WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.360 --> 00:00:04.200 Golf Smarter number three hundred and thirty nine, published on June twenty six, 2 00:00:04.400 --> 00:00:10.839 twenty twelve. Welcome to golf Smarter Mulligans, your second chance to gain insight 3 00:00:10.960 --> 00:00:17.559 and advice from the best instructors featured on the Golf Smarter podcast. Great golf 4 00:00:17.559 --> 00:00:24.000 instruction never gets old. Our interview library features hundreds of hours of game improvement 5 00:00:24.039 --> 00:00:29.199 conversations like this that are no longer available in any podcast app. People should 6 00:00:29.239 --> 00:00:33.719 be aware of that there's pretty master fundamentals. This applies to mainly the golf 7 00:00:33.759 --> 00:00:36.240 swing, but also do the short game a little bit the putting. In 8 00:00:36.320 --> 00:00:40.719 terms of physical skill of the golf swing, there's balance issues, there's mechanical 9 00:00:40.719 --> 00:00:51.840 issues, and there's coordination or timing issues. Can swing changes really lower your 10 00:00:51.880 --> 00:00:59.280 scores? With Jim Waldron this is Golf Smarter sharing tips and insights from golfers 11 00:00:59.280 --> 00:01:03.439 and golf profess to how blower your score. It's worked for your host, 12 00:01:03.920 --> 00:01:07.719 Fred Green, Welcome back to the Golf Smarter Podcast. Jim, Thanks Fred, 13 00:01:07.719 --> 00:01:11.400 great to be great to be back with you again. You have a 14 00:01:11.519 --> 00:01:17.560 topic in mind and contacted me to cover this. I just love that idea 15 00:01:18.200 --> 00:01:25.079 and that is all about what's been going on with Tiger Woods swing changes over 16 00:01:25.079 --> 00:01:27.879 the last couple of years, But also you wanted to talk about how that 17 00:01:27.959 --> 00:01:33.680 affects us as the average golfer. Yeah, how it affects the average golfer 18 00:01:33.680 --> 00:01:36.760 and what it takes to make a swing change. You know, what, 19 00:01:36.760 --> 00:01:38.239 what do you have to do to go through this process of working with a 20 00:01:38.280 --> 00:01:44.760 teacher, which is in the news right now because especially you know, we 21 00:01:44.799 --> 00:01:49.959 actually talked about doing this before Tigers went last week in memorial But how how 22 00:01:49.319 --> 00:01:53.680 how perfect timing comes from but sort of sort of in the middle of the 23 00:01:53.920 --> 00:01:57.640 middle of the pack and then just blows the fields away at the memorial, 24 00:01:57.680 --> 00:02:00.560 which was kind of cool. I thought, yeah, yeah. But the 25 00:02:00.680 --> 00:02:07.079 press over the number of years over his career, because he's made multiple swing 26 00:02:07.159 --> 00:02:12.400 changes and coach changes and then swing changes, He's done this multiple times, 27 00:02:12.479 --> 00:02:16.080 and the press has been relentless on him, like why are you doing this? 28 00:02:16.199 --> 00:02:19.560 You're the best player out there, Why would you do this right? 29 00:02:19.960 --> 00:02:24.560 Right? Right? You know, And I find the whole topic of how 30 00:02:24.639 --> 00:02:30.719 and why you go about working with a teacher being one myself obviously to make 31 00:02:30.759 --> 00:02:37.039 a swing change to be really fascinating, and also an area that the golfing 32 00:02:37.120 --> 00:02:42.599 public is sorely lacking and real knowledge about it. And because there's that lack 33 00:02:42.639 --> 00:02:46.240 of this sort of body of knowledge and not talking so much about the technical 34 00:02:46.280 --> 00:02:50.280 information, obviously that's part of it, but more about the psychology and the 35 00:02:50.280 --> 00:02:53.400 philosophy of how you go about making a swing change, which is very seldom 36 00:02:53.439 --> 00:02:59.960 discussed. And hence we have this this sort of rift between the golf meeting 37 00:03:00.240 --> 00:03:05.000 and Tiger being the example we're going to use today, every press conference they 38 00:03:05.000 --> 00:03:07.719 ask him the same question and he pretty much responds with you got to give 39 00:03:07.800 --> 00:03:12.879 got credit of quite a bit more patience than I would have. And he 40 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:15.840 uses the term process a lot, and he used it with You, used 41 00:03:15.840 --> 00:03:17.879 it with when he was with Butcher, and he used it with Haney, 42 00:03:19.599 --> 00:03:22.120 and now he's using it with Sean Foley. And I'll give you a great 43 00:03:22.159 --> 00:03:24.240 example. A couple of weeks ago, I forgot what tournament it was. 44 00:03:24.360 --> 00:03:30.439 It was one or two before Memorial. Someone asked him a reporter, Tiger, 45 00:03:30.439 --> 00:03:34.159 I don't understand, why are you going through all these technical changes with 46 00:03:34.199 --> 00:03:36.199 Sean. Why don't you just go do what you did when you were a 47 00:03:36.280 --> 00:03:39.199 kid, when you didn't have a teacher. You weren't thinking mechanics all the 48 00:03:39.240 --> 00:03:42.759 time, and he just went out and trusted your swing and played golf. 49 00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:45.879 And there was this long pause and Tiger sort of looked down and I'm thinking, 50 00:03:45.879 --> 00:03:47.960 because I know the history of this guy, and he said what I 51 00:03:49.000 --> 00:03:51.080 was thinking. He said, well, first of all, your premise is 52 00:03:51.120 --> 00:03:54.280 totally wrong. I've never not had a teacher. I've always worked on the 53 00:03:54.319 --> 00:03:59.680 process of making my swing better. My first teacher from age eighteen months until 54 00:03:59.719 --> 00:04:02.439 about that, he said, like age seven or eight was his dad, 55 00:04:02.960 --> 00:04:06.280 who was a good player. And then he went to a guy named Rudy 56 00:04:06.319 --> 00:04:09.400 durry On. Then he had a guy in high school, and then he 57 00:04:09.439 --> 00:04:12.400 went to Butch when he was seventeen years old. And then he left Butch 58 00:04:12.439 --> 00:04:15.400 and pretty quickly, I think he was alone for only a year without a 59 00:04:15.439 --> 00:04:17.639 teacher. And then he went to Hani, and now he went to left 60 00:04:17.639 --> 00:04:20.920 Hani went to Foley. So he said, I've always had a teacher. 