Hey, This is Fred Green of Golf Smarter with our spring back into golf
season with the late Tony Manzoni. This episode, originally number four hundred and
eight, published in October of twenty thirteen, was the fifth time that Tony
blessed us with his wisdom and insights to the effectiveness of his single pivot swing.
Now, at this point we hadn't spoken to Tony in about eighteen months,
so we brought him back to pick his brain for two weeks in a
row. So this is the first of two consecutive episodes that we've never included
in previous years of honoring Tony's memory. His book The Loss Fundamental is available
on Amazon, and his DVD, which we converted to a private link online,
is also available when you write to me. For the most comprehensive information
ever collected about Tony Manzoni, please go to Golfsmarter dot com slash Tony and
Tony is all lowercase. If you'd like access to the video, please write
to me directly golf Smarter podcast at gmail dot com or click on the Heyfred
button at golfsmarter dot com. Golf Smarter number four hundred and eight published on
October twenty nine, twenty thirteen. Take ownership of your swing, Now repeat
it with Tony Manzoni. This is Golf Smarter sharing tips and insights from golfers
and golf professionals to help lower your score. It's worked for your host,
Fred Green. Welcome back to Golf Smarter. Tony. Thank you, Fred.
It's great to be back. It has been way too long and since
you know, it's it feels to me like recent history, but it's really
not anymore. But we just surpassed four hundred episodes on Golf Smarter, and
I've been looking for those instructors who've been on the show numerous times over the
last eight years and said, who can I bring back to help celebrate four
hundred episodes? You know, having the four hundred episode was kind of like
a hole in one, or maybe even like when the Red Sox won the
World Series the first time. It's like you just you just anticipating it so
much and then it happens. You can go, that's it. Yes,
do you want a duck to drop dollars and guess as they grow the dog
get it right exactly. But it's amazing to me the response that we've always
had when when you come on the show because people just love the loss fundamental.
Well, I'm glad to hear that, and I get kind of the
same results. The great thing that happens is when I give a golf lesson
to someone and then I get a note maybe a month or two later saying
I'm playing so much better and blah blah blah, or someone buys my book
and calls me or sends me no saying I'm a stay angel. You know,
that's every professionals dream that that you made some sense and you help them,
And that's what That's what we're all trying to do, is we're trying
to kick somebody and improve their game. I think the majority of guys like
me are really in it for the passion of watching someone grow in the game
and get a little better and maybe even want to play the game more than
the than the money that we make. Well, it's kind of yeah,
yeah, I mean, it's it's kind of like where we come from.
In the podcast world. It's all about engagement, right, Engaging engaging with
your people, whether your customers, your clients, your patients, your listeners,
whatever, it's engaging with them and getting that feedback, it's incredible that
you've earned it well, I like to think so. I've put a lot
of years studying the game, and I made a lot of drastic changes in
the way the way I present the information, and hopefully it's getting better and
more succinct. It's typical to talk too much when you're giving a golf lesson,
but then you can't talk too little, so you can't have any dead
spots, just like on the air when you're when you're broadcasting h and as
I teach to my golf management students how to teach this game, it's really
important that you create an atmosphere of learning and allow the person to be relaxed
and not worry too much about hitting a bad job in front of you.
Uh yeah. I think that a lot of people walk away from lessons overloaded
with information. It feels like on a lesson, especially, most people go
in for one or two lessons and they're like, I'm going on vacation,
fix my swing right, and so there's this information dump that comes from an
instructor, especially that once to change everything that you do, and you're saying,
I just want to hit my irons better, and like, well,
you've got to you've got to change your swing. Yeah, if anyone's been
played for any length of time, what you really want to do is take
what they have, maybe set them up a little bit better to the ball,
but make sure that you can get them to repeat their action, because
in the final analysis, you've got to own your own swing. No matter
what the concept you're trying to do, you've got to be able to repeat
that. I mean, you know when you look at Trevino or the guys
that ain't quite a bit left and blocked it right, or Furic that has
that very loopy swing, but they repeat it, and that's the key.
