Lee Trevino: Underdog at the Top

Lee Trevino likes to tell a joke about two different dogs – a German shepherd and a Chihuahua. Its underdog message mirrors his improbable climb from a poverty-stricken childhood on the wrong side of the Dallas train tracks to fame and fortune as one of the most successful professional golfers in history.Lee Trevino likes to tell a joke about two different dogs – a German shepherd and a Chihuahua. Its underdog message mirrors his improbable climb from a poverty-stricken childhood on the wrong side of the Dallas train tracks to fame and fortune as one of the most successful professional golfers in history.

A policeman walking with his German shepherd wants to get a drink, so he ties the dog up and goes into a bar. Fifteen minutes later, as he is sitting at the bar enjoying a beer, another man walks in and says, “Who owns the German shepherd?”

“I do,” the officer replies. “Why, did he bite you?”

“No,” the man says, “my dog just killed him.”

“Your dog killed mine?” the policeman says. “What kind of dog do you have?”

“A Chihuahua,” the man answers.

“A Chihuahua?” the policeman asks incredulously. “How could a Chihuahua kill a German shepherd?”

“He got stuck in his throat.”

Underdog With Nothing To Lose

Within the ivory tower of the professional golf tour you would have trouble finding an unlikelier candidate for superstardom than Trevino, an eighth-grade dropout raised by his grandfather, an immigrant Mexican gravedigger. To hear Trevino tell it, it is in fact because he has always been the underdog, not despite it, that he has achieved so much success.

“My entire life I’ve been climbing and going up,” he says. “I’ve never been going downhill. I’ve always assumed the underdog role, and it has helped me succeed. Here’s an example: In 1971 at the US Open I went up against Jack Nicklaus in a playoff.

“He had won all of these amateur and professional tournaments and was the biggest thing to ever happen to golf. And who was I? Nobody, compared to him. But it didn’t bother me. There were a lot of players he could intimidate, but not me. And the reason is because I figured all the pressure was on him. He had everything to lose and nothing to win. If he beats me he’s supposed to. Ah, but what if he loses? Then I’m the hero.”

Of course the man they call SuperMex won the US Open that year, defeating Nicklaus in the playoff by three strokes, and then within the month he went on to win the Canadian and British Opens as well. After that stunning year, it was no more Mr. Nobody for Trevino.

In fact, since breaking into the big time with a victory at the 1968 US Open he has won at least one tournament every year, either on the PGA circuit or the senior tour. Does all that success mean he’s had to shed the underdog mentality?

Hardly.

“Everyone has pressure, and I feel it just like everyone else,” he says. “But so does the other guy. Now that I have achieved some success, I can whisper to myself, ‘What the hell; if I don’t win this thing and I don’t beat this guy, it’s no big deal. There’s another tournament next week and I’ve probably already won a heck of a lot more than the other guy is ever going to win.’ So the pressure doesn’t get to me.”

In fact, as Trevino has said before, “You don’t know what pressure is until you play for five bucks with only two in your pocket.” Growing up in a four-room shack with no running water or electricity, young Trevino learned a great deal about this kind of pressure at the nearby Glen Lakes Country Club, where he began caddying (and whenever possible, playing) at age eight. By 1954, when he left school at age 14 to look for work, Trevino had fallen in love with the game. He was hired to help out at a local combination driving range/nine-hole par-3 golf course called Hardy’s.

By this time Trevino was already a pretty fair player, but it wasn’t until 1960, when he returned to Dallas from a four-year stint in the Marine Corps, that the 21-year-old Trevino decided to dedicate himself to the game of golf.

The Practice of a Lifetime

Between 1960 and 1965, Trevino estimates that he had a golf club in his hands an average of 15 hours a day. Virtually every day he followed the same routine: At around 5 a.m. he arrived at the Tennyson public golf course for a quick 18 holes before any matches he had scheduled for the morning.

Next he moved to the practice tee where he methodically hit hundreds of balls until two in the afternoon. After a quick shower he dressed and went to work at Hardy’s, which lasted through eleven or midnight. Even the most dedicated golfers might have soon grown weary of this golf-laden schedule, but not Trevino.

“Self-discipline and practice put me in the position I am today,” he says. “Even when I was young I was always looking to and what was going to happen down the line. It’s because I put the hours in during those years that I gave myself the chance to succeed when the opportunity came up.

