April 27, 2026

Why Golfers Plateau? And How to Break it with Christo Garcia

Why Golfers Plateau? And How to Break it with Christo Garcia
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Christo Garcia was a natural golfer until modern instruction broke his swing. In this episode, Christo demystifies the over the top swing. He tells Josh how he rebuilt his game from scratch by studying the classic swing, using martial arts discipline, and learning to compress the ball without swinging harder.

To learn more about Christo’s swing ethos follow him @classicgolfswing on Instagram or visit his website: classicswing.golf

Please welcome our new host of Golf Smarter, Josh Karp! Fred has retired from his work life, including the podcast, and will be working on his game with more intention than ever. If you have a question for either Josh or Fred, or if you’d like to share a comment about what you’ve heard in this or any other episode, please write to Josh at karpj2323@mac.com or Fred at golfsmarterpodcast@gmail.com.

For exclusive content and first access check out Corrected Mistakes on Substack: https://substack.com/@correctedmistake

WEBVTT

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Last year, I'm in Vegas at the celebrity golf tournament

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before the Super Bowl, all pro football players that can't

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hit a golf ball. But if I handed you a

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violin and said, hey, I'm going to come back in

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a year, I want you to play Mozart for me,

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you're probably not going to be doing anything but playing

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scratches and you know, squeaks.

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If you play golf, you know the deal. You take lessons,

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you take a tip from YouTube, you practice, you integrate,

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and then it works until it doesn't and you're back

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at square one. Simply put, you've joined the quest for

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the perfect thing. So if you're obsessed with breaking eighty

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or ninety, blasting it to eighty or hitting it down

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the middle, you've come to the right place. This is

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golf smartest, correct the mistakes. And now here's your host,

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Josh Carton. Today I am talking to Crystal Garcia Christ.

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Thank you for being here today, my pleasure. You are

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the first person I've had on who I think did

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not really grow up playing in the way that a

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lot of pros and teachers instructors have. So why don't

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we start there?

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Yeah, So I am a bit of an anomaly in

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the world of golf, because I'm probably the latest bloomer

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that's well known. And the reason why that is is

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because golf is challenging for everybody. It's a very small

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number of people that I call naturals that usually pick

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up the game and they're generally shooting par within a

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year and a half two years. So I read an

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article that was the genesis for how I got into

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my whole journey, and it was a disheartening article in

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two thousand and nine in Golf Digest that that the

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average golfer reaches their peak at about three years of

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picking up the game as an adult, and then they

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are basically that's where they're going to live out the

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rest of their life. And they said, you know, guys

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who place at scratch are better. They also hit that

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peak that early. And I started asking my friends later

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as I became more of a golfer, I'd be like,

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you know, hey, man, like when did you start playing,

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Like fifteen sixteen? When did how long did it take

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you to shoot par? A year and a half? Like

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That's generally what I always heard. And so Golf Digest

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in that same article said they were giving away awards

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for people who had dropped their handicap the most during

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the course of a year, and I think the first

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place went to a guy who went from twenty two

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to eleven. And I was like, man, that's a really

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cool idea, and I just kind of put it in

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the back of my mind. And then in November of

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two thousand and nine, I was buying my seventh driver

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in three years, hoping it would fix my block slice

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and next to the cash sure was Ben Hogan's Five

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Lessons book, and so I always liked the pictures in

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that book. And you know, I'm forty years old, struggling,

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struggling golfer, very often well over one hundred, and I'm like,

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you know what, I'm going to pick up this book

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for twelve dollars and I start thumbing through it. And

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the difference in two thousand and nine from when I

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was younger is YouTube would come out and I could

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actually go on YouTube and look up swings of Ben Hogan.

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I've always been interested in the mystique. I know the

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story about the bus accident all that, but I'd never

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really caught his swing more than you would see as

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a flash before a US Open or a master's like

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champions like Ben Hogan, and that's all you saw. There

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wasn't enough to sink your teeth into, you know. So

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I started to watch his swing on YouTube, and then

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for Christmas a month later in two thousand and nine,

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I got a flip video camera and the first thing

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a golfer thinks is man, I got to go out

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to the golf course with my buddies and I got

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to see my swing. I came home devastated. I thought

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I had a good looking golf swing. It had just

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become so so dysfunctional, and I had no idea. But

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I am somewhat of a movement expert. I could see

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very clearly that I did not have a good golf swing.

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And those three elements the article on you know you

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top out after three years, and I was like, that's

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not going to be me. I'm going to try and

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beat that guy's record. To the book Ben Hogan's Five

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Lessons and seeing my swing, that was the genesis for

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me to start my swing evolution. In the year twenty ten,

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in January, I saved every scorecard, putted every ball out.

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It was forty four rounds of golf, and by studying

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the classic swing. This is an important note. As a

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freshman in high school, I shot under par. I was

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played the number one position on my high school golf team,

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and my dad took me to see a golf instructor

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for the first time, and he put me into the

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modern swing and changed my natural classic swing. Both feet

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planted on the ground, stable base, turned the upper body

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against the lower body, swing on plane, all of that,

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and my game went to absolute in the garbage can.

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So what version of the modern swing was this? Like

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so like, because you know, there was the whole X

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factor kind of thing.

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So I'm very good friends with Jim McClain. Yeah, it

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was elements that could be X factor ish, But it

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wasn't Jim that I went to go see. But this

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is one of the most famous teachers in the world.

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You know, got I learned an awful lot about practice

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and you know, and all of that. But it was

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the beginning of this phase where we wanted to keep

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the feet plan and turn the upper body against a

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stable lower body, keep the club on plane the whole time,

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you know, not this kind of like more. You know,

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we all imitated Nicholas, you know, that's what me and

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my older brother did, and we played pretty good.

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Golf under as a teenager. Hell yeah, you are.

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Yeah, I tied the number one player in our district

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as a freshman in high school.

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How frustrating was it to go through that, have be

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that good and then have a kind of deteriorate I mean,

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what was what were your thoughts at the.

