- Feb 15, 2005
- 5,274
- 4,064
Anybody have a golf pro/instructor in the area that they've used and liked - preferably one that won't complexify things or add a lot of new moving parts or multiple swing thoughts.
OT: Nats, Wiz, O's, Ravens, Terps, Navy, Gtown, Mystics, Golf, Summer 2024 (Paris Olympics 2024 as well)
- Thread starter hockeykicker
- Start date
g00n
Retired Global Mod
- Nov 22, 2007
- 31,267
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Jacoby4HOF66
Pull my finger
- Mar 13, 2009
- 30,523
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I took lessons at GolfTEC in Tysons last year. I hadn’t seen a video of my swing in about 10 years so the swing evaluation was a good start. They break the lessons down into 2-3 minute videos of you also to watch before going to the range, which is helpful.
If you are interested I’d be happy to give you my instructors name.
- Feb 15, 2005
- 5,274
- 4,064
Hard (for me) to say. Tough for me to come at the ball from the inside off the tee due to older body and less flexibility to make a good turn while coming down. Result is reduced confidence - more tension in swing, jittery, etc. On holes where I’m confident that I won’t incur trauma off the tee, I’m OK. But, you know, golf course architects like to f*** with your head, and my head - at least for purposes of golf - is easy to f*** with. Something like that
g00n
Retired Global Mod
- Nov 22, 2007
- 31,267
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They're kind of McGolf. All their instructors are usually young guys new to the business (cheap labor) who are trained to teach the same way and from what I hear upsell you on gear if possible. Maybe some people want that kind of thing but I'd be more comfortable working with someone I've researched based on their individual history/abilities etc.
Understood. I had a friend who took lessons there and he recommended it. I thought it was worth it. Sure sales is part of it but I didn’t feel pressured and my guy didn’t seem to care when I said no.
I liked being able to book, move, and cancel lessons online and also being able to do the lessons at night to fit my and my wife and kid’s lives. I haven’t had a lesson since March but I still go back and watch the videos to remind myself of what I should be doing.
Bottom line, I had a good experience, I’m glad I did it, and I would recommend it for others.
- Feb 15, 2005
- 5,274
- 4,064
Jacoby4HOF66
Pull my finger
- Mar 13, 2009
- 30,523
- 7,728
That is fantastic. I need that to play when I wake up in the morning and when I walk in my house at the end of the day.
CapitalsCupReality
It’s Go Time!!
- Feb 27, 2002
- 66,382
- 21,398
Did you book the same instructor each time?
I’ve only taken about 4 lessons in my golfing career. I’ve long considered a regular “coach”, someone I could go to once a week or twice a month maybe, but finding the right coach/personality is challenging.
g00n
Retired Global Mod
- Nov 22, 2007
- 31,267
- 15,868
I hear you. Just found out my 10yrs of back problems are due to arthritic deterioration in the lumbar area. Also have shoulder issues that prevent me from getting into some of the cookie cutter positions. Both have gotten worse since the kid and covid came along and put an end to my monthly massage therapy sessions.
No one thing is a cure for all golfers. In your case there appear to be tensions and worries that feed into a loop.
May I recommend this book?
There's a lot of good headspace stuff in there even if you don't stick with the swing prescription. It can free things up for your body, then you just have to dial in your accuracy. No real changes to swing mechanics at all.
Slicing is the problem, I take it?
Yeah not saying they're terrible, they are what they are. Having the vids available is nice. I record myself with my phone on the range from time to time.
I keep telling myself to get lessons. I normally shoot in the high-80s but I'm entirely self taught. There are so many times on a golf course when I say, "I really wish I knew what the f*** I was supposed to do out here." I also have zero idea how to hit the hybrid or what I'm doing right or wrong with my swing. I know lessons would help because there have been a few times when I've played with people who know what they're doing and they'll give me a tip after seeing my swing changing something that to me is seemingly meaningless like rotating my wrist forward just a bit or lining up the ball with my back heel instead of center and I notice an instant difference.
Somewhat ironically, I played my best round when I had a leg injury. It forced me to stop trying to kill the ball and to be judicious with my movement. I'm pretty sure I'm zero for whatever when saying, "I'm going to crush this ball" and actually doing it. Less is more, I've found.
