Daniel Gale is a winner, a competitor. He possesses all the traits needed to succeed at the top level. The Fox Hills product won three times during last season’s Challenger PGA Tour of Australasia.
He was victorious twice on the PGA Tour of Australasia itself, claiming the Northern Territory PGA championship and Webex Players Series Hunter Valley to go with his win at the hotly contested Sandbelt Invitational. He secured his DP World Tour card for 2025 in the process, allowing him to ply his trade on one of the biggest circuits in the world.
Golf Australia magazine spoke to Gale in February when the Aussie tour was nearing its pointy end, and watched him in the flesh at last year’s Australian Open. It wasn’t the well-documented funky swing or the yellow bucket hat which stood out. His attitude, mental fortitude and approach to the game is what impressed most.
Gale was sure of his game and his ability to compete with the best players on the planet, but he thinks deeply about the process to get there. Whether that meant securing playing rights in Europe or having to play another year at home, he views it as “just golf”. Whatever happens, happens. He will take it in his stride and keep doing what he does best … play golf.
“I don’t want to say it would be life-changing or anything like that,” Gale told Golf Australia Magazine.
“At the end of the day, it’s just golf, and I’ll get to explore a bit more of Europe and play a main tour for a full year.”
Gale will certainly get to explore more of Europe – and the world – during the 2025 season, and he will be playing to win the only way he knows how. However, before we look at the ins and outs of a budding pro career, let’s dive a little deeper into the man who dons the snazzy, bright bucket hat.
EARLY DAYS
Your author contacted Gale again while he was preparing for the Alfred Dunhill Links in an unusually sunny and warm Scotland.
Typically, getting a touring pro on the phone can be difficult. There are certain hoops you have to jump through. They are busy people; we get it. Especially when they are preparing for a big event.
Gale took this writer’s phone call and stayed on the blower for nearly an hour; he is a great speaker and, as we have established, a deep thinker. Getting so much time on the phone with the three-time PGA Tour of Australasia winner was a revelation.
Like most golfers in their late 20s, Tiger Woods was Gale’s main superhero; he was old enough to remember the chip-in at Augusta in 2005. Anything fun and engaging was also a significant factor in Gale getting into the sport. We mentioned Tiger, but Happy Gilmore played a considerable part in this young golfer’s childhood.
“I feel like with the PlayStation games and all that, I remember seeing his [Woods] chip-in at Augusta when I was eight years old. Just seeing all the magical things and all the EA Sports Tiger Woods games. They were awesome. I bought them as soon as I started golf,” Gale said.
“The Happy Gilmore movie, anything that made golf fun, the 400-yard drives and all of that...”
Gale spoke glowingly of his upbringing in Western Sydney, his love of watching sports and of his junior and amateur golf career.
Like all kids in this pocket of the world, Gale grew up watching and playing plenty of different sports.
Soccer, AFL, baseball and, of course, golf.
Golf started at Fox Hills Golf Club, 10 minutes’ drive from Parramatta in the Hills District. Gale comes from a golfing family; his mother, a quality player in her own right, represented her state.
“It was a good family thing to do, and we’re all competitive. I caught the bug early. A couple of driving range sessions and then it’s like, ‘Hey, I want to get better at this,’” Gale says.
RIGHT: One of the better trophies going around, Gale shows off his winnings from the NT PGA Championship.
Although golf was always likely Gale’s number-one love, he was also a talented baseball player. We know what you’re thinking. Golf swing, bat swing, ball speed, he can hit – as the Yanks say – “homers”. However, he doesn’t hold his ability with the bat in very high regard, labelling it “shocking”, but he was a good pitcher. So good, he was brought out of retirement at the ripe old age of 12 to play on The Hills’ rep side.
“I started with soccer, and then got into Aussie rules football, and baseball was a big thing,” Gale says. “I actually gave up when I was maybe 10 or 11. I gave it up for a year. I hadn’t played baseball in a year; I was a really good pitcher.
“Then I went to the trials. My batting was shocking because I went straight from golf every Sunday back to baseball, so I kept missing the ball,” Gale laughs.
“But my pitching was good, so I got picked, and the thing was, you can’t just play for a rep team without being a part of a club-level team. So I had to join the local club. I think I came in three or four weeks into the club season; I missed the first few games, I’m pretty sure.”
There was no chasing any Major League Baseball stints. Not long into balancing a budding golf career with playing the team sport, he learnt something had to give. Gale decided to focus on his golf, aware that getting up on the mound and throwing cannons might throw out a shoulder or an elbow, keeping him off the golf course.
Gale came through the Jack Newton junior golf program and was a regular at the top of the leaderboard throughout his junior days, but he admits he wasn’t a world-beater; plenty of guys had his number most weeks.
There was a natural progression, though. He plays golf out of Castle Hill Country Club – host of Webex Players Series Sydney – nowadays. However, a considerable aspect of Gale’s rise through the ranks was playing at Fox Hills. Gale was one of the better players at the club, even as a youngster. He was included in the club’s division one pennants side at 14. Anyone who has played interclub golf knows how daunting it can be at the best of times. Being barely in high school while doing it, you can see why he is such a great competitor.
