Speaker 1: Hi.
Speaker 2: This is Mike Pokowitz, a golf instructor in Philadelphia, PA,
Speaker 2: and I coach at Five Iron Golf and Play Around Golf.
Speaker 3: This is golf Smarter.
Speaker 2: Golf Smarter number four hundred and seventy one, published on
Speaker 2: January thirteen, twenty fifteen.
Speaker 4: Welcome to Golf Smarter Mulligans, your second chance to gain
Speaker 4: insight and advice from the best instructors featured on the
Speaker 4: Golf Smarter podcast. Great Golf Instruction Never gets Old. Our
Speaker 4: interview library features hundreds of hours of game improvement conversations
Speaker 4: like this that are no longer available in any podcast app.
Speaker 5: You have to take them on the golf course. I
Speaker 5: don't think you can teach that management standing on the
Speaker 5: driving range. What I would do is get that person
Speaker 5: on the golf course, stand on the tee and look
Speaker 5: down the fairway and have them tell me what's out there,
Speaker 5: What do they see? Where's the trouble? Where don't you
Speaker 5: want to go? And they'll convince themselves they say, well,
Speaker 5: it's all water down the right hand side. I definitely
Speaker 5: don't want to go there. So you get them to
Speaker 5: actually see a picture of the hole and where's the
Speaker 5: best place to play that and then start working on
Speaker 5: club selection. You know, this is a little tight driving hole.
Speaker 5: What club do you have the most confidence in it?
Speaker 5: You know, I really like my seven with Okay, so
Speaker 5: hit your seven with office teeth with the next shot
Speaker 5: and play get it inside one hundred yards to the
Speaker 5: green and then get it on the green to walk away.
Speaker 1: With bogie.
Speaker 3: Letting go of the bad shots with Tom Good.
Speaker 4: This is Golf Smarter, sharing tips and insights from golfers
Speaker 4: and golf professionals to help blower your score. It's worked
Speaker 4: for your host, Fred Green.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Golf Smarter Podcast.
Speaker 3: Tom.
Speaker 1: Hey, Fred, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: Well, it's my pleasure. Thank you so much for reaching
Speaker 2: out to me via LinkedIn. Nope, that's interesting how many
Speaker 2: people will do that. But I appreciate you doing that
Speaker 2: because there were a couple things in your introductory let
Speaker 2: that really stood out to me. That mostly which is
Speaker 2: that you teach golfers how to manage a golf course.
Speaker 2: And I think that is such an important part of
Speaker 2: the game that most people don't really get and I
Speaker 2: want to spend some time on that.
Speaker 1: Okay, that sounds good, but before.
Speaker 2: We do that, let's establish who you are, where you
Speaker 2: come from, what you're doing these days, and why in
Speaker 2: the fact, why in the heck that I'm talking to
Speaker 2: you today.
Speaker 5: Well, I'll tell you it's been kind of a long,
Speaker 5: fun journey for me. I've been in this business all
Speaker 5: my life, pretty much as a child.
Speaker 1: I grew up in it. I've played professionally.
Speaker 5: I've played in college, and when I ended up not
Speaker 5: being able to make the money I needed to make professionally,
Speaker 5: I figured I could probably teach the game better than
Speaker 5: I could play it, so I gravitated into teaching. In fact,
Speaker 5: I started my first lessons in nineteen seventy two at
Speaker 5: Lincoln Park Golf Course in San Francisco, and the last
Speaker 5: twenty two years I spent well, actually it's probably a
Speaker 5: little longer ago than that, twenty two years at Almonden
Speaker 5: Country Club as the director of instruction and head golf professional.
Speaker 5: And then four years ago I made a move to
Speaker 5: go strictly back into teaching full time at Center Bar
Speaker 5: Hills Golf Club in San Jose, where I'm the director
Speaker 5: of instruction.
Speaker 3: Very good.
Speaker 2: So, when you said you played professionally, tell me a
Speaker 2: little bit about that. That always is intriguing to me.
Speaker 5: Well, it was you know, I had worked in the
Speaker 5: club business for a little while as a young guy
Speaker 5: right out of college, and decided that I'd like to
Speaker 5: try to play the.
Speaker 1: Game for a living.
Speaker 5: So I did the whole deal of going through the
Speaker 5: tour school qualifying after working for about five years, you know,
Speaker 5: not playing a lot of competitive golf, and I went
Speaker 5: and missed the first stage of the tour school by
Speaker 5: one shot. So I thought, hey, you know, maybe let's
Speaker 5: pursue this. So I played mini tour golf in Arizona
Speaker 5: and around California for about two years, and I'll never
Speaker 5: forget my first first round as a professional. I shot
Speaker 5: sixty seven. I felt absolutely fantastic, and I went into
Speaker 5: the scoreboard and I was six shots behind the lead
Speaker 5: after one round.
Speaker 3: So one of the best rounds of your life. And
Speaker 3: it's like exactly, and you're not.
Speaker 5: Thinking, that's as boud as good as I can play,
Speaker 5: and I was six packs. So and that was quite
Speaker 5: a while ago. That was when everybody wasn't quite as
Speaker 5: good as they are today.
