We have a feeling you are going to be seeing a lot more of Ben Kruper and Ashton Gaulin. From not knowing each other, to signing a deal with Wilson Golf, they went on to win the Good Good Desert Open a few weeks ago. With a field stacked with big names from the YouTube and Instagram world, it’s safe to say that these two guys earned their spot at the top.
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Content:
0:00 – Intro
0:30 – Wilson Relationship
1:30 – Kevin Kisner Story
3:18 – Their role with Wilson Golf
6:34 – Good Good Desert Open
14:33 – Growth of YouTube Golf
18:10 – Wilson Fitting Process
23:40 – What’s next?
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Awesome guys welcome back to another episode we got some special guests with us we have Ben ker and Ashton gin winners of the good good desert open um so how how does that sound sounds good sounds good yeah appreciate you guys appreciate you guys coming on and then uh we appreciate kind
Of Wilson setting this up we know that you two are wlon golf guys how how would you describe your relationship with Wilson kind of before we before we get into the the desert open and all that it’s been a very very successful two months with Wilson uh very uh wholesome
Relationship uh we both joined on about the same time in mid December uh and ever since then it’s like I think we both made the right choice and and we’ve gotten along great with Wilson Wilson’s been great to us the relationship has just been awesome so
Yeah I I would say kind of like for for us right we’re we’re we’re we’re a store fitting Center teaching center right and Wilson’s kind of made a big reass urgence this past yeah I would say year or so you know and I I’m obviously we
We’re we I know Sam pretty well um I know he was down there in Arizona with you guys and um kind of looking at where Wilson’s gone as a brand wise and seeing you guys coming along the way um you guys seemed to put out some pretty cool
Pretty cool content with Wilson got to hang out with kizner and H how was that my head hurts yeah I’ll let Ashton take that one if he remembers it yeah all the stuff we’ve done with Wilson has been amazing I mean uh all the people are super down to earth and
They really kind of understand where they want to go with this um I think the way they’re pumping out content has just been amazing um as far as like the the trip we did in California with the with the shoot and stuff it was amazing I mean kizner
Couldn’t have been a better guy and um just all the people we were hanging out with was just so much fun so yeah I mean were were you on the sidelines after after that taking the Flop shot to the to the Dome you took that like a champ I took it like a
Champ it was it was painful for like I don’t know an hour if that yeah really wasn’t too bad but it was uh it was just one of those things that like the adrenaline was going so fast that I just I didn’t even feel it so
Um I uh I ended up that was our last shoot of the day so we ended up just kind of getting some Advil in me and putting some ice on it and then we went and played like 12 holes like two hours yeah I I mean sometimes you know
Something like that you just got to keep going just got to keep going um kind of leading into because that essentially from my point of view when I started following you guys’s pages and kind of seeing you it was like it was kind of coincided with seeing Wilson’s brand
Kind of kind of take off um H be how would you guys describe kind of like what you guys do for a living do you call yourself content creators professional golfers influencers like what what is it I mean for for old man golf media let’s just say that like how
Would you answer to if old man golf me to ask you what you do it’s uh I don’t it’s kind of confusing uh I know Ashton’s in a little different spot than I am uh he’s in college I’m I’m in Florida right now I’m trying to play some mini tour events and
Stuff like that I’m not a pro I’m not a pro yet but my goal is to become a pro in the next coming months and uh playing Q school next year and kind of blog that whole journey oh nice so yeah I mean as of right now it’s I’m full-time into
This so I guess yeah content creator is is a better word than like influencer yeah um so yeah I would classify myself as like a content creator right now that’s how that’s like what I’m doing as for a living and then also golfing practicing as much as I can trying to
Get to the next level there yeah I’m in I’m in a little bit different of a spot I’m I’m still in college and I’m still a full-time student so all this stuff has kind of been part-time on the side um which is kind of why you see not much
Like effort putting to like a page or something like that but um there’s uh there’s a lot there’s a huge part of me that’s that’s kind of telling me to start doing this full-time and I think that’s going this summer so um it’s
Going to be a it’s going to be a good a good summer for for the content creation so yeah yeah absolutely I mean that’s the biggest thing it’s you’re seeing now and kind of What’s led into like the good good open what you guys won is you
Know you see a lot of things everything started kind of Instagram now you’re seeing things transition over to to YouTube right YouTube golf content um is that something that you guys are going to probably kind of dive into or is it more just kind of you know keeping it on