And that's definitely the key. Now. I think by not shifting a lot
of way to the right and then having to shift it all the way back,
that eliminates that big timing element that most people can't do. Especially after
you get passed forty it becomes almost impossible. So those kind of things you
need to know. You need to know where your body is relative to the
ball. But if you hoist it or you take it a little flat,
I really don't think that means much as long as you do it every time.
And I can't tell you how much impact that little piece that you just
tossed away had on me, not just when when I came down and played
with you and had a friend of mine take a lesson from you as we
videotaped it, and and the golf Smarter TV video that we put on called
Ben Hogan's Secret revealed that is just short one. It's received more views of
any video that we've ever done here. It's it's so incredible that it's it's
not about I'm talking about the hips way and that the slide to the right.
Once I started keeping my lower body quiet, I was making much better
contact and my back ache, my back aches at the end of a round
were gone. Sure, because you're not indianping to reverse city. You're ended
up what we call posted up in the swing. And you know, it's
really nothing new. I mean the old times just say stay in the barrel.
Well, there's a lot to that there. There really is a lot
to say stayin center to the ball. And if you look a film of
Sneador, Hogan or Palmer or Nicholas or the guys that had long careers,
they didn't move off the golf ball. They stayed on the ball. Uh
And they didn't purposely try to stay on it. It was the way they
moved that kept them on the ball. And that's the key. You can't
tell somebody don't move your head in the swing that that's counterintuitive. What you
want to say is, Okay, if that right side goes behind you,
then the head can't move right if you if you're turning from the left side,
you're gonna you're gonna push back a little bit away from the ball and
then you have to get back to that starting position and get a little open
and hit the ball. That's a lot to do in that millisecond the down
swing cakes. So, uh, Hogan was just he figured this out,
and I know he took it to his grave. But there is film that
you could look at and if you, if you're a crazy person like me
that will sit in front of a Camra video and watch it over and over
and over and slow it down and keep looking at it, you'll start seeing
little nuances of the things that that man did. And he for sure played
off the left side. Well, if you're a crazy person, then we're
all crazy. I think you got to really want to learn. You know,
as I tell my students, there's never a day that I don't learn
something about the golf thing, some little thing. I'll be teaching someone and
I'll say something and I'll think to myself, I got to keep that as
a mental note. As soon as I'm done with this lesson, I got
to grab a ball in a club and try that. Because it's like jazz
singers. You know, you're improvising constantly. You're not hitting that same note
you're on the melody, but you're hitting a bunch of different notes. Teaching
is kind of that way, because that light bulb goes on with a phrase,
but that phrase could be totally different for each and every person, even
though you mean the same thing. I've had people take lessons for me for
four or five lessons and I am repeating the same thing over and over again,
and they'll say, oh, you've never told me that before, and
I've said to them, well, I guess I'm going to have to tell
you to you in another language because we've been speaking English most of the time
and I've been saying it over and over. But people here at times and
don't. And as a teacher, you have to really be cognizant of that
that you have to be really clear, and you have to even ask the
question. You understand what I mean. And not only do you understand what
I mean, I want you to show me what I'm trying to get you
to do. When you can get on that kind of a basis with someone,
then they're learning and you're teaching. Well. I want to do a
quick recap for people who are just being introduced to you to the first time,
because you know, there are always new people discovering golf smarter and I
greatly appreciate that. And you have been on so many times, We've been
faced to face, we've been on the phone. But I'll give me a
brief history of when you started playing golf and what your golf career was and
where you are today. Well, I started as a caddy like most people
from my era. I was about eleven years old, went through the caddy
ranks, borrowed clubs from the pro that he discarded, got a mixed bag
of club to start playing the game. I was a pretty good baseball player,
so I had good eye hand coordination, so I immediately hit the ball
pretty far from my size, and that carried on through my golf life until
now. I'm a little older, so give along the two that don't hit
it as far as I work on my shirt gam But during that period of
time, I came up with what I saw and what I heard is how
to deliver the golf club to the ball, and not knowing that the majority
of what I saw and what I heard were cliches that had passed on for
the year and not really based on, you know, any real truth fact.