Speaker 1: So but I did play for a.
Speaker 5: While, and you know, then when kind of that kind
Speaker 5: of served its purpose, I got back into the club
Speaker 5: professional business and concentrating a lot on teaching. That was
Speaker 5: when I really decided that was what I wanted to do.
Speaker 5: And so I've been teaching pretty much off and on
Speaker 5: for forty years, the last thirty years exclusively teaching.
Speaker 2: So great, Great, I want to go back to that
Speaker 2: first round that you had when you were playing professionally.
Speaker 2: Is that one a three or four day tournament?
Speaker 5: It was, I, you know, my memories, that was quite
Speaker 5: a few years ago, but I believe they were three
Speaker 5: day tournaments at that time.
Speaker 2: Okay, So you know, it's so fun to watch recreational
Speaker 2: amateur golfers who get frustrated that they don't get better
Speaker 2: every single round, and they'll go out and shoot a
Speaker 2: eighty five and be ecstatic about it and think that
Speaker 2: they've got everything figured out. And the next day they'll
Speaker 2: go out and shoot a ninety seven and you know,
Speaker 2: it can range ten strokes on any given day. Do
Speaker 2: you happen to remember, you know, you shoot a sixty seven,
Speaker 2: you're stoked, you're pumped up, and then the next day
Speaker 2: do you have any recollection of how you did that?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I believe it was somewhere close to PARR. But
Speaker 5: I think what happens is you go out and shoot
Speaker 5: around like that. Then the next day you go back
Speaker 5: out and try to do the same thing.
Speaker 1: And as soon as you start trying to.
Speaker 5: Do something in this game, that's when you get into trouble.
Speaker 2: Oh please expand on that. That's really an interesting concept.
Speaker 2: It's when you try to do something exactly.
Speaker 5: And I kind of use the analogy a lot in teaching.
Speaker 5: When we get in on a car and drive down
Speaker 5: the road or down the street going to the store
Speaker 5: or wherever, we really don't think about the mechanics of
Speaker 5: driving the car. We don't think about getting in, fasten
Speaker 5: our seat belt, doing all those things that need to
Speaker 5: get us there. We just end up at our destination
Speaker 5: and sometimes you stop and wonder, oh, wow, here's my exit.
Speaker 5: I got to get off the road right here. Well,
Speaker 5: what happens a lot of times when you get on
Speaker 5: that golf course and you've.
Speaker 1: Just had a really good round.
Speaker 5: You go back to the course the next day and
Speaker 5: you say, now, what was I doing?
Speaker 1: You know, I think I was.
Speaker 5: I think I must have been turning really well, I
Speaker 5: was using my body well, and you start thinking about
Speaker 5: the mechanics of the golf swing rather than just playing
Speaker 5: the game, looking at the golf course and picking your
Speaker 5: target and.
Speaker 1: Just letting your swing work. What you've been teaching it.
Speaker 2: Are you telling me that we think too much when
Speaker 2: we're on the golf course.
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 1: Probably got ninety nine percent of us do that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, you're just trying to figure out And
Speaker 5: I think as humans we have this tendency to always
Speaker 5: be trying to figure things out. Whether we've hit a
Speaker 5: bad shot, we try to figure.
Speaker 1: Out what we did wrong.
Speaker 5: Then when we hit a good shot, we try to
Speaker 5: figure out what we did.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 2: Or you have a good shot and you think it's
Speaker 2: an anomaly and you're going, yeah, but I'm hitting bad
Speaker 2: shots today, and you keep focused on the bad shot exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well that good shot wasn't me. That was a mistake,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 5: So I'm the guy that hits it out of bounds
Speaker 5: and left all the time, So right right, that was
Speaker 5: someone else in my body.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Where'd you play in college?
Speaker 1: I played at BYU Okay, very good.
Speaker 5: I played for a couple of years there and then
Speaker 5: went to work at my family golf course after that,
Speaker 5: and that was kind of when.
Speaker 1: I got into the business.
Speaker 2: At that time, wea a family golf course. So you
Speaker 2: said you were in at your entire life. What is
Speaker 2: a family golf course?
Speaker 5: My family, my father was a golf professional, and we
Speaker 5: grew up. I can remember as a kid ten eleven
Speaker 5: years old picking the driving range, doing all the work,
Speaker 5: washing the carts. So I've been in it pretty much
Speaker 5: all my life, which is I'm sixty three years old
Speaker 5: right now, so I've been around it a long time,
Speaker 5: seeing a.
Speaker 1: Lot, done a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, all right. So now I'm thinking, you're a
Speaker 2: teenage boy. You're working in You're working for your family,
Speaker 2: You're driving the golf, you know, picking up balls off
Speaker 2: the driving range, and you're saying to yourself, I am not.
Speaker 3: Going to be in this business. This is ridiculous.
Speaker 2: I mean, were there times that you were going, Okay,
Speaker 2: this is not going to work for me, I'm going
Speaker 2: to be an accountant.