“I had great support from Fox Hills at the time. They really did help out my career and helped get me off to a good start.
“You hear about these experienced 50-year-old guys. It is intimidating because they’ve been playing pennants for 30 years and they’ve never been beaten at their home club.
“You hear all this rubbish [going around]. They are good players. They are the ones who are probably the hardest to beat because they know all the little tricks of the trade.
“Being a youngster, you’re probably not as strong mentally, so they try to get to you, but I want to say I was always pretty good. I was on the stronger side. There were definitely other 14 and 15-year-olds who got rustled up.
“I just thrived on it all. I think it’s just the competitive nature; to just try and beat these guys.”
Thrived is an understatement; when he was 15, he went undefeated throughout the season, playing as the No.1 seed against all the “big clubs” in Sydney: New South Wales, St Michael’s, the ‘Group Ones’. Not bad for a kid from Fox Hills.
PGA TOUR
Gale’s profile was given a massive boost in 2023 when he qualified for the second time for the 3M Open on the PGA Tour. It wasn’t because of his tremendous 65 to qualify, it was because his funky swing went viral on social media.
“I feel like that was an experience in itself outside of the event because I don’t even know how many views there were, between 20-25 million across all socials. Something crazy, maybe even more. It was on ESPN Top 10. I didn’t realise how big that was, but so many people obviously saw that as well,” Gale said about a viral video taken of him during the 3M Open.
More importantly, he found out what the best Tour on the planet was like and what he needed to do to be able to compete at the highest level. He says his game held up, even though he missed the weekend.
Gale played with Nicolai Højgaard the second time he teed it up in Memphis, before the 23-year-old Dane bolted into the European Ryder Cup team. “I played with him for the first two rounds. Before he went on his run to make the Ryder Cup,” Gale says.
“My golf game was on par with where his game was at. Then a few weeks later, he’s playing in the Ryder Cup. It was definitely confidence-boosting and a good learning curve.”
Gale speaks highly of the standard of the Aussie season, how it prepares young players for more extensive international tours, the competitiveness of it, and how it isn’t far off the best tours in the world.
“It is a big jump to get to the PGA Tour, but golf-wise, it’s not that far away in level. The golf courses on tours like the U.S PGA are tougher, but I want to say with more reps under the belt, you just get used to it. I feel like all of those guys are just used to those golf courses,” Gale says.
DP WORLD TOUR-BOUND
It was a fantastic summer of golf for Gale last year. And due to his finish on the PGA Tour of Australasia’s Order of Merit he will tee it up on the DP World Tour in 2025.
When we asked if he had any specific goals for his first full year, he declared he had nothing set in stone. Just go out, enjoy himself and go with the flow.
“I am just going with the flow because I can’t really set goals around a schedule that’s going to be very last-minute at times.
“I’m just going to enjoy the experience and whatever opportunity presents itself, just try to make the most of it that week. That is my plan for next year, and see how we kick along from there.”
We got talking about tour life and how tough times can be on the road. Gale said it can be difficult, but made a great point about self-investment, which speaks volumes about his character and attitude towards his work.
“You are not going to win every week, but you just have to try to become the best version of yourself on the golf course and away from the golf course.
“We’re our own business, and everything’s an investment into ourselves, if you want to look at it that way.
“You look at the Dunhill; a great example. You have some of the most successful business owners from around the world coming in to play the event. If you go and ask them what it was like starting out, it’s a big gamble. That is exactly what pro golf is. It is a big gamble on yourself. It is not a smooth ride.
It is not a smooth journey, but they stuck at it. You find ways to keep improving and make little adjustments here and there. And then, you get that break,” Gale said.
COMING HOME FOR SUMMER
It should be exciting for Aussie golf fans to read how excited local touring pros are to get home for the big events over the summer. They mean a lot.
Gale is no different; he is super-excited be home and playing the Aussie summer, try to lock up his Order of Merit spot again and play the events which he strived to play as a youngster.
“I think as a kid, they’re the events I’ve watched all the time.
“Me, personally, it’s something I really, really look forward to. It is our national Open and, obviously, the national PGA. It is when we get our best players coming back and we’re able to compete with them. We don’t get the chance to see them as much because they’re all busy in America or wherever.
“Just to be able to get the chance to compete with the world’s best players and Australia’s best players in the same week and venue, it’s pretty cool.
“Obviously, they’re Australian icons. That is where I want to be one day – in their shoes.
“At the end of the day, you want to be going toe to toe with them and obviously beating them and holding the trophy.
“If you’re holding one of those trophies at the end of the week, you’ve done something amazing and special.”
Related Articles
A new Tiger leads in Turkish Open as Aussie Gale shines
Huggan: Confident tours wouldn't be bothered by LIV Golf