There was really more theory or what someone felt they were doing. And
we know that a lot of train pros will write a book and they'll say
this is what I do, but then when you watch them in film,
they're not doing that. It's just that that's the sensation they have. So
you have to be careful about words. Are they actually are they actually the
motor that drives a swing? And as I continue my education, you know,
I was a very handsy arms swing player, free arms swing. I
bought it into that and I played pretty good, but under pressure, I
always hooked the golf ball. I always hooked it and got myself in trouble.
And through the years, you know, I played, I was good
enough to play, I qualifying to play the tour, and that we didn't
have the regular qualifying systems that they have today. You just went on Monday
and like they call us rabbits, and you try to qualify. And I
did on a number of occasions, and I got to play, but I
always at that wall. I was. I was quick out of the gate
two three hundred, real quick, and then whip one out of bounds and
then blocked the next one right because I'm trying not to ofalk the next one
and so forth. So that fought that, and I realized that I didn't
have, you know, and and not rightly so, because I felt like,
well, I just don't have the talent for this. But the truth
was I didn't have the information, and unfortunately for me, I got the
information too late to do anything about it. So I decided, you know,
I'm going to give this information to people that have had the dream of
being a player, to have the dream of playing, or somebody that just
wants to play better and not have to practice so much. So as I
evolved as a teacher, one lucky day, a gentleman came in my office
and said, I've got a letter copy of a letter written by Ben Hogan
about the golf swing, and also video that really wasn't authorized. Was kind
of home video, and you know, Hogan didn't like that. His swing
videoed after I read the letter. You know, it said something in there
that was red flagging me. Said, when I'm at the top of the
swing, I'm on the instep of my left foot, and I thought,
well, doesn't he mean right foot? And then I watched the video and
it was exactly that. And I went out and I started hitting balls that
way because in my mind I was thinking, well, am I going to
reverse my waight shift? But I didn't. I got more on the ball
and address, and I moved through the ball during the impact, and all
of a sudden, my iron play got real crisp. I quit it in
the thin and fat, and I started I started using some students of minus
guinea pigs, trying to set them up more left sided and so that they
because you know, no matter how you take the club back, you've got
to be on the left side of where you're hitting the golf ball. So
I got them a little bit more on the left side, I'd say sixty
forty. And I did that, and this thing started evolving. I thought,
Holy Macro, I got lightning in a jar. And a bunch of
my students said, you've got to write a book. You've got to get
this information out. And in the process of writing the book, stack until
came out, which is it's similar and set up, but not in the
action action because they really finish in kind of a reverse sea and I don't
believe in that. I think that creates a lot of strain on the on
the body, and I think that's actually an unnatural way to finish. I
think post it up as better. Uh. And my elderly players who never
get off the right side found that they could get to the left side for
the first time in many, many years. And that's the proof of the
pudding for me. Amazing. And then you went on and started coaching on
the college level after you know how, Yeah, as I told you,
I got involved. I got involved with Callowey Golf. It wasn't Callowey Golf
when I was involved with it was called Hickory Stick. And I made the
cold call to Elee Calloway to get him involved with Dicky Stick Golf Club company.
And the first call he came down to look at him, walked away
and said, I wish you did luck. And then about two weeks later,
because we couldn't make payroll, I called him again and he said,
it's funny that you called. I've been thinking about being involved with you.
And he bought up partners out and then made myself Richard PARENTI and Elie Calloway
we were all thirty three and third partners in a new company called Callaway Stick
and then it became Calawi Golf, And of course the story is a beautiful
story because it's a billion dollar company. And I think I made one of
the great cold calls in golf, for sure. And then from that point
after I left, Calloway cashed out in my stock and so forth, I
wanted to do something in golf give back. College of the Den had a
piece of property that I raised the money to build a golf facility on a
driving range, classrooms and a little museum. Continue to evolve. I got
lucky and got the golf team, and this is our twenty seventh year in
a row. We won the conference championship. That's going to be a record
somewhere twenty seven years in a row. You've won the conference championship twenty seven
years in a row. And we're going to try to win it this year,
the twenty eighth. We won the state championship a number of times under
my tutelage, and we won. We won this what we call the Southern
California Regional Championship a number of times, and I've you know, I've been
blessed. We're in a wonderful area. We were one of the few campuses
that has a driving range in a golf academy on campus, so that helps.