61 00:04:21.000 --> 00:04:26.439 I've always worked on improving my technique. And this idea you guys have that 62 00:04:26.480 --> 00:04:29.360 I have this sort of natural talent that if I just stopped getting in my 63 00:04:29.399 --> 00:04:33.040 own way and go play golf, I'll be perfectly fine is just basically wrong 64 00:04:33.639 --> 00:04:38.279 amazing. So where do we go with that? You know? I mean, 65 00:04:38.800 --> 00:04:43.079 because when I'm you know, thinking about it and talking about it and 66 00:04:43.120 --> 00:04:46.560 playing with people, I don't think people go so, you know, the 67 00:04:46.600 --> 00:04:53.639 average golfer goes so much through swing changes as tweaks correct and my favorite is 68 00:04:53.639 --> 00:04:57.600 when they try to tweak it themselves, thinking they know what's going on right 69 00:04:57.839 --> 00:05:00.160 right. Well, part of what I'm trying to do in my sort of 70 00:05:00.199 --> 00:05:05.480 my golfing mission in life is to educate the golfing public about some stuff that 71 00:05:06.519 --> 00:05:10.480 I've acquired, a kind of a body of knowledge I've acquired, and other 72 00:05:10.600 --> 00:05:14.160 good teachers I know have acquired over the years that they've been involved in golf 73 00:05:14.160 --> 00:05:16.639 and teaching golf, you know, and the average student that I get and 74 00:05:16.639 --> 00:05:19.839 that my teaching buddies get just doesn't know this stuff. We talked about this 75 00:05:19.879 --> 00:05:25.160 in the past and more about some other areas, but specifically, what does 76 00:05:25.199 --> 00:05:29.319 it take in terms of sort of categories of thought. How do you sort 77 00:05:29.360 --> 00:05:33.360 of compartmentalize your understanding and what you're about to engage in when you improve some 78 00:05:33.439 --> 00:05:36.879 aspect of your game, and most often that's improving your ball striking. That's 79 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:43.240 the big demand in the golfing instruction marketplace is for ball striking improvement, much 80 00:05:43.279 --> 00:05:46.120 more than say putting improvement or short game improvement or mental game improvement. But 81 00:05:46.160 --> 00:05:50.480 that is one of these things that people should know. There's four major skill 82 00:05:50.519 --> 00:05:56.759 areas putting, short game, ball striking or long game, and mental game. 83 00:05:57.560 --> 00:05:59.920 And you know, if you're going to embark on a game improvement plan, 84 00:06:00.040 --> 00:06:01.480 one of the decisions, says students, you have to make is which 85 00:06:01.519 --> 00:06:05.519 of those four areas do I want to engage in? Is my primary sort 86 00:06:05.560 --> 00:06:10.560 of big change strategy, because if you're working for a living still, if 87 00:06:10.600 --> 00:06:13.959 if you're not retire you have to you don't have time to work on changing 88 00:06:14.079 --> 00:06:16.160 all four of those you know, you only have time to work on one 89 00:06:16.199 --> 00:06:20.800 of those right major skill categories. And I've always thought that it's almost impossible, 90 00:06:21.120 --> 00:06:25.720 well not impossible, but it's so rare when all four of them work 91 00:06:25.759 --> 00:06:28.920 in any round of golf. Yeah, that's true too. You know. 92 00:06:29.600 --> 00:06:31.600 One of my one of my little sort of things like little bits of wisdom 93 00:06:31.639 --> 00:06:35.040 I try to impart is look, you know, spend eighty percent roughly off 94 00:06:35.079 --> 00:06:40.519 your practice time on the one big change, capital B, capital C that 95 00:06:40.560 --> 00:06:44.879 you're working on in one of those four major skill areas and spend the other 96 00:06:44.920 --> 00:06:47.319 twenty percent of your practice time just trying to maintain your current level of skill 97 00:06:47.360 --> 00:06:54.079 and those other three skill areas and just doing that, it just pushes the 98 00:06:54.120 --> 00:06:58.879 whole game improvement process to another in a higher level because you're you know, 99 00:06:58.879 --> 00:07:01.000 a lot of it's about how do I portion my time and my energy so 100 00:07:01.040 --> 00:07:06.199 I can train I can train my way to better golf, you know. 101 00:07:06.319 --> 00:07:11.360 And that's one of those examples I always use in terms of a body of 102 00:07:11.439 --> 00:07:14.120 knowledge. People need to know some of this stuff. Right. Here's another 103 00:07:14.160 --> 00:07:17.920 one people don't know about making swing changes. There's two major kind of There's 104 00:07:17.920 --> 00:07:23.879 two major kinds of instruction, and one is called fundamental instruction, which is 105 00:07:24.079 --> 00:07:28.759 basically learning what the rules or the laws of proper body motion and proper club 106 00:07:28.800 --> 00:07:32.519 motion are. And the alternative approach is called swing corrective instruction, which is 107 00:07:32.519 --> 00:07:36.480 where you're not really trying to do a radical change. You're trying to do 108 00:07:36.519 --> 00:07:42.040 more of a more moderate to superficial change to your existing golf swing. You're 109 00:07:42.079 --> 00:07:45.120 not going to change from one one of the forest wing styles to a completely 110 00:07:45.160 --> 00:07:47.920 different swing style. Everybody has one of these forest wing styles, which we'll 111 00:07:47.959 --> 00:07:51.399 talk about in a minute. But you're trying to stay with the swing you 112 00:07:51.439 --> 00:07:56.240 currently have but basically polish it or as you said, refine it and kind 113 00:07:56.240 --> 00:08:01.639 of tweak it. And there's effective rules for how you about doing that type 114 00:08:01.680 --> 00:08:05.879 of training that are different than the than the rules you need to train on 115 00:08:05.959 --> 00:08:09.920 making more radical changes, more fundamental changes. Right, there's pros and cons 116 00:08:09.920 --> 00:08:13.560 of each approach, and I think you know, the golfing public out there 117 00:08:13.600 --> 00:08:16.879 needs to know what those pros and cons are before they can make an informed 118 00:08:16.920 --> 00:08:20.920 decision about which of those two they want to work with. Is there's their 119 00:08:20.920 --> 00:08:24.519 main sort of strategy. And this should all be done in advance, before 120 00:08:24.519 --> 00:08:28.480 we even talk to a new teacher about taking lessons or at golf school. 