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Time, Well, it was absolutely devastating because you have to

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love golf a lot to get to where I had

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gotten to. I had won a three day tournament, you know, earlier,

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and you know, and you know I wasn't like I

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shot seventy seven the last day to win that tournament

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when I was in the eighth grade, you know, before

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the ninth grade, and you know, I was a good golfer.

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But there was Gary Nicholas as my same age. He

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was still there were guys levels above me. But the

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point is I went to shooting nineties in over one

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hundred on bad.

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Days, which has got to be very disconcerting.

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Yeah, So I became, you know, I focused on another

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thing that I loved. I loved martial arts. I became

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the number one rated junior fighter in the state of Florida,

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and then I went on to win the Florida Open,

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the Florida Games as an adult, so I competed in

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sport karate. I actually quit golf for four years after

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college because I was just so bad at it. It

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was years later. I was twenty seven and I was

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living with a friend. We worked together in a restaurant,

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I remember, and he loved golf, and we watched Tiger

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win the Masters by twelve and ninety seven. He's like,

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you know, we gotta get you back out there. I

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was like, all right, you know, So I started playing

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golf again and we played with another friend of ours, George,

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and George made us put everything out and I shot

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one hundred and twenty six.

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Oh boy, I've driven home after shooting a ninety three,

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like thinking I wanted to, you know, drive my car

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into a tree off the cliff.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah, So you know I have not only

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am I probably the latest bloomer in golf, I'm probably

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the biggest swing of scoring.

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Oh my, yeah, one hundred and twenty six down to

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where you're at.

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Yeah, you know, like my low round is sixty seven.

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I've shot sixty eight. I'm not like one of these

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guys that shoots insanely low scores usually in the seventies,

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you know, but it's it's when it was bad. I

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would have paid a million dollars if a genie could

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have said, oh, I'll give you this golf swing and

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the ability to play at this level, I would have

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jumped at the chance, because you're hopeless when you're like that.

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You know. That's where I lived for fourteen years until

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I bought the Ben Hogan book and had the revelation

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I'm just going to go back to my childhood swing.

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Yeah, so talk a little bit about there's that pursuit

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of the Hogan swing that was built for Hogan that

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he had to hit a zillion balls of day to maintain.

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So what did you pick up from Hogan that got

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you back to that classic swing?

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You know? So the first thing that I picked up

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from Hogan was by kind of adopting the notion that

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I'm going to just start all over again. It gave

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me a way to reboot my self image because my

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self image was really in the dumpster that I was

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a terrible golfer. I was always embarrassed. But I had

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this new idea, I'm going to swing like Cogan. I'll

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just swing like Cogan. I started to work on it,

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and I started to make a little bit better contact.

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I started to notice. You know, I did take some

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lessons with a couple people I had taken lessons before

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the transformation, and all they did was make me worse,

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just nightmarish. But the next person I called, I said, hey,

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I want to learn to swing like Ben Hogan. Can

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you help me? And of course there's laughter on the

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other side of the phone, and I picked up a

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couple tidbits from him. Then I was hitting golf balls

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on a driving range in February in twenty ten, and

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an old man came walking up to me and he goes,

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let me see you hit a ball. Hit one, because

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let me see you hit one more. I hit another one.

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He goes, your head's in front of the ball. I

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can help you with that. I'm Roger Donne and he

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hands me his card and in La Roger Done golf

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shops all over the place. They're all over the Southwest,

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and I'm like, you're the Roger Dune and he's like, yeah,

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I didn't turn pro, but I did pretty good with

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the stores. Be here on Tuesday night, so it gives

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me a two hour and forty five minute lesson. He

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charges me forty five dollars bring it in cash. We

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actually talked about the swing for an hour and a

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half to almost two hours before we even got out

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to the driving range. And but he he talked about

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a Hogan fan. He was into it. He goes, first

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of all, your swing's too upright. I want you to

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take your left hand and feel like you're reaching your

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right pocket on the back swing. And I'm like, you're crazy.

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But you know, he was able to get me into

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that Hogan plane, you know. And now I understand, you

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know more of why he said that and how it

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fits into the classic swing. But at first I was like,

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you're you're freaking nuts because the last lesson I had,

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the guy was telling me to wretch my arms down

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the train tracks as far as possible, and this guy's

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telling me to reach in my left pocket, which is

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as deep, low and inside as possible. And I'm like,

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you know, what do you do? It was woh, my gosh,

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it's been a crazy journey. Yeah.

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No, so so what so was it a philosophical shift

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for you? Was it physical? Was it philosophical or was

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it just kind of rebooting your system.

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Well, I realized now years later, it was one of

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my friends, Sean Cox, who was the director of golf

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at the Grand del Mar. Now he's up in San Francisco.

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It's a wonderful, wonderful pro friend of mine who pointed

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out to me, he goes, have you ever read a

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book called the Alter Ego Effect? Like, no, I don't

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know anything about it. He goes, you should read that

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because that's what you did with your Hogan transformation. And

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I'm like, excuse me. He goes, Yeah, all sorts of

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athletes and performers create these alter egos that allow them

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to create a new self image and prove their performance ability.

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And I'm like, son of a gun. And I realized

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at that moment, Yeah, I put on the Hogan hat,

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created this new identity. Was able to put in the

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background all the noise and the disappointment and embarrassment of

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my golf game and create something fresh. And I had used.

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Bruce Lee was my idol when I was a martial

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arts competitor, and then I became a pro vallet dancer

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and Mikhail Barishnikov was my idol for that pursuit. All

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I did was replace replace it with Hogan. So okay,

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well I'm gonna imitate Ogan and I'm going to do that.

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And it seems so matter of fact, But now I

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kind of see it much much deeper what happened internally

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to go along with the external work, To.

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Talk a little bit about the martial arts, because that

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always seems to me like martial arts are such a

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great background for somebody who wants to be good at golf.

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How is that influence what you've done?

