The Man Who Changed Golf Without Winning a Single Tournament | Rick Shiels

Summary

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The High Performance Podcast

Episode: The Man Who Changed Golf Without Winning a Single Tournament | Rick Shiels

Date: February 2, 2026
Host(s): Jake Humphrey, Damian Hughes
Guest: Rick Shiels

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Episode Overview

This episode explores the remarkable journey of Rick Shiels, a PGA golf coach turned YouTube superstar, who has changed the face of golf content without winning a single professional tournament. The conversation dives into Rick’s pioneering transition from teaching at a Manchester driving range to building a global digital brand, the evolution of the creator economy, navigating criticism in the online world, the ethics of partnering with disruptors like LIV Golf, and the highs and lows that come with digital entrepreneurship. The episode is rich with insight into what it takes to become – and remain – a high performer in today’s digital-first landscape, blending vulnerability, humour, business wisdom, and a powerful message about authenticity and growth.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Redefining High Performance in the Creator Economy (01:11–03:39)

• Changing Definitions of Success: The hosts argue that cultural focus has shifted from only coveting traditional elite performers (e.g., major tournament winners) to recognizing the scale and influence of digital creators like Rick, who boasts nearly a billion views.
• Rick’s View on Creator Recognition:
  • “The world is starting to realize that content creators do have such a strong pull and do have massive audiences.” – Rick Shiels (02:24)
  • Content creators’ reach often now surpasses mainstream TV, and mainstream acknowledgement is catching up.

2. Rick’s Origin Story – From Teaching Pro to YouTuber (03:46–09:07)

• Why YouTube?: Rick started in 2011 to increase his reach as a teaching professional. Early on, “YouTuber” carried little prestige and was almost embarrassing.
• First Big Win: A call from a Newcastle viewer who wanted a lesson was a watershed moment that proved the media worked.
• Transitioning Identity:
  • “Genuinely, if someone asked me, I’m a YouTuber… Content creator, YouTuber. Don’t love the word influencer… But releasing those shackles…” (03:58)

3. Facing Industry Skepticism and Navigating Rejection (11:07–15:08)

• Pushback from Peers: Other coaches doubted foisting advice online for free; brands were slow to understand the value of sponsoring digital creators.
• Rick Stayed the Course Out of Enjoyment:
  • “Deep down, I was just enjoying the process and seeing little wins along the way.” (14:26)

4. Experimentation and the Power of Authentic Content (15:25–22:19)

• Humble Beginnings and Creative Evolution: Early videos were overproduced or awkward; real breakthrough came when Rick shed the “pro” façade and became authentic on camera.
• Entertainment as Growth Catalyst: Testing “illegal” and unusual golf clubs led to viral, unique content.
  • “For a couple of years then we were the only people on the Internet making this content. Yeah, it banged. Every video banged because the intrigue was there, the entertainment was there.” (19:19)
• Checklist for Ideas:
  • “Normally there’s one question… Do we want to know the answer?” (22:52)

5. Business & Brand Building (26:19–28:39)

• Real Business Growth: Rick now runs a 12-employee operation in Salford (growing to 14), but intentionally maintains the “just Rick” channel feel to protect audience connection.
  • “You’ll never really see my staff in or my crew in the videos… soon as you start showcasing ‘oh, look at me, all this crew’, it loses that bit of magic…” (26:30)
• Guarding Authenticity: Production is intentionally kept slightly raw to preserve the YouTube vibe over over-production.

6. Navigating Criticism & Managing Mental Health (28:50–35:01)

• The Toll of Criticism:
  • “I don’t think any of us are designed to receive hundreds, thousands… of feedback and criticism and judgment.” (28:59)
    • Even 5% negativity impacts mood and mental health deeply.
• Protective Strategies:
  • Rick’s wife encouraged boundaries – e.g., not checking comments at home.
  • Psychological tricks (from psychologist Tom Young) included writing down the worst imaginable criticisms in advance to “inoculate” against real backlash.
  • “If I knew there was an angry mob outside my door, I wouldn’t open the door. So why have I got a potential angry mob in my pocket…” (32:12)
• Memorable Hurtful Comment:
  • “The top comment… was ‘Pete is the type of guy who would benefit from getting cancer.’ How can someone even type that…” (30:31)

7. The LIV Golf Partner Decision – Ethics and Risk (35:03–47:19)

• Decision Process: Rick narrates the evolution of his discussions with LIV Golf, including setting his own deal terms and weighing potential damage to his brand.
  • “On one hand, this is an unbelievable opportunity… On the other hand, it's like, what's that going to do as a brand?” (35:17)
• Handling Backlash: Lost 30,000 subscribers upon announcement but regained growth after content resumed.
• Moral Calculus:
  • “As a massive ambassador of golf… if golf is their vehicle for that [improving and growing], I think that's a fantastic place to be.” (45:58)
  • Open discussion about Saudi PIF’s involvement and Rick’s own learning/shifting perceptions.

8. High Performer Habits – Alcohol, Competitiveness, and Purpose (47:36–51:47)

• Common Traits of High Performers:
  • “One thing I've seen in common... is how alcohol isn't involved.” (47:36)
    • Rick has been sober for over 500 days – credits this for clearer thinking and better business outcomes.
• Competitiveness in High Performers:
  • “Even in the most relaxed setting, they are outrageously competitive.” (49:56)
  • Rick admits he lacks this intensity in golf, but has it now in his media world.

9. Competition, Collaboration, and the Next Generation (51:47–55:15)

• Emergence of YouTube ‘Pro Golfers’: US YouTube golf grew via young creators who aspired to digital fame, not pro tours.
• Collaborative Mindset: Rick viewed new creators as “threats” but also partners for mutual growth. Collaborations with groups like Good Good, Grant Horvat, and even pro players like Bryson DeChambeau accelerate the ecosystem.
  • “Collaborations are key.” (54:47)

10. Sustaining Creativity, Future Ambitions & Succession (55:40–57:19)

• Enduring Uncertainty: “Every single day that you release a video, you start again from zero. Every video can be a bomb, right?” (55:40)
• What’s Next?: Rick eyes diversification and succession—building an enterprise beyond himself.
  • “I really want to grow something that’s way beyond me so diversification is a big thing.” (56:26)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Creative Evolution:
  “I’m gonna make a promise to myself that I’ll aim to use the first take every time. And even if I mess up, it’s ok… that connection with the audience… it was natural.” – Rick Shiels (15:43)

• On Managing Online Criticism:
  “You can get negative comments, of course you can. But like to go that, to go to that place to wish somebody would get a life threatening illness, it’s like, what?” – Rick Shiels (30:31)

• On Handling Backlash to the LIV Deal:
  “He [Tom Young] said, write down every single thing you think is going to be said tomorrow. So I was like, wow, okay… the next day, if anybody writes something worse… almost use it as a bit of a game.” – Rick Shiels (40:16)

• On Purpose and Competitiveness:
  “I think that you thought that golf was your calling or your purpose, but you were wrong. … I bet that in your world of creating your content and your business and your brand, I bet you now are [more competitive].” – Podcast Host (51:10–51:30)

• On Letting Others In, Collaboration Over Competition:
  “Collaborations are key. And then even collaborations with players like Bryson DeChambeau…” – Rick Shiels (54:47)

