It takes about fifteen to twenty minutes to do, and it's an assessment to
kind of see where you are relative to your handicap and a professional. I
recommend it to people that are like I want to get better, but I'm
not sure how I get better, or people that are like, man,
I'm hitting it grid on the range and I can't take it to the course.
So what they combine is gonna do. It's gonna gamify your practice.
It's going to give you specific yardages you want to hit in a specific target
want to hit because I find that a lot of times, myself included,
we go to the range, we take our seven nine, we take our
driver, and we kind of just mindlessly hit balls. So this is going
to bring it in a little bit more in to focus with the combines.
So you're gonna get two approach targets and a driving target, and you'll hit
eight shots at each of those targets. You won't hit eight in a row.
You'll hit two to the first approach target, two to the second approach
target, and two drivers. Hi. Yeah, this is John's Wag from
Modesto, California, and I play at Del Rio Country Club. I'm introducing
Golf Smarter Number nine zero seven. Enjoy played better and learn a ton about
your game with the combine feature of rap Sotos MLM two Pro. This is
golf s Murterer sharing stories, tips and insights from great golf mines to help
you lower your score and raise your golf IQ. Here's your host, Fred
Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter podcast justin. Hey, Fred,
thanks for having me. It's great to have you back on the show.
We first met up with you back in twenty twenty two in July, just
about a year ago. And then you and I saw each other at the
PGA Show this year when you were announcing the new product that we want to
get into detail on today, and that is the rap Soto MLM two Pro.
But first let's get a rundown a rap Soto and your product line.
Tell me about what's going on over there. Yeah, so a lot's happened
in the in the last year since we've talked. But yeah, we you
know, we first launched us to kind of people miss that episode or they're
unfamiliar with Rapsodo. We're a sports analytics company, so basically we have launch
monitors in the you know, baseball, softball, and golf space, so
we're looking to optimize you know, athletes performance, enhance their experience of the
game. So on the baseball side, all thirty MLB teams use our products,
hundreds of players are on staff using it, thousands of universities. But
we're here to talk about golf. So in golf, twenty nineteen, we
launched the MLM, which is what we talked about last year, stands for
Mobile Launch Monitor. It's a radar based unit that uses the camera from your
iPhone or iPad to to track the ball, so it's pretty unique. And
then it uses both technologies. You'll see a lot of units out there that
either use a radar or a camera, but we use both of those.
So that launched it at five hundred dollars four ninety nine in twenty nineteen,
and it's been a great product. It's an indoor and outdoor product, so
you can hit into a net or take it to the range and you get
a you know, video of your swing as well as a lot of metrics.
So it's been a very popular product. And then as you referenced,
we launched the MLM two pro earlier this year. We announced that the PGA
show and that was really exciting. That was actually my first PGA show,
so kind of didn't know what I was getting into you kind of me too,
had had an idea, but yeah, it was. It was really
busy week and a lot of excitement around our product because we we were launching
kind of the next iteration of the MLM, which was the MLM two Pro.
And what that was was it's you know, two years of work developing
that, listening to our consumers with the MLM, seeing how they used the
product, what they wanted, you know, added to the MLM, what
it but it didn't have. So we took all that feedback and worked with
our product team and engineers to to have the MLM two Pro. So that
product is it's six ninety nine and it offers a little bit more features.
So the first thing is people with MLM. It's an iOS only device for
MLM, and they wanted Android, so them one two pros iOS and Android
compatible. So it's great to kind of be able to bring those to all
the Android fans out there. Yeah, let me ask you a question about
that if you don't mind me interrupting, and I apologize for any time Okay,
I'm good because I'm good at that. What kind of adoption rate have
you had with Android users? Have you noticed that it's like significant and you
it was worth the investment at this point? Absolutely? Yeah, So it's
it's uh, I don't have the numbers in front of me, but just
the ease of use to be able to open up to that market, especially
globally. So you know, we are a global company. We sell them
in Europe and Asian and I'll across the globe. So I believe iPhones the
most heavily used in the US, but there's still a lot of Android population,
so to kind of be able to open that to people with Android tablets
or phones, and you know, some people have an iPhone and an Android
tablet or the other way around, and now it just makes it much more
accessible for everybody to use. So definitely a big big win there. Great,
and what sets your products? And I know the answer to this,
but I want the official word on this. What sets your products Apart?
There's so many launch monitors that are incredibly expensive and robust and used by a
lot of teaching professionals. But I think that this was really directed not necessarily
a teaching professionals, but also to include the consumer market, the recreational golfer.
What sets your products apart that make them worthwhile for everybody? Absolutely?