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Well, it's it's tremendous striking in the martial arts, whether

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it's you know, punches or kicks like a spinning back kick.

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They're all rotational and you all build your force from

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the ground up. A boxer couldn't knock you out standing

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on a sheet of ice. You know, you have to

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be able to use the ground. And the motions are

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very very similar as far as discipline goes. I find

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that there are also parallels because it's like you're not

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playing a team sport. It's all solo. You know, there's

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there's nobody to congratulate but yourself and nobody to blame

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but yourself if you inter lose. But martial arts is

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man's That's what I spent the first thirty five years

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of my life. That's that's what I did, and I

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you know, took it pretty deep.

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I'm always kind of amazed, especially you know, somebody as

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good of an athlete as yourself, if you're a ballet

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dancer and you know, martial arts champion, all those things.

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It's always fascinating to me that somebody who's a great

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athlete can struggle with golf. Yet it happens all the time.

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Right, Oh my gosh. Last year, I'm in Vegas at

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the celebrity golf tournament before the Super Bowl. Hey, I

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love to meet all these great pro athletes and everything,

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but you're seeing all pro football players and all these

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different athletes that can't hit a golf ball, and it's like, God,

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bless you know. I mean, the best athletes in the world.

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But if I handed you a bye violin and said, hey,

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I'm gonna come back in a year, I want you

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00:16:03.120 --> 00:16:06.039
to play mozart for me, you're probably not going to

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be doing anything but playing scratches and you know, squeezed.

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That was my experience with the clarin up.

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So golf is a fine art. I separate the idea

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of a fine art from a popular art. Thusly, you

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00:16:20.879 --> 00:16:24.600
can teach yourself a popular art, but a fine art

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00:16:24.639 --> 00:16:28.399
is a master's student relationship that's handed down from generation

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to generation. So you can teach yourself to break dance,

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00:16:33.120 --> 00:16:36.039
you can teach yourself to play acoustic guitar, you can

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teach yourself to rap, but you can't teach yourself opera.

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You can't teach yourself violin, and you can't teach yourself ballet.

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For sure. I know so many people who are really

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good athletes who take up golf and get really serious

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about it, and they struggle exactly like you were struggling.

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What do you do with somebody like that when they

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come to you.

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Well, if we have an athletic background, the first thing

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I want to do is I want to tap in

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on what they were doing previously. So well, the first

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00:17:05.799 --> 00:17:07.799
thing I want to ask is did they ever play

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a sport, either a stick sport or something that required throwing,

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because they're the same kinetic sequence. One of the famous

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00:17:16.720 --> 00:17:19.160
drills that I do is I'll have a student and

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00:17:19.200 --> 00:17:22.559
we'll throw balls, and I show them that you can't

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throw the ball until your lead foot plants. And once

298
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we get that, then I have them get the feeling

299
00:17:28.720 --> 00:17:32.240
of throwing the ball into the ground. And what this

300
00:17:32.440 --> 00:17:35.519
does is it helps them to connect the way they

301
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move in other sports into golf because it's, like I said,

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it's the same kinetic sequence. A lot of my students

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you'll see on YouTube, have these light bulb moments where

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they're like, oh my gosh, where they just unlock two

305
00:17:50.039 --> 00:17:54.599
or three more levels of compression by understanding how they're

306
00:17:54.640 --> 00:17:58.839
applying the energy. So what you have to remember is

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we create all the forces in the golf swing. We

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00:18:01.960 --> 00:18:05.759
can overpower the forces, which is what ninety percent of

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00:18:05.799 --> 00:18:09.799
golfers do, or we can harness the forces. When you

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00:18:09.880 --> 00:18:14.200
look at pro golfers they look like they're effortless, it's

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because they're harnessing the forces they're generating in the swing

312
00:18:18.400 --> 00:18:23.039
and then transmitting them down the club shaft. I just

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00:18:23.119 --> 00:18:25.960
taught a weekend golf school. People flew in from all

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00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:28.599
around the country and I've got an aid iron and

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I'm like, look, guys, you don't have to swing hard

316
00:18:31.039 --> 00:18:33.920
or apply force. You know, I'm doing it and I'm

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just blasting the ball, and they just they just were mystified.

318
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I'm not trying to be braggy or something. I'm just

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trying to say. It's like, I'm not exerting energy or

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00:18:45.880 --> 00:18:51.880
extra force to do this. I'm actually removing extraineous force

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00:18:52.039 --> 00:18:53.920
as simply as I can put it as I'm just

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00:18:54.039 --> 00:18:57.200
letting the weight of my arms in club fall, adding

323
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my turn, and then snapping at the bottom. So energy

324
00:19:00.480 --> 00:19:03.359
goes flinging out the end of the golf club like

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00:19:03.519 --> 00:19:07.039
snap and a towel, you know. But it's not about

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00:19:07.119 --> 00:19:10.200
using more force, right.

327
00:19:10.440 --> 00:19:13.440
I find in my own game, my biggest struggle is

328
00:19:14.480 --> 00:19:16.960
when I'm not hitting the ball straight off the tee,

329
00:19:17.519 --> 00:19:20.400
is that I have that instinct to just start pulling

330
00:19:20.440 --> 00:19:26.240
it down from the top, and that's when I start

331
00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:28.759
slicing the ball and blocking it out to the right

332
00:19:29.599 --> 00:19:36.079
instead of having the nice rhythmic sequence coming through the ball.

333
00:19:36.160 --> 00:19:38.720
Right. That was one of the things I had to

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00:19:38.759 --> 00:19:40.799
learn in martial arts because I used to expend too

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much energy. And my coach was like, look watch how

336
00:19:44.359 --> 00:19:48.319
Pat fights. He's real smooth. When it's time he goes,

337
00:19:48.920 --> 00:19:51.519
you know. So like for me, it's like the time

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00:19:51.599 --> 00:19:54.839
is at the bottom to apply speed and you know,

339
00:19:54.960 --> 00:19:57.960
just that little snap at the bottom. But if I

340
00:19:58.000 --> 00:20:00.079
try and apply it up here, it's just going to

341
00:20:00.119 --> 00:20:02.519
be gone. It's just lost.