121 00:08:28.560 --> 00:08:33.759 I think it should be. It should be information you've already sort of digested. 122 00:08:33.840 --> 00:08:39.039 Right, Well, let's talk about those four styles. There's there's four, 123 00:08:39.120 --> 00:08:41.919 there's four. Traditionally, there's been four ways of splinging in the golf 124 00:08:41.960 --> 00:08:48.679 club that have worked historically. That one majors I call them in no particular 125 00:08:48.759 --> 00:08:50.679 order. I'll start with the most common, the one you see today in 126 00:08:50.720 --> 00:08:56.080 about ninety five percent of tour pros, both males and females. Probably I 127 00:08:56.080 --> 00:08:58.960 don't know, seventy five percent of low handicap you know, really good low 128 00:08:58.000 --> 00:09:07.120 handicap aminger players, uh probably call leverage spinning or leverage spin. It's it's 129 00:09:07.159 --> 00:09:09.720 a swing that has very very few moving parts on plane, club shaft, 130 00:09:09.720 --> 00:09:13.399 the club schaft, that stays on the original plane angle relative to the ground 131 00:09:13.399 --> 00:09:18.919 from start to finish or pretty close to that. Fairly wide arms at the 132 00:09:18.919 --> 00:09:22.200 top of the back swing, you know, not arms not close to the 133 00:09:22.200 --> 00:09:24.799 body, but kind of push pushing the arms away from the body at the 134 00:09:24.799 --> 00:09:28.480 top. That's that's one of the one of the levers or potential source of 135 00:09:30.200 --> 00:09:35.320 clubheit speed, full wrist cock, but a very active rotation. That's the 136 00:09:35.360 --> 00:09:39.120 spin part of the body, especially in the forward swing with the upper arms 137 00:09:39.120 --> 00:09:43.080 connected to the chest. There's an extreme version of that which is another one 138 00:09:43.120 --> 00:09:48.080 of the forestyles, which is based on Hogan swing, which is basically not 139 00:09:48.200 --> 00:09:50.960 so wide with the arms and even even more rotation of the body. That's 140 00:09:52.039 --> 00:09:58.000 today's probably Zach Johnson and Jonathan Byrd Chad Campbell are the probably three modern players 141 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:01.559 who exemplify that style of the most. Then there's a style we call the 142 00:10:01.639 --> 00:10:05.120 slinging or the throwing style, which is young Jack Nicholas. The only great 143 00:10:05.120 --> 00:10:11.120 player today who's using that younger player is Bubba Bubba Watson. So there's lots 144 00:10:11.159 --> 00:10:16.360 of independent arm motion, lots of independent leg motion moving. Yeah, does 145 00:10:16.399 --> 00:10:20.600 Bubba even know that he's doing that? I mean, Bubba claims to never 146 00:10:20.679 --> 00:10:24.840 take lessons, never look at his Yeah, that's something else I'm willing to 147 00:10:24.840 --> 00:10:28.720 buy. He's never paid someone who calls himself a teaching pro to take a 148 00:10:28.759 --> 00:10:33.000 formal lesson. But don't forget he had a high school golf coach, coach 149 00:10:33.039 --> 00:10:37.080 and a college golf coach, and all those guys coach their students, so 150 00:10:37.120 --> 00:10:41.799 he's had instruction. I think it's probably been the more informal variety, more 151 00:10:41.799 --> 00:10:46.480 of the swing corrective type as opposed to the fundamental type. But to think 152 00:10:46.600 --> 00:10:50.360 that he's never taken a lesson, it's just just ridiculous. Of course he 153 00:10:50.399 --> 00:10:52.440 has, it's just going to have been informal. You know, the guy's 154 00:10:52.440 --> 00:10:58.320 won the master. Yeah, you know, that's the most moving parts, 155 00:10:58.320 --> 00:11:01.360 and that's why you don't see it very much anymore, because it's it takes 156 00:11:01.399 --> 00:11:07.440 so much more talent and so much more timing to hit the ball solid with 157 00:11:07.519 --> 00:11:11.240 that style that it's really a throwback to another era and you're not going to 158 00:11:11.279 --> 00:11:13.120 see that many more people. I mean, the only the guy I can 159 00:11:13.159 --> 00:11:16.440 think of who actually uses that style today, he's somewhat of an older player 160 00:11:16.440 --> 00:11:20.600 now, almost a senior, is Colin Montgomery. Those are the only two 161 00:11:20.639 --> 00:11:26.000 guys on the tour today who have won majors with that in the modern are 162 00:11:26.039 --> 00:11:30.000 in the last say, twenty years, is still playing. Colin Montgomery is 163 00:11:30.000 --> 00:11:33.360 still playing, Yeah at one in a while, Yeah, and he's still 164 00:11:33.399 --> 00:11:35.879 playing. Didn't have it heard his name in a while? Yeah? I 165 00:11:35.919 --> 00:11:39.240 know. And then there's who I call it thrusting, and sometimes I call 166 00:11:39.279 --> 00:11:43.600 it a hitting style, which is guys who are extreme endomorph which are which 167 00:11:43.639 --> 00:11:46.559 are you know, the most inflexible the three body types they tend to have, 168 00:11:48.039 --> 00:11:50.639 you know, deep barrel type chest, wide shoulder girdles. Overall, 169 00:11:50.679 --> 00:11:54.480 they lack a lot of flexibility. So they can't use a rotary style swing 170 00:11:54.480 --> 00:11:58.600 because they don't have they don't have the flexibility to rotate. And so someone 171 00:11:58.720 --> 00:12:07.480 like Rocko Media or who else is Guffy Waldorf or Craig Stadler. They do 172 00:12:07.559 --> 00:12:11.039 what I call a thrust style. They still pivot, Don't get me wrong. 