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Timestamps of Important Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |-------------------------------------------------------------------------|---------------| | Redefining high performers & creator economy | 01:11–03:39 | | Rick’s YouTube origin story, audience breakthrough | 03:58–09:07 | | Facing skepticism from peers & brands | 11:07–15:08 | | Creative authenticity: abandoning over-production | 15:25–22:19 | | The business side: growth, team, maintaining authenticity | 26:19–28:39 | | Coping with critique, impact on mental health | 28:50–35:01 | | LIV Golf partnership: risk, ethics, public reaction | 35:03–47:19 | | High performer traits: sobriety, extreme competitiveness | 47:36–51:47 | | The new generation: YouTube golf collaborators as competitors | 51:47–55:15 | | What’s next for Rick: diversification and the next decade | 55:40–57:19 |

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Final Takeaways

• Consistency & Authenticity Win: Rick’s story is a testament to the power of raw, real content and a willingness to adapt.
• High Performance Is Now Multi-Platform: The path to impact is no longer tied to traditional success metrics – building a billion-view audience can mean more influence than a TV contract or trophy.
• Mental Health Requires Boundaries: Success in the digital era demands smart strategies to manage criticism and protect well-being.
• Collaboration Fosters Growth: Newcomers can be both threat and partner—embracing collaboration over competition grows the pie.
• Purpose Evolves: Sometimes the real calling is not what you first expect.
  “You thought your purpose was golf. Your purpose was talking about golf.” (51:35)

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Recommended For:
Anyone interested in building a personal brand, aspiring creators, entrepreneurs in the digital space, and anyone needing inspiration to take creative risks while protecting authenticity and mental health.

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Transcript

[Rick Shiels]

We were the only people on the Internet making this content. Yeah, it banged. Every video banged because the intrigue was there. Most of the conversations with Liv came from me directly. In one hand, this is an unbelievable opportunity. On the other hand, it's like, what's that going to do as a brand? How can someone even type that to wish somebody would get a life threatening illness? It's like what.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You'Re listening to High Performance thanks to everyone who's already subscribed. If you've not, right now is the time because you'll get new episodes the moment they drop. And your support helps us bring more world class guests onto the show.

[Rick Shiels]

Tap.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Subscribe right now and keep growing with High Performance. Rick, welcome to High Performance.

[Rick Shiels]

Thank you for having me. Honestly, I am a huge fan of this podcast.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So should I tell you about the conversation that you won't know happened behind the scenes at High Performance about getting you on?

[Rick Shiels]

I'd love for you to. I'd love to know. They were like, we've run out of guests. We need to ask Rick.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So final record day of the year, three people pulled out at the last minute. No, all of it.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Not true.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Now, the reason why we were really keen to have you sit in this chair is because I think that the world needs to understand that high performers look different in 2025, 2026, 2027 than. Than they did in 95, 96 and 97. Back then it was about being the world number one. Back then it was about being part of something mainstream. There was no opportunity then to create something yourself that could be even 1% of what the world recognized, let alone sometimes now double or 10 times the size. And I look at DeChambeau winning the US Open, right, with a peak audience of 11.4 million and people celebrating that, that's a high number. And then I look at you going from 100 views to 900 million plus views and probably billions more views a year across your social channels as well as your YouTube and other things. And I just think it's time to stop looking at those people as high performers and people like you as someone that hangs around high performers, talking about them and monitoring them, and actually that you and the people in your world are high performers. When I say that, does it make you think, no, no, no, you've got it wrong. Or do you. Do you actually think that it's time we started celebrating content creators in this new creator economy in this way?

[Rick Shiels]

I think the world is celebrating content creators. You know, you've seen it already. You Know, as we've just recorded this podcast, you look at who won I'm a Celebrity, and it's a content creator from Salford right near me, you know, Angry Ginge. And, you know, I remember a couple of years ago seeing him making videos, and it's like, now to see him on I'm a Celebrity and getting the recognition and people loving him, and, you know, he stops at Manchester Airport, he's getting recognized and he's getting pictures and it's like it becomes mainstream. But you're right, probably the views he gets on his own channel far outweigh the views that were on I'm a Celebrity far outweigh it. But I think the. The world is starting to realize that content creators do have such a strong pull and do have massive audiences. Going back to your point with Bryson DeChambeau, I mean, he's kind of doing a bit of both worlds at the moment. He is not only performing at the highest level on the golf course and, you know, winning major tournaments, but he's also setting up his own YouTube channel. And we spoke a few years ago how he got into it and how he actually was inspired by watching my channel, thought, well, if Rick can make it, I'm sure I can give it a bash. And to see him almost wear both hats is. Is really incredible as well. But, you know, I think content creators are starting to get the spotlight that they deserve. You look at what KSI has done and his world, it's. It's unbelievable.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So if someone's listening to this now and they're inspired by this, they realize they don't have to get a job. They realize life doesn't have to be 9 to 5.

[Rick Shiels]

Right?

