Why 3-time major winner thinks everyone should try … a Happy Gilmore swing

“Happy Gilmore 2,” the much-anticipated sequel to the much-beloved golf comedy, is missing someone, Padraig Harrington says. 

Someone kinda perfect. 

Harrington, actually. 

“I’ll watch it, yeah, yeah,” the three-time major winner said. “Watch it more for the cameos, I think, more than anything else. Yeah, it should be a bit of fun. 

“Disappointed they didn’t ask the best person in the world doing a ‘Happy Gilmore’ to be in it, but there you go. Maybe I would have shown ’em up.”

He’s joking, of course, but you can also argue he’s not being hyperbolic. Coming out this year, the movie starring comedian Adam Sandler appears to include roles for some of golf’s best; major winners Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka are among those seen in early looks. But it’s likely none of them can swing the swing made famous by Sandler in playing the fictional golfer as squarely as Harrington. Ahead of last week’s event on the PGA Tour Champions circuit, he said he’d even considered trying the move — which features a few steps to the ball before a full-send swing — in tournament play, and he did give it a go ahead of the 2014 PGA Championship (watch here), and again during a practice round at the 2014 Shriners Children’s Open (watch here).

Thing is, though, Harrington’s been doing it a while — the Irishman said he grew up playing the sport of hurling, which includes a moving swing (watch here) — and he sees a benefit.

Your turn to the ball will improve, Harrington said.        

“Look, it’s second nature to me,” he said. “I grew up playing hurling so I’ve never had a second thought about doing a ‘Happy Gilmore,’ running up, hitting it. I did consider using it in tournament play. I tried to tidy it up a bit. So if you look at my old ‘Happy Gilmores,’ they are full-out 130-mph golf swings. I did try and tidy it up to see if I could maybe use it on the golf course. I could swing faster, but just didn’t quite get the strike of a normal shot so it wasn’t really worth it. I haven’t done one for ages and I do it straight away. 

“As I said, there’s a great Irish sport, probably the best sport in the world called hurling and it’s second nature for us to swing at a ball with a stick, usually with somebody else trying to hit you at the same time. I don’t know if it just builds up a natural confidence with it.

“And every kid should do it, every kid should be doing ‘Happy Gilmores’ because it perfects the right movement in the golf swing, it perfects the right pivot. Everything about it is good for your golf swing. So everybody should try it and do it and their golf swing should be a tidied-up version of that.”

It’s a thought he’s had for a while. On a 2016 video for Golf Pass, Harrington even told host Martin Hall that he picks up a few miles per hour on his regular swing after practicing with the Gilmore move, which led to the following exchange:

Asked Hall, a GOLF Top 100 Lifetime Achievement Teacher: “Now obviously you’re incredibly talented, you grew up in Ireland playing hurling, this is not difficult for you. Is it something you would recommend all golfers to do, or just better players?”

Said Harrington: “I really recommend it for kids. It’s a great drill because you can’t overswing in the backswing. You watch this — so as I’m running up, I can only go this far [a standard-looking backswing] because I’m going forward. It’s the same as if you were playing hockey. It would be very hard to hit a puck — you would never think of doing this [an overswing]. You’d have no time to get to it. So your nice, short, tight backswing.”

Asked Hall: “How many steps would you back?”

Said Harrington: “I could do as many as I like. I do a two-swing step on the range because literally there’s a guy hitting here and a guy here, so I’m a bit worried about running. But I could actually do a full run-up, it wouldn’t bother me.”

That movie, err video, can be seen here.   

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