342
00:20:03.039 --> 00:20:07.160
You know, modern golf instruction as opposed to kind of

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00:20:07.200 --> 00:20:10.640
the classic swing model. Just give me an idea of

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00:20:10.799 --> 00:20:14.000
where the divide takes place. I would imagine the classic

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00:20:14.039 --> 00:20:16.359
swing to me, which is what really interests me, is

346
00:20:16.400 --> 00:20:20.880
that it's much more accessible and doable than swinging like

347
00:20:21.000 --> 00:20:25.400
Rory or But we watch them on TV and think

348
00:20:26.480 --> 00:20:27.359
that's how I'm supposed to.

349
00:20:27.319 --> 00:20:33.599
Play, right, right, So Rory and Bryson, they're playing the

350
00:20:33.640 --> 00:20:38.839
modern game. They have modern swing elements, but both of

351
00:20:38.880 --> 00:20:41.799
them also have a lot of things that I really

352
00:20:41.880 --> 00:20:44.599
like in their golf swing. Rice in de Shambo lifts

353
00:20:44.599 --> 00:20:51.079
his lead heel with a driver, classic swing move. Rory

354
00:20:51.240 --> 00:20:54.200
doesn't have the amount of lateral sidebend that a lot

355
00:20:54.240 --> 00:20:57.759
of modern swingers have, and he has a fairly neutral

356
00:20:57.839 --> 00:21:02.839
grip the modern swing. Let me give you my assessment.

357
00:21:02.920 --> 00:21:05.759
This is something I've arrived at talking with people in

358
00:21:05.799 --> 00:21:09.519
my own experience. When I was first learning the modern swing,

359
00:21:10.079 --> 00:21:14.119
my swing was on videotape. Here's an old tube television.

360
00:21:14.160 --> 00:21:17.079
We're gonna watch your swing on it on VHS or whatever,

361
00:21:17.400 --> 00:21:21.319
And there was a dry erase marker drawn picture that

362
00:21:21.440 --> 00:21:25.079
this is the perfect swing plane. And so to me,

363
00:21:25.279 --> 00:21:29.599
the demarcation point between the classic swing, which is how

364
00:21:29.640 --> 00:21:32.240
I was taught as a kid growing up, and the

365
00:21:32.240 --> 00:21:36.160
beginning of the modern swing, is the video camera. Because

366
00:21:36.279 --> 00:21:39.880
there became this idea that you know, there was a

367
00:21:39.960 --> 00:21:43.480
perfect swing plane, that you can keep the club on

368
00:21:43.519 --> 00:21:46.799
this plane and it's just going to be this perfect

369
00:21:46.839 --> 00:21:50.519
tilted Mary Go round. Whereas if you look at Arnold Palmer,

370
00:21:50.599 --> 00:21:53.599
Bobby Jones, Sam Sneed, they all took it inside and

371
00:21:53.680 --> 00:21:56.680
put it on that plane. On the down swing, you

372
00:21:56.799 --> 00:22:00.720
got guys like Miller, Barber and Arnold Palmer that wild

373
00:22:00.839 --> 00:22:03.799
looking swings where their club head is not on that

374
00:22:03.880 --> 00:22:07.559
plane at all, but they're playing extremely high level golf.

375
00:22:08.200 --> 00:22:10.880
So by the nineties we started to see all golf

376
00:22:10.920 --> 00:22:14.480
instruction moving towards us keep the feet planted, put the

377
00:22:14.480 --> 00:22:17.599
club on that perfect plane. In order to start it

378
00:22:17.640 --> 00:22:19.319
off on the plane, the club head has to go

379
00:22:19.440 --> 00:22:22.640
back outside the hands in order to draw it up

380
00:22:22.680 --> 00:22:26.279
that perfect circle. All this stuff is completely arbitrary and

381
00:22:26.440 --> 00:22:31.160
makes no difference at all. Because the reason I say

382
00:22:31.160 --> 00:22:33.160
this is because the Hall of Fame is filled with

383
00:22:33.279 --> 00:22:36.200
golfers where that club is all over the place on

384
00:22:36.240 --> 00:22:40.240
the back swing. It's not like the top ten guys

385
00:22:40.279 --> 00:22:41.759
all kept it on that plane.

386
00:22:42.519 --> 00:22:45.440
I remember when all of a sudden, I don't remember

387
00:22:45.440 --> 00:22:47.119
what year it was. You probably you have a much

388
00:22:47.119 --> 00:22:49.480
better memory than I do, when all of a sudden,

389
00:22:49.599 --> 00:22:52.400
everybody's problem became, oh my god, they're swinging over the

390
00:22:52.400 --> 00:22:58.319
top right. Yeah, and then it But and I love

391
00:22:58.359 --> 00:23:02.519
what you're saying, which is that's not the flaw. That's

392
00:23:02.640 --> 00:23:05.319
actually what you're supposed to be doing.

393
00:23:06.559 --> 00:23:11.279
So in my book, the way I look at it,

394
00:23:11.559 --> 00:23:14.200
I want to coil as much as I can to

395
00:23:14.319 --> 00:23:19.079
my trail side for power. And I told you Roger

396
00:23:19.160 --> 00:23:21.079
Dunn was the first person who said take your left

397
00:23:21.079 --> 00:23:24.440
hand and put in your right pocket. The only difference

398
00:23:24.519 --> 00:23:29.000
between the modern swing and the classic swing is the

399
00:23:29.119 --> 00:23:33.880
classic swing you did not lift the arms prematurely. He's

400
00:23:34.039 --> 00:23:37.960
kept the upper arms connected so as you turned, the

401
00:23:38.119 --> 00:23:42.480
arms are low. And then once you lift the arms

402
00:23:42.559 --> 00:23:45.200
later in order to get back on plane, you're going

403
00:23:45.240 --> 00:23:50.640
to see this little over move. Okay. The modern swing

404
00:23:50.759 --> 00:23:54.279
people lift the arms sooner to keep that club on

405
00:23:54.480 --> 00:23:57.880
that plane. So it's on that plane on the way down.