You know Instagram do you guys do Tik Tok as well yeah we started on Tik Tok um that’s fashion and I both like blew up same time last summer um I I started posting on Instagram before him and then he started posting on Instagram so we
Kind of were like along the same lines as that I’ve had a YouTube for a while and posted like short videos and stuff like that yeah but I actually have tons of like tons of content coming on YouTube in the next like month like I
Have tons of collabs on the way I have like the I’m not gonna say here but I have like the biggest video I guess this this is GNA be release later right next week so okay so so yeah the Grant I I have a video with Grant Horvat dropping
Today at noon actually um so that’s like a perfect Kickstart uh to my like YouTube career and uh yeah looking forward to getting that it’s definitely a different real like a little more work into those videos and stuff like that I’m going to have to start taking a little more
Serious but yeah definitely going to get serious on YouTube yeah have you done anything YouTube wise Ashen um not really just kind of short stuff um I’ve found a few thousand subscribers just through keeping the link on my uh on my socials and then that helps the big push is this summer
And just kind of doing some stuff um related to Michigan and series and all that stuff so awesome how did you guys get paired together or know kind of team up for the good good open this is a good story yeah yeah why don’t you tell Ash
Because you’re the one that he reached out to me uh when we both realized we were signing with Wilson so yeah so we both signed with Wilson end of December middle of December um and I I can’t remember the day that um like the the video dropped of uh good
Good calling out other influencers I like immediately texted Ben and we got our connections together um still hadn’t met him at this point um we just decided that we were gonna play together and we we texted all the people we knew it good good and they um responded pretty quickly and
Then we went to uh Palm Springs yeah Palm Springs California like end of January and uh that was the first time we actually met so we had spent a week together just kind of playing and having fun doing our shoots with Wilson and stuff and then beginning
Of February was the tournament and that was like the second time we’d ever seen each other so I say it worked out pretty well it did the Stars aligned for sure had a connection going that How would how would you guys say like how would you guys describe describe the event
Because it it was really a first of its kind I mean especially for me I’ve been I’ve been a professional now I’ve been a teacher for seven years years I played fulltime for two years and we never had anything like that you know I I remember turning on the event when the link
Opened and saw 900,000 viewers on YouTube right so like you guys were in it you guys were already probably on whole five when coverage came on does that sound about right yeah it sounds about right I mean like did did you guys think know it was going to be that big
Like when you showed up to play in it yeah I I kind of expected the the atmosphere was just like nothing that I had personally ever experienced like I’ve played in front of crowd and like M members and all that but it’s just like it’s different uh when it’s like a bunch
Of people that follow you that watch you like when we were practicing on the putting green there’s like 150 people just lined up around the putting green like calling your name and stuff like that I’m just like I’ve never been more nervous to practice putting in my life
Like it was it was just such a weird such a weird at it was so cool though we we were but it was so it was such a cool atmosphere though how how competitive was it like the tournament like I would say amongst like amongst the the
Competition I mean there like we get we all know there was a few teams there that we know probably didn’t have know they didn’t have a chance of winning but like for those of you that I would say players of you guys caliber like was it pretty competitive yeah from from what I
Understand it seems like people were really determined to win that thing like there was there was a lot of people in the field um whether it be Brian Bros Garrett and Grant like um just kind of all those people that expected to shoot a low number um and I mean still did it
Just it was the tough day and stuff like that yeah you guys didn’t really have the patented Arizona weather for it no it sunk which might have been our advantage so yeah right yeah coming from Michigan I’m used to that yeah yeah yeah the competitiveness was definitely
There and everybody had the drive to just kind of win that thing and it was it was definitely there was definitely a little bit of pressure on every shot there was like four teams that I was just like okay these teams are legit like we kind of knew going in if we beat
A couple of those teams then we have a very good chance like like Michael block and Brad doy was the one I was thinking about the Brian Brothers yeah uh Willie Willcox and Dan rport they finished second yeah very quietly snuck up and and got an eight under um and then
