Tommy Fleetwood agreed deadline to stop working with wife who has 23-year age gap

Tommy Fleetwood and his wife set a deadline to explore whether their working relationship was viable. The Olympic Games golf star tied the knot with Clare, who is 23 years his senior, in 2017.

The 56-year-old had been Fleetwood's manager and they soon developed a closer relationship. Due to the sizeable age gap between the pair, she initially knocked back his advances before they eventually became romantically involved.

The couple doubted whether they could continue to work together, with Clare (nee Craig) seriously considering giving up her role as his manager. However, after a trial period, they decided that their professional relationship could continue too.

“As we were sat there listening to different proposals, I'm like I can do this,” she told the Performance People podcast in May 2023. “But I just for some reason at the beginning thought I couldn't and I shouldn't. Then we gave it six months, and it worked, so we carried on.”

On how they balance their work-life relationship, Clare explained: “I talk about work a lot – I can’t help it – but I do make a conscious effort [to switch off]. I can see sometimes in his face that he’s had enough, which is quite often!

“We put an office in the house and if I need to talk to him about work, he’ll come in. The only thing we needed to get right was me not talking about work all of the time.

“Tommy’s happier going off reading a book, listening to podcasts, he meditates. I’ll go off to work if I’ve got a spare hour. That’s my weakness in a way. It was never the plan to work together.”

Fleetwood, 33, explained: “When we knew we were going to be working together and married, we always said if we felt it wasn’t working, we’d do something else [and change manager], but gave it a go.”

He's stepfather to Clare's two children, Oscar, 17, and Mo, 16, while the couple also share a six-year-old son called Frankie. The Lancashire pro is hoping to do his family proud at Le Golf National, where the Olympic tournament began today (Thursday, August 1).

He has happy memories of the venue, winning the French Open there in in 2017. Another career highlight occurred the following year as he won four points in five matches to help Europe regain the Ryder Cup.

“When I was look at making the Olympics, coming to Le Golf National, first of all, there’s knowing the course. If you’ve played it quite a lot, that’s always a helping hand,” he said before the first round.

Tommy performed well on his Olympics debut in Tokyo three years ago, although an overall score of 11 under par was only good enough for joint-16th, seven shots off gold medallist Xander Schauffele.