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You don't have to have a lanyard around your neck and a boss moaning that you're two minutes late. You can do what you have done. How do you begin? How do you even start? And I'm really interested in your founder journey in this.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, you're right. I remember when I first started making YouTube videos and the term YouTuber wasn't really a thing. You know, I started making YouTube videos 13 years ago. And when I started making YouTube videos, it's to promote myself as a golf professional, a teaching professional. That's where I started. And when people would say to me, what is it you do for a job? I was very much, I'm a teaching professional. I do a little bit of YouTube on the side. I'll be honest, I was almost embarrassed a little bit about, you know, the YouTube on the side. And as it started to grow and over the years and has the YouTube start to take off and YouTube, it became more of a mainstream description of what you do as a job. Suddenly the kind of shackles came off and suddenly I was a little bit prouder about being a YouTuber. And now if genuinely, if someone asked me, I'm a YouTuber and that is what I do. Content creator, YouTuber. Don't love the word influencer, but I don't. I don't know, I'm not sure if any. Many people do. But, you know, releasing those shackles and going back to you mentioned before about content creators wanting to get mainstream, one of the first things I ever did before making YouTube videos, I reached out to golf magazines because that was the only way really you could become well known in the golf space. So I reached out to all the golf magazines and pretty much got a hard no. If I got a reply from any of them, I was like, okay, well, that, that ship has sailed. I'll leave that now. I have now since doing YouTube and this. I don't want this to sound like a humble brag, but I think it explains the shift in mentality. I've probably done about seven or eight front covers now on golf magazines. And it's lovely and it's. And it makes your parents proud. And, you know, other kind of people from different generations see it as like, that's the gold standard. I kind of see it a bit like now it's nice if I didn't have to do another front cover and it won't be the end of the world. It's not, you know, it's. It's nice to have, but it's nice to have knocking around the office, etc. I love creating golf content and I get to call that a job. I mean, it's not a job to me. I get to travel the world, playing an amazing golf course and documenting it all, releasing it out into the public. And it. And even early days, it was very addictive, that whole process of coming up with a video idea, filming it, editing it, releasing it, seeing the very small views at start and a few comments. I remember celebrating 100 views on a video like this is. I've made it. Let's pop open the. Maybe not champagne, but. And it was like, this is amazing. I remember one real standout win for me. So again, the reason why I got into YouTube was to further my coaching career. I was at a busy driving range in Manchester. You'll know it. Trafford Golf Center. That's where I used to coach. And there was four golf coaches. I was the newest one into the teaching academy and I kind of soon identified a lot of people who came for lessons were people inside Manchester. And I was thinking, there's going to be a point where everybody in Manchester has been taught. There's nobody else to teach. I was like, well, I need to try and spread that area a little bit more. Hence why I wanted to get into YouTube. And I started making YouTube videos and it was all about helping golfers. And at the end of the video, I'd say, hey, guys, if you want to come and see me for a golf lesson, this is where I'm based. It's my number. This how you get in contact. And it took a few months. Not dead long, though, a couple of months. I was getting some views and some traction and I got a phone call and it was. I won't do the accent because it was someone from Newcastle. And he was like, I've seen you on YouTube. Love what you're doing. Can I come for a lesson? And it was at that moment I was like, wow, like all of those videos, everything I've done so far has now been worthwhile because you could. You were. I wasn't making money on YouTube at that point. I'd said sense wasn't a thing. It was. It was just an advertisement tool. This guy had driven down past hundreds and hundreds of golf coaches, probably golf coaches that are better than me. But he come to me in my bay at driving range at the Trafford center, and he was just bought in straight away. And the advice that I gave him was so much more accepted. He improved really, really quickly because he trusted what I said and he understood. And it was like, that's why I did YouTube. And then from that, more and more and more people came from all different areas of the uk. Some people were flying in from America. If they were on a business trip for a lesson, or Europe, the titan would come and see in family and have a lesson. I was like, wow, this is amazing. A few years passed and adsense became a, you know, a motivator. So I'm not. Not only my teaching diary is really busy now. I'm probably the busiest golf coach in the country at the time. My advertising tool, which I was seen as a. As an outlay, it was a scene as a I've got to pay for to have that done, is now paying me. What the hell? And it was that again, that was another moment. I was like, oh, this is pretty cool. I never started any of this to become a YouTuber or someone in the media business. I think probably if people deep dived enough. I didn't do great at school. I wasn't very academic. But I loved two subjects. I loved peace, physical education and drama. I loved being on stage, I loved doing shows. My two real passions of drama and pe. Somehow I've managed to kind of turn into my career and my job really.

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[Rick Shiels]

Can.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

I ask you about those other three golf coaches at the Trafford Centre when you go there? Because when I was doing some research on This I found a stat that said 3/4 of creative ideas for you, it was putting yourself out there and advertising your golf lessons on YouTube get rejected for safer, more incremental ideas like going and getting on the front cover of a golf magazine or advertising in that. So how did you deal with or did you face, in fact rejection, People being bit disenchanted or dismissive of what you were doing?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, I remember when I first even started on, on Twitter. This was even before YouTube and it was really when Twitter was just kind of coming on. You had guys like Stephen Fry was like a big name on there and a few other obviously celebrities. And I used to sit in the pro shop. Um, I was. This was a different golf club that was at. Before the Trafford Center. And I used to spend my time on Twitter and giving advice out, giving free advice. This is how you get better at golf. This is how you should do things. People would post videos of their swing and I would go on there and try and give them advice and help them all free. Like, I wasn't making any money from it. And a pro that worked there at the time always used to look at me and go, why are you doing this? Like, what are you doing? Like, you're wasting time, you're giving away all your secrets, ideas for free. Why are you doing it? At the time, I'll be honest, I didn't really know. I just enjoyed it and I thought, well, I'm sure it's going to become bigger than what it is right now. And surely social media, Twitter is going to keep growing. And as much as I've never made a Twitter have never sent me a check in the post, I've made money through social media, you know, in other ways. So I definitely got pushback from a lot of people in the industry. At first, golf professionals didn't get it. They didn't understand why I was giving away free advice to some degree. I didn't really know either. I was like, why am I giving away free advice? Is this, is this going to be detrimental to my career? But it was only when those phone calls started to come in and people would come in for lessons. And as I said, what I really found was how receptive clients were when they did come in for lessons. Because it wasn't frosty, it wasn't cold, it wasn't. I wasn't meeting a client for the first time or they wasn't meeting me for the first time. There was this rapport already built up, which had been built up for. Through videos. And it Just honestly, it made coaching so much easier. There was still restriction from coaches, of course, because they're like, why still? Why are you doing it? You fast forward now. It's an expectation that coaches have social media presence. Like, they've not got social media presence. They're missing out. The PGA course that I have qualified a professional golf association. They teach social media as a. As a topic now. Like, they use me as an example in their documentation to say, look what, you know, one our PGA members have done through social media. What can we learn from that? How can you bring that into your own business? So, yeah, there was definitely restriction. There was definitely pushback, even from brands. You know, even if I was working with sponsors, there was like, but, you know, we sponsor professional athletes. We don't sponsor you and. Or even car brands. You know, we don't sponsor a driving range pro. We sponsor the best players in the world.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

But how did you take that criticism and not take it personally and just see it as a way to improve or to adapt?

[Rick Shiels]

I think because I didn't know what the future was going to have if I, you know, if you had a crystal ball and it's like, you're making a mistake not sponsoring me right now. I didn't know, like, I was going in there and going, oh, you could actually be right. Like, I don't know the future of this. There's no blueprint. You know what? He's done a journey like this before, let's say, in the world of golf. So you actually might be right. But deep down, I was enjoying it. Deep down, I was just enjoying the process and seeing little wins along the way and going, well, if I'm enjoying it and we're seeing wins, if people are a bit negative to it, okay, that's fine. In some degree, I was actually seeing that as well. At least you're not coming into my space. Like, that's fine. You stay over there. I'll keep. I'll keep doing what I'm doing over here.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

And liking golf and being good at golf and wanting to make content does not give you the golden ticket to be as successful as you. There will be hundreds, if not hundreds of thousands of people that have tried to create YouTube channels, and it hasn't worked. So why are you sitting here having this conversation with us today and they're not.

[Rick Shiels]

It's a great. It is a great question. Because if you actually look back at my really, really old videos, they were shocking. So bad.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Yeah, but that's. That's also useful for you to Know they're shocking because there'll be some people producing that same content today wondering why no one's looking at it. But you know, it's shocking. And I'd be really interested to understand YouTube more.