Speaker 1: Nope.
Speaker 5: Never never had that thought I was going to play
Speaker 5: I was going to play professionally. It was I think
Speaker 5: I've had maybe two other part time jobs in my
Speaker 5: entire life outside of golf, which were that was when
Speaker 5: I was in high school. I sold men's clothing for
Speaker 5: a while, and then I got a job one time
Speaker 5: for a fencing company, and I found out that I
Speaker 5: was the only they hired me because I had a
Speaker 5: driver's license. It wasn't anything about building fences.
Speaker 1: I could drive the truck, so you know, that was
Speaker 1: why I was about eighteen years old. So anyway, and
Speaker 1: that was it.
Speaker 5: Then from then on, it's been golf, all aspects of golf.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 3: Do you have siblings.
Speaker 5: I do.
Speaker 3: Did they go in the business as well?
Speaker 2: Or are they the ones that said I am not
Speaker 2: going to do this.
Speaker 5: Let's just say that they started in it. We were
Speaker 5: all in it one time, and they got smart and
Speaker 5: got out of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you're the bad good right, the bad member
Speaker 2: of the good family.
Speaker 5: He Yeah, I had an older brother that went into
Speaker 5: the superintendent business, taking care of the golf courses rather.
Speaker 1: Than than being the golf professional. But yeah, we were
Speaker 1: all in it one time.
Speaker 3: That's awesome.
Speaker 5: At one point, all four of us, my father and
Speaker 5: my two brothers, we were all pros at the same time.
Speaker 3: So awesome.
Speaker 2: Well, that's great, great story, Thank you. Let's go back
Speaker 2: to us. Let's let's figure out what we're doing wrong here.
Speaker 2: And I love the idea of talking about thinking too
Speaker 2: much and and you know, I know that there's times
Speaker 2: where I'm playing well and I'll focus more on the
Speaker 2: fact that I'm feeling confident as opposed.
Speaker 3: To knowing what I did right.
Speaker 2: Okay, So because I I just you know, I hear
Speaker 2: so often and talk talking to so many instruction instructors
Speaker 2: that confidence is such a key to every shot.
Speaker 3: Tell me your thoughts on that.
Speaker 5: Well, I think, you know, confidence obviously is vital, but
Speaker 5: I kind of look at it like which which comes first,
Speaker 5: the confidence or the consistency of doing something. You know,
Speaker 5: in a routine where you're you're practicing the right things
Speaker 5: and you're practicing your tempo and all that, and then
Speaker 5: so you start hitting better shots, and then out of.
Speaker 1: Those better shots comes the confidence.
Speaker 5: So you know, it's you know what came first, the
Speaker 5: egg or the chicken, you know, So you have to
Speaker 5: have that consistency in the golf swing and be practicing
Speaker 5: the right things.
Speaker 1: To create the confidence.
Speaker 5: So and then once you feel that confidence on the
Speaker 5: golf course, the hardest part is just just trusting yourself
Speaker 5: and believing.
Speaker 1: In what you're doing.
Speaker 2: And also, I would think it's really important to understand
Speaker 2: and be at peace with yourself and knowing things happen
Speaker 2: out of your control, that there are going to be
Speaker 2: bad shots, there are going to be bad results to
Speaker 2: good shots.
Speaker 1: Exactly exactly.
Speaker 5: That's one of the things that it's really hard to
Speaker 5: work with younger players sometimes because.
Speaker 1: They're you know, they think they're.
Speaker 5: Immune to ever hitting a bad shot. So they could
Speaker 5: be really really good players, but.
Speaker 1: They, like you say, they bad.
Speaker 5: Shots are as much a part of the game as
Speaker 5: the good shots. And I would sometimes like to have
Speaker 5: people look at the golf courses. If you're playing an
Speaker 5: eighteen whole round, it's eighteen games and it's maybe going.
Speaker 1: Like going to Las Vegas. The house is going to
Speaker 1: win most of the holes, so you've got.
Speaker 5: To just kind of manage your mistakes and just realize
Speaker 5: that that's part of the game and the hole is
Speaker 5: going to beat you sometimes, so it's you know, you.
Speaker 1: Got to just roll with the punches and have amnesia.
Speaker 5: Let the bad shots go and focus on the next
Speaker 5: shot that you're looking at.
Speaker 2: How how do you have yeah, how do you get
Speaker 2: that amnesia where you know, how do you focus on
Speaker 2: the good and eliminate the negative and not overthink this?
Speaker 3: I mean, how do you teach that well.
Speaker 5: I think I think you've actually got to practice it.
Speaker 5: It's again, it goes back to what I mentioned there before,
Speaker 5: is that we're always trying to figure out what.
Speaker 1: We did wrong.
Speaker 5: And I just share a little story with you. One time,
Speaker 5: I a couple of years ago, I had a young
Speaker 5: high school kid come out and he was he was
Speaker 5: pretty pretty big kid. He came out very very quiet,
Speaker 5: wouldn't talk very much, and so I had him warm up,
Speaker 5: getting some nine irons, and so he hit the first
Speaker 5: nine iron abou one hundred and seventy yards absolutely.
