Speaker 1: Hi, This is Jeff Cocnauga from dock in California. I
play at Lahontan Golf Club. This is golf Marto number
nine seventy seven.
Speaker 2: If I can let everyone get to peek behind the
curtain of the golf coach here, there's a bit of
a power trip that happens with coaching where someone's hitting
it poorly. I change something bomb they're hitting it, well,
how good am I brilliant? On the flip side, there
are cases where you say something and they don't get
it and it's not working. And again, not everything, but
a lot of the things we see online are edited
that made it look like everything works every time. Coaching
is really hard and golf is really really hard, so
it's not going to be there every time. But we've
coaches sometimes as a sort of a washing of their
hands responsibility of ah, they just didn't get it, or ah,
they just got put in the time, whereas I say, well, actually,
maybe you didn't get it. Maybe the advice needs to
be better, how you conduct the session needs to be better.
So really I'm positive when people come to me and
say I just get the impression that what I'm saying
isn't really the ansome because it shows there is a critical.
Speaker 1: Side unlocking the secret to finding your perfect golf coach.
With Anthony McCarthy checking in from Spain, this is Golf Smarter,
sharing stories, tips and insights from great golf minds to
help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ.
Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome to the Golf Smarter podcast.
Speaker 2: Anthony, Hey, Fred, great to be here. Looking forward to
having a really nice conversation.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you. I am looking forward to that as well,
because I like talking to golf coaches. I think that
the primary base of this podcast is to talk to
coaches who can help us all become better, smarter golfers, obviously,
and any opportunity to talk to especially after the President's
Cup weekend, to talk to international coaches is even better. Yeah,
as we're recording this the day after the President's Cup
has finished, you're in Spain.
Speaker 2: I am in Spain, so I'm in the southeast of Spain.
But hopefully you can tell from my accent it's not
a Spanish accent, it's an English accent. So I'm originally
from London, but I've been over here for twelve thirteen
years and I was the director of the golf academy
at La Manga Club, which has quite a good reputation
in Spain. It has connections with Palmer and Player and Biasteros,
so I was very happy to be there and in
general it's a very good place to be.
Speaker 1: So what made the track? How did you get to
Spain from England?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I did a couple education courses in England and
the one in Holland. I was really to give you
just a quick, a quick rundown. I was actually planning
to be a sports teacher, a pee teacher at school.
I very quickly realized after a placement in the school
that probably that wasn't my calling. So then I did
a I did a coaching course, or I did I
did a Yeah, I did a separate coaching course and realized,
you know, coaching and golf was always my passion. So
I originally came over to play, not with any sort
of high hopes of being a player, but just I thought, Hey,
to be a coach, I need to be a half
decent player. So I came over here, then met my
what would be my wife, and then yeah, the rest
is history. I'm sure it's a it's a well told
tale that one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, exactly, the details we don't want to share.
What what What is the state of golf in Spain.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's it's pretty good. It had a had a
massive dip around recession time pre and this is recession
sort of around circle two thousand and eight sort of thing.
A lot of a lot of courses get got built
with housings on it, with housing on it. Then obviously
the world went through a bit of an issue there
and unfortunately a lot of places went bust. But now
it's it's it's working its way up. I always think
with the with Spain, it's probably more of a class divide.
With golf, it's sort of more Yeah, got more for
the affluent in h Yeah. In Europe obviously states is
more accessible. But in general it's it's absolutely trending in
the right direction.
Speaker 1: Is that separation from the classes? Is that because there's
not a lot of public golf? Is it mostly private golf?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a it's a lot of private golf. There's
very very little public golf. Very I can't even think
k in the whole region where I am. There's one
sort of pitch and part the vast exactly exactly, The
vast majority are private. So yeah, that's where there's a
bit of a there's a bit of a gap there,
there's a bit of a divide.
Speaker 1: Is that an issue? I mean, how is it that
you're we can encourage or is there no interest in
you know, I mean the kids are playing soccer, football,
but how do you get children interested in golf at
a young age?
Speaker 2: There's it is a tough one. There is always that misconception.
I suppose that that is for like I said, for
you know, the more affluent the thing where I am
so I'm in the region called Mercia in the southeast
of Spain, and I suppose a lot of golf in
the whole of Spain just depends on tourism. So really
there's not a lot of Spanish people playing golf, but
there's a hell of a lot of Scandinavians, British, German,
French that come in and play. And those are the
ones that are really that are really playing in Spain.