Garrett and Grant they’re both super talented and they can put it together at any time so that that was kind of like those were the four teams I was looking out for the whole time um and I was like those are the four teams that had the
Best chance we can definitely sneak in there uh we definitely weren’t like the favorites by any means um but we were we were up there you know going into the event I knew we had a good chance as long as we just played well yeah I mean
When I when I when when the coverage came on and kind of seeing the pairings I was like yeah I was like it looks like there’s six or seven teams that that are that they’re kind of bunched together that probably score-wise has a potential potential to compete but I think like it
Wasn’t maybe but 5 minutes into the coverage they showed that long putt that you made now was that for birdie was that for Eagle that was for birdie um we had just eagled the hole before Ashton had just made like a 30-footer um and then we were 300
Through three already going into that hole we both kind of hit bad t- shots off the tea and had to take that from like 70 feet from just off the green and that was that was kind when that P like went in I kind of knew that it was like
Our day like the stars were aligning at that point we had like H and egged it pretty well we kept doing that like the whole round um and yeah so that that was for birdie that was to get the 4un through four and after that I just kind
Of knew yeah yeah after that the hole looked like a basketball hoop yeah it did I was say you guys look like it looked like every single time they’ switch back and forth it was either like one of you hitting the shot the other making the putt definitely looked like a
Ham and egg which we play like for our section and stuff we play a lot of Team related events so like it trust me it comes down to like like how a lot of the times it’s not so much like come comes down to skill comes down to like where
You’re going to pick one one another up 100% And in a scramble it’s like 80% ham and a he was he made so many it’s funny because Ashton told me before the event how he’s like not that great of a Putter and then he goes out there and makes
Like five putts over 10 feet in 14 holes and I’m just like dude you made so many putts that like mattered so much just in our round just like keeping that like momentum up you know what I mean and there was a point where I was like I
Was looking at a putt and almost guaranteeing I was gonna make it like it was I don’t feel that I say that’s a fun type of golf to play and not a lot of people feel that feel like that because I’ve always been putting’s always been my weakness
And just like like that day when we and I think and we missed I missed like a four-footer for par on the first hole and then I don’t know how I got the confidence back it was probably the eagle putt I made on three but yeah yeah
It was still like the hole just looked so large and the greens were so perfect and and grass clippings was amazing so yeah that place looked pretty cool now they just opened that right yeah y now is it because you guys played a a random
Kind of like routing of it is it is it like a traditional 18 hole golf course or is there more par 3es and like trickled in par fours par five stuff like that or yeah it’s uh it’s a par three course like it has 18 holes with like a few
Small par fours but not like all of them are um like perfectly lit I think is kind of why they wanted to go to 14 holes is just because some of them look better than others um but also they just wanted to add those Q par fours that
Made it a little more competitive yeah I mean that’s that like the scenery just kind of how they produced it I mean it was it was a home run and like you look at it like this past Monday did you guys watch the match oh yeah yeah so
Like I watched a few of it and then I don’t know if you guys saw like the numbers came out of it was like the least viewed match of all time like they had 500,000 total viewers right and I’m like okay but this YouTube good good event did 900,000 viewing at like one
Time like you know and it it kind of bod’s like my next question right do you guys on on on your side of things right do you guys see more of this stuff coming up in the future like do you think there’s more growth kind of in the
Game into the sport to kind of get you know content creators personalities like yourselves on camera like for a live audience and are we maybe going to see less of like actual like top tier Professionals in the spotlight you know it’s go a coup ways it’s a
Loaded it’s a little bit of load but it could go a couple ways because I mean this this event did well and it created a lot of Buzz yeah um and I feel like the reason people watch YouTube golf and they like watch this event is because
They feel a little bit more of a personal connection yeah with the guys playing like they when they watch a long an hourlong YouTube video you get to see a lot of like what a person’s like you know it’s tough when you’re watching the PJ tour um you know and it’s clicking
Back and forth between like 20 guys and and uh you’re just watching their golf I feel like YouTube golf creates such a you just know the person on a personal level so therefore you get a lot of fans following a lot of like super fans a lot