Speaker 2: Perfect and seventy yards?
Speaker 3: Is that what you said?
Speaker 1: Really? Yes, that's exactly what I said.
Speaker 5: I watched the ball and I went I said, okay, Nathan,
Speaker 5: I said, is that a pretty normal nine iron?
Speaker 1: And he looked at me and goes mm hm.
Speaker 5: And so he had another one about exactly the same thing,
Speaker 5: land in the same spot. And so he hit five
Speaker 5: shots in a row that.
Speaker 1: Were within five to ten yards of each other.
Speaker 5: And I'm looking and I said, that is you know,
Speaker 5: I says, that's your normal nine iron and he's and
Speaker 5: again man of few words, he said mm hmm.
Speaker 1: So then he hit one.
Speaker 5: I hit about three inches behind it. Okay, hit this
Speaker 5: big chunker. So I said, so, Nathan, what happened there?
Speaker 5: And he looked at me like I was like an idiot.
Speaker 5: He looked at me, he said, well, I hit behind it.
Speaker 5: And I said, okay, go on, you know. So it
Speaker 5: wasn't why did I do that? Why did I hit
Speaker 5: behind it?
Speaker 1: He just accepted that he hit behind it and that
Speaker 1: was what it was. So he went on to the
Speaker 1: next shot and.
Speaker 2: Probably hit the next one one hundred and seventy yards.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he just hit it out there again.
Speaker 5: Right, So it's what we have to practice, is and
Speaker 5: I don't I don't think you can just go out
Speaker 5: there and say, okay, I'm you know, for every bad
Speaker 5: shot I hit today, I'm just going to forget it
Speaker 5: and go on to the next one, because that's not
Speaker 5: our human nature. It's something that you have to work at.
Speaker 5: It's something that you have to practice, and you can
Speaker 5: start practicing it on the driving range and it's really
Speaker 5: really hard to do, you know, to get out of
Speaker 5: our get that out of our mind, that got to
Speaker 5: hit that bad shot, and you've got to stay in
Speaker 5: the present. Okay, all right, that SHOT's gone, and you
Speaker 5: actually have.
Speaker 1: To talk yourself through that.
Speaker 5: You have to say, all right, miss that shot, all right,
Speaker 5: I'm moving on to the next one, and you start
Speaker 5: focusing on the next shot. And that's going to help
Speaker 5: you train yourself to get out of what you just did,
Speaker 5: because you know, there's so much time between shots on.
Speaker 1: The golf course.
Speaker 5: You're either waiting for the people that you're playing with
Speaker 5: or waiting for the group in front of it, and
Speaker 5: the whole time is you're thinking about that last shot
Speaker 5: you just hit. So I think you have to actually
Speaker 5: mentally and physically just say okay, I'm going to the
Speaker 5: next shot.
Speaker 1: I'm moving forward here. And it takes time. You might
Speaker 1: be able to do it for three or four holes.
Speaker 5: In around and then gradually the many the next time
Speaker 5: out you're able to kind of stay in that present
Speaker 5: for six holes. So it's just something that you have
Speaker 5: to work at. It's just like practicing the physical shots,
Speaker 5: you got to practice the mental park.
Speaker 2: We've talked so much on this show about outcome versus process.
Speaker 2: We never forget we had one called Nato, which was
Speaker 2: not attached to outcome. And I find that a lot
Speaker 2: of people get upset. People that I play with, they
Speaker 2: get upset with the result of where the ball landed
Speaker 2: versus their swing, their contact with the ball, and I,
Speaker 2: you know, I my friends kind of look at me like,
Speaker 2: what are you talking about? When I'll have a shot
Speaker 2: that I'm not happy with that, I'm more unhappy with
Speaker 2: the swing and with the contact than I am with
Speaker 2: the result the result. You know, once you know I
Speaker 2: can't do much about that. I can have a phenomenal
Speaker 2: drive and it ends up in a bunker. Why should
Speaker 2: I get upset about that? Right?
Speaker 1: Exactly?
Speaker 5: Take on the challenge of trying to get it out
Speaker 5: of the ball.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. It's like, oh boy, this is exciting something different.
Speaker 5: That's why they you know, they put bunkers out there
Speaker 5: for a reason for people to hit into them. So
Speaker 5: you might as well just say, take on the challenge
Speaker 5: of being able to hit the bunker shot.
Speaker 2: And what cracks me up is that you'll play with
Speaker 2: someone who's played that course over and over and they go, God,
Speaker 2: I hit into the bunker every single time, and you
Speaker 2: just want to go, well, let's there's two things you
Speaker 2: can do here. One you can go from a different
Speaker 2: tea box maybe you're playing the wrong tea box, or
Speaker 2: two just try a different club this time. If you're
Speaker 2: going to do that every time, why are you taking
Speaker 2: the driver out every single time to do this?
Speaker 3: Are there other options that I missed?
Speaker 1: They hit right? You know it's I got two things
Speaker 1: I was thinking of.