But yeah, it's not ideal for the actual Spanish to play.
Speaker 1: Interesting and yet Spain has produced some pretty famous.
Speaker 2: Golfers unbelievable and that was I don't know if you say,
I've fred over the weekend in Madrid the playoff between
John Rahm and Idalgo fantastic, fantastic and obviously with a
history by a stereos la foul, It's yeah, it's got
a rich history.
Speaker 1: It does. But it's not generating new players, right, I mean,
based on what you're saying, it doesn't sound like that
it's generating interest in the masses.
Speaker 2: It's a good point for the masses, no for and
normally yeah, I suppose like biostereosol Athaba, it'd be sort
of exceptions. They are generating players. So if you see
on the deep world to there are still a hell
of a lot of Spanish. But it again my guess
would be, and don't I'm not gonna hold the hout
on this, they would be again coming from more from
more affterent backgrounds.
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course, of course. And is that a concern
for golfers, that that we can't open it up to
more people or is just there's other other sporting interests.
Speaker 2: I think other sporting interests, I'd say with it, I
don't have my finger on the pulse of it completely
here the but the football soccer is the be all
end is the number one. It's a religion, but basically yeah,
and and everything everything else basically sports wise, maybe a
bit of basketball here or there, everything else by the wayside,
it's basically just soccer and that's it.
Speaker 1: So you've been coaching in Spain for over a decade.
Speaker 2: Yep, are you busy? Yes, and again it would be more,
but not with but not with Spanish. So the actual
the clubs are very busy, but they would be again,
they would be more through through tourism. So the place
I was at and I've actually I stopped coaching there
in March, but I was there for ten years, La
Manga Club. It had a very very steady stream of
people in out. It had its own hotel. A few
days in the hotel out and then people also there are, however,
many houses on the resort, a lot people would just yes,
stay there. And again Brits Scandinavians predominantly. So it's golf
here is is still big. It's just not so big
with the Spanish.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, So these are private courses, but tourists can get.
Speaker 2: Access, yes, absolutely, yes, not.
Speaker 1: A reciprocal thing. You could just I'm coming in from
a different country and.
Speaker 2: It's it's it's it's public to to to an extent.
It's private to an extent, but you can still get
still get groups and still get people coming from from
outside in.
Speaker 1: I see. So if I if I was coming to Spain,
I would just be able to call the club and
say I'm coming from the States. I'd like to play like.
Speaker 2: No problem, Absolutely, that's exactly interesting.
Speaker 1: Right, Well, I would love to spend more time talking
about your coaching and your approach to coaching. And let's
start with, you know, finding the right the right coach.
How do we find the right coach for ourselves.
Speaker 2: I like to refer to what happens between a coach
and player a sort of a relationship, And like any relationship,
when you're first starting out, there's a little bit of
let's say, uncertainty. And there'll be some people who where
I suppose it would be love at first sight, where
they basically try a coach out and that's it. But
for other people it might be a matter of actually
just trying here and trying there, and trying there, trying there.
I think the overriding factor with it is trust, and
that trust comes in in a lot of forms, not
necessarily always do I trust them to help them with
my game? But are they trustworthy people? Do I like
spending time with them? Those are the characteristics that I say,
and it's sort of my Yeah, hey, I can't take
ownership of it, but sort of my thing that the
coaching is is a hell of a lot more than
just the what we say as coaches. Speaking for me
as a coach, but also the how's, the why is,
the who's and so on. But in terms of actually
picking a coach, I wish I could say, look for this.
I don't really buy into the fact, honestly of if
they've got a proven track record, because for me, then
that's basically just saying, okay, no one else can enter
that club. There are some really really good coaches who
maybe aren't as visible online, who aren't maybe as outgoing
or someone who are really top top coaches, but you
just might never have heard of them. So it's really
just maybe it's a bit of a cop out, but
it's really just seeing and seeing and trying and experimenting
and seeing if that ties in with you. There isn't
really one sized fistle with that.