Yeah, So we're going you know, you'll see when people watching other golf
channel or go to a tour event, you see golfers using launch monitors,
So I think people are much more familiar with them. But really with our
product, as you pointed out, is it's much more affordable and accessible than
a lot of other launch monitors on the market. Plus we have a lot
of features in there, So I would say the first thing that really differentiates
ourselves is just the technology. So to have the radar and camera and there
we're able to leverage both of those because both of those have their their strengths
to them, and so with that we have the foundation of accuracy. So
we you know, that's that's something that we really strive for, is to
have really accurate units because that's the foundation of everything you build off of in
terms of the performance of the device, the experiences you provide. So with
the two pro we have three ways to view your swing. So not only
do you have the data in the thirteen metrics to look at you also have
ways to look at your swing. So every single shot you hit, we
have your shot vision, which is what MLM users are familiar with. It's
that down the line view of your swing with the shot tracer, so you
can actually see what's happening with your swing. You can visually see where the
ball is going, so that's recorded plus the impact vision camera. So this
has been a real popular feature amongst our users is you can actually see what's
happening at you know, we call it the moment of truth with that ball
club interaction. So you can see if you're hitting it on the heel,
if you're hitting it on the toe, if you're hitting high on the face,
low on the face. So there's a great education there, right to
kind of be able to see, Okay, when I hit it solid,
this is what the data happens. When I hit it off the toe,
this is what happened. So there's been a lot of aha moments for people
there. And then lastly, you can pair your mobile device, so whether
it's your phone or your tablet, you can turn on that front facing camera
while you're in the app practicing and see another vantage point. So you can
set that camera up wherever you want the most use cases, kind of setting
it in front of you use you can see the face on and then you'll
get the down the line with the MLM two Pro unit itself. So first
of all, it's just those video capabilities to be able to have three different
views plus the data. You know, you'll have everything you need to be
able to diagnose and see what's happening with your swing. So that's kind of
the first one there. The second one is new to MLM for us,
the MLM two Pro. We have spin now, so when people buy the
MLM two Pro, it'll come with three Callaway Chrome Soft RPT balls. So
RPT stands for a Repsoda Precision technology, which is the unique dot pattern you
see on the ball. So that's how we're actually measuring the spin and spin
access incredibly accurately. People are familiar we're spinning general, but just to break
it down a little bit, there will be backspin, which is the revolutions
it's it's traveling, and then spin access is actually the curve of the balls,
if you can think about it, so you'll get it in terms of
degrees. Positive one it means the balls going to the right, a negative
one means it's going to the left, and obviously the greater the number,
the more curve it'll have. So if there's a negative two degree spin access,
that's a shot that you'll see that you won't see much curve if you
were looking at it in real life outside, but one with you know twenty,
you're seeing you're seeing the ball work right to left there. So so
that's big with Emlum two pros to have those spin numbers. And then lastly
it's the simulation. So we have a repisode of courses which is thirty thousand
built in courses into the app, so you can play your home course,
you can you know, there's a destination course you want to play, if
you have a tournament coming up, if you've got a buddy strip, you
can kind of scout it out ahead of time and play that right right in
your house or at the range, your local range. So that's been great
as well, as we have integrations with Awesome Golf in East six so you
can partner and use those software capabilities as well with the unit. Wait wait
wait wait wait wait, when you say you can play with your buddies indoor,
are you hitting a ball? Yeah, So I'm ALM two pro.
You can you can set it up into a net so you can hit,
and you'll want to use those RPT balls that come with the unit. We
also sell more of them online if you if you need more of them,
and then that way you can get really accurate spin numbers and we'll see where
the ball's curving because a lot of times, you know, you're outside you
can kind of see what's going on, but inside you really need those precise
measurements to know if you're hitting a you know, a draw or a fade
or a slice or a hook. You need to know how much that ball's
curving because you can't see it when it goes into the net right because you're
just hitting, you know, a few feet in front of you. So
it's really important that we measure that precisely and give those users the feedback they
need so that you know, if it's the winter months or if they're practicing
at night, that when they go to the course on that weekend, they
know what their ball is going to do because they've been seeing it happen at
their house. Well, I'm really glad to know that you guys sell extra
balls because I have a net in my backyard. Here comes I have a
net in my backyard, and so I was testing the unit out and hitting
some of the balls, and then we had company arrived with their dog who
decided that that was a scrumptious ball. And so I'm down to two of
the callaways. Now, yeah, all right, you can buy them by
the dozen at repster dot com exclusively. Good to know, Good to know.
All right, We're gonna take a time out. We'll be back right
after this. I love how seriously you guys took feedback in developing your your
second product, because I liked I liked the first unit and used it regularly,
but there were some obvious deficiencies to it. And now that you've let
me test out this second one, I'm amazed about how far it's developed.
And clearly it's not just engineers deciding what they wanted to do with this.
Yeah. Absolutely, the you know, the the user is extremely important to
us, so they're you know, listening to that feedback gathering it. We
have people that reach out on social media, reach out to our support team.