I'd like to think that a percentage of the success came from me,
from my teaching. But it's been a win win for me. And as
I tell everyone, this is the best thing I ever did in golf.
And I mean I qualified for the Senior Masters, and the day I qualified,
I think I probably called everyone I ever met to tell them that I
qualified. And I've had some moments in golf, but nothing has fulfilled me
like working with young people and teaching them golf and teaching them what how they're
supposed to act when they win and lose, teaching them, you know,
character and some of the things that I've seen from the greats how they acted.
Arnold Palmer is a perfect example of a guy that conducts himself so well
Everyone loves Arnie. You can't help but love him. He's just a great
man. And I try to pass those things on to the especially in today's
world where you got kids with their pants down, you see their underwear,
all that stuff like that, and I try to explain to them why that's
to turn. I understand. When I was a kid, my folks hated
the music I listened to, and I think that's with every generation. But
I try to tell them, you know, how you have to prioritize and
how you have to have a goal now and you have to start working towards
that goal, and these other things like music and style, those are okay,
but that can't be you're probably unless you're a hip hop artist or you're
a music artist or something. You can't go out looking like that because everyone's
judged at first glance, you know. So, So I found my niche.
I really like mentoring and I love coaching, and I love to watch
some of these kids hit that ball farther than I ever dreamed. Wow,
all right, and you've you've revealed a couple of things here, but I
hope you don't mind me asking how old are you. I'm a seventy seven
as of July twecause when you said from my era, no one says that
unless you're from that era. Yeah, well there was there was big animals
walking the land. Oh well that's because you're in the Palm Springs area and
it's just everyone's away. Well, I'm very lucky. I I want to
say, knock on wood, but it's hard to find wood nowadays, but
knock on plastic. I am really good shape and I and I work at
it. I have to work at it. And being around young people helps
me work at it because typically they're all pretty fit these days. And so
we talk about nutrition and doing all the right things. And you know,
I love to hear Gary Player talk about put Kuman on everything you eat.
You know, he's a marvel that guy. And more people that would copy
him, and so some of these other artists they'd be better off for it.
And at seventy seven years old, I'm sure you know, like this
is going to enhance credibility for you, Like crazy, what are you shooting
these days? I still shoot part? And how far do you drive the
ball to sixty five? Well? I pop it? I need it off
for about to lead? I don't know. Yeah, but everybody gets really
well downhill. I mean when you're on a normal drive, is that really
what you're doing on normal dit? My normal drive is in the it's over
two fifty, you know. With me, I'm in that two sixty range.
Like I say, every now and then I cook one and you know,
you get a turn over a little bit and it'll get out there.
I can get out there pretty good still. You know, I can still
reach par fives and stuff. I usually hit it well over three hundred yards.
And I was just a skinny kid, but I was very flippy wristed,
and you know, and that was with the persimon would But I can
still move it a little bit, you know. I mean my golf team,
everybody hits the three hundred yards. They got arms three inches around and
they hit a three hundred yards. It's just crazy. So what kind of
new things have you discovered with your recent crop of young studs over at College
of the Desert. Well, you know what, I'm finding, they're not
so reluctant to listen. They're more curious about the golf. So again,
part of it is because they see the record we've compiled. And I'm not
going to say that every player that plays for me plays off the left side,
but a lot of them have changed to it, and when I explain
it to them, they realize that mathematically it makes sense. It's not very
It's just that, Look, if we got to get to the left side,
and when we hit the golf ball, the farther we get to the
right, the harder is to get to the left. There's a whole bunch
of things happening on that downsling that you've got a time, and we want
to eliminate timing as much as we can in the golfling. And so if
we can rotate on a axis instead of two but one, if we can
trap the club against our body via the connection of our arms to our body,
then as we rotate, the club face stays square through impact. And
it's easy to do physically. So you know, for the older generation out
there, they say, yeah, but you've got to be young to do
that. No, it's the opposite. The older you are, you know,
you're going to find it much more efficient. And the key here is
that you can square the club to the ball easier, so you get a
lot of square hits. You know, I've got believe me. Late in
their eighties, are said, tell me, they're hitting the ball farther now
than they did fifteen twenty years ago because for the first time in their life,
they know they're hitting the sweet spot. When you're throwing that club from
the top, they're trying to roll your hands over. Good luck, Charlie,
because you may hit once on a year, or if you're practicing out
eight hours a day, then maybe you can do that. But who practices
over a half hour a day, you know, So it's a godsend.