Speaker 1: Is. There a lot of competition, not forgetting students. But
I mean, do you have a lot of other golf
instructors in the area that you're competing against or is
it pretty much like I'd like to take lessons in
this part of the country. I'm just going to go
talk to Anthony because there's not a lot of other
people out.
Speaker 2: There there, Yes and no, there are. There are quite
a few coaches around, but most of the players will
stick to their own club or the club where they
tend to tend to frequent I suppose it also depends
if there's many pros at the same at the same club,
but only speaking personally for it. Yeah, it's you'll find
most people would just congregranate and stick to one. Can
I ask you, You've talked about it a bit in
previous podcasts. What's your history with with coaching? Fred and.
Speaker 1: My personal history of getting getting lessons with teachings?
Speaker 2: Yeah, slim to none.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, I've had. I think I could say I've
had less than five in person lessons.
Speaker 2: Firstly, I say there's nothing wrong with it, and I
don't think I think coaches will often say that you
have to get lessons on you don't. You don't have
to get lessons but I think for a lot of
people it can help. Can I ask how did that?
How did them? What were the reasons behind that you.
Speaker 1: Are Episode number nine hundred and seventy seven. I've probably
talked over five hundred coaches, many of them multiple times,
and then and then the gamut of golf conversation, from
authors to fitness and all these different things. So I've
always kind of wanted to prove my point that you
can learn from instructors just by listening to them, by
you know, whether you're reading their books or you're just
hearing a podcast. And I have gone from being probably
when I first started playing, when I was in my forties.
When I first started playing, I was forty two, and
you know, at the beginning, you don't even keep an
index or anything. But I was easily a twenty or
around there somewhere, and now I'm hovering around a ten.
And it's all by the conversations, all what I've learned
from the instructors that I've had conversation. I mean, like
I've been doing this weekly for nineteen years. It's almost
like a graduate level course that I've had in golf
instruction and game improvement. So it's funny because I think
frequently it's like, what am I going to do when
I retire. Well, I'm going to keep doing the podcast
because I do this for the fun of doing it
and how much I learned. But it's like, maybe I'll
go start taking golf lessons and get serious about really
trying to lower my index, because you know, sometimes my
head is exploding with the amount of information that I get,
and you know, with a conflicting instruction, I.
Speaker 2: Think with that, and it sort of links to something
that I'm keen to say, Please, it wasn't in. It
wasn't in, just where I said, there's nothing wrong with that.
There is nothing wrong with not taking lessons. It's you know,
to a certain extent, you know, the secrets in the dirt.
You know, the body doesn't really know if you're taking
lessons or not. The ball doesn't know if you're taking
lessons or not. It's that why I would say, and
I think this might be helpful to the listeners is
and again it might sound like a cop out. The
more I coach, the more I realize it's just you
have to sort of personalize everything and the I think
some of the issue with golf and I heard Kelvin
talking the other day and he was talking about like
the online and so on, which I'm not really that against.
It's all generalized, and that's the issue. Any tip you
any tip you read, any video you watch is by
definition generalized what you've done with it for it, like
by not taking lessons, it's actually just personalizing that situation too. Okay,
it's an extreme example because very few people are going
to have, you know, nine hundred and seventy class podcast
episodes and and and and have access to have access
to some really good minds. I'm not including myself.
Speaker 1: In that, but you are now included.
Speaker 2: It's being but it's it's being able to personalize everything
you do to you. And again it sounds like it
sounds cliche and so on. There are very very few truths.
There are very very few things that we really know
in of and to a certain extent, like we said,
for being able to pick a coach, it's about just
trying things and experimenting with things and seeing what works
for you, and speaking from a coach's perspective, it's the
trick is really being able to personalize what's happening to
the person in front rather than generalizing. Again, I know
it is cliched, I know you've heard it all before.
Good that the more I coach, the more I believe.
Speaker 1: That honestly incredible. Well, yes, the primary motivation of this
podcast was I need to learn a lot. How do
I and the and the focus is like how do
I become a better golfer? Oh, I'll just talk to
golf instructors and put it up on the web. But
these are my conversations. I've been blessed with the fact
that a lot of people relate to these conversations and
listen and see themselves in my voice, and so that's
been very But that's never been my focus of like
how am I going to help all these people who
are listening? It's how am I going to become better?
