.

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What does a typical tournament week look like for you both?

Poora Singh: During a typical week on the DP World Tour and HotelPlanner Tour, we’ll usually arrive on the Monday and recce the venue. We’ll find out where the treatment unit is, where access to emergency services is, where the gym and recovery areas are and all those kinds of things. Then we’ll start on Tuesday morning. On the HotelPlanner Tour, players book 30-minute treatment sessions through our booking system, and we’ll usually work from around 10am until 6pm.

Once the tournament starts, the days become much longer. Wednesday is a pro-am day, so we’ll start at 7am and work through until 6pm. That then continues through Thursday, Friday and Saturday, with Sunday usually finishing around lunchtime. On average, we’ll each see around 18 players a day, so it can be very intense.

On the DP World Tour, there are more physios and no booking system because there are usually three physios on at all times. The working day runs from an hour and a half before the first tee time until an hour and a half after the final group comes in. At events like The Open, where tee times can start at 6am, you’re arriving at 4am or 4:30am. The hours are demanding, but that comes with the territory.

William Wayland: I generally arrive on the Monday as well and assess what facilities we have available. Sometimes we’ll have a gym truck on site, but that’s not always the case on the HotelPlanner Tour, so we often have to find local gyms or training facilities nearby and organise access for players during the week.

Typically, I’m there from early Tuesday morning until around 6pm, then the same again on Wednesday.

Most of the work is one-to-one coaching with players. That can include physical testing, training sessions, programming adjustments or rehab support where players have been referred over by the physios.

There are also players who work with us regularly throughout the season, while others might only come in occasionally for assessments or specific help.

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How physically demanding is modern professional golf compared to what people might expect?

WW: The sport has become increasingly physically demanding and you can see that in the players themselves. They’re taller, heavier, more muscular, more explosive and generally much stronger than golfers were 20 years ago. That tells you something fundamental has changed in the nature of the game.

In the past, there wasn’t a huge physical gap between golfers and athletes in other sports. Now, the physicality of elite golfers has changed dramatically, particularly over the last two decades, and that’s reflected in the style of golf they play.

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What are the most common injuries or issues you deal with?

PS: If we’re talking purely about areas of the body, lower back issues are the most common, followed closely by hips, necks, shoulders, wrists and knees.

A lot of what we see are fatigue-based injuries. Players might have been on the road for six or seven weeks straight, not recovering properly, not sleeping well enough or not maintaining good nutrition and training habits.

You have to remember they could be hitting 200 to 300 balls a day, then playing tournament rounds, finishing late in the evening, trying to recover and eat properly, then waking up at 5am for another early tee time. It’s incredibly demanding physically. If those recovery habits aren’t in place, eventually the body struggles to keep up.

Then there are also the more unpredictable injuries. A player can hit a hidden root or a heavy divot and hurt their wrist, elbow or shoulder. We’ve had players tear calf muscles or Achilles tendons after slipping on hills. But generally, I’d say the biggest risk comes from repetition and volume rather than the sport itself.

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Is the growing emphasis on speed in golf contributing to those injuries?

PS: Absolutely. Everybody wants to hit the ball further now, but to create speed you also need the ability to control and decelerate that speed safely. That only comes from proper conditioning, training and understanding how the body works.

WW: To tolerate those forces, you need a certain level of physical robustness. If players don’t have that — or if they’re constantly chasing more speed — eventually tissue tolerance breaks down somewhere and that’s usually when injuries happen.

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So a large part of your work is injury prevention rather than simply treatment?

PS: Definitely. A huge part of what we do is education. We try to teach players good habits and help them understand that while manual therapy and treatment have their place, you can’t beat good athletic habits, sensible training and proper nutrition.

Those things are what keep players healthy and available to compete week after week.

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What recovery methods are players relying on most during tournaments?

WW: The biggest thing for us is what we call performance lifestyle planning. At the top of that is sleep. Everything is downstream from sleep. If players aren’t sleeping properly, injury risk goes up, illness risk goes up, fatigue increases and performance suffers. We spend a lot of time talking about sleep hygiene — keeping rooms cool and dark, avoiding screens and stimulants before bed and creating a proper environment for recovery.

