11 Guys Who Gave The Gym A Miss

Post from Sports Writer Derek Clements

When Tiger Woods burst onto the professional golf scene we were told that every golfer on the planet would follow him into the gym - or at least all of those with serious ambitions to become major champions.

This week we pay tribute to a band of men who thought: "Exercise? Pah! Schmexercise! I am having none of that. If God had meant us to be slim, he would have fitted out the womb with a mini-gym!"

These are a group of guys who are probably at their happiest with a burger and a beer in front of them:

Miguel Angel Jimenez

Surely everybody's favourite fatty. Anybody who has witnessed Miguel's fitness routine will understand why he remains the shape that he does - more like a truck driver than a professional athlete.

His regime involves a half-hearted bending process in which he always has a club handy; we presume this is to stop him from falling over if he should lose his balance. And all the while, he carefully balances a huge cigar between his lips. Whether he shoots 67 or a 77, Miguel then heads for a glass (or several) of Spanish rioja. Everybody loves him. And why not?

Kevin Stadler

Talk about like father like son. Craig was always a big man, which may have had something to do with his avowed hatred of exercise and love of a glass of beer. Kevin is a chip, or rather a bucket of French fries, off the old block. He even has his father's temper. Kevin is a proponent of the broomhandle putter - some unkind sorts have suggested that he has to use it because he can't bend over to use a traditional putter

John Daly

With apologies to Johnny Cash....

Big John, Big John, Big Bad John, Big John
Nobody seemed to know where John's drives were going
He just drifted round the course and found spots of his own,
He didn't say much, just kind of cursed and swore
And if you spoke, you said hi Big John, I've shouted fore.
Somebody said he came from a big free land,
Where he got into a fight and was subsequently banned.
And a crash and a blow from a huge right hand,
Sent a Lousiana fan to the promise land.
Big John. Big Bad John.

The former Open and PGA champion has always been a big boy, but when he started packing away beer, Coke and burgers in industrial portions his weight ballooned and he found himself tipping the scales somewhere north of 20 stones, which is heavy. He tried everything to lose weight. Well, he tried everything other than going on a diet. Finally he admitted defeat and went under the knife. Surgeons fitted a gastric band and the weight tumbled off. Big John is now a shadow of his former self. Sadly, so is his golf!

Mark Calcavecchia

Even in his prime, Calc was a chunky individual, but it was when he hit his late forties that the pounds really started to pile on. He is still capable of playing some marvellous golf, the only waddling duck earning a good living on the Champions Tour. The poor old boy really struggled in the heat at The Open

Tim Herron

Affectionately known as Lumpy, Tim Herron is that rare thing on the PGA Tour - somebody who doesn't take himself or his sport terribly seriously. Some describe him as a breath of fresh air, but it is quite probable that none of those people have been downwind of Tim after he has finished a man-sized meal. And Herron is a man-sized man. He has a pretty refreshing attitude towards fitness too."I subscribe to the John Daly theory," he says. "You can pull a muscle, but you can't pull fat." You've just got to love him!

Angel Cabrera

Known as The Duck, Cabrera is but a stripling when compared with some of the others we feature, but his appetite for prime steak (lots of prime steak) has taken its toll. Put it this way, if he went to audition for the lead role in a remake of The Invisible Man, he wouldn't be asked back.

Darren Clarke

The Northern Irishman, who is a close friend of Tiger Woods, decided that if he was going to compete with the best then he was going to have to lose weight and become as fit as the best. In theory that was fine, but nobody seemed to have explained to Clarke that getting fit and then staying fit actually involved a fair amount of physical effort. He went the whole hog and the weight disappeared, but then he got fed up with the daily routine and decided it was better to eat the whole hog

Colin Montgomerie

Poor old Monty. He was first dubbed Mrs Doubtfire at the 1997 US Open at Congressional. It was a nickname he did not enjoy and that, of course, simply led to American golf fans using it at every available opportunity. David Feherty, blamed by Monty for first coming up with the name, even asked the Scot to dress up as the Robin Williams' character for a TV show he did in 2011. Unsurprisingly, there was no response from the dour Scot. Never a fan of the practice ground, he hated the idea of spending hours in the gym even more, deciding that a pair of man-boobs were a better look. We hope he goes on a diet before going very much further with his Champions Tour career

Colt Knost

Carol King once wrote: "I feel the earth move under my feet, I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down, I feel my heart start to trembling, Whenever you're around." Did the singer-songwriter have a premonition about meeting Colt Knost, we wonder? He is comfortably the youngest in our list, and probably the most likely to feel his heart trembling as he carries round all that excess weight. He stands just 5ft 9in and owns up to weighting 215 lb. Yup, the earth sure does move under his feet

Carl Pettersson

Your favourite Swede, all 200lb and two double chins of him, has a way of walking that is - now how can we put this delicately - erm, unique to overweight men. Imagine a red hot poker. Now imagine inserting it in a certain human orifice. Are you still with us? Now imagine how that individual would have to walk. The thing with Pettersson is that when he swings the golf club and wields his long putter it still looks like the poker hasn't cooled down yet. Ray Floyd was similarly afflicted

Billy Casper

It is a shame that today's generation only know former Masters and US Open champion Casper as he is now - a great, waddling lump of lard who failed to break 100 at Augusta in The Masters. He was also prone to committing the biggest fashion faux pas an overweight golfer can possibly commit - he allowed himself to be seen in public wearing plus-fours! He's a Silly Billy. When last weighed, he tipped the scales at 235lb. He's a Heavy Billy

Photo Credit: TourProGolfClubs.com

Derek Clements is a sports journalist with a particular passion for golf with over 12 years of experience covering golf and other sports including Chief Sub-Editor on the sports desk of The Sunday Times. To contact Derek email direct via [email protected]

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