Of just like people that are super interested obviously kids love YouTube golf um so that’s like that’s the future of golf right is all these kids and um yeah I think you’re just going to see more of it down the line you got the next event at French Lick in uh in June
And I think it’s only going to get bigger from here are you guys G to run it back oh yeah think so yeah that’s awesome there you go have you guys seen so like I’m sure you have but like here because we have the Myrtle Beach Classic
Now we’re in Wilmington we’re only an hour and 40 minutes north of Myrtle Beach and then obviously a PJ tour events doing first thing they’re doing a thing for the first time they’re they’re doing a for a sponsor exemption they’re having U half the field of content
Creators half a field of I would say mix between tour players High School you know established tournament Players kind of competing for a tour spot and and you know it’s you got to like wonder if are they going to do is Vince going to go more that route now
Obviously when I heard you guys were coming on the podcast and looking at the field I mean did you guys get ever get reached out to for that not for that that was I think they had already made their decision before the good good desert like I think they kind of already
Had their field in place before the good good desert open and I think that would have that could have changed things if it was after yeah uh but yeah we didn’t we didn’t get the invite to that I definitely I wanted to play in that I actually talked to Grant about that a
Little bit because he’s playing in it and uh yeah I think it just didn’t in the line but yeah we kind of we got we got wind of it um quite a few months ago and we we know some context with play golf Myrtle Beach and we were like okay
Well if we’re doing that like you know we were we kind of were like hey so how do we get a spot for that and obviously our our following is nowhere nowhere near where you guys is neck but um and that’s where it’s like I was sitting
There I was like well if the guys that just won like event that’s fairly similar I was like man they should they should have at least been there but makes sense if the field was Pro probably all set there yeah I think so a
Little late in the in the game to hop in there so hey well if you you know guys go win at French slick then I’ll probably make the next one a little decisions a little easier yeah defit now as far as like you
Know and um on on our page you see a lot of equipment related stuff now when you got switched over to Wilson how how was the fitting like getting you guys into to you know working out your bags and kind of are you guys still kind of
Tweaking some things in your bags with Wilson or explain kind of like how that that’s something you don’t see a lot of people on YouTube talk about is how they got they they might film A fitting but they don’t really talk in detail kind of like how a lot of people like to
Showcase with what’s in their bag I’ve got a interesting story with that one just CU I signed so quickly um I built my bag based off of specs that I like um and I feel like my club should fit me um so I got like everything all my iron is
An inch long um like certain um driver specs that I like and then I just had normal wedges um so I I hadn’t even been fit when we went to um the desert open so all my clubs kind of like a like a mesh of all the Wilson clubs but um it
Was uh the the clubs got to me super quickly and I just I put them in the bag and started playing them but I actually just got fit like professionally um last week so I’ve got a YouTube video coming out over that whole thing and just kind of what
Goes into it because I was there for three hours so it’s it’s like really tigh ring to that many balls but just kind of what goes into um a fitting like that and fitting all the Wilson clubs and stuff like that and we got some stuff figured out so so the bag is
Actually fitted to me now but um good it it was uh it was quite the experience to see how fast they were able to get me my stuff and just kind of build it to the specs that I like and um yeah it was impressive yeah well we’ll definitely
Kind of yeah you don’t have to spill any of the setup before that video comes out um but yeah you’re right it sounds like you did it right cuz if you did a full bag fitting it’s definitely going to take a little bit of time yeah and you
Are only doing one company too I mean biggest thing is we have we do full bag fittings here and it’s a two-hour process and we have 12 different companies so to go through so what what about your bag Ben I’m kind of in the same realm as Ashton uh I always I was
Always super like I tweak like I tweak with equipment a time like before I joined Wilson like I would change Putters all the time change drivers all the time tweak out shafts like I was just equipment junkie and I kind of knew like exactly what I wanted like the
Specs wise I went up to New York I actually did a little uh I did a little video on the Wilson fit AI when I went up there the new technology they came out with um so I did that up there I got fit into irons uh for that and I order