We have a group of Repisodo golf champions that are really close to our
team that use the product a lot. They're kind of our super users that
you know, they're beta testing the product. We're kind of seeking their feedback
in terms of uses and what they want to see. So with MLM one,
we're still very passionate about that product. As I said, it launched
at a four ninety nine price point. We brought that down to two ninety
nine earlier this year, so it's it's even more accessible and we're seeing a
lot of people really enjoying that and we're excited to continue to update MLM one
with new features and new improvements. But with MLM two, you can see
it right off the bat, so if I encourage people to, you know,
google it if you haven't seen yet, but it looks very different than
a lot of other launch monitors that are out in the market, and that
that's on purpose because the design was really listening to that feedback. So it's
a device that comes in two pieces, so you know, you can easily
fit it in your golf bag to you know, if you're using it at
home and you want to take it to the range. It comes in a
little compartment carrying case that you can take with you. So there's a tripod
there so that the unit actually sits up a little bit higher, so that
was by design. With the MLM one with integrated camera, users kind of
wanted that that video to be a little bit higher, and you know,
we didn't make it too high because you know, the tripod would have been
too big, but we did raise it as much as we could with that
in consideration, you know, made sure that this was Android compatible. People
really wanted to spin who brought that in, you know, simulation. So
we really want to build products that people, you know, can enhance their
experience, can make them better players, but also ones that they're excited to
use all the time, and so we really want them to be involved in
the process and take ownership on the where we're going with it as well.
Yeah, yeah, kudos to the design of the tripod. I know it's
it's really not has a lot to do with the with the user, but
the user will definitely appreciate the fact that you guys developed a tripod that you
can set your phone in, or if it's flipped around, you can set
a tablet in. And so it's sitting right there on the unit when you
take a swing and look back and it's sitting right there that was brilliant design.
Thank you. Yeah, I wish I could take credit. I can't
our our engineering team designers, they they thought of everything in there. You
know, there's there's certain little components that users might not see, just like
part of it has that metal connection, so it's you know easy to We
thought about how is this going to you know, connect to make it really
easy but secure, and you know, went through a lot of iterations there
and that does well. So yeah, we were very lucky to have the
engineers that we have. Yeah, yeah, well we're gonna thank you and
you can tell them later. So I'll pass it along for sure, thank
you, or just take credit for it. So I, like I said,
I've been using it hitting in my net in the backyard, but sometimes
it's not recognizing that I hit the ball, or the lighting isn't properly because
isn't right. I have to make sure the lighting is right because the way
the sun is hitting me, sometimes it's not seeing every swing. So I
got to make sure that everything's exactly in place. So I tried taking it
to arrange yesterday and the range that I was at, I have no cell
service and I couldn't get it to connect. On WiFi. Is there a
WiFi built into the unit that I can connect? Now, this is my
own problem I need to fix with. Deal with this. How do I
connect if there's no Wi Fi where I'm out hitting balls? How do I
connect the unit to my phone? Yeah, it's a it's a great question.
So first of all, there's a couple of ways to connect. So
I think in terms of a learning curve. I'm not saying this is you,
Fred, but some people associate WiFi with internet exclusively, and you can
think of WiFi as a form to connect devices to them, you know,
to each other. So when you when you prompt to connect to your device,
it'll ask do you have a you know, a local WiFi I'd like
to connect to you. So you can think of that as you know,
your Internet service that you have at your house, your router, and that
is a way that you can connect. Otherwise, you can connect directly to
the unit itself, so you would click no there and there there would be
a direct connection between your phone own and the unit. And then if your
phone or tablet has internet service, we'll use the internet that way. So
some of the features you will need internet connection with, such as simulation,
you'll need internet connection with but otherwise you can use all the practice modes.
You could take a combine, you could you can hit shots and practice mode.
You can use the video your swing to gather certain reports like your insight
report or combine report. You will need internet access, but you can make
a direct connection with a tablet that that doesn't have it, So there's ways
to do that. And then in terms of setup for people that you know
are listening for an indoors, you will need eight feet from ball to net,
and then we suggest the unit sits six and a half to eight and
a half feet behind you, so kind of right in line with your target,
and that's the same outside, so six and a half feet behind you,
and there is an alignment prompt on there visually so you can kind of
see, you know, this is where my target is that I'm aiming,
and then this is kind of the ball area that it needs to be in,
so that's captured. So the ball air is actually a little bit bigger
than people think. You kind of see it on the screen and it looks
small, but relative to two other launch minors in the market, it's actually
bigger than there so it should give you optimal you know, placement there if
you're on if you're on a mat, you should never have to move it.
If you're on the range kind of taking divots and you may need to
move it around a little bit just so you have a nice piece of grass
to hit off of. Does the ground have to be level because my my
net is on a little up slope, so it would be lower than my
then where the hitting area is a little bit. Yeah, So that was
another thing we looked at when we were developing it. So we kind of
looked at the surfaces all of our users with MLM are on, so most
people weren't on completely flat surfaces. So with MLM two pro and the MLM,
it's taken into consideration that you know, might not be completely level,
so you don't have to worry about it being you know, completely flat out
there. But I would say if it's you know, if a steep incline
or if it's a steep decline, you kind of have to take that into
account a little bit. We have some people to talk about their mats being
higher than the ground. You know, do I need to raise the unit?