406
00:23:58.759 --> 00:24:01.319
If I was throwing a bar all into the ground.

407
00:24:01.640 --> 00:24:05.319
I'm not gonna take it artificially up this plane line

408
00:24:05.359 --> 00:24:08.039
and throw it down into the ground. I'm gonna take

409
00:24:08.079 --> 00:24:12.200
it back to the inside and throw it down. That's

410
00:24:12.240 --> 00:24:15.440
the most power if I was gonna throw a punch,

411
00:24:15.880 --> 00:24:18.960
if I was throwing, you know, that's how the shoulder

412
00:24:19.039 --> 00:24:22.920
is designed. So to me, it makes more sense to

413
00:24:23.000 --> 00:24:27.119
take it inside, coil to the max, and then drop

414
00:24:27.240 --> 00:24:27.920
the hammer.

415
00:24:29.160 --> 00:24:31.119
How hard is it for people to pick that up.

416
00:24:31.680 --> 00:24:34.839
It's the easiest thing I've found. I've been obsessed with

417
00:24:34.920 --> 00:24:40.279
the golf swing for fifty years. You know, Okay, it's

418
00:24:40.319 --> 00:24:43.799
what kids do naturally. If you give them a golf club,

419
00:24:43.799 --> 00:24:47.000
they're gonna whip it back to the inside and then

420
00:24:47.079 --> 00:24:47.960
hit down on it.

421
00:24:48.960 --> 00:24:52.359
One of my kids was a good baseball player and

422
00:24:52.400 --> 00:24:55.119
as a great arm, and you know, it was a

423
00:24:55.119 --> 00:24:59.599
good hitter, and it took him about two rounds before

424
00:25:00.079 --> 00:25:03.119
he caught one. He's hitting the to eighty two ninety

425
00:25:03.200 --> 00:25:09.160
because nobody had fixed him. He was taking a totally

426
00:25:09.240 --> 00:25:10.799
natural swing at it.

427
00:25:11.480 --> 00:25:14.759
Take a kid, they can hit it too. Eighty two ninety.

428
00:25:15.599 --> 00:25:21.759
You know that has that natural pattern. And imagine they

429
00:25:21.839 --> 00:25:25.519
were able to refine that for about eighteen months and

430
00:25:25.640 --> 00:25:30.319
learn how to putt, chip, hit wedge shots. I bet

431
00:25:30.400 --> 00:25:33.119
you they're going to be one of those people that's

432
00:25:33.160 --> 00:25:35.319
around that scratch level.

433
00:25:36.400 --> 00:25:40.279
How similar is the is the swing to the putting stroke?

434
00:25:40.440 --> 00:25:42.720
You know? Is there something people can take from what

435
00:25:42.759 --> 00:25:46.599
you do and apply it to their putting that will

436
00:25:46.720 --> 00:25:47.240
help them.

437
00:25:47.720 --> 00:25:51.039
I've got a friend who's a plus four handicap. He's like,

438
00:25:51.160 --> 00:25:54.319
Chris Man, I'm playing really good golf lately, but my

439
00:25:54.440 --> 00:25:57.640
putting like he missed. He had this like twenty footer

440
00:25:57.720 --> 00:26:01.119
per eagle and he ran at like seven feet past

441
00:26:01.279 --> 00:26:03.519
and missed the putt. Coming back, He's like, man, but

442
00:26:03.559 --> 00:26:06.519
I'm putting like crap. I'm like, are you working on

443
00:26:06.559 --> 00:26:07.880
your putting? He goes.

444
00:26:11.400 --> 00:26:13.279
Right. The problem with the average kid is they don't

445
00:26:13.279 --> 00:26:17.039
want to practice putting the short game I did.

446
00:26:17.640 --> 00:26:23.759
In the nineteen forties, Bobby Locke from South Africa, he

447
00:26:23.920 --> 00:26:28.079
was winning a lot. He was probably the greatest player

448
00:26:28.359 --> 00:26:31.799
you know in that era. And he came to America

449
00:26:32.119 --> 00:26:35.440
and he wrote a book and in the nineteen forties

450
00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:38.839
he said that Ben Hogan was the best putter on tour.

451
00:26:40.119 --> 00:26:44.079
Really in nineteen forty nine, Ben Hogan had the accident,

452
00:26:44.680 --> 00:26:47.519
gradually lost sight in his left eye, which was his

453
00:26:47.680 --> 00:26:52.240
dominant eye, and his depth perception got worse and worse,

454
00:26:52.920 --> 00:26:56.480
and he developed the yips. This is my understanding of

455
00:26:56.960 --> 00:26:58.359
what happened to mister Hogan.

456
00:26:59.319 --> 00:27:03.240
Now what that's the biggest breakthrough thing you do with

457
00:27:03.599 --> 00:27:06.640
students where people suddenly get it.

458
00:27:08.039 --> 00:27:10.359
The thing that most of my students come to me

459
00:27:10.440 --> 00:27:12.599
for is to learn how to compress the golf ball.