Somewhat ironically, I played my best round when I had a leg injury. It forced me to stop trying to kill the ball and to be judicious with my movement. I'm pretty sure I'm zero for whatever when saying, "I'm going to crush this ball" and actually doing it. Less is more, I've found.
g00n
Retired Global Mod
- Nov 22, 2007
- 31,267
- 15,868
This is a good point because more of a bad thing is...more of a bad thing.
Sometimes two identical swings will produce wildly different distances because one shot was on the sweet spot and the other wasn't. This is really big on drives and on irons it can be the difference between putting for birdie or struggling to get up and down for par because you dunked it in the guarding bunker.
Most of us have compensations in our swings. I definitely do. The reality is perfect body positions only get you so close to accuracy at impact, which is determined by a few degrees of face angle vs path for the small space/time the ball is on the clubface. And this space/time or "compression zone" is different for each club and at different swing speeds. For wedges it's almost instant and for driver it's about half the width of the ball, if you have decent speed and typical ball compression rating.
Give yourself the best chance to get into position to deliver the club the right way for the shot, but don't rely on X foot position or Y shaft position halfway down to do all the work for you. There's still hand-eye coordination involved.
I've been working on some things recently that have produced great results and I need some course time to test them out further.
- Feb 15, 2005
- 5,274
- 4,064
Many thanks Goon. Will check out the Shoemaker book. If it’s anything li,e Rotella’s, it should be beneficial for me. May I ask what you’re working on with your swing right now
CapitalsCupReality
It’s Go Time!!
- Feb 27, 2002
- 66,382
- 21,398
g00n
Retired Global Mod
- Nov 22, 2007
- 31,267
- 15,868
It's a bit like Rotella in the potential effect, I'd say.
I hope you're ready for The Crazy. I'm not sure I'd read all this or try it before trying the simpler fix of the book I recommended. Up to you. Going to spoiler this because it's long:
I've been down the rabbit hole for a long time so the mad scientist is always looking for more. I'm self-taught with an unconventional John Daly looking swing and have been playing & studying for about 25 years. My current handicap is 0.8 but I can put up a big ugly number on a hole with the best of them, including in competitions, so I keep hunting for secrets.
You name it, I've probably dissected it and tried it.
There's a saying to the effect of "when the student is ready the master will appear". I'd been thinking about this for a while and wondered if I should talk to a nearby pro who's played the Canadian tour.
Then one day recently I was at the club and I ran into the GM and one of the other pros, both of whom worked for me at a different course years ago. They told me Mac O'Grady had been flown in from Japan via California iirc by some members for a set of marathon, multi-day private group lessons.
I could see the mythical figure at the chipping green and was in awe that he was actually there, and teaching, since even the USGA couldn't confirm he was still active.
Mac is notorious for being...eccentric...and this situation was no different. I won't go into some of the things that went down that day but they were interesting and consistent with the legends.
That got me to circle back to some of his videos and theories. You can spend days going through it all but I zeroed in on some of his basic ideas from the late 80s that I wasn't aware of.
He's a disciple of Homer Kelley and "The Golfing Machine" just like DeChambeau, though he diverged from some elements of Kelley at some point (which is fitting since Mac is a rebellious anti-authoritarian). Like both of them I've done a lot of looking at the physics, biomechanics, and math involved in golf and tend to buck the common thinking.
After some trial and error I found some parts of his MORAD system were good for me while others were probably personal or temporary modifications. Mac did change some ideas as the years went by-- like grip strength, stance width, etc, --but he was adamant about them when he believed in them, per his nature. So you have to beware while viewing/reading as I found out.
One thing that was useful to me was the separation of the swing into 10 positions, more specifically the P2, P3, and P4 positions to the top. You can look these up but they're basically common steps in the backswing. I found that I could hit these positions in an even tempo and then impact on the next (4th) beat and it made my chances of success higher.
This seems pretty stock and it sort of is, but it has some significance. I'd messed around with various 6/8 tempos in the past (Snead thought of a waltz while swinging) and the Tour Tempo book over 20 years ago, but having those positions ticked off in a good rhythm and tempo added some consistency and balance to the swing that weren't there when I was focusing on more narrow elements around the ball. Coordination is important, obviously, and this helps with it.
