About 15 years ago, an appraisal client of mine (appraising commercial real estate is how I’ve paid my bills for nearly 30 years) asked me to play in a four-ball tournament, one that I had won in 1989.
I had not played much golf for a few years up to that point, and was quite a bit leary about playing.
As it turned out, I had good reason. For three straight days, I played dreadfully. I would venture to guess that in the final round, on my own ball, I would’ve shot about 95.
As a result, I played little golf over the next five years until I got the hair brained idea that maybe I’d want to teach golf for a living.
Brian Jacobs, Hank Haney, Scott Cole
So, I ventured down to Lewisville, Texas in February 2009 to attend Hank Haney’s annual teaching seminar. At the time, Hank was still coaching Tiger Woods.
Prior to getting there, I had communicated with one of the instructors working at Haney’s facility, Doug Alexander, and told him about my issues. On the day I arrived, before the seminar was to begin, I met with Doug on the range and he started to clue me in about my issues.
During the seminar, our swings were videotaped on the range as we were hitting balls during a break. Hank reviewed the videos and picked me out of the 50 or so instructors who were in attendance for a lesson. I had the “stuck” position flaw that Tiger constantly battled.
Hank’s video analysis of my swing, combined with his thoughts on the swing plane set me on the path to understanding how to play better golf.
However, it wasn’t until more recently that the light bulb really went off.
For a long time I was focused on trying to implement different swing models into my swing. This proved to be the wrong approach.
What I realized was that, while my golf swing is somewhat unusual in appearance, there are a lot of things that I do right. I’ve always been a fairly long hitter, and to hit the ball like that, you have to be doing a lot of things right.
Therefore, I focused more of my attention on learning how to create a variety of ball flights with MY swing. I learned that all I needed to do was make very minor adjustments in my set up, and/or the swing path with my arms to create different shots. Fortunately, I have the athletic ability to pull this off.
So, what is the moral to this story?
The first step any golfer should take is to get a good video analysis of their swing from a pro who really understands the concepts of swing plane,the Kinematic Sequence (I discuss this here), and improving athleticism.
There really aren’t that many instructors who really “get” all this, so do some research before you spend your hard earned money.
Once you get that video analysis, be sure you gain a complete understanding of how the club works and the ball flight laws. Then develop a plan to improve what you need to in order to become a good ball striker.
Now, get to work!