“Then, even when I went on tour in 1968, I kept up the same pace. I practiced every day before and after playing 18 holes in the tournament, then I’d go to a driving range that was lit at night and hit golf balls until 11 p.m. But the other guys, they would get through with a round and have a couple of beers in the clubhouse, and then go out to dinner. We were getting home around the same time, but the next morning I’d been practicing and they were trying to shake off a couple of beers.”

Trevino says that he put the practice time to good use as well. Even then he was mercilessly critical of his own game, and worked hard to improve on his major weaknesses.

“If you have the talent,” he explains, “even if you learn skills incorrectly, you can still be successful, but you have to work twice as hard. If you learn correctly how to play, you don’t have to practice as hard to be successful.”

Driven to Fade

In his youth, Trevino had always struggled on his drives with a hook, which, when he mis-hit the ball, would send it well to the left of its intended trajectory. One day he had the opportunity to watch the great Ben Hogan hitting drives. Trevino was impressed with the way Hogan could fade every shot very slightly from left to right – the opposite of a hook. Knowing that Hogan had developed this shot only after years spent hooking the ball, Trevino resolved to master the fade as well.

After some experimentation, Trevino learned that by gripping the driver extremely tightly, closing the club face and extending his body as far forward as possible during the downswing, he soon had the ball cutting from left to right.

Although this shot felt totally unnatural to the way Trevino was used to hitting the ball, he was determined to add the shot to his repertoire. So he kept at it.

To help himself keep his swing steady he would imagine that there were four balls lined up in succession on his downswing and try to hit through all four of them. After about a year of practicing the new shot, Trevino felt confident that he had mastered the fade. If he had not developed this particular shot, there is no guarantee that Lee Trevino would have ever made a name for himself on the pro tour.

A True Confidence Man

According to Trevino, besides helping him learn the necessary skills to succeed, this almost superhuman dedication to practice contributed exponentially to his confidence in tournament play as well.

“I don’t feel I’ve ever had a slump,” he says, “because I have always worked and worked and worked so that I would never get to that point. My confidence comes from being ready. If I’ve paid the price of standing on the practice tee in the hot sun and hitting golf balls, going to bed early and doing my stretching, then in my subconscious mind I know I’m ready.

“But if I neglect my practice, and all of a sudden I’m playing pretty well and it looks like I might win, then there’s a lot more pressure on me because I know deep down that I did not prepare. How well you do in the next tournament is not going to be determined in your mind on the course that day, but during the preceding week whether you’re out there on the practice tee or working on your wedge shots.”

No Adverse Effects

You might think that compared with the backgrounds of the other players on the pro tour, Trevino’s unique history would provide enough adversity for a lifetime. But since making his stunning debut at the 1968 US Open, all has not been wine, roses and gimme putts for Trevino.

In possibly the most bizarre and certainly the most life-threatening instance, Trevino was struck by lightning during the 1975 Western Open at the Butler National Golf Club near Chicago. The force of the jolt lifted him off of the ground and knocked him unconscious. After 24 hours in intensive care, Trevino began to recover and within three weeks he was back on the tour.

Not even counting the mental and emotional impact of the accident, however, Trevino was still far from having recovered 100 percent physically. His muscles had atrophied considerably and, more seriously, he was left with intermittent back trouble. Nonetheless, he took these blows in stride and set himself on a course for recovery.

“If, as an athlete,” he says, “you hope to maintain a consistency over a long period of time, then invariably you’re going to have to face and overcome some sort of physical adversity. And sometimes that can help you.

“For me, after the lightning in Chicago, I started reading between the lines in the newspapers, and it got me back to working really hard. In 1976 I had to have an operation because I threw my back out lifting a potted plant. Every newspaper or magazine article I picked up said, ‘Trevino is finished. He’ll never get back to where he once was.’ And I said, ‘Why not?’ They said that it was too hard to come back from a back injury and I said, ‘Hey, they cut part of a disk out. But they didn’t take any of my heart or my guts.’ So I was even more driven after 1976. And you know why? Because I was the underdog again. And I like that.”

By 1980, Trevino had come back completely, even reengineering his coveted fade swing to accommodate his back, and chalked up his most successful year as a golfer. Just to be on the safe side, however, Trevino jokes that he never lifts anything heavier than a can of Miller Lite. And the next time he gets caught in a thunderstorm he says he’ll just hold up a 1-iron.

Why? “Because,” Trevino says, “even He can’t hit a 1-iron.”