Nutrition is another huge factor. One thing we often see during the season is players unintentionally losing weight because they underestimate how many calories they’re burning. If they lose muscle mass and strength across the season, injury risk increases and performance can drop.

Then there’s training itself. We want players following well-rounded strength and conditioning programmes that support what they’re trying to achieve physically.

One thing we always say is to avoid making dramatic changes during the season. Introducing too much novelty mid-season can create problems.

There’s also the mental side of tour life. It can be lonely and mentally draining, so having strong relationships with friends, coaches and family is incredibly important.

Finally, we encourage players to monitor how much golf they’re actually playing. Golfers often manage their own workloads and sometimes they’re not very good at recognising when they’re doing too much.

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Poora, you’ve been around the game for nearly two decades. How have you seen golfers change during that time?

PS: Massively. When I first came into golf, player support was incredibly basic. You’d have a treatment table in the locker room and maybe a few resistance bands.

I came from a high-performance athletics background where sports science and conditioning were already standard, so when I joined golf I was shocked by how little of that existed. A lot of it was cultural. Golf had this old-school mentality where people believed weights would make golfers slower and that players only needed to practise golf itself.

Over time, through the work of the European Tour Performance Institute and the support systems on the HotelPlanner Tour and DP World Tour, we’ve helped re-educate players and coaches about the athletic side of performance.

Now, players understand that if they want to compete consistently across six or seven events in a row, they need to treat themselves like elite athletes. I’m genuinely very proud of how far things have come.

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What separates the players who stay healthy all year from those who struggle physically?

PS: The players who stay healthy are usually the ones with the best habits and routines. Some younger players still come from environments where they’ve been told to just play golf and everything else will take care of itself. But once they experience life on tour, they realise very quickly that isn’t enough.

The standard on the HotelPlanner Tour and DP World Tour is incredibly high. If you can win on the HotelPlanner Tour, you’re good enough to compete at the very highest level. The players who succeed long-term are the ones who look at what elite players are doing and adopt those same professional habits around training, nutrition and recovery.

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You also seem to create a relaxed and supportive environment for players. How important is that?

PS: It’s a very conscious part of what we do because tour life can be lonely. We want players to feel comfortable coming into our space, whether that’s for treatment, recovery or simply to switch off mentally for a while. Sometimes a player just wants to sit in recovery boots, listen to music and relax. Sometimes they need somewhere quiet to sleep for an hour. It’s about creating an environment where players feel safe and supported.

WW: It becomes a kind of third space for players. They spend all day around competitors, either on the course or in the clubhouse, so having somewhere they can properly relax and let their guard down makes a huge difference.

Some players don’t even come in to train — they just want to sit down and talk. That in itself can be really valuable during a long season.

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Is it difficult stopping players from overtraining?

WW: It depends on the individual because golfers tend to be very process-driven people. A lot of them want to optimise everything — sleep, diet, routines, recovery — and because golf is such a technical and psychological sport, players can become very analytical about performance. We encourage them to take a balanced, holistic approach rather than becoming obsessed with any one method. But generally, if players overdo anything, it’s usually golf itself.

One of the biggest injury mechanisms in golf is simply too much golf. We rarely see injuries caused by sensible strength and conditioning work. It’s usually the repetitive volume of golf practice and competition that creates problems.

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How important is it for the two of you to work closely together?

WW: We work as part of a multi-disciplinary team, so we’re constantly referring players between each other. A player might come to Poora with an issue and then be referred to me because there are underlying strength or movement deficiencies that need addressing.

Likewise, if I feel something is more medical or rehab-focused and outside my expertise, I’ll refer the player back to Poora. It’s a very collaborative relationship.

PS: The medical team is involved as well. If we feel a player needs scans or medical assessment, we’ll bring the doctor in and make decisions together. The players are always looked after collectively.

WW: It also helps that me and Poora genuinely like each other. That makes the whole environment work better because there’s trust within the team.

PS: I trust Will completely and I know the players are in world-class hands with him.

That’s a huge part of building a successful multi-disciplinary team — making sure everyone is highly skilled, experienced and working together towards the same goal.