And I kind of say, use your judgment a little bit. So
you know, when we test in the office, when I use it at
home, you know, if my MAT's about an inch inch and a half
above you know, the ground, I don't move it. But you know,
some people have big platforms that are three or four inches above the ground
and you can use you know, flift your unit up a little bit higher.
So kind of play around with your setup a little bit, use your
judgment, but it doesn't have to be completely level with the area that you're
hitting on. Oh my god, the revelations already. I've clearly I've been
setting this up all wrong, and I'm glad to hear this because I thought
that I had to be six feet from the net and that the unit had
to be two feet behind me. I've got this all wrong, don't I.
Well, we're getting you sorted away. So yeah, So ball to
net, So if you're hitting shots, it needs to be at least eight
feet of ball flight. It can be longer, you know, some people
have different setups, but you need at least eight feet. And then the
unit sits behind you six six and a half feet at minimum, and you
can put it back to eight and a half so that'll give you you a
better set up there. So for people at home that are looking for an
indoor setup, it needs about fourteen and a half feet to kind of set
up the net. Okay, so that probably explains why I'm like, no,
I hit the ball farther than that. Come on, really well,
that opens up another you know, another thing, Fred that users are you
know, I never want to talk about, but indoor swing syndrome. I
don't know if you've ever talked about that on the on the podcast, No,
I haven't. What is indoor swing syndrome that you guys must have been
indoor swing syndrome. It's a real thing. But a lot of people will
will reach out to us and say, you know, my data looks great
when I take it to the range, and when I go home, the
data looks shorter. And I experienced this as well. And if the first
thing to always look at if you're kind of seeing shorter distances is I as
sly, look at your club speed. So hit an eight iron at the
range, hit an eight iron here, and just look at your club speed,
see what the difference is. And almost you know, ninety nine percent
of the time it's people that are swinging it slower. Now that could be
due to them having you know, nine foot ceilings and they're worried about hitting
you know the ceiling. It could be they're worried, you know, their
nets kind of small, and they're worrying about hitting the shank into their neighbor's
yard or hitting a wedge over the net, or it's just that you know,
subconscious feeling of like I'm swinging my hardest and there's a net eight feet
in front of me, you know, the ball is going to stop.
So it's very common for a lot of people to just not swing the exact
same inside speed wise. So it's something that that I see two. You
know, we have a set up here at the office, and you know,
i'll hit some I have a setup in my in my net, and
it takes me a little bit longer to get kind of warmed up and kind
of for the trust to be there that the ball is gonna you know,
hit the net and they go there. So I would encourage people to kind
of check out if they see that in their data, check out your club
swing, look at your video and kind of see see if you've see any
differences, because normally that's the culprit you're just not quite as comfortable as you
think. Even if you don't think there's a problem, yeah, well I
am outdoors, but I do think that the issue is that I have the
unit way too close to me. It's only it's like I'm nervous that I'm
going to hit the unit on my back swing. It's that close. And
yeah, yeah, all right, you guys can come out here from Saint
Louis and then you set me up and we'll go yeah, two two,
two or three strides from your from your ball to the unit and set it
down and you'll see that you'll see a target line and there's a yellow box
and it'll say ball area and that's where you want to put Make sure your
ball is in that area. Oh that's what that is, that little dotted
yellow box. Yeah, okay, all right. I'm still learning about this
and every time I use it, I learned something more, which I absolutely
love. I also love that we get to break for commercial sponsors because it
helps us continue the podcast. So let's do that right now. I like
the unit. I want to love the unit and learning as much as I
have already in the first two segments, I can't believe it I'm gonna it's
just getting me so excited to get out there as soon as we're done and
start hitting some more balls. Now, let's talk about using the three cameras,
adding a third camera to this so you can have a different angle,
a different view. How exactly does that work? Yeah, so you can
you can put that wherever you want. So when you know, when you're
using the MLM two Pro, you need to be connected to either a phone
or a tablet through the app to get data, So while you're in a
practice session, it's one of our three play modes. We have practice combines
and simulation. So when you're in a practice mode, you'll see in the
top center of the screen a little icon and if you slide it to the
right, it'll activate the front facing camera of either your phone or your tablet.
So then at that point you can really put that wherever you want the
other angle to be. So if you want it behind you, if you
want it above you, below you, in front of you, you could
put it wherever you want. As I said, the highest use case is
normally kind of face on, so if you're kind of swinging, you can
kind of see, you know, where your positions are, and normally people
kind of have a tripod that they're using to kind of hold the device there.
So that's what I use at home. I kind of I have one
of those tripods that sits right in front of me. That's what I kind
of stick the unit, look at all my data, and then if I
want to turn on that front facing camera to get another view, I just
hit the button and it turns on and it records that angle and it'll sing
sync it with the video from the MLM two pro, so you can kind
of review them both at the same time. So does it record that angle
as well? Because I know that you can play it back and look at
the angle from the m MLM two Pro. I know that I can look
at that with each swing. But does it record from your camera as well?