Speaker 5: One one story college coach was talking to me the
Speaker 5: one time about one of his tail players was standing
Speaker 5: on a part three, one hundred and six bole water
Speaker 5: on the right, Arizona on the left, so there's tons
Speaker 5: of room on the left.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 5: First ball goes in the water, right, second ball goes
Speaker 5: in the water right, So three free balls in a
Speaker 5: row into the water to the right of the green.
Speaker 1: You're under a coach and said what do I do?
Speaker 1: And the coach said, aim left.
Speaker 5: You know, if you keep making the same mistake, that's
Speaker 5: you know, you just you got to look at it
Speaker 5: and say God that that you know, you don't have
Speaker 5: to hit driver off every team. You don't have to
Speaker 5: hit three wood on every part five for your second shot.
Speaker 1: Just because it's a long waist from the green.
Speaker 5: But what you're trying to do is keep the golf
Speaker 5: ball in play and hit the club that you have
Speaker 5: the most confidence in.
Speaker 1: And you know, and I think another thing.
Speaker 5: Another mistake people make a lot is they don't play
Speaker 5: the way they hit the ball. So you know, if
Speaker 5: they'll stand on the range and they'll practice, and their
Speaker 5: driver ninety eight percent of the time has a left
Speaker 5: to right shape to it, sometimes more than others. Okay,
Speaker 5: So they stand up and they aim down the middle
Speaker 5: of the fairway and the ball slices into the trees
Speaker 5: on the right.
Speaker 3: Okay, so I know it, well, yeah.
Speaker 5: If you do it ninety percent of the time, So
Speaker 5: why don't you just aim down the left side and
Speaker 5: play the fade rather than trying to hit it straight,
Speaker 5: which you can't do right. So I think it's it's
Speaker 5: people have to understand their game.
Speaker 1: Know their game.
Speaker 5: Okay, if you're a twenty two handicap and you hit
Speaker 5: your ball off the tee one hundred and eighty five yards,
Speaker 5: but in your mind, you should be hitting at two
Speaker 5: hundred and thirty. So then you start trying to hit
Speaker 5: it two hundred and thirty yards and it goes further
Speaker 5: into the trees, further left, missing shots, Okay, rather than
Speaker 5: just playing your normal game, play what your your swing
Speaker 5: is it it's your perfect golf swing is what you create,
Speaker 5: not the one that's in Golf Digest or on Golf Channel.
Speaker 5: And you know, this is what the guys on the tour,
Speaker 5: this is the way they hit their drive. You know,
Speaker 5: use your perfect golf swing and play your own game.
Speaker 2: Is that something that you teach is that everyone has
Speaker 2: their own perfect golf swing or you try to recreate
Speaker 2: what you know Rory does.
Speaker 5: No, I absolutely I do not teach everybody a method.
Speaker 5: In other words, this is you come to see me.
Speaker 5: You're going to learn to swing the golf club this way.
Speaker 5: What I'm going to do is I'm going to see
Speaker 5: what you can do physically. You know where you are
Speaker 5: in the game, what you want to try to do.
Speaker 5: You know what are your goals and can you physically
Speaker 5: do some of the things that you read about or
Speaker 5: you know you have certain restrictions to your body, the flexibility,
Speaker 5: whatever it is. And you know I've played for forty years.
Speaker 5: I need to get better. I need to start hooking
Speaker 5: my driver rather than fading it. And I'm going to
Speaker 5: try to work with that person with what they've got bring.
Speaker 5: Bring to me your game, and we'll make your game
Speaker 5: better by by looking at where where are you mismanaging
Speaker 5: your game? You know, you stand out there and I
Speaker 5: can't hit the drivers. Okay, I'm hitting I hit my driver,
Speaker 5: you know bad all the time.
Speaker 1: Well, if you really analyze their game, their driver may.
Speaker 5: Not be that bad, but they just had forty seven
Speaker 5: putts in eighteen.
Speaker 1: Holes, you know.
Speaker 5: So it's not your driver, it's your putting. So you
Speaker 5: have to look at your game and analyze your game.
Speaker 5: Is that you know I'm horrible from fifty yards in.
Speaker 5: It takes me two shots to get it on the green,
Speaker 5: and then I can't get it close on the third shot.
Speaker 1: So you better start working on your short game.
Speaker 2: That That actually is what happened to me and was
Speaker 2: a huge made a huge difference in my game once
Speaker 2: I started focusing on my short.
Speaker 3: Game in and around the green.
Speaker 2: Is what is the most common problem that you come
Speaker 2: up with? Is it people don't know the distance they
Speaker 2: hit each club that they have. They think they're better
Speaker 2: than they are. What do you find not what people
Speaker 2: ask you like, I want more consistency, I want to
Speaker 2: hit the ball farther. What do you find is the
Speaker 2: most common amateur mistake that's going on that they don't
Speaker 2: recognize their making?
Speaker 1: Well, I think you.
Speaker 5: Know the first thing you said there was their distance.
Speaker 5: I think a lot of people really have a.
Speaker 1: Misconception of how far they actually hit the.
