Kevin Hart Is All In on Golf

Watching Kevin Hart on set is akin to watching a veteran fighter in the ring. There’s efficiency to everything he does. At a shoot in South Brooklyn, he transitions from still photography to a scripted commercial to short-form social without ever losing momentum. Someone steps in, gives him the brief and Hart takes it from there as he riffs, adjusts and delivers with the composure of someone who has done this thousands of times. Because, of course, he has.

It’s an appropriate way to encounter Hart at this particular moment. At 46, after a career built around comedy, entertainment, business and a relentless commitment to fitness, he has thrown himself headfirst into something he is decidedly less experienced at: golf.

What began less than a year ago has quickly become another obsession. Hart has joined a growing group of high-profile athletes and entertainers taking up the game, traded playful challenges with LeBron James and even appeared at Augusta National during Masters week. Now golf is becoming part of his business world, too, as Fabletics expands into the category with a collection shaped in part by Hart’s own rapid immersion in the sport.

That’s what brought us to the course in Brooklyn: to talk about why golf took hold so quickly, how his instinct for self-improvement translates to a game built on frustration and what happens when someone accustomed to mastering his craft willingly puts himself back in the position of being a beginner.

Hypegolf: We know you’ve been getting into golf recently. Once you got into golf, what was the moment you realized that this was becoming more than a hobby for you?

Kevin Hart: Probably when I took a liking to it. I’m pretty obsessive, so if I take a liking to anything, it’s very hard for me to approach it halfway. It’s kind of all or nothing. And the idea of a game that puts you in a position where you’re just competing against yourself is fun. It’s exciting to also suck and know that you can only get better. So I think that was the driving force in showing up, showing back up.

So the question is, how good did I want it to get? And that’s where the obsessive behavior and approach to the game came in.

When you started getting into the game, was there maybe a misconception you had about it from earlier in your life that was disproved as you learned more?

No. There was no perception of the game at all. I wasn’t a follower of golf, a fan of golf. I had no knowledge of golf, so, you know, from afar it was just a game that I wasn’t into, that I didn’t play. Boring. Not for me, not my audience, not my culture. There were so many assumptions that I had just because. Just because of where I was from, how I was raised, and I wasn’t brought up on the game or around country clubs or, you know, any place that would give me any type of knowledge of golf.

So because of that, I was very blind to what the game was. At the late age of 46, I was able to pick it up and have a bunch of aha moments. I think a lot of people that have taken up the game at late stages in their life, it’s aha. It’s, “Oh my God, there’s so much more to the game than what I thought was in the game.”

Like you said, golf can be frustrating and addictive at the same time. When there’s a day where nothing’s going right and you can’t hit the ball the way you want, what keeps you coming back?

I think it’s back to what I said earlier. Sucking is good, right? You can only go up from there. So it’s a frustrating game, but if you are patient and really adapt to the process of just competing against yourself, there are no losses. It’s all about just showing up an inch ahead of where you were the day before.

So how do you do that? How do you position yourself to grow? You’re not looking at everybody else. You’re not going to the Tour. You’re not aligning yourself against pros. In the beginning stages of it, it’s just you against you.

The idea of a golf swing is all you’re focused on. What is a good golf swing? How do you get to a good golf swing? Are you trying to do it on your own? Are you going to develop bad habits? Are you getting the right information? Are you getting a coach? Are you getting help?

For me, from day one, it was doing it correctly, so I jumped in full speed ahead. Coach, nine holes, every day. Working on it every morning. Working on it, working on it, working on it, and now I’m at a place where it’s like, oh, it’s starting to all make sense. It’s starting to come together.

It’s kind of similar to the way you’ve approached comedy or fitness or business. You mentioned that you go all in when you get into something.

There’s no halfway. It’s what I am. It’s how I was raised. So if I’m not gonna apply myself fully, then I wouldn’t do it at all.

If I’m not gonna apply myself fully, then I wouldn’t do it at all.

As you’ve gotten into the sport, spending time with athletes from different sports, is there anything you’ve learned from watching some of them apply themselves to golf?

Depends on what sport they’re coming from. Some of them have a crazy advantage. Hockey players, baseball players have a crazy advantage. Tennis players have a crazy advantage just because of the swing or swing path.

They have developed muscle memory at a very high level of going, you know, in to out versus out to in. And what you’ll see is that they can pick up the dynamics of a swing so much faster.

Mookie Betts, as an example, an amazing athlete, but phenomenal golfer, whose golf swing is probably up there with some of the most elite pros that have played the game for quite some time. But he is a lover of the game, and he also works on it. He’s devoted to it. He wants to be a scratch golfer. He has high, high, high expectations of himself for himself.

And you can tell that he’s not stopping until he gets what he wants out of the game. I think athletes that are successful in their profession are looking for the same level of success in the games they take on as a hobby.

Golf is a game that puts you around so many people, so many different types of individuals, right? From business to athletes to professionals.

So naturally, wanting to compete when you do get to those stages is what everybody wants to do. But you also just wanna be the best version of yourself.

How does personal style factor in? Golf is one of the few sports where you can express yourself through what you wear and how you present yourself on the course. How have you started to develop that?

I think it’s everything. I think the beauty of where golf is today is it’s expanding, right? You’re seeing golf realize that the idea of old and true is not something that really fits within the new. There’s a younger generation that’s gravitating towards the sport, and style attached to golf is growing, right?

I think you’ve seen brands like Malbon do a great job of expanding what golf attire can be and should be, while still respecting the game.

You know, as a guy who loves clothes in general, any way that I can step into the space and be fashionable while having fun, it’s a big deal. If you don’t play good, you at least wanna look good.

So the brands that are allowing the golfer of today to express a little more from a fashion perspective are brands that are standing out. Fabletics, myself, we’re trying to do our own version of what we can call standout apparel in the golf space, while staying true to the foundation of what golf is. You don’t wanna disrespect it. You wanna keep a level of class and premium to it, but you also wanna add some flair where you can.

Humor is very important. It’s been in the game for a while. You just haven’t been able to see it because of the way golf has been showcased.

And that logo on the chest, that’s kind of representative of the collection?

Yes. My little guy. I’m all about love. I’m all about living, loving, laughing. And any time that I can expand the brand of myself with a noticeable attachment to what I think the world needs, which is love, I’m all about putting people in a position to, you know, be together, stay together, have fun together.

What I love about golf is golf does that, right? Friendships can last forever on a golf course. You know, you have friendships that take golf trips year on end. You have friends that are golfing every weekend. You have relationships that last and find themselves in much bigger and better places because of the world travel that golf allows you to do.

It’s a game that truly, truly builds and protects what I would call the memories, right? I’m less than a year in, and I can say some of my best memories in life are traveling to some of the most beautiful golf courses that I’ve ever seen, and my wife and my friends being a part of it.

Having a logo that I can now connect with people from afar, where we all understand what the logo is and why we’re gravitated toward it—not just because of how good the clothes look, but because of the meaning behind it—I think that’s special.

So anything that I can do that comes from the heart, my fan base has always gravitated towards the things that I’ve been able to do because they know how much of an authentic person I am, especially when I’m speaking from the heart.

Golf has a reputation for taking itself pretty seriously. Where do you think humor fits into the game?

Humor is very important. It’s been in the game for a while. You just haven’t been able to see it because of the way golf has been showcased.

I think there’s a lot of personalities that have been at the forefront. They just haven’t had the space to be the voice. But if you golf and you have a foursome, you’re out there with people that you’re laughing with, that you’re enjoying life with, and through four hours of enjoyment, there’s tons of stories that you leave with.

I mean, this is why golf days are so long, because of the good time.