It does. Yeah, So if you have WOW, if you have
a phone, you can kind of once you toggle on the front facing camera
of your device, so you can kind of view which video you want to
see, whether it's the one from the camera from your phone or the MLM
two pro. I always like using the iPad, I think just because you
have more real estate. With those devices, you can kind of see a
little bit more on the screen just in general in terms of gameplay, But
once you turn on the second camera, so we call it swing vision,
you can see both of them at the same time. So after your shot,
you can just replay it right there, or you know, if you
go home or want to show a buddy or your swing coach the next day,
you can just go into your session detail, go to your replay options,
and you'll be able to see see both swings at the same time.
Awesome, Awesome. Let's talk about combine. This is something you know,
I've only when I see the three elements on the screen, I've only noticed
practice, so I haven't even gotten to combine or simulation yet. That's how
new it is to me, and I'm really excited to get started. But
I want to talk about because you've you've hinted this to me earlier on when
we saw each other back in January at our first PGA show. Tell me
about combine, how it works, and what the advantages to the consumer.
Yeah. So we launched combines on the Amilum one last September or late August
of twenty twenty two, and it's a It's my favorite feature on the app
in terms of gameplay. So it's a twenty four shot test. So you
know, people may be wondering what's a combine mean. You can kind of
think of it as a game assessment. So it takes about fifteen to twenty
minutes to do, and it's an assessment to kind of see where you are
relative to your handicap and a professional. So I recommend it to people that
are like, you know, I want to get better, but I'm not
sure how I get better, or people that are like, man, I'm
hitting it great on the range and I can't take it to the course.
So what the combine is gonna do. It's gonna gamify your practice. It's
going to give you specific yardages you want to hit and a specific target you
want to hit, because I find that a lot of times myself included,
we go to the range, we take our seven iron, we take our
driver, and we kind of just, you know, mindlessly hit balls.
So this is going to bring it in a little bit. Wren to focus
with the combine. So you're gonna get two approach targets in a driving target,
and you'll hit eight shots at each of those targets. So you won't
hit eight in a row, you'll hit two to the first approach target,
two to the second approach target, and two drivers, so you can either
customize those yardages for your approach target. Fred Let's say you really wanted you
to work on your wedge aim and a long iron. You could put in,
you know, seventy seven yards and one hundred and ninety three and then
you'd hit a driver. So after you kind of take the combine hit all
of the shots at that specific target, you'll get your report. So you'll
get a score based out of a hundred, so it's kind of, you
know, easy to understand of how you're doing. But there's also a handicap
associated with that to give you context. So you know, let's say you
go out there and get a seventy that might equate to, you know,
a scratch golfer. Plus it will give you a score and a handicap for
each of the targets that you that you hit at. So I always use
the example of one of our team members here who loves loves to hit his
driver, doesn't work a ton on the other part of his game, so
he's about a twenty handicap, and when he takes a combine every single time
he hits his driver like a scratch golfer, so he gets a really good
score there, and then his approach targets he hits on like a thirty handicap,
so it's pretty easy what he needs to do to improve it needs to
work on his iron play. So it's really fun to kind of also kind
of play against yourself or against your buddies, you know, pick two yardages,
see what you can score, see if they can beat you at that
score, but also kind of to improve over time. So the minute you
get your score back, you know, I want to beat that score again,
whether it's the same targets or different ones. And it's just a really
fun way to practice and improve and kind of understand how you're doing, because
a lot of times people from one hundred yards they may not really know,
you know, what's a good shot from one hundred So you know, we'll
give you your medium distance from all the eight shots you hit, will show
you how far pros normally hit from that distance, as well as your handicap
range, so you can see how kind of how you're doing relative to your
peer group and kind of what's achievable with a professional to give you some context.
Does this work both in a net and the range or does it have
to be out on the range? Great questions. So the MLM one,
the combine has to be taken outside. It's not compatible with net function right
now. With EMLM two pro it is indoor or outdoor. If you take
a combine indoor, you just need to use the RPT golf balls. So
it's a great way to stay sharp during the winter or just kind of have
a great, you know, practice session you don't have time to play.
Combine takes you fifteen twenty minutes and you can kind of feel like you played
around because you you know, you hit different clubs in your bag with purpose
and you kind of got a score at the end that you can, you
know, see how you did. So when you were saying indoor, that
just means hitting into a net because my net is outdoors still counts. Sorry,
yep, yep, absolutely yeah, my nets outside too. So yeah,
I should have said net or net or range, never range. Okay,
and tell me about who developed combine, how it works, how we're
with you. Yeah, so we developed it with doctor Sasha McKenzie, who
works with a ton of tour players. You may have heard of him from
the STAT system which has been exploding, which is a swing training aid,
but we developed it with him really wanted to focus in on, you know,
practicing with purpose in a good timeline. So he used one hundred thousand
shots from PGA Tour pros as well as twenty plus years of his data where
he's worked with handicaps, you know, from scratch all the way to beginners.