460
00:27:13.200 --> 00:27:16.359
That's probably the thing that they admire the most about

461
00:27:16.359 --> 00:27:19.680
what I do in my swing and they want to

462
00:27:19.720 --> 00:27:22.960
get it. And so the main thing that I want

463
00:27:23.000 --> 00:27:29.559
them to understand is impact alignments. Okay, so if I'm

464
00:27:29.559 --> 00:27:34.319
going to compress a golf ball, for example, I wouldn't

465
00:27:34.359 --> 00:27:37.720
be able to hit down with say I've got an

466
00:27:37.720 --> 00:27:40.400
eight iron. If I wanted to compress a golf ball,

467
00:27:40.720 --> 00:27:43.000
if my weight was on my right leg and I

468
00:27:43.039 --> 00:27:45.400
was tilted back, I'm probably not going to be able

469
00:27:45.400 --> 00:27:48.119
to do it right. But you hear all the pros

470
00:27:48.160 --> 00:27:50.960
talk about covering the ball or being on top of

471
00:27:51.000 --> 00:27:56.599
the ball. That's impact alignments. So you cannot deliver the

472
00:27:56.640 --> 00:28:02.400
force through the shaft into the ball unless your skeleton

473
00:28:02.759 --> 00:28:07.559
is aligned properly. So if you have improper impact alignments,

474
00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:12.960
you can spend years, millions of golf balls swinging on

475
00:28:13.000 --> 00:28:15.359
the range and you're never going to figure it out.

476
00:28:15.480 --> 00:28:19.359
It's the it's the violin analogy. That's where you need,

477
00:28:19.519 --> 00:28:22.839
you know, a professional to look at you and say, okay,

478
00:28:22.880 --> 00:28:27.079
look see this right here. You know you're you're tilted

479
00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:30.400
too far back. You know your weight is not you

480
00:28:30.440 --> 00:28:32.319
know where it needs to be. There's no way you

481
00:28:32.400 --> 00:28:35.640
can reach the ball and compress it in this way.

482
00:28:35.839 --> 00:28:37.880
But if you get here, you're on top of it,

483
00:28:37.880 --> 00:28:42.759
got forward Chafflin, then we can do something. The problem is,

484
00:28:43.559 --> 00:28:46.559
you know, everybody wants to take out their five iron

485
00:28:46.640 --> 00:28:48.680
or driver and swing as hard as they can and

486
00:28:48.759 --> 00:28:52.119
hit it perfect, you know, and flush it. I'm like,

487
00:28:52.200 --> 00:28:54.720
if you can't do it with just like a chip

488
00:28:54.839 --> 00:28:57.920
a pitch shot, it's going to be very hard to

489
00:28:57.920 --> 00:29:01.079
teach you impact alignments with a five iron or a

490
00:29:01.119 --> 00:29:04.319
three iron that your mind is telling you I have

491
00:29:04.400 --> 00:29:07.480
to swing this hard. That was one of the things

492
00:29:07.519 --> 00:29:10.240
I was teaching this weekend was I had a five

493
00:29:10.279 --> 00:29:13.720
wood and I'm like, guys, I'm swinging it like a

494
00:29:13.799 --> 00:29:17.680
pitching wedge, and it was just the same tempo, smooth,

495
00:29:18.240 --> 00:29:21.079
and you know, I'm just hitting it long and straight,

496
00:29:21.160 --> 00:29:25.319
and everybody's brains were melting because it's like, you're not

497
00:29:25.480 --> 00:29:28.480
swinging hard, but why is the ball going so far?

498
00:29:29.240 --> 00:29:32.880
You know? And it's the correct transmission of energy through

499
00:29:32.920 --> 00:29:34.799
the shaft with good impact alignments.

500
00:29:35.799 --> 00:29:39.680
It's funny because I've tried to do the same swing

501
00:29:39.720 --> 00:29:46.079
for every club thing, and it's interesting the results because

502
00:29:46.599 --> 00:29:50.319
it tends to if I catch a square, my driver

503
00:29:50.440 --> 00:29:54.720
is great and it really doesn't impact my distance all

504
00:29:54.759 --> 00:29:57.160
that much. If I put a good swing on the ball,

505
00:29:57.319 --> 00:30:02.440
it's gonna go no matter how intensely I'm coming at

506
00:30:02.480 --> 00:30:05.599
it or how smoothly I'm coming at it, And obviously

507
00:30:05.599 --> 00:30:09.319
you want you want both. It's interesting to me because

508
00:30:10.359 --> 00:30:13.480
we all do swing differently as we move up the

509
00:30:13.799 --> 00:30:16.400
length of the club. Should people be trying to employ

510
00:30:17.119 --> 00:30:19.720
the same swing er? Is there a different swing when

511
00:30:19.799 --> 00:30:22.079
I mean, obviously there's a different swing when you're hitting

512
00:30:22.079 --> 00:30:24.559
a sixty, I suppose than a driver.

513
00:30:24.920 --> 00:30:29.839
There's variations, okay, but just as a general rule, Jack

514
00:30:29.960 --> 00:30:35.160
Nicholas said, I want one golf swing. I want one

515
00:30:35.200 --> 00:30:37.279
golf swing. I want to keep the game as simple

516
00:30:37.279 --> 00:30:41.400
as possible. He said, the secret to is one iron.

517
00:30:41.720 --> 00:30:44.799
You know. Trevino famously said only God and Nicholas can

518
00:30:44.920 --> 00:30:47.960
hit a one iron, and Jack said, the secret is

519
00:30:48.000 --> 00:30:52.000
I swing it like a seven iron. You know, it's

520
00:30:52.039 --> 00:30:55.640
he said that he swung his irons generally three quarters.

521
00:30:56.400 --> 00:30:58.799
He said, I want to hit my driver hard because

522
00:30:58.839 --> 00:31:01.440
I want to, you know, stretchically, bite off as much

523
00:31:01.440 --> 00:31:05.960
as I can. Every shot after that is a precise distance.

524
00:31:06.519 --> 00:31:08.599
It doesn't matter if it's a six iron or an

525
00:31:08.599 --> 00:31:11.720
eight iron. It just matters I can hit my number.