[Rick Shiels]

So when I again first, very first started making YouTube videos, it was all self taught. So I would, I would make videos on my iPad or whatever. And it was very static. Hi. Because this is what you'd see on presentation. Hi, my name is Rick Shiels. Today I'm going to help you. And it was very robotic and it was very professional. Like it had to have this professional layer to it. And I actually hired a videographer and editor for a day. So I thought, well, let's try and make them really good. So I hired this videographer the day and I had this idea that I was going to make like 50 videos in a day. Really did okay. And the price that I was paying him, I was like, I need to make 50 videos today because this is, this is really expensive. And the very first video I shot again in this. Hi, I'm Rick Shiels. Tone. I thought I'd nailed the delivery. It's a three minute video, quick chip in tip. I thought I'd nailed it. And he's come from tv. He's come from a TV background and he had all the equipment, had his headphones on this, that, the other. He goes, ah, now there was a, there's a bit of a buzz in there. I think there's a tractor in a field two fields over. Let's do it again. I was like, okay, right, I'll do it again. So then tried to do it again and inevitably you don't do it as good the first time and then the third time and then the fifth time and then the 15th time. And I'm thinking, thought I'd nailed it the first time. F mons for you. And at the end it was like we got to the take and that he was happy with. And I was thinking, don't think it needed all that. That was way too overproduced. So again I'm thinking I'm getting 50 videos out of this. We got maybe four that day, full day of filming four videos. And he was like, what a great success. That was thinking. But he wasn't the amount of money I'm paying you for this. And I'm only getting four videos out of it. Those videos are still online now actually. So it was at that point I was like, that's not YouTube. That's not what I see on YouTube as a fan of YouTube way, way back, you know, beyond 13 years. YouTube's a bit raw. It's a bit real. It's not. It's not got a filter to it. It's a bit more shaky. Like, that's what it's gotta be. And then from that moment, I was like, I'm gonna make a promise to myself that I'll aim to use the first take every time, and even if I mess up, it's okay. Like, don't worry about it. Yeah, like, there's no script. I didn't have words to say, but if I'd stumbled my lines or hit a bad shot, kind of laughed it off. I was like, oh, that was a daft shot. Let me try that again. And I think that really helped, that connection with the audience, because they'd only seen polished versions on TV before. Everything's perfect on tv, isn't it? And I'd end up hiring a cameraman. Then this was like 11 years ago. So I've been doing YouTube a couple of times. And even then he said, I've seen you coach and the way you deliver your lessons, but then the way you're delivering it to me because of the camera there is still a bit different. It's still not the same. The Rick I see coaching somebody isn't the Rick I'm seeing on video. He said, forget the camera and just speak to me behind the cameras if I'm a client of yours. From that moment, everything changed. Even then, it still wasn't a structure. It was like I was just chatting to a mate. Hey, Jake, this is what I want you to do. You golf swing, you've got a bit of a strong grip. We can fix that. I can help you fix that. Slice this and the other and it. And it was suddenly. It was natural. It was. It was me not putting on an act. It was me just how I'd deliver a line, like, I'm. I'd speak to you guys today. And then over that time, I suppose two and a half hours of videos, you learn what's good, what's not. And I watch all the videos back and I. And I consume a lot of YouTube sent to you off topic, off podcast. Maybe not as much YouTube as I do now, but I used to consume a lot of YouTube and pick up little tidbits from other creators in other genres.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

What is your most popular video?

[Rick Shiels]

About seven years ago, I genuinely was at a point, like, I think we've made every video we can make. I think we're done. Like, it was a Great run. Well done everyone.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

What a horrendous business decision that would be. We've run out of actual creativity.

[Rick Shiels]

I think we're done. Because all my content was around coaching.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Yeah.

[Rick Shiels]

Equipment reviews or playing golf, like a bit of challenges. And I was thinking, I think, I think that's it, everyone. And then we really came up with this kind of new strand of what's entertaining. It's not going to maybe teach you anything, you're not going to learn from it, but it's just going to entertain you. What is that content? And we went down this crazy journey of testing a lot of elite what are classed as illegal golf clubs. So there's legal golf clubs that you can use in competition, but then there's this like crazy section of the Internet that sells all these illegal golf clubs and often they're plastered all over, over the Internet or on Golf Channel on in America. It's like this driver is going to help you hit it 450 yards and all this. And I was. And nobody had ever really tested any of these drivers. So I was like, let's go. So we just bought everything we found online. Every mad golf club, every crazy invention with. From a golf ball that had a microchip inside of it so you couldn't lose it. A golf club that was called a swingless golf club. So it has ammunition in it and you press a button, it shoots the ball perfectly straight. Straight every time. 250 yards from a golf ball that vowed that, that believed it only flew straight. You couldn't slice it, you couldn't hook it. We bought everything. Everything. And then for a couple of years then we were the only people on the Internet making this content. Yeah, it banged. Every video banged because the intrigue was there, the entertainment was there. Like we bought a golf ball that only flew straight. The way that the dimples were positioned on the ball meant that the aerodynamics it almost self corrected. And I dead skeptical, I went into going, this is going to be crap. This is never going to work. And it bloody worked. And I was like, oh my God, it actually works. Like I can't believe it. There was downsides, the ball didn't travel as far and this, that the other, but it did what it said in the tin. And I remember that video getting a million views in a couple of days. And we were like, okay, we're onto something.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Million views in a couple of days.

[Rick Shiels]

And this is six, seven years when.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

No one was getting those.

[Rick Shiels]

Nobody. Going back to the topic, what's my most, most popular After a spell of reviewing all these illegal golf clubs, I was like, right, let's put everything together. Let's put in one video. I'm going to go out and play with every illegal golf club you can possibly find. And does it genuinely make me play better at golf? And I think that's up to like 8,9 million views now. And it's like. Because the intrigue was there. Yeah. The brands had done all the marketing for me. The brands who had made all these pieces of equipment had spent fortunes on the marketing and making you believe these clubs work. And I'm kind of cutting through the BS and telling you whether it does or doesn't. And it really hit with the audience and did fantastic for us.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

I think that's so interesting. And you start creating these videos, right? And that's now what you're known for.

[Rick Shiels]

I bet a lot of people watch.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Those and don't even know that you were once a golf pro working up in Manchester. Is there something that you go through when you come up with an idea where you. You almost have a checklist of. How do we know if this is going to fly on YouTube? Well, these are the things we're going to. These are the questions we're going to ask ourselves.

[Rick Shiels]

Normally there's one question.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Yeah.

[Rick Shiels]

And it's do we, do we want to know the answer? For example, I filmed a video. One of my first pros I had on the channel was Tommy Fleetwood. We had a day with him to film and it was like, right, we're going to go and film with him. But it's like, what's the content? Because obviously he's better than me. Considerably better than me. And it was like, well, what do we film? Like how. How do we make this a competition? And we ended up a guy who works for my team kind of came up with the idea. Well, what's never been done before is what about if you had a. A certain amount of shots, Head start. It's like, okay. Because it builds in the narrative. It still gets 18 holes in, but you have. I started 10 on the par. So you start with a massive advantage. We, we're saying, Tommy, you're way better than me. I'm gonna start with a head start. Can you catch me? Are you good enough to catch me or am I good enough to hold onto this lead, whatever it may be? And again, that's a topic we want to know the answer to. Can I beat Tommy fleetwood with a 10 shot start? That's what we called the video. And I wanted to know, Tommy wanted to know. So if we wanted to know, the audience are going to want to know. Of course they are. So I think they're the ones that excite us most when we want to know the answer. So I've got a really good friend of mine who played on tour, he played in the Open, he's called James Robinson. Really, really good. But he didn't qualify, he didn't make it. So it's like, well, why didn't he make it? What, what's the reason? So he's a bit of a Stig character on our channel where. Right. James who you're bloody really, really good at golf. Can you shoot par with this terrible set of golf clubs? Like can you shoot par with this budget set of clubs or these kids clubs or these not left handed clubs but any. Like just keep throwing stuff at him or can you be me using certain clubs or, you know, we just, it's all of. I think they're the most interesting questions to us because before we start in genuinely like I don't know how this is going to go. Mr. Beast is the gold star in, in YouTube and you know, he again does a similar thing where he'll, he'll sometimes he opens, apparently opens a dictionary and he'll be scanning through and he'll try and find a word and, and it, this word might be something like. I can't think of an example now. Extraordinary. And he'll just play with that word. Right. Extraordinary. How could I turn that into a video title? I visit the most extraordinary place on earth. Okay, well that's all right. I visit seven extraordinary place in 24 hours. Okay, we're getting better. I visited the most extraordinary. Blah, blah. It's like it just keeps going. And then suddenly he goes, yeah, it's a good idea. Or he just scratched it. Okay, next word. And it's just, it's just.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Does it start with a title every time?