Speaker 5: Ball and how far you know, they they think the
Speaker 5: ball is going when it's really not.
Speaker 1: And then they're you know.
Speaker 5: They're always coming up short, or they're trying to hit
Speaker 5: the ball harder than they need to rather than playing
Speaker 5: within themselves. But I think it's a it's a misunderstanding
Speaker 5: of their of their true yardages.
Speaker 2: How do you get their ego to accept that.
Speaker 3: That's the problem.
Speaker 5: I think if I'm working with someone consistently, we're going
Speaker 5: to take them out on the golf course and put.
Speaker 1: Them at a certain yardage.
Speaker 5: It's it's sometimes really hard to see that actual yardage
Speaker 5: on the driving range, and then well it's a range ball.
Speaker 5: It doesn't go as far as my regular ball that
Speaker 5: I play, And then it's so I think the answer
Speaker 5: to that is actually getting them on the golf course,
Speaker 5: putting them at one hundred and thirty yards and having
Speaker 5: them hit their nine iron and dump a twenty yards
Speaker 5: short in the bunker. Say, okay, so you're nine iron
Speaker 5: really goes one hundred and ten.
Speaker 3: No, it doesn't.
Speaker 1: I really had no I hit it one thirty exactly exactly.
Speaker 1: Hit the ball.
Speaker 3: I hit it one thirty once exactly.
Speaker 5: It's that, Okay, I can't hit it one thirty and
Speaker 5: something happened.
Speaker 1: But it's you know, that's not you know that. You know,
Speaker 1: it's where you.
Speaker 5: Hit the ball, where you hit it on the club
Speaker 5: face and all that. So you've just got I think
Speaker 5: it's just in coaching and teaching, you you've gone to
Speaker 5: get that.
Speaker 1: Have the student gained the confidence, you know.
Speaker 5: In their coach that that I'm there to help and
Speaker 5: and and you know, they've just got to accept the
Speaker 5: fact that that numbers don't lie, you know, and you
Speaker 5: just have to convince them that if you you might
Speaker 5: have to take them out two or three times and
Speaker 5: show them that, hey, here's now, you can knock this
Speaker 5: seven iron from one hundred and thirty yards. You can
Speaker 5: knock it on the green, you know, eight out of
Speaker 5: nine times.
Speaker 1: And you're going to play better from there.
Speaker 5: And you know, if they accept it, they accept it
Speaker 5: and they go on to play better golf.
Speaker 1: And if they don't, they just keep struggling.
Speaker 2: This is a great lead in for something that we
Speaker 2: talked about in the very beginning. And I do want
Speaker 2: to get to it, and that is how to manage
Speaker 2: your game on the golf course. And you said, you know,
Speaker 2: I'm sure this is just a start. When you put
Speaker 2: the ball one hundred and thirty yards out and say,
Speaker 2: give give me your best shot. What does it mean
Speaker 2: to teach someone to manage the golf course?
Speaker 5: I think you have to you, first of all, start
Speaker 5: with their game and their shot shape.
Speaker 1: What kind of shots do you hit off the tee?
Speaker 1: You know, how far do you hit it? And what
Speaker 1: first you know?
Speaker 5: So once they understand that, okay, I do play my ball.
Speaker 1: Left to right, that's what I play.
Speaker 5: Okay, then you actually you have to take them on
Speaker 5: the golf course.
Speaker 1: You can't.
Speaker 5: I don't think you can teach that management standing on
Speaker 5: the driving range. But then you what I would do
Speaker 5: is get that person on the golf course, stand on
Speaker 5: the tee and look down the fairway and have.
Speaker 1: Them tell me what's out there? What do they see?
Speaker 1: What you know?
Speaker 5: What's where's the trouble? Where don't you want to go?
Speaker 5: And let them tell themselves. They'll convince themselves. They say, well,
Speaker 5: geeze the water, it's all water down the.
Speaker 1: Right hand side.
Speaker 5: I definitely don't want to go there. So you get
Speaker 5: them to actually see a picture of the hole and
Speaker 5: where's the best place to play that now? And then
Speaker 5: start working on club selection.
Speaker 1: You know, where's your you know, this is.
Speaker 5: A little tight driving hole. What club do you have
Speaker 5: the most confidence in? You know, I really like my
Speaker 5: seven wood? Okay, so hit your seven with off this
Speaker 5: te put it in play, with the next shot in play,
Speaker 5: get it inside one hundred yards to the green, and
Speaker 5: then get it on the green to walk away with bogie.
Speaker 1: You know. So you just I think you have to
Speaker 1: show it to.
Speaker 5: Them and prove them. Prove to them there's other ways
Speaker 5: to play the golf rather than always hitting driver off
Speaker 5: of par fours and par fives, and you.
Speaker 1: Know, just understand.
Speaker 5: How to back off a little bit, play more within themselves.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, And then the whole shot shape idea. There's
Speaker 2: a natural shot shape that everybody has. But so often
Speaker 2: I'll see middle handicappers and I'm talking, you know, fifteen
Speaker 2: to what do you consider a middle handicap?
Speaker 1: Probably fifteen to twenty two.