173 00:12:11.080 --> 00:12:13.440 I mean all four styles use the pivot as the primary source of power, 174 00:12:13.440 --> 00:12:20.200 but these are more secondary differences we're talking about anyhow, So you know, 175 00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:22.720 you got to decide which are those four styles you're going to use, 176 00:12:22.720 --> 00:12:26.000 because some teachers only teach one of the four and they don't teach the other 177 00:12:26.080 --> 00:12:30.639 three at all. I prefer never to teach the slinging or the throwing, 178 00:12:30.679 --> 00:12:33.639 you know, the bubba style. Although if I'm working with someone who's already 179 00:12:33.639 --> 00:12:37.919 about maybe a twelve ten handicapper better and they just want to tweak it, 180 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:43.320 I know enough about that style to be able to tweak it. But if 181 00:12:43.320 --> 00:12:46.159 someone's higher than a twelve or roughly at twelve, I'll usually try to change 182 00:12:46.159 --> 00:12:50.919 into a simpler method if they're willing to put the time in. Obviously, 183 00:12:50.120 --> 00:12:52.879 it takes time to make the swing change, which is one of the big 184 00:12:52.919 --> 00:12:56.440 things I wanted to talk about. Tiger brings it up. He says, 185 00:12:56.440 --> 00:13:00.799 you know, hey, guys, it takes time. I'm changing a neuromuscular 186 00:13:00.879 --> 00:13:07.799 path or several neuromuscular pathways from my existing old style neuromuscular pathways, and that 187 00:13:07.919 --> 00:13:11.279 literally takes lots and lots of repetitions, lots of patience, lots of persistence, 188 00:13:11.320 --> 00:13:16.120 lots of perseverance, and eventually I'll form, you know, either a 189 00:13:16.120 --> 00:13:20.559 dominant habit or a close to dominant habit, which is apparently what he's doing 190 00:13:20.600 --> 00:13:26.120 now with this the second win of the Year memorial, which he obviously he 191 00:13:26.159 --> 00:13:28.720 was. He led in greens and regulation, he led in total driving, 192 00:13:28.759 --> 00:13:31.600 he let him driving distance, He hit a ton of fairways with his driver, 193 00:13:31.679 --> 00:13:35.679 which is which you know always in the past that was his big weakness, 194 00:13:35.799 --> 00:13:39.480 Yeah, traditionally. Yeah, it looks like it also look in that 195 00:13:39.600 --> 00:13:43.320 event that he led in confidence too. Yes, And I was just going 196 00:13:43.360 --> 00:13:46.480 to say, that's the other big issue, and you know, that's one 197 00:13:46.480 --> 00:13:48.960 of those chicken and egg arguments. So how do you get confidence? You 198 00:13:48.960 --> 00:13:56.000 know? And I always talked about the John Wooden Bobby Knight basketball too opposing 199 00:13:58.000 --> 00:14:03.120 ideas about confidence. You know, Bobby Knight's idea was he had a sign 200 00:14:03.120 --> 00:14:09.320 in the locker room saying confidence is BS, meaning you got confident because you 201 00:14:09.399 --> 00:14:13.799 worked on the mechanics of dribbling, shooting, passing free throws. That's how 202 00:14:13.840 --> 00:14:18.480 you got confidence by improving your physical mechanics of the sport of basketball. And 203 00:14:18.519 --> 00:14:22.759 when you really get better at those skill areas, you see improvement. You 204 00:14:22.759 --> 00:14:26.159 score more points, you win more games, you pass better, you shoot 205 00:14:26.159 --> 00:14:30.480 better, you dribble better, you play defense better, you block shots better 206 00:14:30.559 --> 00:14:33.039 because your technique is better, and then you get the confidence. Right, 207 00:14:33.080 --> 00:14:37.080 So it's sort of like the confidence the end result of this process of physical 208 00:14:37.080 --> 00:14:43.039 skill acquisition. Whereas John wouldn't believed, I think more correctly that you can 209 00:14:43.120 --> 00:14:48.759 practice confidence as a fundamental mental game, fundamental of basketball that's completely separate from 210 00:14:48.759 --> 00:14:52.759 whatever current skill level you have in terms of the mechanical skills of the game 211 00:14:52.799 --> 00:14:58.639 of basketball. And you know, and my approach balance point, right, 212 00:14:58.679 --> 00:15:01.559 I teach both. You can get confident by improving your technique and you can 213 00:15:01.600 --> 00:15:05.200 get confident by not doing anything your technique, just leaving your technique alone and 214 00:15:05.279 --> 00:15:09.639 just working on accessing that state of confidence as part is they're in the early 215 00:15:09.679 --> 00:15:13.879 stages of your preshiot routine and staying with that state of confidence until the finish 216 00:15:13.960 --> 00:15:20.039 of your golf swing. Both both both methods work so why not use both. 217 00:15:20.080 --> 00:15:24.919 That's kind of they're not exclusionary in my opinion. But anyhow, so 218 00:15:26.000 --> 00:15:28.360 you know, you got to figure out what are these force Which are these 219 00:15:28.360 --> 00:15:31.039 four swing styles you're going to work with, because they have some of their 220 00:15:31.080 --> 00:15:43.639 components are not compatible with the other three swing styles. Can the recreational golfer, 221 00:15:43.679 --> 00:15:48.759 the average golfer, can they determine for themselves which one that they want 222 00:15:48.840 --> 00:15:54.879 to do or do they need to have an instructor to say, in watching 223 00:15:54.919 --> 00:15:58.080 what you've been doing, here's what I think would be best for you to 224 00:15:58.159 --> 