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Main Image: Harry Grimshaw

The post Behind the ropes with European Tour Performance Institute appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

The pasting the Americans tasted two years ago at the Marco Simone Golf and Country Club in Rome at the hands of Luke Donald’s Europeans will still be rankling their rivals over the water and history has not exactly been kind to visiting teams on US soil over the decades.

It’s been 13 long years since Europe last triumphed in the States, one of only four away victories it has tasted since 1979.

On and off the course, everything will need to be working like clockwork in the Europeans’ favour for Donald’s men at Bethpage Black Course in Farmingdale and the unassuming but fiercely competitive and detailed Englishman is leaving no stone unturned as he seeks a rare repeat win in golf’s greatest and most historic team test.

Donald has accordingly assembled a formidable arsenal of experienced Ryder Cup know-how with his vice-captains, Eduardo Molinari and Thomas Bjorn, and a backroom team of equally impressive expertise.

Dr/Prof Andrew Murray, Chief Medical and Scientific Officer, DP World Tour, and Sport and Exercise, University of Edinburgh

Dr Andrew Murray, Chief Medical and Scientific Officer for the DP World Tour, who also leads health and performance for the R&A, the Open Championship, also boasts a resumé that covers Olympics, Paralympics and World Athletics Championships among other top sporting events, is another vital cog in that smooth-running engine and could yet make a significant difference without, of course, hitting a ball.

It’s his job to keep Team Europe fit, mentally and physically, and focused on the mighty job in hand and the recent Team Cup, pitching many of the likely players in the biennial clash between GB & Ireland and Continental Europe at Abu Dhabi Golf Resort was a Ryder Cup dress rehearsal for both the pros and Dr Murray.

Don’t get us wrong, the Team Cup is a very serious sporting clash that carries important bragging rights within the European pro community on Tour for the next two years but naturally much of the focus was still firmly on New York and the Ryder Cup showdown from September 25-28 when the teams locked horns in the first week of January.

Ryder Cup New York 2025 – Luke Donald and Keegan Bradley – Andrew Redington

Dr Murray suggested in an exclusive interview with Golf Digest Middle East that the Europeans under Donald’s meticulous planning that reaped such rewards in 2023 in Italy, were already shaping up impressively with a close-knit team spirit clearly in evidence at the Team Cup.

“Luke Donald is a fantastic captain, extremely evident from the work that he did at Marco Simone. But I think what a good captain does is bring on board the right professionals that have got expertise in specific areas and help inform and make sure that everything that we can do to support optimal performance for our players is done,” he said.

“Culturally, Team Europe has always looked to work together and build on whatever advantage they’ve got, and you can really see that at what happened at Marco Simone, in particular looking forward to New York as well.

“Luke’s very collaborative, he’s got a great group of vice captains there and a great group of staff who are looking to support the players and make sure that we can help with performance and in my role, help with illness and any injury or other concerns that they have got.”

Just as is the case with all sports, the top professionals are susceptible to injury and illness and Dr Murray and his team are certainly doing all they can to ensure all the cream of European golf pitch up in the States, fully fit and ready to rumble come September.

Certainly, they won’t be short of backroom expertise and amazing facilities to keep them firing on all cylinders. Dr Murray describes a week-in-week-out fitness and wellness travelling provision for the DP World Tour players that would put many leading gyms – and specialist medical centres – to shame.

“We know that our golfers are always looking to see how they can hit the ball further and closer to the hole and week in week out on the DP World Tour, and there’s a number of services that we provide to them,” said the genial Scot with admirable understatement, before listing all on offer.

“There’s a well-equipped gym to help with strength, and power, flexibility. There is a strength and conditioning coach to help support with that, physiotherapists.

“We’ve got performance nutritionists and player-focused dining in the players’ lounges, we’ve got mental fitness, we have got medical professionals, we’ve got the ability to scan using diagnostic ultra-sound on site, we have skin screening, heart health assessments; basically, all the things that we have spoken to the players about and introduced based on player feedback.”

Rory McIlroy – Ryder Cup – Richard Heathcote

For the Team Cup and Ryder Cup, the standards don’t drop a millimetre, he says. “In the team environment, we are very much guided again by the captain and by the vice-captains and by the players themselves. We know the science of it but we’re really keen just to make sure that what we put in is appropriate for golf.”