[Rick Shiels]

I think so, yes. Title and thumbnail are really, really important.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Why?

[Rick Shiels]

Because it's, it's your front cover of your book. I know you guys have got a book out like it's your front cover. It's what attracts people to click on that video. I would some degree love not to have a title and a thumbnail. You know, I'd love to just. This is episode three, but it doesn't work in YouTube like TV. It just works, doesn't it? You don't really need a thumbnail or a title. It's just, it just works. That's the episode number you're up to or even on Netflix. Thumbnails are important on Netflix because you've got so much choice. But once you're in that series, it doesn't matter what episode, episode three is called, does it? Like, it's just episode three. Yeah. Where in YouTube, every single episode has to have a title and thumbnail. That's fantastic.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

We haven't even spoken about the business side of things. Like, you don't talk about it as your channel, you talk about it as your business. Right. I just think if you had made it as a pro golfer and had an okay golfing career, like, you would have restricted yourself so much.

[Rick Shiels]

I just, you. I learned on the job, though. Yeah. This wasn't, this was never the plan, as I mentioned. I think it's your business. So we've got 12 members of staff currently. We've got really sizable office now in Salford, which I'm really proud of. And, you know, it's such a nice place to work. We're recruiting a couple. We've got two more job adverts out at the moment, which we're just recruiting for now. So we'll be up to 14. I don't think many people watching the channel know that, but I also never wanted, never want them to know that. So you'll never really see my staff in or my crew in the videos. You'll never see me touring around my office or my studio. Because going back to that idea, I still want it to feel real and I want it to feel like it's a YouTube channel that people tuned in from 13 years ago, where it's, oh, it's just Rick, it's my mate, he's just going to help us or he's going to do this. And I think soon as you start showcasing, oh, look at me with all this crew and all the. It loses that bit of magic I always feel. So I've always tried to keep it what feels like it's the audience and me. That's it. That's all there is. There's nothing else going on. It's not, you know, and the productions increase all the time. Of course it has, because that's what's needed to happen. But we actually almost, we pull back the production a little bit. Like we could make better videos. We, the production could be way better. But I don't want to lose that connection with the, with the fan or the audience because as soon as they think, ah, this is overproduced, this is like a Netflix show now. It's not YouTube anymore and it's still got to be a bit shaky camera. It's still got to be a bit spitting sawdust. Like, it's still got to have that YouTube feel to it. Mr. Beast did that for years. You know, he could have. He could have filmed everything in 4K, but he didn't want to because he felt like it was almost too polished. He ended up filming everything in 1080 because it just. He wants it to still look like YouTube. The. He did a series on Prime, Amazon prime, and that looks so different to his normal YouTube videos because it was filmed on really fancy Amazon prime cameras. And even I watched it going, ah, it's gone. This isn't YouTube anymore. I enjoyed it, but this isn't YouTube anymore. And that really weird find balance.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

But how do you keep yourself honest then, so that. Because sometimes I can imagine you can almost get lost in that world. So who gives you feedback to go, rick, this isn't working? Or Rick, you need to consider this.

[Rick Shiels]

Probably the audience.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Is it?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, probably the audience.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You can't hide in your job.

[Rick Shiels]

No, I protect myself from the audience a bit more now because.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Explain.

[Rick Shiels]

I don't think any of us are designed to receive hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands in my sense, over my YouTube career to feedback and criticism and judgment. Don't think any of us are designed for that. And it's hard. Isn't like it's difficult. And I could read 10 lovely comments and I'll read one negative one, and that's the only one. That's the only one I ever remember. And whether we programmed like that, I'm not sure. You might know a bit more than I do about that. But it's like, I think over the time I've really tried to put things in place because I would say that's been my not regret because I don't really. I don't have many regrets in this space. But it's the thing that I never expected. I. I came into YouTube Golf to try and help people. I saw a business opportunity. I didn't put myself in a position to be criticized for everything that I do, really. And that. That can be everything. It can be. God, you're looking a bit fat today, Rick. You've had too many sausage rolls. So now I've actually lost a bit of weight recently. Oh, bloody hell, Rick, you're looking too skinny. It's like, jesus, where do we win? Or like, your golf game's terrible. I'm like, well, yeah, okay. And you know, there's just. And over time, it just takes and golf game Terrible. I can take on the chin. It's not the end of the world. But I think when it gets really personal or it's like, God, I've worked really hard for this video and you know, the top comment might be, this is crap, or this is. Or that's like, oh, thanks.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

What message have you had that you, you that really hurt and you still remember?

[Rick Shiels]

It wasn't, weirdly, it wasn't aimed at me. So one video I released, it was with a good friend of mine, Peter Finch, who I've done loads of videos with in the past. And the video had just come out, I hadn't been out long. This was a number of years ago, seven or eight years ago. And the top comment, or one of the comments was, P is the type of guy who would benefit from getting cancer. How can someone even type that? How can someone say that? How can someone think that? Luckily I was on YouTube at the time and I literally deleted the comment as quick as I possibly could. I didn't want anyone to see it. I didn't want Pete to see it. Like, what? And I blocked that guy from the channel. I hope he's never watched the channel ever again. But I was like, how is somebody even having that as a thought in the mind? And you know, that always kind of really stands out to me as one of the ones I was thinking, because you can get negative comments, of course you can. But like to go that, to go to that place to wish somebody would get a life threatening illness, it's like, what?

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So what have you done to protect yourself from this sort of stuff?

[Rick Shiels]

So my wife's been the biggest helper in, in a lot of this because there's many times where I would get home and I'd be in a lovely mood. I've had a great day filming. Video's just been released. I'm in a great mood. Kids getting the kids ready. I used to have a habit pulling out my phone. Oh, how's the video doing? Let's have a quick look. Okay. Okay. The video's maybe not performing as well as we'd like. Okay, well that's annoying. Let's read the comments. Okay, read some nice ones. So there's a negative one. Okay, great. Read a bit more. There's another negative one. Okay, great. Some nice ones. Negative. Okay, nice. And again, it might only be 5% of the comments are negative. And I'd put my phone in my pocket. Suddenly I'm in a crap mood. I'm suddenly in a crap mood. I've Gone from lovely happy making tea. And my wife's gone, what's happened? North video's not doing great. All right, okay. And yeah, someone's just called me this or someone said that, or she's like, all right, okay, well, do you have to look at it? And at the time I was like, yeah, yeah, of course I do. That's my job. Of course I've got to look at it. Like, there's no. I have to look at this. And she was like, okay. So she would. She would just expect that. So that's what I've got to do. But I was almost like I was a ticking time bomb. At some point, my good mood was gonna turn into a foul mood and that would affect things. I'd get narcy. I'd get more annoyed with the kids for doing silly things. You know, suddenly I'm bringing negativity into my house. Why have I done that? If I knew there was a. There was an angry mob outside my door, I wouldn't open the door. So why have I got a potent. I'm not saying they're all angry mobs, but why have I got a potential angry mob in my pocket and I'm bringing that into my house. Why am I doing that to myself? And there'd be real times where I'd feel down and like, really annoyed or really upset. And again, probably the back end of last year, my wife went, do you actually need to do this? And still my answer was, yes, of course I do. It's my job. But do you need to.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

What.