So a ton of data in there that we that we use to kind
of really mold this into what we think is the best way to kind of
test your test your game, and the data that he has comparing to everybody,
and then you combine it all and now, how do you compete with
your friends with this? You just do you can't do it remotely. You
can't do it with like I'm in California, you're in Saint Louis. We
can't compete at the same time. How would we do that? Yeah,
so right now you could, you know, pick which distances you So Fred,
maybe we'll do this. We'll pick you know, you pick the first
approach targets. You may think, oh, man, I've played with Justin
He's no good from from eighty yards. So you'll pick eighty, you know,
and I may say Fred, I've seen Fred had shots from one forty.
He's no good. So we could kind of pick eighty one forty driver
and uh and take the combine and both kind of share what we got with
that. So right now, there's no way to kind of challenge somebody within
the app, but there's definitely ways you can compete against your friends and challenge
them and you know, put a little something on the line. Awesome.
Oh, that's so cool. That is so cool. Let's see here,
I'm going over my notes of all the questions I wanted to talk to and
we're gonna we're gonna talk about the membership and simulations, but we're gonna take
another time out before we wrap it up. We'll do that right now.
Find out what's going on on this week on Golf Smarter Mulligan's. If you
spend any time on YouTube or even social media, you've probably seen Martin Chuck,
inventor of the complete line of tourist striker training aids well. This week
on Golf Smarter Mulligans, we go back to twenty twelve and Golf Smarter episode
three hundred and fifteen to speak with Martin about improving your critical point of impact
when you swing a golf club. An interesting thing happens the arms. Okay,
let's just say at a dress your arms are hanging comfortably from your shoulders,
and you've got your grip on there, and let's hope your grip's effective,
because man, a good grip really helps when you make your backswing.
Now, your arms actually compress against your body. Your left arm works against
your pack, your right arm supports your left arm, and your left arm
basically compressed against your body. That is your impact condition. There's a level
of compression that is attained in your back swing that you actually need to deliver
to impact. You can't press into that position. Setting up at impact is
pretty much useless because you're not going to return there unless your compressed arms get
back to the golf ball. That's Martin Chuck of tour striker dot Com.
Now, I've always found that in addition to an amazingly brilliant design, mine
Martin communicates how to improve a golf swing along with some of the very best
that's Golf Smarter Mulligan's episode two hundred twenty three being released this Friday. Golf
Smarter is published every Tuesday, and Golf Smarter Mulligan's our sister podcast that revisits
the best of Golf Smarter episodes that are no longer available, is released every
Friday. From wherever you're listening right now, justin as we're recording this.
We're just getting about to be into August of twenty twenty three, and I
got an email from Repsoda the other day about an upcoming contest you have this
August, tell me about it. Yeah, So we partner with our Repsodo
advisor, Claude Harmon the third to giveaway to virtual off lessons. So if
you're not familiar with Claude, he's a top fifty golf instructor by Golf Digests.
He's worked with Brooks Kepka, Dustin Johnson, Ricky Fowler, a ton
of PGA Tour players. He's one of the career Grand Career Grand Slam in
terms of coaching, so he's coached somebody to every major victory, which is
really cool. There's only been amount of coaches that have been able to do
that. But we have partner with him to give away two virtual lessons,
so all you need to do is take a combine in the month of August.
So either MLM one or MLM two pro. You can take a combine
and that is one entry into into the contest, and the entries are unlimited,
so you can take as many combines as you want. You can take
ten combines twenty fifty and those will be fifty entries into the contest where you
could win a virtual lesson with Claude Harmon. So really cool opportunity that we're
offering our members. Wow, oh so you can. You can do it
just once. Every time you practice a combine gets submitted to you or we
have to submit it. Yeah, every time you can complete a combine and
make you know, make sure it's sinked. So anything that's any session you
have, make sure it's connected to the internet, whether that's not you know,
after or during the combine session and we'll get it. So every you
know, completed combine is an entry, so you can take as many as
you want. And so Claude Harmon is not necessarily available for coaching. This
is quite the coup that you've well I'm sure he is, but no one
can afford it other than the guys on the tour. Yeah, there's gut
He you know, he teaches uh in Florida as well to some you know,
normal golfers we'll call him. But definitely a really cool opportunity. Not
easy to get to, and I mean there's a ton of knowledge in there.
I've spent a lot of time with them and just kind of try to
get as much you know, uh information and knowledge as I can because he's
been around the game a long time time in terms of playing with these uh,
you know players. His dad's Butch Harmon, who obviously is very well
known of coaching Tiger and he's just a wealth of knowledge. So to be
able to get a lesson from him, spend some time with him, it's
gonna help your golf game. Oh yeah, well, at least I know
that there's a connection with one of the Harmon's. It wasn't Brian Harmon,
but it's Yeah. So tell me about what the premium membership offers from Rep.