00:16:03.240 focus on. Well, I think it's again it's sort of in the middle 225 00:16:03.240 --> 00:16:06.360 there. I mean, I mean, obviously, if they have zero knowledge 226 00:16:06.360 --> 00:16:10.399 of golf swing theory and they don't have the interest or the time to study 227 00:16:11.039 --> 00:16:15.039 books or going online read some of the web forms where these issues are discussed 228 00:16:15.080 --> 00:16:17.919 in depth, then yeah, then they pretty much have to go with what 229 00:16:17.919 --> 00:16:21.320 the teacher recommends. But if they want to do a little investigative research and 230 00:16:21.360 --> 00:16:23.960 study some of the stuff that's on the web, look at some YouTube videos, 231 00:16:25.879 --> 00:16:29.559 it quickly becomes apparent of which are these four styles that they're more likely 232 00:16:29.559 --> 00:16:32.279 to want to gravitate towards some of it. That's to do body type obviously, 233 00:16:32.320 --> 00:16:34.639 which is a physical limitation. Again, if you're an extreme endo, 234 00:16:34.720 --> 00:16:37.320 you don't have a choice. You've got to use the thrust or the hitting 235 00:16:37.320 --> 00:16:45.000 styles. If you're a moderate endo, the only style that's probably going to 236 00:16:45.039 --> 00:16:48.679 work for you is the leverage spin. The only people that can do the 237 00:16:49.159 --> 00:16:52.399 ultra spin, which is the Hogan sort of Hogan four point zero, you 238 00:16:52.399 --> 00:16:59.360 know, the modern version of the Hogan swing are people who are extremely flexible, 239 00:16:59.399 --> 00:17:03.559 with extremely strong cores and have a natural ability to you know, rotate 240 00:17:03.680 --> 00:17:07.519 or to turn their body on the forward swing, especially at a very fast 241 00:17:07.519 --> 00:17:12.640 tempo. So fast tempo is part of that type of ultraspin swing style. 242 00:17:12.880 --> 00:17:18.640 And my guess, yes, I'm sorry, my guess is that that comes 243 00:17:18.680 --> 00:17:22.839 from starting to play golf when you're very young. I mean, yeah, 244 00:17:22.000 --> 00:17:25.200 you pick up the game, you pick up the game, and later in 245 00:17:25.240 --> 00:17:26.160 life. You know, I've talked about it. I started when I was 246 00:17:26.160 --> 00:17:30.480 playing forty. I got an email from a listener that recently who said, 247 00:17:30.559 --> 00:17:33.079 I beat you. I started playing when I was sixty. You know, 248 00:17:33.920 --> 00:17:37.039 yeah, I mean, but it's not those We're not those kinds that are 249 00:17:37.039 --> 00:17:41.519 going to be the ultra flexible you know, correct, Well, that's why 250 00:17:41.519 --> 00:17:45.039 I saw most people. I just say, look, of the four styles, 251 00:17:45.079 --> 00:17:49.119 probably ninety five percent or more of the population should should choose the leverage 252 00:17:49.119 --> 00:17:53.160 spin. It's actually the easiest to learn of the four by far, takes 253 00:17:53.200 --> 00:17:56.359 the least amount of practice time to get pretty good at, and you can 254 00:17:56.440 --> 00:18:02.680 you can do it with anybody type except the extreme and extreme endomworphs are probably 255 00:18:02.720 --> 00:18:07.480 less than one percent of the population. But the reason I say that is 256 00:18:07.519 --> 00:18:11.279 you may go to a teacher who only teaches the old nineteen sixties leg drive 257 00:18:11.400 --> 00:18:15.319 reverse see Johnny Miller, Tony Lee, the Jack Nicholas slinging or throwing style, 258 00:18:15.599 --> 00:18:18.240 and that's you know, they're older teachers. Guys my age are a 259 00:18:18.279 --> 00:18:22.519 little older who'll only teach that, and they'll tell you to drive your legs 260 00:18:22.519 --> 00:18:25.319 for power. They'll tell you to swing your arms across your chest to impact. 261 00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:29.440 A lot of stuff that I think is, you know, it takes 262 00:18:29.519 --> 00:18:33.920 well above average athletic ability to do well and still hit the ball solid. 263 00:18:33.000 --> 00:18:37.279 Although obviously Bubba does it right. He's but he's sort of like a freak 264 00:18:37.319 --> 00:18:41.000 of nature, right, But for the average person. I mean, the 265 00:18:41.279 --> 00:18:44.599 average person is already kind of doing sort of the natural golf swing that everybody 266 00:18:44.599 --> 00:18:48.119 brings the table except for extreme endowarfs. Is the is the slinging style. 267 00:18:48.160 --> 00:18:52.240 It's a very leggy, very armsy type of swing. And the practice rangers 268 00:18:52.240 --> 00:18:56.440 of the entire planet are full of people who are twenty five handicaps and higher 269 00:18:56.559 --> 00:19:00.960 who are trying to do that swing style and they're never going to get any 270 00:19:00.000 --> 00:19:03.640 better, I mean, no matter how much they practice. So obviously I'm 271 00:19:03.680 --> 00:19:08.039 not a fan of that one because again it's from a biomechanical standpoint, it 272 00:19:08.039 --> 00:19:11.920 has the most moving parts, It tends to be the hardest to stay in 273 00:19:11.960 --> 00:19:15.279 balance. It requires the most timing. You know, in timing issues and 274 00:19:15.359 --> 00:19:19.160 balance issues are two of the big reasons why average golfers can't hit the ball 275 00:19:19.200 --> 00:19:23.720 solid anyhow. So that's stuff you have to know. You know, either 276 00:19:23.720 --> 00:19:29.240 whether you work without directly with a teacher or without a teacher, you've got 277 00:19:29.279 --> 00:19:32.200 to know that there's these four main styles and what the pros and cons of 278 00:19:32.200 --> 00:19:34.519 each, And then you got to decide do I want to do Do I 279 00:19:34.519 --> 00:19:38.559 want to do a tweaking or corrective type approach, which is more about finding 280 00:19:38.599 --> 00:19:41.759 a one or more flaws and then doing basically the opposite. So, you 281 00:19:41.799 --> 00:19:45.039 know, it's