But it’s not just the incredible facilities that are ensuring the players stay on the fairways, albeit that four-fifths of them will encounter some kind of injury and illness that will keep them sidelined for at least part of an average season which, let’s face it, lasts pretty much all the calendar year these days.

“Golf is a sport that has got a huge range of health benefits; we know that golf is good for length of life, it’s good for mental health, and it’s good for physical health,” said Dr Murray, a very accomplished ultra runner in his own right and government advisor on health.

“But injuries and illness do occur and if you look at injuries in particular, we do a regular survey of all our players and publish that, and hand and wrist and lower back are the two areas that we see professionals injure most frequently.

“And it’s a relatively lower risk compared to some other sports but 80% of golfers will get injured in any particular year because they play so much in terms of practice and competition.

“In terms of illnesses, again they are human beings so you get the same illnesses that you might expect from people that travel a lot. So, spending a lot of time in grass, we see a lot of hay fever, we see a lot of people with asthma, general illnesses, influenzas, that you might get around this time of year, gut ache, and things like that.

“Actually, a lot of that can be prevented so the modern-day pro and those of have played a few Ryder Cups and have been on the DP World Tour for a while tend to sleep really well, they’ve got good strategies, they manage jet lag and travel fatigue, they tend to take care of their nutrition, so plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables, anything that’s colourful except for Skittles (!) tends to work.

“Again, you’ve got people being fastidious in terms of their hand hygiene, making sure that if they’ve got any illness that they report that early.”

Ryder Cup 2018 – David Cannon

Dr Murray and his team will also be focusing on the team’s mental preparations – it will not be easy walking on to that first tee come September with thousands of Americans urging you to carve it out of bounds. Again, according to Dr Murray, Donald will have left nothing to chance that he has any control over.

“An away Ryder Cup is very different to a home Ryder Cup. That might be due to travel considerations, it might be due to the amount of support that you have got. You’re likely to have largely a crowd that is cheering for Team US in New York so that’s different and there’s also the type of course and set-up that’s there,” he said.

“So, each of those elements will be being planned for by Luke. You’ve got people like Eduardo Molinari, who’s unbelievable at knowing our players really well and that statistics of what may be helpful for the Ryder Cup, and it’s like anything really.

“If you’re up against a specific challenge or you’ve got an opportunity of taking on a challenge, it’s working out what that challenge is and how you can best prepare for it as well. So, there’s no doubt that an away Ryder Cup is a really big opportunity and requires a different type of preparation from a home Ryder Cup.”

The Team Cup, Dr Murray believes, will have given many of the Europeans at least a taster of the kind of pressure cooker atmosphere they’ll be facing in nine months’ time.

“The players already know each other pretty well and are really looking forward to the change in the team environment, they’re really embracing that, they’re really embracing the information that they’ll get from this.

“They’re looking forward to the opportunity to get out there and test some partnerships and work together so there’s a great buzz about the Team Cup. The players love being in this region, they love being in the Middle East, and that’s not just for the weather, not just for the golf courses, not just for the fantastic support that they get, it’s for events like this. It’s something different.

“It’s like the Team Cup, it’s like the Hero Dubai Desert Classic next week so this week has been meticulous preparation by each of the captains, Francesco (Molinari), and Justin (Rose), and by Luke Donald, just to try to get the best result possible this week for GB & Ireland and Continental Europe but also to look ahead to future events as well.”

Main Image: Richard Heathcote

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By Kent Gray
Jumeirah Golf Estates’ world-class training academy has jettisoned its European Tour endorsement to put Peter Cowen’s name above the door.

Formerly the European Tour Performance Institute, JGE’s facility will become the third Peter Cowen Golf Academy to fall under the auspices of Dubai Golf, joining academies at Emirates Golf Club and Dubai Creek Golf & Yacht Club.

A long-held industry secret, the partnership between the world-renowned English coach to the stars and the host venue of the European Tour’s season-ending DP World Tour Championship was confirmed on Wednesday.

Cowen coaches some of the biggest names in the game including 2016 Open Champion Henrik Stenson, 2016 DP World Tour Championship winner Matthew Fitzpatrick and former world No.1 Lee Westwood. He also helps three-time major champion Brooks Koepka with his short game.