And one of the things that I've really prided myself
on is that I have found instructors that are not
the most popular, that are not on TV, that don't
have the biggest YouTube channels. Right as time has progressed
and YouTube has become a main factor here, so I
like to talk about focusing on and showcasing the unsung
heroes of golf instruction, like yourself.
Speaker 2: Well again, maybe when teve myself. And that's the one
thing I say with it is when it comes to
coaching and golf improvement and so on. A couple of things.
Why I really like this podcast is because it is
open and you used it before. You use the term
to the masses. Sometimes when we read different articles and
watch different videos and someone, we have to be aware
that that quote unquote content is maybe not geared towards
the masses. A lot of the content now is geared
towards really really top players who practice a lot, who
are really impassioned to improve, and soon I think there's
a massive drop in Okay, I use the word information
for people who maybe don't fall into that category. I
always say this, This is a I call it like
a ninety ten principle, where I say ninety of the
golfing content is for the ten percent of people who
either have a really low handicap or like I said,
are out there every day practicing and song. It's not
for the quote unquote average golfer who doesn't have the
time to do that and has a family and someone
And maybe we'll jump in on the video here and
another there, but it'sn't really going to be clicking on
every sort of link. Again, like to tip my hat
to you. I think there's a massive, massive space there,
and I think when people do watch things and read things,
it's just remembering this might not be for me or
made specifically for me, and it's just being aware of
that when we do.
Speaker 1: Okay, Anthony, please put your hat back on. No tipping
to me, because I've always felt very similarly that what
here in the States watching the Golf Channel. I don't
know if you have an equivalent or you get that
the Golf Channel was always directed at single digit, at
low digit, handicapped golfers, and there was not an approach
a voice for everybody who you know, can't practice once
a week, hopefully can play once a week, have a
passion for the sport, have a passion for its history,
have a passion for everything that surrounds it. But you know,
as one player I played with years ago said to me,
you know what I want for Christmas this year? What's that?
He says? Two good shots in a row? I mean,
this is this is who we are. And I think
that's ninety nine percent of golfers, you know, are are
the ones who are struggling to get into the nineties
or the eighties. But we're always compelled to try one
more time, go out again, because golf will do that
to you. You get one good, one good shot that
either sounds great or looks great, You're going I'm coming.
Speaker 2: Back, absolutely and I think, yeah, I can't sort of
pull it a study. But I used to ask a
lot of my people, a lot of the people like coach,
would you rather shoot your handicap? Or yeah, would you
rather shoot your handicap? Would you rather shoot two or
three over your handicap? But hit it really well, And
undoubtedly the reply was hit it really well again using
the personalized thing. You just have to play golf the
way you want to play golf. And let's say the
use of statistics now and someone is absolutely great, is
pushing the game forward. However, it is dividing golf into
right and wrong. Okay, until you should be doing this
and should be doing that. Okay, I'm in the land
of biosteros. But if you're in the trees and you
you know, you just enjoy hitting nice shots, you probably
know the safe shot would be to punch out sideways.
But if for that one out of fifty time you're
able to punch it below the branches and then cutting
the leather and so on, and it works its way
up onto the green. It will be worth it. It
will be one hundred percent worth it. And again, for
a player, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. We
have to play golf the way we want to. And again,
I because I'm a coach, asked to coaches, I'd say
actually promoting that, encouraging that in players, even if it
might not help the score depending on what the actual
goal is. Again, yeah, there's nothing wrong with it. I
always think, just last point, it's coaches will often feel
compelled to think everyone wants to get their handicapped down.
Everyone wants to They don't. They just don't. A lot
of people just want to hit nice shots. And I
think coaches will go off sometimes so okay, right, they
assume in eighteen handicapped, for instance, wants to get down
to twelve or someone because that's what they would have done. Okay,
you need to be out on the putting green doing
these drills and so on. Not interested, not interested, And
there's nothing wrong with that. But again, it's actually actually
for me encouraging that rather than resisting against it.
Speaker 1: Well, there's so many things that you said there that
I want to go talk about. You know, the risk
reward element of a shot under the trees, hobbling around,
blah blah blah blah. Right as you describe.
Speaker 2: That.
Speaker 1: You know, that's why we call the show golf smarter,
right You, Yeah, you can see the flag, but you're
not necessarily going to hit it, and you may end
up with double or triple bogie where if you just
go back out into the fairway, okay, you'll get a bogie.