the old saying and golf, how do you teach people not 282 00:19:45.119 --> 00:19:48.359 to slice? The answer is you teach them how to hook it. That's 283 00:19:48.359 --> 00:19:52.759 swing corrective. This is like Butch Harmon is sort of the premier swing corrective 284 00:19:52.799 --> 00:19:55.680 coach in the game today. Not that he doesn't teach some of the fundamentals, 285 00:19:55.720 --> 00:19:57.880 obviously he does that as well, but once the grip is there, 286 00:19:57.920 --> 00:20:02.920 the grip pressure angle, you know, the posture to set up some of 287 00:20:02.960 --> 00:20:04.759 the basic balance stuff. He basically does what his dad taught him to do, 288 00:20:04.799 --> 00:20:07.799 which is fine, what the person is doing wrong and get him to 289 00:20:07.839 --> 00:20:14.920 stop doing it right. It takes the least amount of time to start to 290 00:20:14.920 --> 00:20:21.160 see some degree of immediate improvement to the ball flight. The problem is sometimes 291 00:20:21.279 --> 00:20:23.880 quite often, in fact, it tends to be kind of band aidy. 292 00:20:23.960 --> 00:20:29.079 It tends to be short term improvement, and after you invest a little bit 293 00:20:29.079 --> 00:20:34.160 of time on the range working on these swing flaw corrective exercises, they tend 294 00:20:34.200 --> 00:20:40.119 not to manifest into long term permanent changes. Well the way the band aid 295 00:20:40.119 --> 00:20:44.480 tends to come off. So that's the downside to it. Yeah. Now, 296 00:20:44.680 --> 00:20:49.519 let me ask you this, because you not only have individual students that 297 00:20:49.640 --> 00:20:55.039 come to you on a regular basis, hopefully you also the balance point golf 298 00:20:55.039 --> 00:20:59.119 schools. You'll have people come out for two, three, five days, 299 00:20:59.160 --> 00:21:03.039 correct, right, So my question is when people, from your observation, 300 00:21:04.000 --> 00:21:10.079 when golfers come out to a five day school, are they looking for a 301 00:21:10.240 --> 00:21:15.119 swing change or a swing fix? Unlike somebody who's committed to coming to you 302 00:21:15.319 --> 00:21:19.640 every week for a year or two. I mean, like they're just totally 303 00:21:19.640 --> 00:21:25.319 committed. What do you see as the norm and what do you see you 304 00:21:25.359 --> 00:21:29.400 know? Well, I mean you got to remember because I'm so clear about 305 00:21:29.440 --> 00:21:33.000 this issue on our website, and I talk to every new student who signs 306 00:21:33.079 --> 00:21:34.759 up on the phone for usually at least thirty minutes, sometimes an hour or 307 00:21:34.759 --> 00:21:40.200 two in advance. I try to disabuse them of the notion they're going to 308 00:21:40.200 --> 00:21:42.759 come to school and form a dominant habit, you know. And the joke 309 00:21:42.799 --> 00:21:45.079 I always say it every school. I say, well, if you're expecting 310 00:21:45.079 --> 00:21:48.359 to have a tour pro quality golf swing when you leave here in three days, 311 00:21:49.279 --> 00:21:52.599 you came to the wrong school. That's our million dollar tuition school. 312 00:21:55.799 --> 00:21:57.640 So if you're expecting a miracle, you're going to pay for it, right 313 00:21:57.240 --> 00:22:02.119 ye, Meaning it's impossible, can't you can't. You can't get to that 314 00:22:02.200 --> 00:22:04.319 level of dom even you can't get even fifty percent of dominant habit. You 315 00:22:04.359 --> 00:22:07.920 might get ten percent there after three days, but to get to the fifty 316 00:22:07.920 --> 00:22:11.200 percent mark, which is where where most people will be really happy and see 317 00:22:11.240 --> 00:22:15.640 a lot of improvement, you're talking like, you know, nine months, 318 00:22:15.680 --> 00:22:18.039 a year, year and a half of training after they graduate to get to 319 00:22:18.079 --> 00:22:23.240 that level. Because again, we're talking about changing you know, we're creating 320 00:22:23.240 --> 00:22:27.759 new neuromuscular pathways. It's you're literally changing the physiology how your brain and body 321 00:22:27.759 --> 00:22:32.720 work together. Uh So most of those people already know that, So I 322 00:22:32.720 --> 00:22:36.200 would I would put it this way. Part of their ego, hopefully a 323 00:22:36.240 --> 00:22:41.119 small part is sort of hoping. I'm sort of not telling them one hundred 324 00:22:41.119 --> 00:22:42.680 percent truth about that, and they're kind of hoping that a miracle is going 325 00:22:42.720 --> 00:22:47.319 to happen. But I think that's a pretty tiny part of of their conscious 326 00:22:47.359 --> 00:22:48.920 mind. I think for the most part, they're not expecting a miracle. 327 00:22:56.039 --> 00:22:59.839 In my mind, golf schools, you can you can correct, you can 328 00:23:00.319 --> 00:23:03.359 you can learn a lot, but then you have to go back and work 329 00:23:03.359 --> 00:23:06.440 on it on your own, I mean correct and I know that you'll you 330 00:23:06.519 --> 00:23:10.839 will continue the conversation, you will look at videos you know of people, 331 00:23:10.880 --> 00:23:15.119 but still you're not there. And really, I really believe that you if 332 00:23:15.160 --> 00:23:18.359 you're going to be working with a coach, you're not going to learn a 333 00:23:18.400 --> 00:23:22.240 lot. You're not going to be able to correct things by watching YouTube videos 334 00:23:22.240 --> 00:23:25.279 of the golf channel. You really need to have somebody who's going to be 335 00:23:25.319 --> 00:23:29.960 there and hold your hand and say and literally hold your hands and guide your 336 00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:32.440 hands, you know, get you through that. Yeah, that's right. 