Mitchell Golf recently caught up with LPGA Club Repair Technician Paul Boehmer, all-around great tech, good guy, and hard worker. We wanted to find out what Paul typically does in a week and wondered what stories he had after 20 years in the club repair business.
As the saying goes: “Early to bed, early to rise,” is at least half true for Paul — as he’s usually already at the golf course before it gets light. A typical tour week starts with him getting to a site on the Saturday before the event and getting everything set up to have ready on Sunday. He’ll get to the golf course at 6 o’clock in the morning. He then sets up the trailer, cleans it, makes the coffee and is ready for business at 7 a.m.
As Paul likes to say, he only works half days: 12 hours is half of 24, right?
His van is his pride and joy, and what a van it is. From sanding machines and bending machines to grip tape and shafts, the van is outfitted with all top-of-the-line repair aids and tools to keep the player’s equipment at peak performance during events. Repair aids, which of course, included custom loft and lie bending iron and putting machines made by Mitchell Golf (extremely important for what he does), along with a shaft puller and grip guns.
Although there is never a dull moment for Paul, the beginning of the tour year is definitely the craziest. This is when he usually sees between 80 and 100 players a week. And since he hasn’t seen them in a while, he will put in solid 12-hour days trying to get everything (for everyone!) in shape.
Added on top of this is that all manufactures work out of Paul’s trailer instead of bringing their own, so you can imagine it can get a little bit crazy.
Although it is extremely busy for Paul, he doesn’t find it stressful. His years of experience certainly help, but it is also no small point that Paul uses Mitchell golf equipment and has been using it ever since he got in the business in the early ’90s. To him, MG equipment is easy to use and always accurate. “I’ve never worried once about the Mitchell Golf Equipment I use,” states Paul. “It’s great to show up to work without having something else to worry about.”
The accuracy that Mitchell Golf machines provide is extremely important, as players are becoming more tuned into loft and lie adjustments, whether they fully understand the process or not. This is quite a step forward, considering in the old days players could be seen “adjusting” their clubs on a cart path!
As far as the accuracy of Paul’s golf stories, we are going to have to take him at his word. One of his favorites happened back in the day with a professional who was notorious for not hitting a lot of fairway woods. She would tee off with a driver and then immediately turn to her irons. One day this person came into Paul’s trailer (on the day of her first round) and told him that she needed a 1 iron.
This was at a time when nobody was hitting a 1 iron, and hybrids were just beginning to come onto the scene. In a bit of a quandary, the only thing he could think of what to do was take a 2-iron out of his bag, reshaft it, and set it up as a 1 iron.
He gave it to her 20 minutes before her tee time. He assumes she liked it because he never saw that iron again!
“When a player calls me for recommendations on what machines to get, Mitchell Golf immediately falls out of my mouth. Patrick has been awesome to work with, along with everyone at Mitchell Golf. To me, they are not just a company. They are people that I know.”
–Paul Boehmer