The announcement comes after Dubai Golf assumed management of JGE in October, meaning it oversees Dubai’s two European Tour venues. Emirates G.C. hosted the 30th-anniversary edition of the Omega Dubai Desert Classic in January.

Related: Dubai Golf assumes management of Jumeirah Golf Estates

“I have been coming to Dubai and Jumeirah Golf Estates for a number of years now and I am very proud of my association with the club, with many of my players enjoying success at the DP World Tour Championship,” said Cowen.

Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images
Cowen works with many of the game’s biggest names including former Open champion Henrik Stenson.

“The Peter Cowen Golf Academy Dubai will be a place for all players from beginners through to elite to come and get the most out of their game. The facilities at Jumeirah Golf Estates are unparalleled to anywhere in the world, and the players whom I work with around the time of the DP World Championship and Omega Dubai Desert Classic love to use the club and its facilities. I look forward to continuing my relationship with Jumeirah Golf Estates and Dubai Golf for many years to come.”

The Peter Cowen Golf Academy Dubai at JGE will officially open its doors late this month.

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Most of us are familiar with the traditional method of playing a greenside splash shot – where you stand open to the target, open the clubface and swing along the line of your feet. Well in this drill, European Tour Performance Institute director of instruction Mark Gregson-Walters tells you to park that theory. “Instead, try standing closed to the target [that’s pointing right for a right-hander], and opening the clubface so it points even further to the right,” he says. “By swinging back down towards the target, you will get an instant feel for how the club should enter the sand correctly. It’s a great drill for good bunker players to sharpen their skills, and for players who struggle with sand shots, it can even serve as your go-to method when you’re out on the course.”

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Groove a more powerful hip action in your downswing with this drill
By Mark Gregson-Walters
With Robbie Greenfield

[divider] [/divider]

ore than just about any other layout on the European Tour, the Earth course here at Jumeirah Golf Estates has proven to be a stage for the best ball strikers in the game. Guys that can hit the ball long and high have a tremendous advantage on a layout that can stretch to over 7,700 yards and features greens that are so firm and undulating, they repel mis-struck approach shots to some tricky spots.

On some tour stops a hot putter can get the job done, but you need more than that on Earth, as evidenced so clearly during Henrik Stenson’s record-breaking 2013 performance in which he only missed a couple of greens the entire week.

Solid ball striking is critical to success in the DP World Tour Championship, and it’s also what most amateurs strive the hardest to improve. The drill illustrated here will give you instant feedback, and should lead to some good results, too. It’s a sensory exercise that positions your body in such a way that allows you to feel the correct hip action on your downswing for better ball flight and distance control. Most golfers are familiar with the idea that the lower body ‘leads’ on the downswing, but in an effort to clear or ‘fire’ their hips, a lot of amateurs get the sequence of movement badly wrong.

The reality is, the hips must work downward first, allowing weight to transfer from your trail heel to the toes, before rotating through impact. By turning your back foot outward at address, the position of your bones forces the muscles in your trail leg and hip to move correctly to strike the ball. Follow the steps below on the range, and watch the quality  of your ball striking improve.

1
The beauty of this drill is in its simplicity. All you’re doing at set-up (and you can practice this with anything from wedge shots to a 6-iron) is turning your trail foot out to a 45 degree angle, ensuring that your knee joint stays in line with your toes. By moving into this position, it forces your bones to move in the correct way for good hip action during the golf swing

2
Stability is a vital ingredient in any good golf swing. When you analyse the best swings on tour, something they all share in common is the way they use the ground to generate force. From this position at the top, amateurs can give up energy and get out of sync by trying to immediately rotate their hips towards the target. What you should aim to do from here though, is feel your hips work back down, and your weight shift from your trail heel to the ball of your foot.

3
So long as you have kept your trail knee pointing over your toes during this drill, feeling your weight shift from heel to toe on the downswing will really give you the feel for how your hips move back into position ready to rotate and convert this ground force into a powerful connection with the ball. If you slide laterally with your hips from this position, it’s impossible to feel your weight moving onto your toe and you’ll know you haven’t performed the exercise correctly.

Mark Gregson-Walters is the European Tour Performance Institute Director of Instruction

Photos by Farooq Salik

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