337 00:23:32.519 --> 00:23:34.240 So you need we tell people you need follow up lessons, either in person 338 00:23:34.359 --> 00:23:38.160 or or or by YouTube where we talk on the phone after I analyze, 339 00:23:38.519 --> 00:23:41.039 which works fine for people who have been through the program because they have all 340 00:23:41.039 --> 00:23:45.160 the conceptual knowledge. You know, they know. So if I say, 341 00:23:45.200 --> 00:23:48.480 okay, your arm extensions you know too narrow at this point, or if 342 00:23:48.519 --> 00:23:51.559 I say your spine angles you come out of your spineing angele four inches at 343 00:23:51.599 --> 00:23:53.160 this point, or you flipped your wrist, they know what I'm talking about 344 00:23:53.599 --> 00:23:59.839 because they've been through that three days of intensive training. But any So that's 345 00:23:59.839 --> 00:24:03.400 the downside of swing corrective. It tends not to laugh. And that doesn't 346 00:24:03.440 --> 00:24:06.559 mean it never lasts. Sometimes it does last. I'm just saying that's that's 347 00:24:06.559 --> 00:24:12.599 a precondition that people are that's an aspect of swing corrective approach that any educated 348 00:24:12.599 --> 00:24:19.160 golfer should be aware of that it may not be permanent improvement if the underlying 349 00:24:19.200 --> 00:24:26.279 fundamental that's the basis for the swing flaw is so absent. You know, 350 00:24:26.319 --> 00:24:29.319 it's like building. It's like building a house without putting a foundation down. 351 00:24:29.359 --> 00:24:32.000 I mean the fundamentals of the foundation. And when you're when you're patching a 352 00:24:32.039 --> 00:24:34.799 hole in the roof, that's the swing corrective. So in our golf schools 353 00:24:34.839 --> 00:24:37.599 we do, you know, probably about ten to twenty percent of the time 354 00:24:37.680 --> 00:24:42.079 is swing corrective. In the other eighty to ninety is fundamental training, And 355 00:24:42.119 --> 00:24:45.599 in private lessons it's just the opposite. It's probably you know, I don't 356 00:24:45.640 --> 00:24:52.079 know, sixty or seventy percent swing corrective and the rest of its fundamentals. 357 00:24:53.519 --> 00:24:56.279 And then the other thing is there's there people should be aware of that. 358 00:24:56.319 --> 00:25:00.880 There's what we call them the three master fundamentals. I mean, this applies 359 00:25:00.920 --> 00:25:03.960 to mainly the golf swing, but also do the short game and a little 360 00:25:03.960 --> 00:25:07.200 bit to putting, which is there's there's three sort of you know, in 361 00:25:07.319 --> 00:25:12.759 terms of physical skill of the golf swing. There's balance issues, there's mechanical 362 00:25:12.799 --> 00:25:17.400 issues, and there's coordination or timing issues. So an example of timing or 363 00:25:17.720 --> 00:25:21.759 coordination would be tempo, which is you know the length of time or your 364 00:25:21.880 --> 00:25:25.319 in your of your swing can start to finish rhythm, which is that there's 365 00:25:25.319 --> 00:25:27.920 a there's a difference in time between the length of your back swing and then 366 00:25:27.920 --> 00:25:30.880 from top of back swing the impact. So there's a sort of internal beat 367 00:25:32.039 --> 00:25:36.359 or rhythm that you that your body moves to and order the time your golf 368 00:25:36.400 --> 00:25:40.359 swing properly so you arrive at impact with a square club phase right. And 369 00:25:40.359 --> 00:25:42.839 there's some other ones the proper sequence of motion of your forward swing body parts. 370 00:25:42.880 --> 00:25:47.519 But so that's coordination. Balance is self explanatory. You set up in 371 00:25:47.599 --> 00:25:49.839 balance, you stay and balance dynamically all the way up to and including the 372 00:25:49.920 --> 00:25:55.079 finish really important fundamental. And there's and there's there's the mechanics, which is 373 00:25:55.119 --> 00:25:57.799 how the individual body parts move in the golf swing. So you know, 374 00:25:57.839 --> 00:26:00.880 you don't want to be trying to like do a little bit of each. 375 00:26:00.920 --> 00:26:03.319 I mean again, you're going to try to pick one of those three areas 376 00:26:03.400 --> 00:26:07.119 as your main sort of focus for your practice time. Is it going to 377 00:26:07.119 --> 00:26:10.160 be that you have a balance issue, Is it you have a mechanical issue? 378 00:26:10.480 --> 00:26:14.119 Or do you have a tempo, rhythm or timing issue? Because again, 379 00:26:14.160 --> 00:26:15.039 if you're working for a living, you don't have time to do all 380 00:26:15.079 --> 00:26:18.720 three. It's not going to happen, right, And so it's kind of 381 00:26:18.720 --> 00:26:22.079 like the whole jack of all trades, master of none thing. You want 382 00:26:22.119 --> 00:26:26.000 to avoid that. You want to be a master of one right, right, 383 00:26:26.480 --> 00:26:30.599 right? And then back to Tiger, you know the big thing he 384 00:26:30.680 --> 00:26:37.799 keeps doing. Yeah, it's it's you know, uh, he obviously has 385 00:26:37.880 --> 00:26:40.759 done exactly what I do in my gospools. If you if you study what 386 00:26:40.799 --> 00:26:42.720 he's done with Folly. Now, they're pretty they keep it pretty close to 387 00:26:42.759 --> 00:26:47.160 their vests, both he and Folly. But they have done, you know, 388 00:26:47.319 --> 00:26:52.319 enough interviews with individual journalists and plus the press conferences, and they've let 389 00:26:52.319 --> 00:26:56.920 some of the information working on kind of leak out. And so what apparently 390 00:26:56.960 --> 00:26:59.400 what it is, it's sort of a kind of maybe I don't know what 391 00:26:59.400 --> 00:27:00.880 the exact persons, but it looks like it's close to fifty to fifty. 