[Rick Shiels]

What different does it make? You seen how well the video does? What difference does it make? You going to change anything? You can delete the video. Are you going to check, like, what are you going to do? It's like, well, nothing. What are you gonna do about these comments? Well, nothing, because I never really replied to him, by the way.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You're now in a world where you have an entire team that can look at the comments. Yeah. Look at the video, can judge the performance, can look at the spikes and the drops. That's all bit. You pay people to do that.

[Rick Shiels]

But. But I did it from the start.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Yeah. Like, it's so hard to let go.

[Rick Shiels]

That was my baby from the start. Like, I've. I've read every single comment and watched every single like and every single view that's ever come into the channel to that point. So last Christmas, I made a real conscious effort. We went away for Christmas New Year and she went, don't go on it. And it was Bloody hard. It was two weeks where I was like, this is really hard. Not to look at performance, not to look at comments, not to do this, that, and the other. But I got through it. It. And at the end of it, she was like, how did you find that? I was like, it was really hard. She said it was. But your attitude, your behavior was so consistent through the two weeks. You never went really down. You were just consistent. You were, Rick. Yeah. How I'd like, you know, you were much better with the kids. I was like, yeah, you know what I was. And did the world end? No. Did you lose views? No. Did you lose subscribers? No. Okay, great.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

If we're going to talk about losing subscribers, can we talk about another difficult decision where you would have probably known in advance that criticism would come your way?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

And you know what I'm going to say?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

The deal to partner with Liv. Would you take us through getting the news that it's something they'd want to do to making the decision that, okay, I'm going to do this? And how in a moment like this, you also had to, I guess, protect yourself?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah. So I've known about live for a long, long time. Even before it was brought out, there was a concept that this new league was going to come out. And I actually got approached very, very early on to live stream the first ever event. So the conversation came up, would you live stream the first ever event at Centurion? And at the time, it was like, oh, my God, this is quite daunting, because at the time, it was very destructive, and the audience, the world of golf, wasn't reacting that well to it. And I was like, wow, this in one hand, this is an unbelievable opportunity in what? Like, this is to live stream a golf event on my channel. Wow. And the world's gonna be watching. Wow, this is really cool. On the other hand, it's like, what's that gonna do as a. As a brand? Like, is that gonna damage my brand for the rest of my life? So I basically came back to him and said, I will live stream it, but I want exclusivity for two years. I'll live stream every event for two years. Because that gives me a bit of a safety net. We could never agree on that this time the other. So I said, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna lie. I'm not gonna do it. And from that point, I kind of very much sat back. I wanted to see what the reaction was gonna be like from the audience. I wanted to give live a chance I wanted to see how it was gonna develop. You know, we talk about it on the podcast. Loads from its off. It was. There was lots of positives, there was negatives, there was things that they doing they would live as a league were doing really well. There's other things that were new and different and they weren't really getting right. The teams connection with the teams and the fans wasn't great. It was a bit of a mixed match. It was all kind of like a bit of a rush. It all kind of happened in that first couple of years. It worked, but it wasn't the best product in the world. So as it moved into its third year, it's coming into its fifth year now. As it moved into its third year, there was a few more conversations. Would you like to be involved? You know, is the room. And I was like, okay. People are warming to the idea of live a bit more now. Like, you know, I've gotta. I've got to understand how the audience is going to react to this. I'm warming to live. I'm getting to understand it. I've been critical, but I'm. I'm warming to the idea of how it's going. So then a conversation took place was, well, if we did work together, what would it look like? So I just basically wrote this plan out one afternoon in an. If I. If I had access to all these players and I had access to these amazing golf courses around the world, what would I do? I just wrote this incredible plan out. I was like, that's what I'd do. And they went, we like the sound of that. I was like, okay, that's interesting. I said, is it all possible? Yes, most of it is possible. We might have to tweak a few things, but most of it's possible. I was like, okay, or can we agree what a deal might look like.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Due to these negotiations yourself?

[Rick Shiels]

I'm very, very heavily involved. Yeah, very heavily involved. Because again, I think I know other on screen talent wouldn't be. And they've got management and I've got management and representatives. But it's like, I re. I'm very passionate about this now. You know, if I'm going to do something, agree to something, it's got to come from me because I'm doing it. Never at the end of the day, it's not someone else that's doing it. And some of the legal stuff obviously would get looked after, but most of the conversations with Liv came, came from me directly and then ended up going playing golf with Greg Norman. At. At Turnbury on the Sunday of the Open two years ago, where he won the Open in 1986. So that was a really cool experience. And again, we had lots of chats there. How could this work? Moving into. Into 2025? And I was like, this.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Was that for content or just for no time together?

[Rick Shiels]

It was like, I always thought to myself, if I'm gonna put. Put a toe in to live, I can't. I've got to be all in or nothing. Because you can't put a toe into it because as soon as you. As soon as you. You put. You dip your toe in, the audience's reaction is going to be one way or the other anyway. Like, I can't. It has to be. I have to be all in or I almost.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

And you would have had all the negativity with none of the upside. Yeah, that's what you do.

[Rick Shiels]

Correct. So it's like, I could put my toe in, but me filming Greg Norman at Turnbury was going to come, would have come with a lot of negativity for me. No massive amount of upside at that time. So, as we agreed that the original plan was to have it ready for the middle of 2024 didn't quite work out, so I was like, right, let's reset, let's launch this at the start of 2025. And I was really excited. I am excited. You know, I love the opportunity. It's like, if this plan I've presented comes off, then the content's going to be so good that the viewers are going to love it. Like, the viewers are going to love it. I know I'm going to get some backlash. I know I am. Of course I am. I know I'm going to lose subscribers. I know that's, you know, that's a given to this for me. There's obviously upsides. There was financial security, there was security for the team, there was security for content for the next three years. Like, this was a. It was a. It was a security net as well as something really, really exciting. So as we released the announcement, 2025, January, I kind of shut everything off, shut my laptop, shut my phone. I worked with a psychologist, funny enough, Tom Young, who I mentioned before. I'd been working with him for a while already and he gave me some advice than the day before the video was released because I'd been speaking to him about it. He said, you're probably going to get some negatives. And I'm like, I know, I know it's going to come. He said, well, Write down. Spend an afternoon writing down every negative comment you can think of. I was like, what? He said, write down every single thing you think is going to be said tomorrow. So I was like, wow, okay, he said, because the next day, if anybody writes something worse than what you've written, almost give them credit, almost use it as a bit of a game. So one afternoon I just spent that and I wrote down the most disgusting things I could ever think to say to myself, which was weird. And you know, for everything from money grabber to this to that, you know, obviously Liv Golf is backed by, by Saudi, the pif, so that was going to come with a level of feedback, etc. So I was like, okay, I'm just going to write down everything. And then the next day when the video got released and, you know, I was brave enough to open my laptop and see the reactions and I read through comments and to be honest, in a weird way, it was a lot more positive than I was expecting.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Okay.