526
00:31:12.359 --> 00:31:15.960
And so he swung three quarters, and you look at

527
00:31:15.960 --> 00:31:18.480
his distances. It's like, you know, Jack Nicholas is one

528
00:31:18.559 --> 00:31:21.480
hundred and you know, sixty five yards. He's got a

529
00:31:21.519 --> 00:31:24.640
six iron. It's like, believe me, he can hit a

530
00:31:24.720 --> 00:31:27.839
two hundred. It takes some discipline, it takes taking your

531
00:31:27.920 --> 00:31:29.920
ego out of it. You know. I'm working hard on

532
00:31:29.960 --> 00:31:33.559
that right now, you know, because I've always, you know,

533
00:31:33.640 --> 00:31:35.640
wanted to hit my irons as far as I can

534
00:31:35.680 --> 00:31:39.160
hit them, you know. But I'm really starting to become

535
00:31:39.200 --> 00:31:42.920
more judicious. And you know, like, you know, go ahead,

536
00:31:43.319 --> 00:31:48.119
hit an eight iron. Club up. You can always have

537
00:31:48.240 --> 00:31:51.519
too little club, but you can never have too much club,

538
00:31:52.039 --> 00:31:54.240
you know, right for sure?

539
00:31:54.680 --> 00:31:58.200
For sure. Now, if you look back at classic swings,

540
00:31:58.400 --> 00:32:01.079
and you know we've talked about Hogan, what are the

541
00:32:01.079 --> 00:32:05.680
swings that you most admire and what have you taken

542
00:32:05.720 --> 00:32:09.400
from them to apply to you know, your methods.

543
00:32:11.240 --> 00:32:13.880
Right off the bat, I think Bobby Jones and Sam

544
00:32:13.920 --> 00:32:18.279
Snead they have very similar motion. If you've seen my videos,

545
00:32:18.319 --> 00:32:21.279
you'll see that. I show how they take the club

546
00:32:21.319 --> 00:32:24.880
back low to the inside, and then they both have

547
00:32:25.200 --> 00:32:30.759
a pretty generous looping motion over onto the golf plane.

548
00:32:31.160 --> 00:32:33.400
But the thing that I love about their swings is

549
00:32:33.440 --> 00:32:39.400
how fluid and uninhibited they are, all three of them, Hogan,

550
00:32:39.759 --> 00:32:43.960
Snead and Bobby Jones. It's like they put that club

551
00:32:44.000 --> 00:32:47.920
in motion and there's just nothing impeding it. There's no jerks,

552
00:32:48.000 --> 00:32:52.240
there's no kind of like movements that don't seem to add.

553
00:32:52.319 --> 00:32:56.240
It's like very symphonic. It's very very smooth and elegant,

554
00:32:58.039 --> 00:33:00.599
you know. And so so those are the swings that

555
00:33:00.759 --> 00:33:08.559
really stick out to me. I absolutely think Jack Nicholas

556
00:33:08.680 --> 00:33:12.680
may be the smartest golfer that ever lived. Actually, I'll

557
00:33:12.680 --> 00:33:17.000
go ahead and say he is. He made it simpler

558
00:33:17.039 --> 00:33:22.599
than everybody else and obviously eighteen major wins, nineteen major

559
00:33:22.720 --> 00:33:26.000
runner ups. You know it's crazy.

560
00:33:27.160 --> 00:33:31.880
Yeah, no, it's it's interesting or it struck me that

561
00:33:32.359 --> 00:33:34.480
his swing in some ways. I mean, I would like

562
00:33:34.720 --> 00:33:37.680
give anything to swing like Sam's Need. I would take

563
00:33:38.000 --> 00:33:39.680
a couple of years off the end of my life

564
00:33:39.759 --> 00:33:41.400
if I could never.

565
00:33:41.759 --> 00:33:44.920
That's a tough wager, because you got me thinking about it.

566
00:33:45.799 --> 00:33:47.680
Sir, I'm not kidding you.

567
00:33:48.279 --> 00:33:52.079
Need was the man like when I interviewed Chee Chee.

568
00:33:52.119 --> 00:33:55.319
I'm like, you know, Hogan, Hogan, Hogan, and he's like Hogan,

569
00:33:55.400 --> 00:33:57.720
Hogan was the man he goes. If I could have

570
00:33:57.759 --> 00:33:59.279
putt it for Hogan, he would have shot in the

571
00:33:59.279 --> 00:34:04.400
mid fifties every time. But Sam Snead, He's like Sneid

572
00:34:04.559 --> 00:34:07.960
was longer, you know, Sneed hit it every bit as

573
00:34:08.000 --> 00:34:09.159
solid as Ben Hogan.

574
00:34:10.320 --> 00:34:13.000
Because I'm never going to swing like Sam Sneaed. Nicholas's

575
00:34:13.039 --> 00:34:17.239
swing seems more accessible somehow for an average I mean,

576
00:34:17.280 --> 00:34:19.599
not to hit the ball like him, but that type

577
00:34:19.599 --> 00:34:24.239
of swing, I mean is there because of obviously both

578
00:34:24.280 --> 00:34:25.719
were great natural athletes.

579
00:34:26.320 --> 00:34:30.840
Yes, they were both really serious athletes in multiple sports.

580
00:34:31.280 --> 00:34:33.840
Right, I mean, Nicholas's background is like crazy. I mean,

581
00:34:33.880 --> 00:34:35.840
I know he's a football player or a bad All

582
00:34:35.880 --> 00:34:40.199
state basketball We've gone to Ohio State for basketball. Yeah,

583
00:34:40.320 --> 00:34:42.880
but so what and a really good baseball player I

584
00:34:42.880 --> 00:34:46.480
believe as well. But what was Is there something more

585
00:34:46.519 --> 00:34:50.119
accessible for the average golfer about Nicholas's swing? Because I

586
00:34:50.119 --> 00:34:52.440
feel like I can I would love to swing like

587
00:34:52.480 --> 00:34:55.159
Sam Sneaed, but I feel like at my best I

588
00:34:55.199 --> 00:34:59.159
can at least approach a Jack Nicholas swing.

589
00:35:00.760 --> 00:35:06.559
So I think that this is actually kind of well known.

