Before the Gold Rush

Netflix ‘Full Swing’ captures Wyndham Clark before, during, and after breakthrough season

By Jim Bebbington

As promised, the new season of Netflix’ documentary on the 2023 PGA Tour season ‘Full Swing’ includes a lot of Wyndham Clark

The season’s third episode, called “Mind Game,” juxtaposes Clark’s 2023 early season with that of fellow PGA Tour pro Joel Dahmen.

Wyndham Clark at beginning of Netflix ‘Full Swing’ season 2.

By late 2022 Clark had been warned by his agent and caddy that if he did not do something to change his mental approach to the game they were going to have to move on from him.

“I had a lot of people on my team were pretty much telling me see a sports psychologist or we’re done,” Clark says in the episode.

We meet him during the Netflix broadcast when he was No. 109 in the World Golf Rankings.

Today, roughly a year later, he is No. 4.

What happened?

According to the episode, Clark embraced the work of sports psychologist Julie Elion.

“I had trained my mind over years of belittling myself and thinking negatively, locking myself in rooms and not coming out for a long time or drinking to excess or being mean to people,” Clark said. “I didn’t want to play golf.”

The episode captures several conversations between Clark and Elion, and shows her coaching him to be both humble and cocky.

“Sports psychology, mental coaching has taken off,” Elion says. “People are using this line of work way more often than five years ago.”

Clark blazed to glory in 2023, winning twice during the season and cementing himself as one of the Tour’s best players. His win at the U.S. Open is a turning point in the episode.

Dahmen, conversely, resists counseling. He and his caddie Geno Bonnalie stuggled throughout the season – when Clark won the U.S. Open, Dahmen missed the cut.

Golf is hard.

The episode is part of Netflix’s eight-episode season 2 of Full Swing.

 

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Colorado AvidGolfer Magazine is the state’s leading resource for golf and the lifestyle that surrounds it, publishing eight issues annually and proudly delivering daily content via coloradoavidgolfer.com.

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Jim Bebbington is the Director of Content at Colorado AvidGolfer. Contact him at [email protected]