Manu Elvira keeps his pace. But what a pace. Each year he shifts up a gear. A little better. A little higher. A little closer to winning. A little closer to the Dubai Final. A little closer to the best. Step by step. Stroke by stroke. Manu doesn’t skip gears two at a time. He shifts properly. He doesn’t go from first to third. He follows an order. But what an order. He hasn’t taken a step back in his entire career.
Since 2019 he has been growing. Each year a little better on the Challenge Tour until he moved up in 2023 without needing to win a tournament. He has completed two seasons on the DP World Tour and it’s more of the same. In 2024 he finished in 102nd place in the Race to Dubai and in 2025 he climbed to 68th. It’s true that 2026 has just begun, but he’s already 40th. It’s the same story with the world ranking. Manu is like a treasury bond. You invest your money at a fixed term and each year it gives you a little more. It’s not the Euromillions, but it will never leave you broke.
He didn’t enter the Dubai Invitational and starts 2026 this week in the Emirates. The new gear change is ready and has a name and surname. “I want to win my first tournament this year. I’ve been close a couple of times. Getting into the PGA Tour cards is more ambitious, but the Dubai Final is realistic. I also want to get closer to the top 100 in the world and aim to play in a Major.” In reality, almost everything is related. If you achieve one of those things, the others come along.
That said, having expectations, having those notable goals, doesn’t mean Manu has lost touch with reality. He wants all that and more, but he knows it’s difficult and if it doesn’t happen, it’s not the end of the world. “You have to go tournament by tournament and not ‘bite off more than you can chew’. You never know when your week might come. I saw Nacho last week: on Monday he said he had lost his swing and on Sunday he lifted the trophy. You never know. You have to do the best you can in every practice and every round: sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn’t… and who knows, maybe on Sunday you end up lifting a trophy,” he explains.
The younger Elvira has prepared tirelessly for that gear change. He’s not one to believe that success falls from the sky. Rather, it sprouts from the ground, from every step you take, every swing, every squat. “I’ve put a lot more effort into the physical aspect in the last month and a half. I’ve started working on fitness with Diego Suazo and we’re quite strict about it. When I slip up, he’s there: ‘hey, you haven’t done this, you haven’t done that.’ I try not to slip up, of course. Besides being for golf, it’s a health issue. The goal isn’t so much to gain distance, as I think I’m doing well in that area, but to have more endurance. I want to be better for the last stretch of the season. I play a lot because I think it’s important, there are points every week, and last year I noticed it on the backnine. The fuel tank was at its limit. The idea is to be able to make the best swing possible more often and for fitness not to be an issue,” he explains.
Of course, he has also worked on his swing with his coach, Alfredo Gutiérrez. “It’s mainly about not losing the fundamentals of the swing and, at the same time, working on little things: whether it’s a slightly shorter swing or whatever. But always on the same foundations. We have a method set for life and we try not to deviate from it. Obviously, one week the swing is better and another worse, but we aim for the mistakes to be as few as possible,” he points out.
For that gear change he’s already preparing, there’s no doubt that his brother Nacho’s victory last Sunday is an extra incentive. It’s like putting Unleaded 98 petrol in the engine instead of 95. Without additives, of course. “I’m very happy that he’s won three times and even more so that I’ve been able to see two of them live. Seeing him win inspires you: you say ‘I want to win too.’ I know it’s difficult, but it motivates you. You have it at home, you know how he plays, he teaches you… and you want to aspire to the same. It’s in your genes. The Elvira gene, Pablo Larrazábal told me before.”
In this regard, Manu is clear that his brother’s influence is tremendously positive. As much as giving him all the credit for saving his card in 2024. “It’s a pleasure. Since I joined the Tour, everyone has welcomed me very well. And I still think that keeping the card the first year, which is always complicated, I achieved thanks to Nacho and all these guys (referring to the rest of the Armada): they welcomed me, explained everything to me, made me feel as if I had already played before. It was a great help.”
In two years he has experienced an accelerated master’s degree. High-level golf can run you over, but this 29-year-old from Cantabria is adept at assimilating information. He listens and learns. He has no trouble listing his four major lessons in this time: “you have to be prepared because you never know when it’s going to be your week, also the other way around, you’re playing well and suddenly everything clouds over; another thing I’ve learned the hard way is that a shot you’ve already hit is done: it stays in the past. Many times I keep dwelling on a bad swing from one or two holes back; every week you have to play with what you have: you’re never going to have the swing at one hundred percent, you have to compete. If you’re missing more to the right, you protect yourself on the left; always look for the good side to miss. Sometimes I leave myself a difficult approach and I have to say: ‘if I’m not hitting it well, I’m going to look for the place where I know I can make four,’ eliminate the double or triple from the equation. And lastly and most importantly: patience. It’s the best tool in this sport. I experienced it in Mauritius a month ago: on Sunday I didn’t play well, but I said ‘I’m going to be patient, I know there are opportunities.’ I missed shots, got lucky (luck plays a part), you miss it into the bushes, you find it… you manage to make four, you’re patient, a couple of birdies drop and I finished with -2 and got a top ten when it seemed it wasn’t going to happen.”
Nacho’s victory on Sunday was a boost. Experiencing it live, a joy. However, he remembers it was “very tough.” No sugar-coating. “When I got to the course, he had made two bogeys on 8 and 9 and hit it into the water on 10… And I thought, what do I do, do I leave, right? Then, on 18, I had a really hard time. I wanted to shout to them that Shane Lowry had made a double bogey so they knew a four was enough to win. When I saw the ball end up between the water and the flag, I almost had an arrhythmia. That was the only moment I really struggled inside.
Then it was a tremendous joy. In the end, they handled it in the best way possible and the rest is history.”
As would be the history of Spanish golf if one day Manu Elvira’s true dream came true: “if one day I can play the Ryder Cup with my brother, then I can die happy.”