590
00:35:06.760 --> 00:35:11.599
Snead's golf swing required more mobility than Jack Nicholas. You know,

591
00:35:11.840 --> 00:35:15.559
he could kick you know, kick the jail, yeah, you know,

592
00:35:15.599 --> 00:35:18.159
all kinds of weird stuff like that, but he gets

593
00:35:18.199 --> 00:35:21.239
in more. Snead gets in more lateral sight ben than

594
00:35:21.280 --> 00:35:23.639
a lot of the classic guys. But if you look

595
00:35:23.639 --> 00:35:25.840
at Jack Nicholas, Nicholas even has a little bit of

596
00:35:25.880 --> 00:35:32.559
early extension, you know which Nicholas is inside across the line,

597
00:35:32.920 --> 00:35:37.039
a little over the top with early extension. What would

598
00:35:37.039 --> 00:35:39.079
a modern golf teacher say to Jack.

599
00:35:38.960 --> 00:35:42.880
Nicholas, Oh, they tear him, tear them down and rebuild.

600
00:35:42.599 --> 00:35:47.079
Them right, Yeah, they destroyed the greatest golf swing in history.

601
00:35:47.920 --> 00:35:50.760
You know, and when I say Nicholas is the man

602
00:35:50.800 --> 00:35:54.119
is because he had it so simple. So what did

603
00:35:54.159 --> 00:35:56.480
he have? What did did he have that was so simple?

604
00:35:56.480 --> 00:35:59.960
If there's these seeming problems in the golf, you know,

605
00:36:00.400 --> 00:36:03.280
it's like, let me tell you what my theory is.

606
00:36:05.000 --> 00:36:08.079
So Nicholas said he wanted the club to go up

607
00:36:08.079 --> 00:36:12.519
and down his spine. Okay, I've also heard him say

608
00:36:12.599 --> 00:36:17.039
he always wanted the club to be inside of the fat, right,

609
00:36:18.119 --> 00:36:23.079
So if that's the case, the club face is always square.

610
00:36:23.239 --> 00:36:29.559
The way he's swinging it, it's never it's never flip, shut,

611
00:36:29.880 --> 00:36:34.280
catching up, stuck, it's never any of that. This this

612
00:36:34.400 --> 00:36:36.159
is as simple as it gets. Man.

613
00:36:37.760 --> 00:36:40.360
Right, No, his his swing is really I mean, it's

614
00:36:40.679 --> 00:36:44.320
it is. It's so simple, and I love watching videos

615
00:36:44.320 --> 00:36:47.280
of him. I mean it's because you just see how

616
00:36:47.320 --> 00:36:51.039
over complicated we tend to make the swing. Last question, here,

617
00:36:51.079 --> 00:36:55.679
what three things? If I'm listening to this and I'm

618
00:36:55.719 --> 00:36:59.280
your average golfer, if you were to tell people, you know,

619
00:36:59.360 --> 00:37:01.960
two or three things that they can walk away with

620
00:37:02.679 --> 00:37:06.519
that will help them. You know, obviously you're not saying

621
00:37:06.519 --> 00:37:08.599
the videos of they're swings or any of that stuff,

622
00:37:08.599 --> 00:37:12.280
But like what three general things can people walk away

623
00:37:12.280 --> 00:37:14.039
with that they can say, Okay, I could work on

624
00:37:14.079 --> 00:37:15.239
this and I can get better.

625
00:37:16.800 --> 00:37:19.719
The first thing is you have to develop a smooth transition.

626
00:37:20.840 --> 00:37:25.320
That is the number one thing that changed my life

627
00:37:25.400 --> 00:37:28.159
on the golf course because I would want to play

628
00:37:28.199 --> 00:37:31.519
all my force in the transition and I'd have nothing

629
00:37:31.559 --> 00:37:34.440
when I got to the ball. So you cannot be

630
00:37:34.639 --> 00:37:37.079
aggressive in the transition. You have to learn to be

631
00:37:37.360 --> 00:37:44.039
very patient and relaxed, smooth acceleration. Okay. The second thing

632
00:37:44.079 --> 00:37:48.199
I'm going to say is that if you're not willing

633
00:37:48.320 --> 00:37:52.079
to fall in love with your short game that's chipping,

634
00:37:52.159 --> 00:37:57.360
putting pitch shots, you're never going to reach your potential. Now,

635
00:37:57.400 --> 00:38:00.679
the thing is I said fall in love with your

636
00:38:00.719 --> 00:38:06.159
short game. I enjoy practicing short game. I didn't in

637
00:38:06.199 --> 00:38:09.199
the beginning, and if you can learn to do that,

638
00:38:10.599 --> 00:38:14.199
it gives you another level of confidence. Number three is

639
00:38:14.239 --> 00:38:18.519
you have to learn to grow a positive self identity.

640
00:38:19.760 --> 00:38:23.400
That may be let yourself be inspired by your idols.

641
00:38:23.440 --> 00:38:25.400
You know, put on a Hogan hat, put on a

642
00:38:25.599 --> 00:38:29.559
Bubba Watson, pink driver chef, put on you know, whatever

643
00:38:29.639 --> 00:38:33.000
it is that makes you feel like you know that

644
00:38:33.079 --> 00:38:36.800
alter ego effect can be very, very helpful because if

645
00:38:36.880 --> 00:38:41.639
you have thirty five years of mental scar tissue of

646
00:38:41.679 --> 00:38:45.400
shooting one hundred and tens, you know you have to

647
00:38:45.480 --> 00:38:49.440
break out of that mindset. You have to do something radical,

648
00:38:49.840 --> 00:38:52.599
and that's where the transformation of what I teach in

649
00:38:52.639 --> 00:38:56.400
my six month online program. It's all about recreating your

650
00:38:56.440 --> 00:38:57.239
self identity.

651
00:38:57.519 --> 00:38:59.400
A great point on then, thank you so much for

652
00:38:59.440 --> 00:39:01.079
doing this, Chris that it was great to talk to you.

653
00:39:02.119 --> 00:39:04.039
I loved it. Thank you so kindly.

654
00:39:05.400 --> 00:39:05.760
Thank you

655
00:39:07.840 --> 00:39:07.880
M