I was very lucky that someone walked in my office and gave me a letter
in a video because it changed the way I teach, and consequently it's helped
everyone I work with, whether they're I've got a girl that I worked with
two years, player of the Year last year. Her name is June Jangs.
She's on my video and she's winning everything and she's now going on to
the regionals of the state. And you watch you hit the ball, you
just go crazy. I mean, she's a fifteen year old girl that can
hit it to sixty two seventy wow. And that's not an exaggeration because when
we play, she keeps it up with me. When she busts when she's
got to ride by her buy me and I tell her, don't do that
anymore. But it's wonderful. And I just took on a seven year old
Korean boy that I'm going to tell you. I'm gonna tell you something.
I'm gonna film. I'm going to take a film of the Indian golf ball
and I'm going to send it to you, and it's going to shock you.
Seventies are seventeen, seven years old, seven years old, seven years
old and clocks it. I mean, I mean, he hits it out
there where you say that's not possible, and he puts like a madman.
And I can't take a lot of credit for this. His dad came to
me and I to watch this little boy on the on the driving range,
and it was like watching a little Ben Hogan. And his dad came.
He said, which you take give my boy lessons? And I said,
well, yeah, but you know you've done a really good job. He
says he won't listen to me. He won't listen to me anymore, but
help. So I took him. And of course I don't charge kids.
I'm you know, it's for me. I get such a reward by teaching
him and watch them. And the first thing I found is when I talked
to him, he was really shy all I he was a top of his
head. So I said, you know, you have to look at me
and I talked to you. So at the end of the lesson, I
said to them, Okay, Ivan, what have you learned today? He
said, well, you told me I have to set up a little better
at the ball and take it back a little bit more with the bigger should
return. And I have to look at you when you talk to me.
And you know, I just I just thought, oh, man, you
know that's that's really cool that he was listening. Wow, And can you
share his name? I don't even know the last name. His name is
Ivan, and he's a he's a I said, Korean. He's a little
Japanese, I excuse me, a little Chinese boy. And the next time
I talked to I'll tell you that the girl June Jang is she's Korean uh
and and she's going to be you watch. You will see her on the
tour and not only will she make the tour, she will win on the
tour. She's that good. Wow. Wow, Yeah, Well please send
me video. I want to see this, and we'll definitely put it up
on the website and let people see it. If oh yeah, you've got
to see this. I got to just give you a quick little story.
After a lesson of this last Tuesday, I brought him over back to the
We were on the turf way back, and I brought him back to the
front of the range where a lot of my golf team were. I said,
okay, guys, I'm going to show you how he was supposed to
hit the t ball. He teed that ball up and he hit it.
I don't know how far he hit it, but it was crazy far for
for a kid that and he's a small seven, but he's got this lag
right at the bottom that God gave him. Okay, and he busted it,
and I said, I just want to show you that that wasn't luck.
I tied another one up and get this a little farther. I mean,
he's got you know, he just can't wait to show off. So
it's it's a beautiful thing. Yeah, he's seven, of course old.
He wants to show people what he can do. Well. You know,
it's so interesting because I've had many conversations with people and have asked this question
of many instructors, and you know, about getting young people started, because
I you know, people go, HI, how much my ten year old
practice? Or how when should I? What should I? How do I
get my kid interested in golf? And I always talk about just start at
the putting green, the practice putting green. It's it's free, it's easy
to figure out. It's a way to compete with the kid that lets them
do it. Because hitting a golf ball is so difficult for anybody, and
and you know, it's so easy to get discouraged by hitting a golf ball.