There's even video out there of Mac O'Grady and Gary McCord hitting balls at the same time, and they're in perfect sync without watching each other. It's pretty cool.
There's a problem with relying on just tempo, however. You can feel one way today while there's a totally different but subtle change the next day. You might think everything is the same but you could have a little extra tension in one muscle of the forearm or hand, or maybe the scapula is winged an inch more because of fatigue or posture, or your back is a bit stiffer and you're not clearing as well, etc
That means you can feel like you're swinging in that same tempo and hitting those same positions but the clubface or path will be off by a few degrees and that's enough to send the ball into the parking lot.
I already knew positions in the swing were no guarantee of perfect impact conditions, as sometimes the swing is just "adding power to the waggle", which can be a preview of the "release".
This is where the MORAD thing came into play again.
In 1987 Mac was preaching a "no rotation" philosophy regarding the forearms and clubhead, with the the body and club just turning and right arm simply extending on the downswing to "release" the club. I believe he felt he was doing that but it's physically impossible to make an on-plane swing and hit those positions without rotating the club as you turn. It has to rotate some to get to P2 which is clubshaft parallel to the ground with hands around hip-high.
Moe Normal also insisted he didn't rotate the club but you can see he did. We might feel like our arms never "wander" across the chest or rotate but that's just the feeling of doing less of it than before. Likewise you can't get to a good position at the top with your arms in the same orientation to your torso that they were at address.
So just turning, hinging, and reversing the order of those movements is attractive in its simplicity but not really what happens.
Additionally there was talk about maintaining the angle of the right wrist about 12-20 degrees throughout the swing, with Kelley saying the right wrist can only dorsiflex, not experience ulnar or radial deviation. This means it can only cup backwards toward the forearm, and can't make a "chopping" up and down motion, which is what the left wrist is supposed to do (the hinge on the backswing).
This didn't make any sense to me. Try to get to the top with a decent hinge of the left wrist while not hinging the right wrist in the same plane. It's impossible. So that's a contradiction in Kelley that Mac also seemed to have picked up.
That got me looking further at what Kelley had to say about "Educated Hands" and personal variations.
If the most authoritative scientific examination of the golf swing can conclude we need some level of hand-eye coordination and "educated hands", and there are personal variations in all swings, this is a very freeing thing to know.
How then to nail down what to do in the hitting area?
This is a good read on the topic that shows better than I can explain:
The "Flying Wedges" and Wrist Movement Glossary
Making sure to preserve the "flying wedge" and rotating the forearms back and through (Hogan's old pronation and supination) are better for ballstriking than flipping and losing your wrist angle.
It's also much easier and more comfortable to get into positions and just swing this way.
One thing I'd done in the past when using this or similar methods was keep turning over the club through impact (for the sake of power and "release") which worked if timing was good but produced weird results if not (hooks, blocks, etc).
So it now seemed a better option to rotate the forearms/hands/club back to square and NO FURTHER unless trying to draw the ball.
This with the timing and the positions AND the MORAD-consistent idea that the shoulders are the engine of the swing (back and through, don't stop them) produced a lot of power and greater consistency, but at times some pulls or maybe slight fades I didn't like.
Why? Because in addition to the hand-eye coordination and timing necessary you still have to stay ORIENTED TO THE TARGET.
It's very easy to feel like you're swinging in line with your body when you're actually releasing the club a few degrees to the inside or outside, producing pulls/slices or blocks/hooks. With all that body movement and shoulders turning it's not hard to imagine them becoming oriented incorrectly vs the target line at the moment of truth.
Stopping the shoulders in order to shuttle the clubhead down the line as long as possible is not an option since it robs power and doesn't really solve the accuracy problem since it's difficult to execute correctly or consistently, as you end up needing to kind of chicken wing to "steer" the club through the hitting area and parallel to your body/shoulders/feet/whatever.
So again I went back to some old methods where I use an Intermediate Target, which helps me visualize the clubhead staying square and going straight down the line through the IT, even as the shoulders are pulling everything around and through. (In the book I recommended this would be like throwing the clubhead at the target, only I'm using an imaginary line on the ground extending from ball to IT as the guide).