Soto. Yeah, So the MLM two Pro comes with the first year
of premium membership included. H right, year two it's one nine, So
that will include simulation that will include access to your spin data as well as
the some of the other video options. So Impact Vision, Swing Vision which
is that second camera, as well as combines. So you can still use
the device getting metrics and practice with it, but to really get the full
capabilities of it and play simulation and get spin, you will need the membership
for the MLM two Pro. The MLM one also has a membership that's a
bit cheaper. It's ninety nine dollars a year, and that gives you access
to combines, It gives you access to APEX, gives you action to different
slow motions, so different speeds to viewers swinging, as well as video storage
of up to ten thousand videos. So that's the same on MLM two Pro.
It's that ten to ten thousand video storage, which is a lot of
videos, so you don't have to worry about you know, last week's video
is getting lost or not saving. So they're in there and it's a great,
great benefit of the membership package. And that's the two hundred dollars for
the mL M two and the one hundred dollars ninety nine dollars for MLM one.
That's an annual fee. That's not monthly right correct, it's an annual
fee. And again the EMLM Supro membership is included for the first year,
so for six ninety nine you have all the features unlocked. It comes with
three of the RPT golf ball, So once you buy your unit, you
are ready to go. You can you can do everything with the unit.
So when we think about it that way, it's like that's less than a
round of golf every week. And if you're a member of a club and
you have access to a teaching pro, this is data he can use for
you, but you're still going to have to pay for that teaching pro.
So this really can help you not take as many lessons because you can analyze
your own data and when you need help, you can find it and show
them the video that you have. They'd probably love seeing this video of you.
Yeah. I think for you know, in terms of people that get
a lot of instruction, I think this just speeds up the learning curve because
I think there's a time where you know you're with the coach and you're getting
a less and you know, you know, you feel kind of good after
the lesson, but then you kind of may stick with your for a while,
you may go into a wall. This way, you can, you
know, send it to your coach. You can text him your next you
know, lesson. You can bring this video and the data and then he
knows what you've kind of been doing, you know, while you're away,
and he can kind of see the progression of maybe you know, a month
ago, two weeks ago, yesterday, and you can just pull that up
in your device. So I think that's that's great there. We've also seen
a lot of people MLM two users that you know we're talking about. Man,
I used to go to the range every day and spend twenty dollars in
a bucket of balls, and now I'm just putting up the net in my
backyard and you know, I've I've paid for this and uh, you know,
save a ton of money not having to go to the range and time.
So there's a lot of big advantages to it. And with the subscription,
it's you know, I like to think of it as it's you know,
the same as Netflix, so and you can't here the Netflix and the
count anymore. No, it's really it's really spectacular and the packaging is amazing.
If you don't, you know, you get your free membership for a
year when you purchase the product, and then when you your membership expires,
you have the opportunity to re up for another year. If you don't re
up for another year, what do you lose? What don't you have?
But can you still you can still use the unit. Yeah, you can
still practice and get metrics. You won't have simulation, so you won't have
the thirty thousand episode of courses. You won't have access to our partners that
we've integrated with like E six and Awesome Golf. You won't see the spin
metrics, the spin data, you won't see the RPMs, you won't see
the spin access, and you won't have access to combines. So i'd really
suggest you know that membership package, and it's still extremely extremely affordable at the
price when we're at with them Molment two pro. If you think about all
those video replays, all the storage, the simulation, the spin there's no
one else offering that at the price point we're offering. So it's a really
great value. And I think what's really great about the Moment two pros you
can kind of make your setup what you you know want with it. So
if you're looking for a home setup, you know there's some units out there
you need to do X y Z and you need to you know, you
need a PC to use it, and all of a sudden you kind of
add it up and it's like, wow, I'm spending a lot of money.
But with the MLM two Pro, it's six nine ninety nine and if
you're at home, all you need I'm at in the net and you can
play. But we've seen some people you know then kind of go to the
TV route and you can connect your phone or iPad to the TV for a
bigger screen, or you can connect it to a projector and have a full
impact screen so that you can really make it. You know, whatever your
budget and whatever your space requirements are at your house, you can really personalize
it. So I think it's a it's a great way for people to have
that kind of man cave or she shed where they're you know, get into
the practice at home. And you know a way to do this. If
you don't sign up again, if you don't renew your membership, can you
let it pause for a month or two, maybe because you're saying, you
know what, I'm going to ask people to give me a membership for my
birthday or for for the holidays, but that's not for a couple of months
away. Can you resign up for that if you let it pause? Oh
awesome, Yeah you can, you can, you can. You can rejoin
it at a time. Okay, now we haven't talked about the simulation part.