Let's walk away with that. So yeah, and the audience
is going to you'll be able to hear the audience
sing along with me on this. And one of our
favorite lines is never follow a bad shot with a
stupid shot, right, And.
Speaker 2: I'd say with this, it's all dependent on what the
objective is. If the objective is school place smater and this,
you wouldn't be able to say, all right, go for
that shot if it's a one out of fifty, like
I said, because there's nothing smart about there's nothing smart
about that. But if the objective is actually yeah, if
you're just playing with your friends and so on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you want to you want to be you
want to beat them. I mean, if you're playing with
your friends, there's probably some competition and money being exchanged.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it depends on the the your friends, I suppose.
But again if the objective again, just if the objective
is school, Yes, it's not always school.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what it's the next shot. It's always the
next shot, which is, as we know, the hardest shot
in golf is the next one right now. And the
other party you talked about the handicap and that, you know,
let's also remember it's like, do you want to play
to your handicap or do you want to you know,
just have some good shots. The handicap is an indication
of your potential, not your average score. Right, That's why
they take of your last twenty rounds, they take the
best eight. Say, you know, you have potential of playing here.
And as we recently learned from Joel Suggs that the
p is what he called the PGA, the bell curve
of your scoring, which is poor, good, an average, right,
and the bell curve being the top being the average,
and then you've got poor and and everybody has that,
and it could range with a single digit player, it
can range seven or eight strokes and for a you know,
a twenty handicap, it can range fifteen strokes, but you know,
but you've got that, So the handicap is I'm not
a big fan of that. Playing to the potential it's like,
you know, because then all of a sudden people are
gambling on your potential. It's like, okay, what you're index?
All right, that's what you owe me two strokes? Like
wait a minute, this is your course. You play from
teeth farther back than I do. Neil, are you listening
right now? We're playing at your course, We're playing at
t's that I don't usually play, and I have to
give you two strokes three strokes? Come on, man, there's
got to be some balance here, even players, and we
both know it. Yeah, but the numbers say you gotta
give me three. Give me a break, man.
Speaker 2: Do you know how that? Because that actually do you
know how I used to work? I can only speak
for the UK, but before the changes in handicap how
it used to work. Over that it was literally it
wasn't the eight, it wasn't the eight best, it was
just the average. So anytime, so anytime you played in
the competition, in Again, I can only speak for the UK.
I don't know if it was the same in other
places in Europe. You just you had your handicap, and
if you played poorly, your handicap went up, and if
you played well, your handicap went down point one, point
two or whatever. And there always used to be a
thing of oka, oh, the American systems. So I'm glad that.
I'm glad You're not the only one. You're You're an
honorary brit Thank you.
Speaker 1: Someday I'll make it there. I always wanted to go,
and hopefully I got a big birthday coming up up
next summer, i'd like to make it. I might like
to make it over the UK to get some golf
in for that. Yeah right, we'll talk about that later.
Let's talk about instruction and personalizing. You talked about personalized
versus generalize. Let's get deeper into that of how how
how you personalize for a golfer? And I don't like
asking two questions, but I'll go ahead and do that.
And how long does it take for you to be
able to personalize your instruction for a student?
Speaker 2: It doesn't take long. It just depends on how you
see it. The thing I say, and yeah, I think
this would be almost like a takeaway for anyone listening,
and at least this is this is the way I
see it. Try to work as much in what you
know rather than in a realm that you know will work,
rather than hope will work. So when it comes to gold,
there are actually very few things that we know help everyone,
and particularly with the swing thread, there's very very there
are very very few things that everyone does that you
can look on and the PGA tour and say, okay,
everyone does it that way. So with that, and if
I could just go go into detail with that, we
know basically we know impact and we know bull flight,
So everyone who is good will hit the ball first
then grass. And you're talking the other week about low point,
that's what we know. Everyone will hit the middle of
the face or around the middle of the face. It
doesn't lean towards drastically off the toe and drastically off
the hill, and everyone will have the club face that's
functionally straight. If if anyone's listened to Adam Young, those
are three principles that he really that he really goes by,
and I completely completely agree. So once you have that,
then you can branch off into. And there are other
things that we know. There are certain movements, for instance,
that we know that we know basically everyone does. Is
then actually again to a certain extent, experimenting different bids
and seeing what works for you. And again, I'm not
always the biggest thing, the biggest proponent of right and wrong,
good and bad. It's actually, to a certain extent, trying stuff,
and the coach can do this or a coach can
help with that in various ways and seeing what works
for you. The question that we that always sort of
is in the back of our heads or is yeah,
but could it be better? Could be better? And that's
where you might have to show a little bit of
a restraint of not actually just trying everything. The fact
of the matter is, we don't know a hell of
a lot. This is really positive, isn't it. We don't.