But if putting, if you can fall in love with putting as a
little kid and it just becomes a second nature to you, then everything else
opens up for you. That's right. And then when you search for an
instruction instructor, find someone that really really enjoys teaching young people that that's that
they have a passion for it, because they'll be patient and they won't overload
them, and they won't it won't be don't do that and don't do this,
It'll be it'll be taught positively. Most PGA professionals have some idea about
this, but there's a lot of people that are not PGA professionals that are
wonderful teachers. You've got to be real careful with that first one. And
the reason I say this with June, her parents came to me and said,
would you teach her daughter? And by the way, she hates golf.
And I said, why doesn't she hate golf? Well, she had
a lesson and she just couldn't do it. She couldn't hold the club,
she just couldn't do it. So I sat her down and I said,
I understand you really don't like golf. She says, no, it's too
hard. I said, well, how about if I give you a lesson
and then you make a determination if you want to continue, and she said
okay, and we hit it off, and I knew what to do with
her because I've done this enough to know what to do. And now if
you ask her the question, what do you think about golf, she says,
I love golf. And so it's you know, it's that initial moment
when someone is helping them that they understand that this is such a great game
and you can really do this, and you have to instill those feelings and
it can't be penal, especially in the sore should never be penal number one.
But you just can't. You can't make them worry about performance. Initially.
It's like a dance. I'm teaching you a dance, and we all
look a little funnier, and we dance, and I always do a little
dance and they laugh and and we break the eye. So I really caution
people this. First of all, this is one of the greatest games a
young person could learn. For business, for pleasure, for a social you
meet quality people. So get your kids on the golf course. Get them
playing this great game. But make sure that, like going to a doctor,
pickoff someone that that that knows what they're doing. Don't be looking for
a bargain basement deal. If you're if you're in palm desert, the deals
real good because it doesn't cost you anything to you know, a thousand kids
are trying. But no, I you know, I have a rule.
I would always have had that rule. I won't charge up until about sixteen
years old, and I sixteen. I can't. I just can't do it.
I mean ill, it's very generous with well, you know, you
know that's it's my time. I can do what I want with it.
Really that's how I feel about it. And and I promise you I get
as much out of it they do, you know, you know, as
I tell my students, when you're generous, you get a lot more than
the person you're giving to. And that's what I can tell you. That
should be written in stone. And I really believe that. And when I
even comes as shows Up or June or whoever I'm teaching, and I can't
wait, I'm chomping at the bit. And that's how you should be.
I'm not special. That's the way you're supposed to be. Well, If
anybody ever is considering taking a lesson from Tony or wanted to take him up
on this offer about you're under sixteen years old, do me the favor.
If you're going to book time for your child, with book an hour for
yourself too. I mean, give the guy something from a bone. You
can both go out and get a lesson. He's not going to charge you
for your kid, but let him you know. Anyway that you should know
is that Tony has a book and an accompanying DVD that the only place you
can find these are on Tony's website and at golfsmarter dot com it really is.
Is that still true? Yes? Okay. So the book is called
The Loss Fundamental, One Simple Move, Better Golf Forever. And then there's
a complimentary DVD called The Lost Fundamental. You can buy as a combo or
you can buy individually whatever you'd like, but please go to Golfsmarter dot com
or go to the golf Smarter app. You can purchase it right off of
the app, the free app that we now have for both Apple and Android,
and you can buy it from there and Tony will send it to you
directly. Order comes to me, but I send it to Tony and he
sends it out. I don't fulfill it, but you should really consider it's
not a thick book. It's an effective book. And it's same with the
DVD and check out on our When you're in the app, go into videos
and find Ben Hogan's Secret Revealed to find the video that Tony and I did
together. Tony, I have based on the things that we've already discussed,
I have so many more questions that I want to get into details on swing
mechanics, which I don't do a lot, but I trust you there's some
questions that I have and some things that you said, you know, like
when you talked about when you were under pressure you hooked the ball. That
to me is absolutely fascinating. So can we spend some more time doing a
member's only episode. Absolutely awesome. All right, Tony, we're gonna do
this again for at least another thirty minutes, starting in just a moment.
All right, thank you very much. I really I really enjoy talking to
you, and I'm so glad you're back on the show.