392 00:27:00.920 --> 00:27:07.039 It's like roughly fifty percent radical swing changes for Tiger, which you can clearly 393 00:27:07.039 --> 00:27:10.200 see now if you look at his swing now on YouTube from last week in 394 00:27:10.279 --> 00:27:14.319 slow mo and looking you know two thousand when he was winning everything. Yea, 395 00:27:14.319 --> 00:27:17.240 And when you say, again, let's clarify that we're talking about the 396 00:27:17.279 --> 00:27:22.240 memorial in moorial of twenty twelve, correct verset swing in two thousand, because 397 00:27:22.680 --> 00:27:26.160 yeah, but the point is you compared that swing, this present day swing 398 00:27:26.279 --> 00:27:30.880 to twelve years ago. It doesn't even look like the same person. It's 399 00:27:30.880 --> 00:27:33.559 completely different, and in my opinion, it's much much better. It's it's 400 00:27:33.599 --> 00:27:40.720 better from a biomechanical standpoint, it's better from a geometry standpoint. The club 401 00:27:40.799 --> 00:27:44.839 chaft stays on plane throughout the swing, where his old swing it was moving 402 00:27:44.880 --> 00:27:47.359 around a lot. It made a lot of shifts and loops and kind of 403 00:27:47.359 --> 00:27:52.519 dips, and his old swing was way more leggy and especially more armsy. 404 00:27:52.839 --> 00:27:56.759 He's basically got his arms under control. That was probably the biggest things that 405 00:27:56.839 --> 00:27:57.880 I know of. Again, they may have been working on stuff they haven't 406 00:27:57.920 --> 00:28:02.279 told anybody about. I can't. You know, I'm not inside Sean Foley's 407 00:28:02.279 --> 00:28:04.319 head or in Tiger's heads. I'm just I'm sort of guessing here. I'm 408 00:28:04.319 --> 00:28:10.920 speculating. But but what I can see so far is that they have talked 409 00:28:10.920 --> 00:28:15.480 about this a little bit. Is the biggest difference is his arms are trailing 410 00:28:15.519 --> 00:28:18.519 the right amount behind his body, not too far behind, which is what 411 00:28:18.640 --> 00:28:22.400 this big problem was before on the way down, and then he would then 412 00:28:22.440 --> 00:28:26.079 he would pull his arms across his chest trying to get him to catch up 413 00:28:26.079 --> 00:28:27.079 with his body, and if he did it too much, he hit a 414 00:28:27.079 --> 00:28:30.519 pull hook. If he didn't do enough, he hit a push or a 415 00:28:30.519 --> 00:28:34.319 block slice. They fixed that lack of synchronization issue between his arm motion and 416 00:28:34.359 --> 00:28:37.680 the down swinging in his body motion. So now his body and arms are 417 00:28:37.680 --> 00:28:41.799 more in sync. The club is more in front of his body, and 418 00:28:41.319 --> 00:28:45.599 he doesn't have to sling his arms across his chest to try to square the 419 00:28:45.640 --> 00:28:48.119 face. All he's doing is turning his body while his upper arms take glued 420 00:28:48.119 --> 00:28:52.640 to his chest, kind of like how Hogan discovered back in the nineteen thirties. 421 00:28:52.960 --> 00:28:56.960 So he's more connected on the forward swinging through impact. That's the number 422 00:28:56.960 --> 00:29:00.839 one biggest change. The other is more of a swing corrective. He's not 423 00:29:00.920 --> 00:29:03.160 dropping his spine angle if he used to, if you looked at them. 424 00:29:03.359 --> 00:29:06.880 Even though for a few months ago when he was kind of in a bit 425 00:29:06.880 --> 00:29:11.799 of a slump there and some of those shots they showed on the TV broadcast, 426 00:29:11.839 --> 00:29:15.000 he was dropping. He was increasing the angle the spine forward toward the 427 00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:18.680 ground by like ten inches. So you know, if he doesn't stand up 428 00:29:18.720 --> 00:29:21.920 by tent by, you know, at least at least by six or seven 429 00:29:21.960 --> 00:29:23.680 inches, he's going to hit it really fat, right, They drive the 430 00:29:23.680 --> 00:29:26.319 club directly into the ground, which he would occasionally do it. He would 431 00:29:26.319 --> 00:29:30.000 occasionally hit a driver where the club would bounce off the ground like five six 432 00:29:30.039 --> 00:29:33.720 inches behind the ball, something that we do all the time. Yeah, 433 00:29:33.759 --> 00:29:37.640 the average people do, right. So, although for a different reason, 434 00:29:37.640 --> 00:29:41.000 most people don't don't increase their spine, the average person listening to his broadcast 435 00:29:41.039 --> 00:29:45.799 does the opposite Tiger's floor. Instead of dipping increasing their spine angle. They're 436 00:29:45.839 --> 00:29:48.920 coming out of it. And the reason they hit the grounds because they throw 437 00:29:48.960 --> 00:29:52.720 their wristcock angle away way before their hands get below waist high in the down 438 00:29:52.759 --> 00:29:56.839 swing. Anytime you stay in your spine angle, don't dip, don't stand 439 00:29:56.920 --> 00:30:00.480 up to stay level, but you throw your wristcock angle away before your hands 440 00:30:00.480 --> 00:30:03.799 passed below waist high. In the downswing, you're going to steep in the 441 00:30:03.799 --> 00:30:07.119 club shaft plane angle the shafts to get more upright relative to the ground than 442 00:30:07.119 --> 00:30:10.920 it was when you started. And effect it's going to get you know, 443 00:30:10.960 --> 00:30:14.440 two or three four inches longer in effective length, which means you're going to 444 00:30:14.519 --> 00:30:18.559 hit the ground right. That's that's one common reason why people, by average 445 00:30:18.559 --> 00:30:22.720 golfers hit that so anyhow, so that's what I see. He's less arms. 446 00:30:22.759 --> 00:30:29.000 He uh, he's fixed, not completely, but he's much better on 447 00:30:29.039 --> 00:30:33.759 the spine angle issue and the other big changes. That thought which is hold 448 00:30:34.079 --> 00:30:41.720 because we've hit our time limit here, and please hold that thought. And 449 00:30:42.079 --> 00:30:47.400 I would love to continue the conversation on a members only episode. Could you 450 00:30:47.480 --> 00:30:49.799 hang around and we continue that. I'll do it. Awesome fun, Jim. 451 00:30:49.839 --> 00:30:55.359 We will continue this conversation on the next episode of the Golf Smarter podcast. 452 00:30:55.480 --> 00:31:00.400 Please yeah,