[Rick Shiels]

Because I'd written all this negativity, I thought it was going to be 100% negative, almost to a degree. That's what I'd almost built in my head. And the next day when I woke up and they're like, it was like 60 positive, 40 negative. I was like, well, that's already a win. That's great. And I'm reading through the negative comments, I was like, well, actually these aren't that bad. Like, it's everything I expected. And if I did see one that was a bit more creative, I was like, that's actually good, that one. And thought about that one. I'm gonna write that one down. And then, you know, there was a little bit of time where I was like, okay, this is getting. Obviously I'm losing subscribers. I think we lost 30,000 subscribers, which in the grand scheme of things, we're nearly up to 3 million. So 30,000 was a dent, but it didn't, like, it didn't cripple the channel, and it didn't take that long until that kind of leveled out and started to go back up. And then once we started releasing content again, the feedback from the audience was fantastic. I was like, great, okay, sigh relief.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

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[Co-host or Interviewer]

I think what Tom's advised yeah is something called psychological inoculation into it where you've almost like immunized yourself against what about what's to come and there's evidence that it improves your resilience by between 20 and 25%.

[Rick Shiels]

Is that doing it?

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Which sounds like you've had. Have you used it since in other aspects of your life?

[Rick Shiels]

No, I've not actually. And maybe you know, when he said it I thought is that not a really weird negative way of thinking about it? But I think it was just managing expectations. I've not had to use it yet. But yeah, it's been, it's been a really interesting year for me and you know, I've got to travel the world. I've got amazing places I've been To places I've never seen before, like Hong Kong, Singapore, Mexico City, Adelaide. I've never been to Adelaide before. It's like, so I've built all these wonderful relationships with the players. Like, as we move into 2026, I've got even better plans of what we can film. The channel's as strong as it's ever been. We're now over 3 million subscribers. We're getting really close to a billion views. It's like, okay, like, the dust has settled. Live in its own right is becoming more accepted. It's not there yet.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

And how did you morally square this off with the fact that it was PIF and Saudi?

[Rick Shiels]

I think when you. When you look at how much is invested across the world, like, they love golf and they want to grow golf. And I got to meet His Excellency, has played golf with him since, and he loves golf. Like, they. They want to see golf as a. As a backbone in Saudi Arabia, and they want kids to get into golf and women to get into golf, and they want golf professionals to come through their rankings. It's like, well, that can only be a good thing. We've seen that in so many other countries. We've seen that across the world, how golf has brought people together. And as a. As a massive ambassador of golf, it's like, well, why would we not want PIF money to come into the world of golf? And, you know, you see it now with what they've done with the Saudi Football League. And, you know, that's going to continue to grow, I'm sure. And, you know, they're invested in Uber and Disney and all these other things. It's like, most things that everyone touches every day is got PIF involved in it. And, you know what, meeting His Excellency and spending time with him and just realizing the vision of what they want for Saudi Arabia. And, you know, 2030 is the big goal. It's like, you know, it's going to be a hotspot for people to go to and travel, destination. And without getting kind of political on it, it's like, I feel like they're trying to do good, they're trying to do better, and they're trying to grow as a nation. And. And if golf is their vehicle for that, then I think that's a fantastic place to be.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

And you're meeting some incredible people. Like you said there, His Excellency out in Saudi Arabia, Greg Norman, you've mentioned the great white Shark. You've played golf with him. What have you seen in common with all These people whose worlds you're going in and exploring.

[Rick Shiels]

One thing I've seen in common quite a lot is, and I can't say this for every high performer or great person I've spent time with, but how alcohol isn't involved.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Go on, say more.

[Rick Shiels]

I feel like really, really kind of tuned in individuals. Certainly more recently I've quit alcohol don't drink. They don't overindulge in drink. It's something that I've become more part of. So I stopped drinking 500 and odd days ago.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Tea total.

[Rick Shiels]

Tea total. And I see benefits for that as me as well. You know, I've really seen a new side of me that I'm really happy with. I never had a drink problem as such. You know, I wouldn't ever brand myself an alcoholic, but I felt like drink was getting in the way of things. And, you know, there was a level of me not being able to control how much I drank when I drank. And it affected me, affecting my business, my mood, all these other things. And I think subconsciously, because I knew I was moving into the live deal this year, I was like, I don't want drink to jeopardize that in any way. Like the last thing I need is a player seeing me stumbling out of a bar pissed up one night. Or, you know, I don't, I can't be. Not turn up for filming because I've been out for some drinks the night before or stinking of alcohol. So it's like, okay, well let's, let's see if we can knock on it on its head. I originally, I was only meant to do three months and once it got to three months, I was like, quite like that. Let's see if I can get to six months. I got six months, then a year. And right now drink is so far off my radar, it's, it's mind blowing. And again, I think it's something that I've seen with certain individuals. You know, they, they'll drink maybe, but it's very controlled and it's not overindulged and, or they don't drink at all.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

And aside from the alcohol thing, I think one thing that you are privileged to have seen, and I feel similar for us actually, is that you see people in a different environment when they're competing at the top. Yeah, so you're still playing golf with them, but they're so much more relaxed. So we'll have elite people come in here and they're still talking about their world of F1 or golf or football. Or whatever, but they're. They're so much more relaxed again. And I wonder when you. When you see people in that environment psychologically, what you think those people who are just the best of the best have got or what, what do you notice that just makes a difference for those who are just that step up from great to greatest?

[Rick Shiels]

I think they are unbelievably competitive.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Right.

[Rick Shiels]

Even in the most relaxed setting, they are outrageously competitive. We were talking players. That is the biggest standout for me, like, how much they want to win at everything, and that drives them so much. Again, the criticism for players that have moved to live or they don't care anymore. Bloody hell. That's not the truth. Like, if I go to a driving range on the week of a live event, I can't believe how hard they're practicing. I can't believe it. Like, it baffles me. Like, some of these guys who have signed for hundreds and hundreds of million are out there. Rain, shine, humidity, whatever, beating balls, practicing, working hard, wanting to get better, wanting to win, wanting to win majors. It's like, wow. And again, any interaction I've had with these guys, whether it's. I feel like if you'd have a game of tiddlywinks with them, they'd want to destroy you. Like, they'd want to bury you. And that is something I've never had personally. I think that's why I never made it as a player, because I am somewhat competitive, but I'm not hyper competitive.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

See, I think that you might not. I think that you thought that golf was your calling or your purpose, but you were wrong. And the reason why you weren't as competitive in golf as some other people was because it wasn't your purpose. Now, I'm. I bet that in your world of creating your content and your business and your brand, I bet you now are.

[Rick Shiels]

I'm very competitive in that world. Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Because this. Because you've actually now found your purpose.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You thought your purpose was golf. Your purpose was talking about golf.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So take us into your competitiveness. What is your mindset? Like when you see other channels and other ideas and other guests and other growth? Like, what is that?