We don't know a hell of a lot. And a
lot of coaches will point at Furic, for instance, and say, well,
imagine if his dad had changed his swing, well, we'd
never have heard of him. Well, to be fair, we
don't know that either. If some changes went into Furic
when he was younger to make him quote unquote more conventional.
He might have been a better player for all we know.
So for me, it's working in a realm that you
know will work and try to spend as much time
in that realm as possible. Then it's seeing your patent,
seeing how you want to play, and then personalizing around
them all excuse me, personalizing a round those rather than hey,
you know the cliche, the typical one sized fiscle trying
to feel fit a model. Yeah, it's that's not ideal
when that happens.
Speaker 1: First, I have to thank you for mentioning previous episodes
that you've heard. So are you Are you a listener? Really?
Speaker 2: I am a listener, and I'm a self considered self
confessed like golf nuts or golf improvement not and definitely
a golf coaching nuts.
Speaker 1: So that leads me to the question and I and
I truly appreciate you listening, but listening as an instructor?
Do you listen because of other instructors being on this
podcast and that you find this as additional study for you?
Speaker 2: Point blank? Yes? And I think you just got to
You've got to keep your eyes open, in your ears
to the ground, and you've got to be aware of
what so and so are saying? And what so and
so are saying? And again that's where the experimental bits
come in. It's like, okay, a m I try that
for a bit. It's not though it's being open to
things but close to dogma. Is what I would say
is to actually be really critical and really self critical.
And I like to think for myself that I'm self critical.
It's saying, okay, is this working? Does that work? Did
that work? And when I listen to coaches and I yeah,
I basically try to listen to everything. It's always almost
with a critical eye, not a negative eye, but a
critical eye of is this good or is this bad?
A lot of it's good, a lot of it not
so good. And then I just find my own find
my own conclusion.
Speaker 1: As do I that is that is what we're looking for.
It's like there's a lot of information that we receive
and that we get, but it is sure great to
be able to figure out how to separate yourself from
all of an if I hate to call it noise
because I'm contributing to it, but but there's a lot
out there, and you know, I will get an email
from somebody saying that guy who who was on last
week really didn't connect with me, you know, or they
can say something a little more harsh than that, but
the point is that it didn't connect. And I inevitably
will write back and say wait till next week because
you're gonna have a different voice.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then there'd be something else. And again, there's
nothing wrong with it disconnecting. No, Yeah, it's just it's
just that's not exactly right. It's just deciphering and again
being critical of For me, it's if there are exceptions
to the rule, is probably not the rule. So it's
sticking with that. And then it's okay being aware of preferences.
You might have certain preferences, but at the end of
the day, they're just that. It's not holding onto them
for their life. It's understanding their preferences and then working
at your own Now.
Speaker 1: Now your website is golf Coachinstitute dot com. You work,
do you instruct instructors?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's that's basically what I do now. So
I said that are left in March at my previous
employment and I just go full time on this now.
So at the moment, I'm mentoring other coaches around some
of the topics that I that I talked about today
and enjoying myself great.
Speaker 1: I hope it's succeeding for you. I know that when
recreational golfers call them amateur golfers if you'd like, but
recreational golfers that come to an instructor, you know, and
the instructor will ask the first couple basic questions, But
the answer inevitably is, I want more consistency, I want
greater distance. Probably the number one and number two requests
that instructors get, and there's probably three and four there
as well. But what is it when instructors come to you,
what is number one, two, three, or four of the
request that they have about, you know, from you as
a mentor to them? What do they want to improve on?
What do they want to know that will help them
become a better instructor.
Speaker 2: It's a really good question. I would say only one.