The driver I wanted the three-wood I wanted and the two iron and all the specs I like um I’m actually kind of the same boat with Ashton as far as like I’m going to be filming a YouTube video in the next couple weeks about a full I’m
Going to get a full bag fitting just like go in detail you never know when you you know have something that you’re missing or something like that or uh you know I don’t know my swing insanely well um so yeah I’m G to be in the same boat
As him kind of getting fit making a YouTube video out of it uh including that with like a what’s in the bag you know updated what’s in the bag um but yeah kind of kind of in the same boat with him we both knew our specs pretty
Well so we both got our clubs dra the same time and uh yeah they’ve treed us well so far though yeah I mean biggest thing it’s like we we’ve seen it looks like they’re just going back to like the classic Wilson iron that everyone raved and loved about right I mean they’ve
Always known for making fantastic irons and we’ve seen it in our Bay like the the the woods and stuff it can compete with anybody right but obviously it comes down to that doing that fitting to get it tweaked now I we just recently had um we just recently had our last our
Last podcast we had Spencer from fujiura on to go over the new uh vooc core plus the new uh Ventus um now I saw that you guys did some did some things in testing with that what did you guys think of uh think of that that was fun I uh they invited me
Down to Orlando for the um PGA show like a little demo day and uh I got I I never hit the ven blue and I got to hit that and I was really impressed with that with that shaft um they tipped it I think half an inch to kind of like you
Know go with my swing speed or whatever but um yeah I actually used that shaft yesterday in a tournament round for the first time because I have always used the Ventus black but it’s a good shaft but I think you know Fuji I think they make the best shafts on the market so
There’s a reason why it’s the number one shaft on tour I mean there’s there’s a lot to be said to it I’m wearing a Fu care shirt right now yeah yeah have you have you gotten to hit the shaft Ashton uh not the new one yeah um I I
Was also invited down to Orlando I couldn’t make it just because I was in school but um they were uh they were telling me all about it and stuff like that but I think it’s it’s going to be in the bag come the next couple months because it’s I think it’s
Shipping right now on the way so cool awesome well yeah that’s the thing we just we got them in and testing so I mean it’s a it’s a it’s a tough shaft to be I just know um I at least saw a video of Ben when you were hitting it so I
Just figured I ask just hear it from a different perspective yeah um yeah the M hits were really I was like shocked to see the consistency with everything I wasn’t even swinging it that great that day and it was like every ball was doing the exact same thing so yeah so I I
Would kind of leave it like this you guys been gracious with your time so yeah last question here what what’s next for for for you guys um you know what what would you say kind of you like to see your pages like to see kind of next
With just kind of content golf in general let ashon take this one first um I think where I’m going next is just kind of taking this on fulltime and uh and really producing like content that people want to watch every day and and including like my personality a little
More um I I think I do struggle in that aspect I post a lot of Swing videos but I don’t post like myself right yeah I think a lot of stuff on YouTube this summer is going to be huge um but really just focusing on doing this as
Like a full-time thing and making sure I put out the best content for the people that want to watch so perfect yeah ma’am yeah it’s um it’s going to be interesting over the next couple months because this YouTube like now that I’m making the push for YouTube um I feel
Like you just have to make you know consistent like wholesome like like good content you know on YouTube you have to come out with it every week or so and just like uh I don’t know I’m starting to realize that it’s a little more of a
Job than just posting one short video a day you know 130 second video it’s just like 30 minutes of editing or whatever 30 minutes of filming and then boom but YouTube it’s like I stayed up till like 1: am the other day editing a video that
I wanted to get out like I don’t know it’s just gonna be a different life but um I’m looking forward to it because it’s going to be a grind but I’m I’m having a lot of fun with it and there’s G to be a lot of long content coming out
So I think people are going to be um I think a lot of my my fans are going to be interested awesome well I I appreciate we appreciate you guys coming on I I wish both of you best of what’s what’s yet to come and then uh we’ll
Continue to follow we’ll continue to follow the pages and um if there’s anything we can do for you guys along the way just just let us know so but uh I we we appreciate it and uh thank you for your time thank you yeah all right y’all take care
2 Comments
Good stuff
These guys look like Wilson’s brand, great pick up by them. Class acts all around, but a swagger and confidence that demands respect. Love to see it!