[Rick Shiels]

Like, it hurts. It's. I think because I had such free reign for so long, you know, in. In the YouTube world, you know, when I first started, there was probably two or three creators. And then for a long time, you know, it was very UK centric. The USA almost hadn't gotten onto it. And I always knew there was going to be A time where they'd. The light would, you know, the light bulb would switch and the US would, would be coming. So I was trying to make hay while the sun shone and I did such a great job of that. Like, we really put our foot down. It's like, there's no USA competitors, let's just go for it. And then what was interesting, the USA competitors didn't come like they did in the uk. So a lot of the UK guys was very similar to me. Golf professionals who wanted to build a reputation and then kind of stumbled into this world of giving advice online. That's how the UK started and I always thought that's how the USA were going to start. Wasn't, interestingly for me, it was fans of my channel. Young lads, young girls who weren't professional golfers who had almost played golf their life, but they almost wanted already to become YouTube golfers. And these young, like a Grant Horvat or, you know, the good, good lads.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

So this was the aim. The aim wasn't to be a pro. And if you don't get that settled for something else, being YouTube golfer was the ambition for them a lot.

[Rick Shiels]

For most of them, yeah. For most of them, yeah. It's mind blowing. And they're not professionals, as in they're not, they're not coaches. They came onto YouTube scene to make fun golf videos and as soon as that started to take place, I was like, wow, this is really cool, actually. I really like this because it was different to what I was doing. I did loads of collaborations with the guys over there because, you know, they wanted to get a bit of my audience. I knew that, you know, like the good, good lads, who are like the one direction of, of YouTube Golf, pretty much been brought together almost by a Simon Cowell type character, has almost brought these lads together, these young lads who are all fairly talented at golf, but it's personality driven. It's like, well, they're going to be the next up and coming thing, let's collaborate. So I invited him over to the uk, we did a week's worth of content together, which was fantastic. Grant, who is doing brilliant on YouTube now, he was part of that group originally. A bit like a Robbie Williams from Take that. He kind of went solo and has done really well since that as well. So you lent threat 100%.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

That's interesting.

[Rick Shiels]

100.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

It was a threat, right?

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, it was new, it was different, but. But also to some degree it was a threat. But I knew that they had a younger audience that than I had not Knowing analytics, but just looking at their age group, they're going to be trapped in 20 year olds rather than 30, 40 year olds. So it's like, well, let's, let's collaborate. I'm still young enough and fresh enough to be able to feel like I'm not the granddad in this, in this mix, you know, let's do as much as we can together. And again, to some degree, I knew that they were building and growing and doing really well. I was like, well, let's piggyback off each other's success a little bit.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

I love this.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, no, it was good. Collaborate. Collaborations are key. And then even collaborations with players like Bryson DeChambeau, like when he first started we, I spent a week with him in, in West Palm beach. Got to meet Trump that week as well, which was wild. Yeah. Because we filmed a lot of his golf courses.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

What was that like?

[Rick Shiels]

Interesting character, you know, what did you learn from him?

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Because I do believe you can learn from anyone and everyone, regardless of who they are.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

He.

[Rick Shiels]

What I've honestly learned from him was how receptive he was to my world. In a very small window of meeting him, it wasn't one sided conversation. He very much wanted to know what, what I did, what I was doing. He wanted to have an input and he wanted to, to, you know, have his say on, on YouTube etc. But he was very much like, so what videos are you doing? And he said, I'm sure, I'm sure I've watched a video.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

You know, you are in a hard space, right? Because every single day that you release a video, you start again from zero. Every video can be a bomb, right? And that's the difference between the world that we're now in and the world of being in mainstream media where you're so protected by a channel and producers and schedules and you know, your content, the same as the content we produce, is not served to anyone. It's sought by people. And people can stop seeking your content at any given day. That's why this comes at quite a cost, Right. It's like an exhausting way to live your life, to think, what's next? What's next? So that's the final question, really, like if I say to you, what is next? What are your ambitions? What is the dream now? What. What would you love the future to look like for you?

[Rick Shiels]

A yacht in Aruba? Is that, is that allowed to be you?

[Sean and Linda (Two Black Guys with Good Credit)]

Allow?

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Yeah, you probably have that already.

[Rick Shiels]

No, I think, think, you know, I really want to grow something that's way beyond me so diversification is a big thing. You know, I know that I can't be making videos forever and nor maybe do I do I want to. But what we've built as a brand and as a business and the knowledge that we've acquired, that's something I'm really excited about branching out to, whether that's setting up other YouTube channels in different genres, whether that's creating our own talent, whatever it may be, but just diversifying and being able to take of advantage the backseat, but still manage a media business that's, that's really growing in the space. I think that's, that's kind of the next step potentially for me. But yeah, you know, there's so much going on anyway, it's sometimes hard to see the future. But that's, that's my biggest job this year has been, what is that Next? What's the 5 year, 10 year vision look like?

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Media empire incoming, hopefully.

[Rick Shiels]

Hopefully that's the plan.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

I hope so. I love it when good guys win and you are one. So thank you so much for listening to our show and thank you so much for being on our show.

[Rick Shiels]

I am a huge. Honestly, this is, I'm not BSing you. This is my favorite podcast because the way you ask your questions, the way you deliver, everything is so, so good. And the guests you have on are fantastic. Who's your dream guest? Before I finish, I did want to ask you.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

I would love Lewis Hamilton.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah, yeah.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Broke it.

[Rick Shiels]

Yeah. That'd be class, wouldn't it?

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Wouldn't it be?

[Rick Shiels]

Anyway, I hope you get those guys.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Thank you, brother.

[Co-host or Interviewer]

Thank you, mate.

[Podcast Host (High Performance)]

Thank you so much to Rick for that fascinating insight into a life that has led him from 100 views to almost a billion. I'm gonna be honest, I'm pretty jealous of his impact on YouTube because I think Rick has built something extraordinary. But I think what struck me most there was his ability to stay grounded through all of it. Collaborating with competitors, not fighting them. Listening to his wife when she challenged him about doom. Scrolling through comments, writing down every horrible thing that might be said about him before he announced the deal with Liv Golf. That kind of psychological inoculation from Tom Young. Honestly, a really interesting episode. And Rick, thank you so much for joining us. And you know that moment where he said, I just want it to feel real, I think that idea of turning down over production, keeping the connection with his audience, even as he scales up his staff numbers, I think that's the secret. You know, it's growth without losing authenticity. Something that we've really tried to do right as well here on high performance because I think the creator economy is here. Like it's real, it's in our lives. It's central to what I'm doing, what you're doing. And people like Rick are proving you don't need a TV channel or a magazine cover to build an empire. You actually need imagination, consistency and of course, the all important courage to hit that publish button. And if you enjoyed what we published today, if you found it helpful, please hit subscribe. We do this because we love it, but it helps us to grow, attract more guests, find a bigger audience. If you can hit the subscribe button or leave a comment, it makes such an difference to us. So please feel free to share this maybe with someone in your life who's trying to build something of their own and they can benefit from Rick's wisdom. I'm so pleased you joined us for this episode and we'll see you next time.

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