Let's let's dig into that one. I'm excited to do it. Tell
me Yeah, so, uh as I got referenced before, So there's there's
ah once you click into simulation as a practice mode. First off, we
have Rhapsodo Range, which is our three D range experience, So you can
use it at you know, a local range, hitting outside, or you
can use it hidden into a net and this kind of gives you your metrics
on the green and shows kind of the ball flights, so you can actually
kind of visualize what's happening. But we also have a repsode of courses which
is thirty over thirty thousand courses on there. So a ton of times I'll
play my home course, you know, whether I have a club championship match
coming up, I'll kind of play it ahead of times to get comfortable,
or if I'm you know, going to a new course or a buddy's trip
and I kind of want to see, man, what am I going to
hit off number seven. It's a great way to to to play on that
platform. Tons of options and then we've partnered with Awesome Golf, so you
can use your MLM two Pro with Awesome Golf software. My kids love using
Awesome Golf. It's got kind of some games that you can play, you
know, hitting golf balls at you know, boats and the boats kind of
explode or buildings. But there's also courses to play is on there as well.
There's different play modes and ranges. It's a really great platform. An
Awesome Golf offers a fourteen day free trial, so I encourage everyone to check
that out. I don't I know what it is. Oh, you gotta
check it out, Fred, I've never heard. Yeah, So it's it's
just a software platform, but it integrates with MM two Pro, so it's
you can play courses on there, you can use their simulated range, you
can you know, play games closest to the pin. You definitely have to
check it out. Yeah, we'll definitely check that out. This sounds like
fun. And I'm traveling suit in a couple of weeks and to a course
that I've never played before, so I'm definitely going to check in check that
out, see if that works. Very cool. The six is a great
platform as well, and with the MLM two Pro it comes with five free
courses for E six So once you buy your unit within forty eight hours,
you will receive a unique product key code that will give you access to five
of E six is courses. So they have great courses on there as well,
and you can purchase their subscription to kind of play their whole range of
courses. So great platform to check out as well. So this is the
MLM one right, this is the case, and I just love these cases.
It's even got a carabiner on there so you can hang it on your
bag if you need to. Opens up into a little clamshell and then I'm
you should be the one showing this off. But it opens up here and
then you just put your phone sitting it right there. It's really easy.
It takes the shots. People, how fast you can set up I mean
I think I could set it up in five seconds. It's yeah, yeah,
hitting shots right. And now the second one, MLM two Pro is
not much bigger than the one, a little bit bigger. And when you
open up this beautiful case slogo, Yeah, this is sounding like an infomercial,
I know, but so what? So what it's a podcast? Yeah,
you know, it's a podcast. And if this is the way you're
going to hear about this stuff, so you open it up and it's the
two unit. This is the unit itself. It's not very big. It's
kind of like a remote control, a little bit heavier with the it's kind
of like, yeah, like a week controller almost right. And what you'll
be mostly amazed at is there's a USBC charging unit to it and one button
that's it. Can it get easier than that? One button? One place
to plug it in? And it's very awesome. I love this tripod so
much. As you can do it either way. This is the tripod and
it just fits and turns like that clicks in and when you open it up
this way is for your phone right here, and then if you do you
install it the other way, you can have it with your tablet. That
sits right there. Brilliant design, brilliant, amazing, amazing. Well,
justin thank you, I really appreciate your support and allowing me to test these
things out so that we can have a knowledgeable conversation. But obviously I wasn't
that smart about it. So I learned a ton today. Thank you so
much, and speak for having great to talk to you again. Thanks bred
So. In that conversation, I mentioned that my backyard net is not on
a level surface, making it difficult to get a good read. I've also
tried to use my MLM two pro at the range where the mats could be
elevated, or even if you're hitting off the grass, the ground is probably
not level. So I did a little research and found this awesome little accessory
on Etsy. Yeah, on Etsy. It's from Dad's three D Creations,
Dad's Dads Dad's three D Creations, and they make a launch monitor stand with
a level and three independent screwing legs so that you can not only elevate the
launch monitor a couple of inches off the ground, but you can also be
sure that it's completely level. Now, I've communicated with Johnny, the creator
of the stand, and he wants to offer the golf Smarter community a ten
percent discount on the stand for MLM and MLM two pro from rap Soto,
or on any other launch monitor that you have. He can make a stand
for it. All you need to do is use a coupon code Golf Smarter
ten at checkout now again, go to Etsy and search Dad's three D creations.
If you search for launch monitor stand on Etsy, you'll get some variations,
but please trust me on this one. It's the most affordable and it
has the best design. I've done all that legwork for you. Check it
out, and, as Don Zwig of Modesto California said when he introduced today's
episode, enjoy yep. Don's wig is our newest Golf Smarter Ambassador. Don
has received a free copy of Tony Manzoni's video of a loss Fundamental as our
way of saying thank you for listening and playing through. It's not hard to
become one of our ambassadors, and you'll receive a free gift now to play.
Either write a review of our podcast from wherever you subscribe, or just
introduce a new episode by sharing where you're from and where you play. And
the three gifts you can choose from include Tony's video, a box of oden
X one balls with the Golf Smarter logo, or a glove and glove storage
compartment from Red Rooster golf dot com. I'll leave links in the show notes
and today's blog posts, so you can learn more about them. Please write
to me and I'll get back to you with some instructions of what to do
and what to say. Send your request to Golf Smarter podcast at gmail dot
com, or click on that Hey Fred button when you visit golfsmarter dot com