Speaker 2: We're in there, all right, So somebody who's shooting high eighties, nineties, okay,
Speaker 2: and they're out there and I've seen it so many
Speaker 2: times it cracks me up. Say, all I need to
Speaker 2: do is hit a slight draw here, and all I
Speaker 2: need to do is hit it low.
Speaker 3: And it's like.
Speaker 2: I've admitted to myself, I don't know how to shape
Speaker 2: my shots.
Speaker 3: I don't know how. I don't have that many tools
Speaker 3: in my bag.
Speaker 2: If you will, that my ball has just a natural
Speaker 2: fade to it.
Speaker 3: And I've accepted.
Speaker 2: That my irons go farther right, farther right than I
Speaker 2: want them to, and I'm working on that. But there's
Speaker 2: so many people that these middle handicappers that are talk
Speaker 2: about shaping their shots and talk about knowing what they
Speaker 2: did wrong.
Speaker 3: I lifted my.
Speaker 2: Head, but really, yeah again, but it's like you really
Speaker 2: should people be trying to shape their shots if they're
Speaker 2: not a single digit handicap.
Speaker 1: I don't think so.
Speaker 5: I mean I think if you're you know, and I'll
Speaker 5: if I really feel.
Speaker 1: Confident with my students, you.
Speaker 5: Know, and they're and they're talking about, you know, shaping
Speaker 5: shots and doing this, I said, if you want to.
Speaker 1: Do that, you got to get a lower handicap, you know.
Speaker 5: So yeah, I think, you know, if if people who
Speaker 5: are averaged to higher handicaps, just trust themselves to play.
Speaker 5: What again, their perfect golf swing gives them When they're
Speaker 5: swinging right, man, it's a little left to right boom
Speaker 5: that goes right in the fairway every time.
Speaker 1: I'm never out of the fairway.
Speaker 5: And you know, they're just going to play so much
Speaker 5: better and have so much more fun.
Speaker 1: But I think we're in this.
Speaker 5: You know, you've got Golf Channel now and you watch
Speaker 5: you watch any of the tournaments on TV, and this
Speaker 5: whole Okay, he's got to hit it out there right,
Speaker 5: he's got to bring it in right to left here,
Speaker 5: and they talk about this. So as a human, we're
Speaker 5: out there and we're thinking, man, okay, I'm going.
Speaker 1: To hook this ball. Well, they don't have.
Speaker 5: First of all, they don't know how to hook it.
Speaker 5: They don't know how to do that, okay, but they're
Speaker 5: trying it on the golf course. So if they want
Speaker 5: to start learning how to work the ball, they've got
Speaker 5: to do it on the driving range. And most of
Speaker 5: the time, no one ever practices shaping shots or trying
Speaker 5: to make a ball go right to left, So they
Speaker 5: have no idea how to do it, and they don't
Speaker 5: know if they can. So then they're trying it on
Speaker 5: the golf course and it ends up into a triple
Speaker 5: bow gear or quadruple bogue or something like that because
Speaker 5: they they got a shot there trying that they've never
Speaker 5: hit in their life.
Speaker 2: It brings out I'm going to go a little sidetrack here,
Speaker 2: because this came up in my round the other day
Speaker 2: with a friend of mine and we were talking about, uh,
Speaker 2: fade versus slice or a draw versus a hook, right,
Speaker 2: I mean so like so a slice is an exaggerated fade.
Speaker 3: Correct. Correct, It's a left to right.
Speaker 5: It's a left to right shape and usually starts left
Speaker 5: of the target ends.
Speaker 1: Up right of the target.
Speaker 3: Is this is a slice?
Speaker 1: That's a slice, Okay? And a fade A fade, A
Speaker 1: lot of fade.
Speaker 5: A lot of times will be just it's a it's
Speaker 5: a a softer curve maybe starting at the target and
Speaker 5: then just drifting off to the right.
Speaker 2: Okay, and then going that's left to right, now going
Speaker 2: right to left.
Speaker 5: We have go ahead, you got the you got a hook, okay, hook,
Speaker 5: big big curve right to left. Usually you know, I
Speaker 5: think most hooks kind of start at the.
Speaker 1: Target in a.
Speaker 5: Curve way left or just a slight draw, it's usually
Speaker 5: a little higher shot drops softly down left.
Speaker 1: Of the target.
Speaker 3: And a cut. What's a cut?
Speaker 2: That's that's where this conversation led the other day. We
Speaker 2: were like, that's a cut. Well, I don't know what's
Speaker 2: a cut?
Speaker 5: Okay, A cut is is more it's it's kind of
Speaker 5: an intentional slice where you never release the golf club,
Speaker 5: you hold on really if you're a right hand or
Speaker 5: you hold on really firm with your left and you
Speaker 5: actually try to hit the ball left with a with
Speaker 5: a h swing path that comes across the ball and
Speaker 5: puts dramatic left to right spin on the.
Speaker 3: Ball, and going the opposite way would be called.
Speaker 5: What a pole hook right to left and kind of
Speaker 5: a pole.