Nerves of Steel

In addition to his obvious charm and wit, Trevino is particularly beloved by golf aficionados because of his unique ability to communicate with virtually everyone he meets. Whether he is playing with the King of Morocco (“I was so nervous,” Trevino says, “that I almost whiffed on my first drive”) or regaling the gallery with a funny story, Trevino makes friends wherever he goes. In fact, he says that his renowned interactions with fans help calm him before making important shots.

“Some players hit their tee shots,” he says, “and as they’re walking you can see the wheels turning in their minds. They’re trying to figure out a swing or a grip or something else. I don’t like to do that, so I talk to the other players, the caddies or the gallery. It’s a device. I can’t concentrate that hard for five hours; I’d go nuts. I just need five or ten seconds to tap my foot and hit it. But I’m very serious for those five seconds.”

Playing Every Angle

Trevino says that he actually watches other players to see if perhaps they are thinking too much or may be getting more nervous than they would like to let on.

“Pressure gets to people,” he says, “and it affects different people different ways. So you have to watch the other guy. How’s he feeling? Watch him, watch him. Maybe you’re playing with a guy who normally looks up at the hole a couple of times then pulls the trigger. Suddenly he’s looking up five times. Mannerisms change. People get to walking a little faster, or they drink a lot of water, even when it’s not hot. We’re out there playing in sweaters and one guy’s drinking water every hole. Well, you know what happens to your mouth when you’re under a lot of pressure? Your mouth gets dry. Hell, I’ve had so much cotton in my mouth sometimes you could have knitted a sweater. But that doesn’t mean I let on.”

Trevino illustrates an interesting point about the all-important mental aspect to the game of golf. Without the mental toughness to withstand 72 pressure-filled holes, you have no business playing on the professional tour. And Trevino freely admits that he’ll use the media to play to a competitor’s mental shortcomings.

“Now you have to understand that I never volunteer this information,” Trevino quickly points out. “But if somebody asks me a question, I’m going to give them an answer. Call it gamesmanship, call it what you like.

“Here’s a case in point: I was recently in the hunt in a tournament on Long Island with Jay Sigel. In the press room they asked me, ‘Does Jay Sigel have a weakness?’ And I said, ‘Boy, it’s tough to find a weakness in this man. He drives the ball long; he’s a great iron player and a hell of a putter. If I had to pick a weakness it would be his wedge play.’ Well, they put it in the paper. And of course he’s going to read this, right? Well, the next day damn if he didn’t blow every wedge shot just because he was trying to impress me.

“And it’s not just him; every player has a weakness. It never hurts to store that information away until some time when it just might come in handy.”

Short-Term Goals Drive Long-Term Success

Since joining the senior tour in 1989 Trevino has had little to prove. His record on the PGA tour – 27 victories, earnings of almost $3.5 million, a record five Vardon trophies for the lowest scoring average for a single year – speaks for itself. Yet even now, at age 55, Trevino feels that it’s just as important to set goals for himself today as when he was just coming up through the ranks.

“I’ve always believed in setting small goals,” he explains. “When I was just starting out, my goal was just to get on the regular tour and make $2,000 a week. That was my whole goal. Then all of a sudden I won the US Open in 1968 and I had to reevaluate. My new goal was to win another tournament to prove that I wasn’t just a flash-in-the-pan. Once I accomplished that by winning the Hawaiian Open, I set new goals again.

“And that’s why I think you should always set small goals that you can see yourself accomplishing. When you achieve them it’s a very gratifying experience, and that spurs you on to conquer the next one. But when you set your goals too high and you don’t achieve them, that can be very demoralizing. What I’ve discovered is that when you keep setting and achieving the small goals, the big ones take care of themselves.

“For example, this year my goal was to win three tournaments, and I’ve already won seven. So now I know that there are five more tournaments this year, and my new goal is to win two more. I’ve also set my sights on player of the year and the top money title, which I’m right on track for. Knowing that I’ve set these goals and that I can achieve them, I have a much greater sense of direction than if I didn’t know what I wanted.”

After all of his success on and off the links, it might be easy for Trevino to fall back on his achievements and become complacent. No way, says SuperMex.

“When I first came up,” he explains, “because I had never won anything, I felt that I had nothing to lose and everything to gain. It was the underdog thing. But now that I’ve won so many tournaments and so much money, I still feel like I have nothing to lose and everything to gain. So it still works for me. But if you really want to see me work hard and practice, just tell me I can’t do something. Then you’ll see me show you everything I’ve got. But you’d better get a plate ready because you can count on having to eat a big pile of crow when I’m done.”

Spoken like a true Chihuahua.