(Yet Another) Golf Swing Epiphany

Surely anyone who's swung a club more than twice has had that same feeling: "Oh, THAT'S how it's done!" A range session one Sunday AM last year was like that; Swinging each club seemed effortless. The ball obeyed my every command. The 100, 150, and 200 yard signs could be hit - in fact, they were easy to hit - and each time I hit them, the loud clang reported to my range mates that I had found it! "Crap! If only I had played today!"

You know the story, though - the following week, teeing it up, 3 guys watch after my confident "I'll take us out" to see which way I'd be starting my day, and instead of the solid muted thwack of a Pro V being squashed on titanium before being propelled rocket-like downrange, the familiar clank-pull-hook, "I think I saw it near that tree." Yep, "the zone" was in another time zone, far from where I stood, in my out-of-balance finish, such as it was. Many trips to the range later, I had yet to find that feeling again... That feeling of effortlessness... That sudden ability to hit my P-Wedge where my 8-iron was normally used. That sudden ability to hit my driver straight, no matter how I chose to swing the thing.

Today, I took the weekend off from playing golf, visited the range to work on a few things. Today, I was back in that zone.

This is a rare occurrence. My being in "golf zone" is an event similar in frequency to UFO sightings over Manhattan, and as mystical as the image of Mother Mary appearing on the fogged window of a skyscraper. Like the aurora borealis, or a shooting star, it comes and goes without warning or announcement - it just appears.

I sensed it from my first swing, though it wasn't a good shot. A 6 iron, pull hooked, hit thin, but one that carried 180 yards. I did not consciously ponder how to correct that miss. The instructions seemed to flow, as if from The Force, directly to my shoulders, arms, and hands. Minor adjustments made themselves. The next swing was almost dreamlike - as I held my finish, watching the ball shoot missile-like straight away from me, I had no conscious memory of my back-swing. Impact sounded different - solid, muted. Wedge shots landed like darts near their destinations. My 3 wood carried to the top of the small hill near the fence at the far end of the range - that where I usually would hit my driver.

It has always been my goal to hit the fence at the far end with my driver. Today, I thought I was falling short before I realized that I was hitting the fence repeatedly, but this fence is a loose mesh that "caught" the ball, and allowed it to fall straight down - a bit of an optical illusion. That was the epiphany. The feeling of having arrived, that every golf-day of my life would be different from now on. I had progressed! I was at the Next Level.

Sure, I should've seen this coming; at a recent scramble, I crushed a drive 285 yards down the middle, and followed that with a pured 215 yd 3-wood to a par 5 green. I'd been playing a lot more short-iron approaches, and was starting to feel bad for my 5 and 6 iron lest their feelings be hurt for having to spend so much time in the bag. Something was happening. Here, at the range, under lab conditions, the truth was being revealed.

I called Golfflog Jr. over to my stall - "Watch this, I'm going to hit this ball over the fence." Jr. eyed me with that look that told me he was considering taking my car keys away.

It seemed simple enough - I wound up, and smoothly stroked. I felt the shaft load as I began the downswing. My one thought was an image of the ball being squashed against the clubface long enough to transfer all of the club-head momentum to the ball. I looked up to see the ball flight - it was moving straight away - almost a stationary point in the sky, not so much flying as getting smaller. It hit the fence near it's top third. Mind you, I could not hit that damn fence before today.

I teed up one more, this one struck harder and louder, but with a fade to it, hitting the fence, though, at about the same height. That was that - two tries, but failure never felt so sweet. I finished my last few balls with some short irons and chips. I gave Jr. a few pointers on his grip.

This COULD be the result of my having just read "The Impact Zone" by Bobby Clampett - Jr. and I talked about the swing dynamics described in the book as we rode in the car on the way to the range today.

Did those descriptions of swing dynamics somehow impose themselves into my muscle memory? They say that thinking about a golf swing has the same effect on muscle memory as actually swinging, you know... Of course, this could just be another "aurora borealis..."

I'm trying like hell to get to The Black on Monday by virtue of an extra day off from work. We'll see if The Zone and MY zone are anywhere near each other...

GF

Spitball Sergio Wins Players, Goydos Dissed by Press

Part of me was willing to smile for Sergio, winning his first almost-major - he showed flashes of brilliance, seemed at times to be a genuine sportsman, and won the thing after all. But part of me couldn't just look at Sergio's performance in this one event. No, I couldn't ignore (as they say at the Oscars) his body of work: whining about conditions at the 2002 U.S. Open while endlessly milking his grips, spitting into the cup last year at Doral, choking at the 2007 British Open, and all through his recent career openly expressing how he's been somehow cheated, that everyone else but he gets the lucky breaks.