So my goal during the strike is to swing with my shoulders, get into positions IN TEMPO while using the forearm rotations, and via that rotation and unhinging deliver a squared clubhead down the line as long as possible. The shoulders naturally pull it around and you FEEL like you're sending the clubhead a foot or two at the target but the reality is the arc only flattens for a very short period...compression is maybe 1/8th of an inch for wedges and about half the diameter of the ball for driver.
This is another example of the pros confusing feel and real, as Moe Norman believed he held this position for 22 inches past impact when video shows he clearly did not. But to him that's how it FELT.
Still another example of the legends not really knowing what they're doing is Nicklaus believing clubhead path determines starting direction per his book "Golf My Way". These days we know from Trackman data that the opposite is true, and depending on loft the starting direction is around 80-85% from face angle.
Anyway, the last time I was doing this entire combination of tactics on the range I was dropping the ball on flags and carrying the back of the range around 270. The last shot of the session was a mid-iron that nailed the flag at 150yds.
To find a swing method that allows more power AND potentially the freedom to swing in a way I find workable (and capable of drawing or fading based on how much the forearms rotate, especially the lead/left arm/wrist) is encouraging.
You can even swing just to P2 and back down to impact on the NEXT beat for a partial shot, in the same tempo, using the same principles. Or go to P3 for a slightly longer one, again same tempo. And you can draw or fade even when doing this. With any club.
But I haven't been able to get to the range in a while due to work and a nasty, ongoing bout of COVID via my kid's daycare so who knows what this will look like when I start up again.
TMI? Probably. Maybe you'll find it useful. Maybe not.
And then there's putting... I have a secret about that I'm not telling anyone because it's so simple in execution, even though complex in theory.
You name it, I've probably dissected it and tried it.
There's a saying to the effect of "when the student is ready the master will appear". I'd been thinking about this for a while and wondered if I should talk to a nearby pro who's played the Canadian tour.
Then one day recently I was at the club and I ran into the GM and one of the other pros, both of whom worked for me at a different course years ago. They told me Mac O'Grady had been flown in from Japan via California iirc by some members for a set of marathon, multi-day private group lessons.
I could see the mythical figure at the chipping green and was in awe that he was actually there, and teaching, since even the USGA couldn't confirm he was still active.
Mac is notorious for being...eccentric...and this situation was no different. I won't go into some of the things that went down that day but they were interesting and consistent with the legends.
That got me to circle back to some of his videos and theories. You can spend days going through it all but I zeroed in on some of his basic ideas from the late 80s that I wasn't aware of.
He's a disciple of Homer Kelley and "The Golfing Machine" just like DeChambeau, though he diverged from some elements of Kelley at some point (which is fitting since Mac is a rebellious anti-authoritarian). Like both of them I've done a lot of looking at the physics, biomechanics, and math involved in golf and tend to buck the common thinking.
After some trial and error I found some parts of his MORAD system were good for me while others were probably personal or temporary modifications. Mac did change some ideas as the years went by-- like grip strength, stance width, etc, --but he was adamant about them when he believed in them, per his nature. So you have to beware while viewing/reading as I found out.
One thing that was useful to me was the separation of the swing into 10 positions, more specifically the P2, P3, and P4 positions to the top. You can look these up but they're basically common steps in the backswing. I found that I could hit these positions in an even tempo and then impact on the next (4th) beat and it made my chances of success higher.
This seems pretty stock and it sort of is, but it has some significance. I'd messed around with various 6/8 tempos in the past (Snead thought of a waltz while swinging) and the Tour Tempo book over 20 years ago, but having those positions ticked off in a good rhythm and tempo added some consistency and balance to the swing that weren't there when I was focusing on more narrow elements around the ball. Coordination is important, obviously, and this helps with it.
There's even video out there of Mac O'Grady and Gary McCord hitting balls at the same time, and they're in perfect sync without watching each other. It's pretty cool.
There's a problem with relying on just tempo, however. You can feel one way today while there's a totally different but subtle change the next day. You might think everything is the same but you could have a little extra tension in one muscle of the forearm or hand, or maybe the scapula is winged an inch more because of fatigue or posture, or your back is a bit stiffer and you're not clearing as well, etc
That means you can feel like you're swinging in that same tempo and hitting those same positions but the clubface or path will be off by a few degrees and that's enough to send the ball into the parking lot.