Speaker 1: Draw where you're actually but that's an intentionally.
Speaker 5: That's intentional where you're really trying to close the club
Speaker 5: face over the ball, keep it low and get it
Speaker 5: going around a tree left or something like that.
Speaker 3: Is it dangerous for us?
Speaker 2: I watched tournaments on TV and listen to these guys
Speaker 2: because then we walk out going okay, I got.
Speaker 5: It, yeah, because I think the I'll probably get in
Speaker 5: trouble here to tell you, I think they talked too
Speaker 5: much instead of just letting us watch the tournament and uh,
Speaker 5: you know, they're they're just you know. And the one
Speaker 5: I love when the golf tournament tournaments is when he's
Speaker 5: got no chance here to get this up and down.
Speaker 1: He's in the deep rough.
Speaker 5: He's got it here, he's got green sloping away from me,
Speaker 5: water on the other side, and the guy.
Speaker 1: Hits it up two feet Well okay, well, okay.
Speaker 3: Right in my wildest dream.
Speaker 5: Yeah, But you know, I think most slices, and I
Speaker 5: see this so much for for I'm kind of talking
Speaker 5: right handed player here, but most most slices come when
Speaker 5: the player is trying to hit the ball straight. And
Speaker 5: I guarantee that everybody that's gone down to the range
Speaker 5: to practice, they're trying to hit the ball straight.
Speaker 2: And you should not try to hit the ball straight.
Speaker 1: I don't think so. I think it's the hardest shot
Speaker 1: in golf to hit.
Speaker 3: Really.
Speaker 5: If if you if you take okay, just picture and iron,
Speaker 5: you know anything, seven iron, six iron.
Speaker 1: Okay, the face is flat, the ball.
Speaker 5: Is round, and if you look at the contact point
Speaker 5: between the ball and the club face, you know there's
Speaker 5: not a lot of.
Speaker 1: Room for error there. So as soon as you start.
Speaker 5: Trying to guide that ball straight, you get tension in
Speaker 5: your hands. You're trying, you're trying to to keep the
Speaker 5: golf club going straight at the target rather than letting
Speaker 5: it release naturally. And if you happen to line it
Speaker 5: up with good timing, the ball goes relatively straight, but
Speaker 5: it's much easier to curve the ball one way or
Speaker 5: the other.
Speaker 2: Hey, you know what, we're out of time, So here's
Speaker 2: what I'd like to do. Can you hang around so
Speaker 2: we can have a continue this conversation. We'll do part two. Sure, awesome, absolutely, okay,
Speaker 2: but before you go, please tell me if people want
Speaker 2: to get in touch with you.
Speaker 3: Do you have a website?
Speaker 2: What's the best way If they're living in the South
Speaker 2: Bay of the Bay Area and they want some lessons,
Speaker 2: or if they want to they've enjoyed this conversation, they
Speaker 2: want to travel to meet you and work with you,
Speaker 2: how's the best way to get in touch with you.
Speaker 5: My website is Tom Goood g o D one word
Speaker 5: at the Good Golf Connection dot com.
Speaker 3: That's your email.
Speaker 5: I'm sorry, A right, sorry, and that's my I'm sorry,
Speaker 5: that's my email. See huh, San Jose golf lessons.
Speaker 3: Okay, wait it's Tom Tom What wait.
Speaker 1: I'm talking way too fast here.
Speaker 3: That's okay, I do that all the time. Okay, not
Speaker 3: a problem.
Speaker 2: So I just gave you my email, okay, that which
Speaker 2: is Tom Good at what.
Speaker 5: The at the Good Golf Connection.
Speaker 2: Good Golf Connection okay dot com dot com.
Speaker 3: That's your email, all right?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 5: Phone number four zero eight four six zero eight zero
Speaker 5: two five.
Speaker 3: Okay, good. And do you have a website?
Speaker 1: I I do.
Speaker 5: I'm going to give you it's it's San Jose, San
Speaker 5: hyphen Jose hyphen golf dot all right, I'm sorry, hyphen
Speaker 5: again lessons dot com.
Speaker 3: Should I be interviewing your wife, sir Sam?
Speaker 5: All right?
Speaker 1: I have.
Speaker 5: I have about three three websites, and I never get
Speaker 5: the right one going because you wanted to if you
Speaker 5: wanted to.
Speaker 1: Go to another.
Speaker 2: It was golf MDS dot com slash Tom Good golf
Speaker 2: MDS okay, uh slash.
Speaker 1: Tom Tom golf MDS dot com.
Speaker 3: Okay dot com lash slash Tom Good Okay, slash Tom Good.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 5: That's that's in my calendar and the whole thing and
Speaker 5: some other information on there.
Speaker 3: That's great.
Speaker 2: So I need to ask you more about that when
Speaker 2: we got for our next show. All right, well, thank
Speaker 2: you so much for your time, and I really appreciate
Speaker 2: you agreeing to do part.
Speaker 3: Two of this, and I hope you're enjoying talk to this.
Speaker 1: I'm gon enjoin me. Thanks for letting me babble. Mhm