What they're saying, or what they're saying they know isn't
fully the case, isn't fully right. And I appreciate that
more than anything because it shows to me that they're
critical about what they're saying. You'll have and I don't
want to be critical of coaches here sometimes if I
can let everyone get to peek behind the curtain of
the golf coach here, there's a bit of a power
trip that happens with coaching where someone's hitting it poorly.
I change something bomb they're hitting it, well, how good
am I brilliant? But on the flip side, there are
cases where you say something and they don't get it
and it's not working. Okay, And again everything not everything,
but a lot of the things we see online are
edited and made it look like everything works every time.
But just coaching is really hard and golf is really
really a really really hard spot, so it's not going
to be there every time. But with coaches sometimes as
a sort of washing of their hands, the responsibility of ah,
they just didn't get it or they just got to
put in the time, where as I say, well, actually,
maybe maybe you didn't get it. Yeah, maybe maybe the
advice needs to be better, or how you can douct
the session needs to be better. So really, I'm I'm
positive when people come to me and say I just
get the impression of what I'm saying isn't isn't really
the answer, because it shows that there is a critical
side and especially starting out younger coaches, it will be
the case where it's it probably isn't the answer. Uh.
And so a lot of people come and ask me
for advice in that there there to a certain extent
happy with what they're doing. Information wise, I think is okay,
but the application and so on, it's just they know
it's maybe not fully there.
Speaker 1: It's that's just like golf to me, it's your your
intention versus execution the teacher. You know. And you asked
me about how many lessons I've had that also included
a weekend golf school. Early and early in the podcast,
there was a golf academy in Arizona that my wife
and I went to. My wife was like brand new
to golf. She still is. She's not listening. I can
say this. She says, yeah, I played cold. It's like, no,
you don't.
Speaker 2: She's a really good plan.
Speaker 1: About six years ago. You can't. And she goes, let's
go on playing. I'm like, I don't want to do that.
It's not going to be fun for me. But we
went to this golf school and there was an instructor
that I was working with at this school. To remain nameless,
mainly because I forgot her name, but she was saying, Okay,
just do this, and I'm like, I don't understand what
that means, because we'll just do that. I'm like, do what.
She goes what I what I'm telling you to do what?
I'm sure it's like, I don't understand that though I
don't understand how to execute that. How can you reframe it?
Can you restate it so I might be able to
comprehend what you're saying. And it just came back the
same way. So intention versus execution from a coach as
well as the amateur golfer. You know, our intent. Our
intent is so important here on every shot.
Speaker 2: I mentioned earlier. And that's the thing I mentioned earlier
about it being a relationship, and for a relationship there
has to be equal amounts of input and equal amounts
of responsibility on both sides. So if the player is saying, God,
that coach was terrible all the time when they haven't
maybe actually practiced what the coach was saying and so on,
that's not great. But at the same time, a coach
saying they just didn't get it, they're not that good,
that's not great either. And it's a really important point
for it. It's a cliched one, but really sort of
top coaches, we'll be able to say things that resonate,
and we'll be able to demonstrate and resonate and leave
a mark on the player. It's one of those things
that all things get said, Okay, I didn't understand, and
then they said it a different way than I did understand.
It's absolutely it's absolutely right, and the really really top
coaches will be able to transcend what you even thought
about happening in the golf lesson not just through not
just through the result and the success you have in
that golf session, but also the relationship that you have
with them and the sport in the sports in general.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we talked about your website is golf Coachinstitute
dot com. Do you work with recreational amateur players or
is it you primarily focused on working with instructors.
Speaker 2: It's just instructors at the moment, but there's a you know,
when I when I was playing a bit, I would
still just look at all the instructors work on Golf
Digest and so on. So there's still a hell of
a lot of a hell of a lot of good
stuff for players and also, and I suppose there was
almost the topic of the conversation today or right, things
that you can just keep an eye out in your
own work with with your coach or if you are
looking for a coach. There's a few there's a few
useful points in there.
Speaker 1: Feel well, Anthony, I truly appreciate your support of listening
to the podcast and reaching out to have this conversation
because I found it absolutely fascinating and I've learned a lot,
So thank you so much for coming on to the
Golf Smarter podcast.
Speaker 2: Thanks Ritt. Honestly, if you do a head of a
lot of good stuff. So yeah, I was really really
happy to join