I already knew positions in the swing were no guarantee of perfect impact conditions, as sometimes the swing is just "adding power to the waggle", which can be a preview of the "release".
This is where the MORAD thing came into play again.
In 1987 Mac was preaching a "no rotation" philosophy regarding the forearms and clubhead, with the the body and club just turning and right arm simply extending on the downswing to "release" the club. I believe he felt he was doing that but it's physically impossible to make an on-plane swing and hit those positions without rotating the club as you turn. It has to rotate some to get to P2 which is clubshaft parallel to the ground with hands around hip-high.
Moe Normal also insisted he didn't rotate the club but you can see he did. We might feel like our arms never "wander" across the chest or rotate but that's just the feeling of doing less of it than before. Likewise you can't get to a good position at the top with your arms in the same orientation to your torso that they were at address.
So just turning, hinging, and reversing the order of those movements is attractive in its simplicity but not really what happens.
Additionally there was talk about maintaining the angle of the right wrist about 12-20 degrees throughout the swing, with Kelley saying the right wrist can only dorsiflex, not experience ulnar or radial deviation. This means it can only cup backwards toward the forearm, and can't make a "chopping" up and down motion, which is what the left wrist is supposed to do (the hinge on the backswing).
This didn't make any sense to me. Try to get to the top with a decent hinge of the left wrist while not hinging the right wrist in the same plane. It's impossible. So that's a contradiction in Kelley that Mac also seemed to have picked up.
That got me looking further at what Kelley had to say about "Educated Hands" and personal variations.
If the most authoritative scientific examination of the golf swing can conclude we need some level of hand-eye coordination and "educated hands", and there are personal variations in all swings, this is a very freeing thing to know.
How then to nail down what to do in the hitting area?
This is a good read on the topic that shows better than I can explain:
The "Flying Wedges" and Wrist Movement Glossary
Making sure to preserve the "flying wedge" and rotating the forearms back and through (Hogan's old pronation and supination) are better for ballstriking than flipping and losing your wrist angle.
It's also much easier and more comfortable to get into positions and just swing this way.
One thing I'd done in the past when using this or similar methods was keep turning over the club through impact (for the sake of power and "release") which worked if timing was good but produced weird results if not (hooks, blocks, etc).
So it now seemed a better option to rotate the forearms/hands/club back to square and NO FURTHER unless trying to draw the ball.
This with the timing and the positions AND the MORAD-consistent idea that the shoulders are the engine of the swing (back and through, don't stop them) produced a lot of power and greater consistency, but at times some pulls or maybe slight fades I didn't like.
Why? Because in addition to the hand-eye coordination and timing necessary you still have to stay ORIENTED TO THE TARGET.
It's very easy to feel like you're swinging in line with your body when you're actually releasing the club a few degrees to the inside or outside, producing pulls/slices or blocks/hooks. With all that body movement and shoulders turning it's not hard to imagine them becoming oriented incorrectly vs the target line at the moment of truth.
Stopping the shoulders in order to shuttle the clubhead down the line as long as possible is not an option since it robs power and doesn't really solve the accuracy problem since it's difficult to execute correctly or consistently, as you end up needing to kind of chicken wing to "steer" the club through the hitting area and parallel to your body/shoulders/feet/whatever.
So again I went back to some old methods where I use an Intermediate Target, which helps me visualize the clubhead staying square and going straight down the line through the IT, even as the shoulders are pulling everything around and through. (In the book I recommended this would be like throwing the clubhead at the target, only I'm using an imaginary line on the ground extending from ball to IT as the guide).
So my goal during the strike is to swing with my shoulders, get into positions IN TEMPO while using the forearm rotations, and via that rotation and unhinging deliver a squared clubhead down the line as long as possible. The shoulders naturally pull it around and you FEEL like you're sending the clubhead a foot or two at the target but the reality is the arc only flattens for a very short period...compression is maybe 1/8th of an inch for wedges and about half the diameter of the ball for driver.
This is another example of the pros confusing feel and real, as Moe Norman believed he held this position for 22 inches past impact when video shows he clearly did not. But to him that's how it FELT.
