At his home course in Orlando, Maurice Allen is teeing up some golf balls on the driving range at Dubsdread.  “Some people take their lives too seriously, my friend,”  Allen says as he takes a shot with his wedge.  

Maurice Allen is not your average golfer. 

You can’t miss him on the range he’s wearing hot pink and has dragons as club covers.

“Try to keep it as stylish as possible,” he says as he pulls out another club.

Talk to him for a couple minutes it’s clear he thinks different too.

“I think the biggest lesson you can learn in this game is imagination and self expression.”

Allen expresses himself with one of the biggest swings in the world.  Maurice Allen is the 2018 World Long Drive Champion.

“The World Championship is just once a year it’s our version of the Super Bowl.  So it’s probably the most coveted title in the sport of long drive.”

The Orlando native was a multi-sport athlete at Evans High School.  His Dad taught him golf as a kid but he got into the sport of long drive almost by accident.  A friend bet him he couldn’t hit a golf ball.  Allen crushed one, won the bet and the rest is history.  

He's recorded drives up to 483 yards, but he’s best known for his victory speech.  In 2017 Allen unleashed a Ric Flair impersonation including the wrestler’s signature “woo!”  The video went viral.  Allen brought it back after his World Long Drive victory in 2018, but now he says it’s retired.

“I’m certain you’ll never see the Rick Flair again it’s just one of those things that happened but as an athlete you’re an entertainer,” he says.

Allen definitely understands the value of entertainment, but he also understands the value of giving back.  After winning the world long drive competition Maurice donated $20,000 in scholarships to his alma mater Evans High School.  

 “For me donating the money to the school was just  to give kids an opportunity to better themselves,” Allen says.  “You know show them that somebody else believes in them that they don’t even know.”

As for his 18 hole game, Allen says “really good, really really good.”

A man not afraid to give an honest answer, but he’s also not afraid to admit he’s not good enough to make the PGA tour. 

“There’s just so many things when you’re trying to hit the ball far compared to hitting a fifty or sixty yard shot when you look at the swings on the PGA tour they are nothing like the swings on the long drive tour but they still work,” Allen says.  “So that was the big thing that I had to realize I didn’t try to have to emulate someone else swing I had to find my swing and what works for me and stick with that and stay true to that.” ​

A different stroke, a different perspective.  Maurice Allen is the kind of different sports needs.