'I Finished Top Of The Poll, Ahead Of Tiger Woods!' - Andrew 'Beef' Johnston On Fame And Mental Health Struggles

Andrew 'Beef' Johnston's life could genuinely be a movie. And it might end up being the best golf film ever made.

By his own admissions, 'Beef' is just "an ordinary geezer" from Finchley in London. But he was undoubtedly a prodigious teenage talent and was destined for a career in the paid ranks.

Following a five-year period after turning pro in 2009 where he bounced around the tough tiers of elite golf, Johnston eventually found his way to the DP World Tour for good in 2014. The next three years would be nothing short of wild.

Not exactly widely known at that stage, people really cottoned on to Beef's popularity at the 2015 BMW PGA Championship.

Johnston made a hole-in-one at the tenth in the opening round to win a £70,000 BMW, and celebrated by rushing over to a pal standing nearby before giving him a flying chest bump.

The reaction, the beard, the toothy grin - it made golf fans around the world fall in love with Beef.

The next year, 2016, Johnston won the Spanish Open and qualified for three of the four Majors. He rocked up to Oakmont for the US Open in June thinking he could sneak under the radar and see what happened. No such chance.

Speaking to Golf Monthly, Johnston recalled how shouts of "Beeeef!" greeted him the entire week. And it was a different level once he returned to the UK for The Open Championship at Royal Troon.

Johnston admitted he felt like he was "walking on air" down the first, such was the level of impassioned support he was receiving.

“Then I hole the putt on the first, and you’d have thought I’d just won the Claret Jug," he said.

While he (and most of the field) ultimately ended a long way behind Henrik Stenson and Phil Mickelson, Beef finished the 2016 Open in T8th and subsequently qualified for the PGA Championship at Baltusrol.

It was that week Johnston admitted things became "really weird" from a fame standpoint.

He said: “I’ve become so ‘famous’ in the States that I end up signing a promotional deal with the fast food chain, Arby’s, and I do a series of adverts for them, and get filmed serving burgers to customers at one of their restaurants.

“They asked me if I wanted to try my hand as a cook, and I said no way, man - I couldn’t afford the lawsuit if I poisoned someone. That just cracked them up, but I was being honest!

“The Wall Street Journal also got me to try out three different burger houses on the same night, and rate them from best to worst. I’m not making this up, man - The Wall Street Journal!"

From the start of 2016 and for a long while afterwards, there was 'Beefmania' wherever he went. But despite the fact it had been going on for a long time, Johnston was still struggling to make sense of his new-found level of popularity.

He continued: “I’ll tell you how nuts it got. There was a poll before one of the US Opens I played in where people were asked who they were looking forward to seeing most - and I finished top of the poll, ahead of Tiger Woods!

“No kidding. Me. Andrew Johnston, an ordinary geezer from Finchley whose dad was a bus driver and whose mum was a school dinner lady. Someone who had the most normal upbringing you could imagine with a brother and a sister, a family who are all as down to earth as you.

“And now people are falling over themselves to have pictures taken with me, fist bump me, shake my hand, and stuff. That was something I never expected."

After that initial career surge in 2016, Beef managed to earn a PGA Tour card for 2017 via the Korn Ferry Tour play-offs.

He failed to hold onto his playing rights in the States the following season but easily managed that in Europe - although it seemed to him that he was seriously under-performing.

He added: “The big problem was I went from being a decent tour pro to someone with this huge public profile in such a short period of time."

Johnston, although universally loved by golf fans, was struggling to calibrate where his career was.

He felt due to the swathe in fandom and a taste of the US that he should be doing better than he was. Not that he was doing badly at all, in actual fact.

However, as a result of that internal pressure, his mental health took the brunt and golf became a lot tougher than it needed to be.

“All the ‘fame’ stuff happened so quickly, I didn't know what was going on," said Johnston. "I mean, I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the crowds. I would never change that. But when you throw someone into that, you don't know the effect it’s having on them.

“I had no idea. I didn't realize the underlying pressure I was putting on myself to perform, to try and please thousands of people. I didn't realize that was happening until I started working with [psychologist Ben Davies] and he broke it all down.

"Most people know about my struggles with mental health a few years ago. I went to some dark, dark places. You can never take that stuff for granted, because it can affect pretty much anyone. But I really hope all that stuff is behind me for good man.”

Johnston's battle with his own mental health and a troublesome thumb injury in the years since has been widely documented, but it appears as though he's well on the road to recovery - both psychologically and physiologically - now thanks to the support of loved ones, and especially his wife Jodie.

One of the most popular golfers of his generation might not be quite back to his absolute best, but he's certainly making strides - exhibited by a couple of top-20 results in DP World Tour events between the PGA Championship and the US Open.

He said: “It’s still a constant battle, dealing with expectations and not being too tough on yourself when things don’t work out great.

“But once I saw that, it became easier to handle disappointments. We all get them as golfers almost every time you tee it up. But you have to accept that, and you also appreciate the good times more when they come round...

“Your mental attitude is just as important as how well you play the game. I learned that the hard way, but I’ve come through it. And I’m still smiling man. I’m still smiling.”

You can read the full in-depth interview with Andrew 'Beef' Johnston in this edition of Golf Monthly magazine, which is on sale now.