Still another example of the legends not really knowing what they're doing is Nicklaus believing clubhead path determines starting direction per his book "Golf My Way". These days we know from Trackman data that the opposite is true, and depending on loft the starting direction is around 80-85% from face angle.
Anyway, the last time I was doing this entire combination of tactics on the range I was dropping the ball on flags and carrying the back of the range around 270. The last shot of the session was a mid-iron that nailed the flag at 150yds.
To find a swing method that allows more power AND potentially the freedom to swing in a way I find workable (and capable of drawing or fading based on how much the forearms rotate, especially the lead/left arm/wrist) is encouraging.
You can even swing just to P2 and back down to impact on the NEXT beat for a partial shot, in the same tempo, using the same principles. Or go to P3 for a slightly longer one, again same tempo. And you can draw or fade even when doing this. With any club.
But I haven't been able to get to the range in a while due to work and a nasty, ongoing bout of COVID via my kid's daycare so who knows what this will look like when I start up again.
TMI? Probably. Maybe you'll find it useful. Maybe not.
And then there's putting... I have a secret about that I'm not telling anyone because it's so simple in execution, even though complex in theory.
- Feb 15, 2005
- 5,274
- 4,064
Yeah that is a lot - a whole lot - to digest. But there's some interesting ideas in there that I'll look to unpack after Shoemaker helps me make the whole experience less traumatic. Many thanks
Dr John Carlson
Registered User
Lots of reputable sources on Twitter saying Cam Smith has officially moved to LIV.
Also, and this is low-key important, the formula used to calculate the OWGR has been changed, and it's launching this week. The most notable change is that the European Tour has always been artificially given more world ranking points than warranted, but now they're being given much fewer points. It's going to be a more accurate ranking system, which is good, but already there are a lot of Euros - many of them LIV guys - on Twitter complaining about it. Will be interesting to monitor.
Also, and this is low-key important, the formula used to calculate the OWGR has been changed, and it's launching this week. The most notable change is that the European Tour has always been artificially given more world ranking points than warranted, but now they're being given much fewer points. It's going to be a more accurate ranking system, which is good, but already there are a lot of Euros - many of them LIV guys - on Twitter complaining about it. Will be interesting to monitor.
CapitalsCupReality
It’s Go Time!!
- Feb 27, 2002
- 66,382
- 21,398
on that….not just the DP Tour….
Need to know: OWGR's modernized system debuts this week
Starting this week, the OWGR will begin its modernized, field rating-based system.
www.golfchannel.com
Poulter And Westwood Blast New World Golf Ranking Changes
The English duo have had their say on the new OWGR system
www.golfmonthly.com
Former World No.1 Lee Westwood said: "Literally makes all the tours around the world feeder tours. How they could vote for this and get it passed I have no idea." Fellow Englishman and Ryder Cup teammate Ian Poulter responded in a similar fashion: "They didn’t vote that’s the problem… How was this possible. How didn’t players have that option."
CapitalsCupReality
It’s Go Time!!
- Feb 27, 2002
- 66,382
- 21,398
Yeah I used the same guy. It just seemed to make sense, I felt like I had a rapport with the guy, and my ball striking definitely improved.
The only other time I took lessons was a 3 day golf school at the Ledbetter academy in Naples, FL, about 10 years ago, which was the only other time I had video of my swing.
CapitalsCupReality
It’s Go Time!!
- Feb 27, 2002
- 66,382
- 21,398
my first lesson was after like 7 years of starting…..that first one was video and one other. The other two were “fix sessions” when I developed something wonky with my takeaway and for the life of me I couldn't figure it out.
I love having another set of eyes occasionally, I wish more often….plus the golf swing is incredibly complex even for good/accomplished players.
- Feb 13, 2019
- 1,137
- 1,300
Yeah, this is pretty amazing.
New Orioles closer Felix Bautista has started walking out to the Omar whistle from The Wire which I am so here for. (But none of the video out there of it is all that good...)
Dr John Carlson
Registered User
Fears rise over emerging stars following Cameron Smith’s lead to LIV after FedEx Cup play-offs
Greg Norman might have been ostracised from the Open’s 150th anniversary, but the Australian’s celebrations will have rarely stopped since Cameron Smith took hi
www.thetimes.co.uk
Gulp.
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