Do I hope that Sergio turns the corner? Will I root for Gentleman Garcia if he chooses to mend his whiny ways, and leaves "Spitball Sergio" behind? I sure will. I'm a big believer in second chances, and an admirer of famous figures who've changed their approach to fame, and reinvented their public persona. George Foreman comes to mind: See "When we were Kings" to understand just how far he's come...

But here's what got my goat today: Seeing the following exclamation from Cameron Morfit on Golf.com: "And ultimately, to the great relief of everyone who hoped for a first-class winner at the "fifth major," Sergio Garcia won the Players. " Cameron: What the fu__ is that all about? Didn't Goydos acquit himself with good humor and grace? Didn't he perform admirably, playing within himself, sticking to his game plan, and play steady-eddie golf?

And what makes Spitball Sergio a "first-class winner?" The surly disposition? His proclivity to yell "cut... CUT!!" at every other tee shot? The whiny behavior? The cursing of the vast golf conspiracy that's been against him all the while? I have two words for you, Mr. Morfit: Puh - leeze.

If not for a gust of wind on the first playoff hole, a deserving and humble Paul Goydos would be holding the crystal trophy. Sure, Sergio gets a second chance in this fan's eyes, but I hope to see more of Mr. Goydos as well.

GF

I Found It (Again)!

Yes, I had an epiphany about my golf swing! Yes, I was at the range, and thinking hard about what the pro told me two weeks earlier about my swing. For a change, I didn't just bang through the bucket o'balls waiting for something to happen to improve the results. Read on at your own risk - what worked for me may royally screw you up...

I've always maintained that, no matter the sport, be it baseball, throwing darts, shooting pool, the basics rule. I gave lots of thought to my pro's guidance, and the guidance I've absorbed over the years that fits my game (and not all of it does...) I decided Sunday to apply my range time to grooving these lessons, and to avoid the trap of focusing on the instant gratification of desired ball-flight. We all know that it's possible to get reasonable ball-flight results from the crappiest swing - we've all done it at one time or another - but I'm after real improvement. Instead, I was looking for "swing" results. An odd thing happened - the better my swing, the better the resulting ball-flight. Hey.... That's how it's supposed to work!

So here's what I found worked for me: The pro said I was getting my hips out in front of my arms and standing up through impact. This pushed the club outside the swing plane causing pulls, pull hooks, and sometimes a frightening shank. It took some doing to un-groove this tendency, I'm sure because my middle-aged body finds it easier to NOT maintain spine angle through the swing... ("BAD body... BAD!")

Here's my little range secret - works only at ranges with some windows near each booth - I look at my own reflection at various stages of the swing. Let me tell you, these "mirrors" don't lie! The pro was right - I was flipping the club inside too soon on the back swing! My shoulders were tensed way up almost around my head! I was out over my toes!

Ben Hogan says in his famous "Five Lessons" to stay grounded - my interpretation of this is to keep your center of gravity as low as you can, which you can't do all tensed up shoulder high and out over your toes! The key move: at the top of the backswing, I wanted to feel almost as though I was sitting on my right hip.

The downswing began to feel nearly automatic - it was over in a wink. The sound of impact began to sound authoritative! The fall was flying straight!

Getting a little to bound up in the various positions, I tried to make the whole thing happen in a smooth rythmic back and forth. Good things continued to happen!

Today the real results: Only my second outing of the season, and at an unfamiliar course, I'm back in the 80's again. I parred 9 holes, bogeyed 4 more - the rest were a total mess, my having fallen victim to "range mat" syndrome. Plainly put, my short pitches were struck with a fatness rarely seen even on reality television. Sure, I'm "solid gold" off the astro-turf mat at my favority ball-beating-boutique, but (it turns out) fairways don't work like astro-turf. They don't forgive you when you let your club arc bottom out 6 inches behind the ball... Range mats will ruin your game (but that rant will be a separate blog entry...)

So, fellow floggers, I believe I am on my way to a career season here. My goals include breaking 40 on any front or back nine (my personal best is 41) and I'm looking to break 85. I'm working hard to get my unofficial 18 handicap to an offical 15 (or lower.) These goals suddenly feel within reach.

Stay tuned!

GF

Season Opener, Flogger Style

The Blade and I made it out for our own season opener on Masters Sunday. Here in the Northeast, April has been a changeable month, and it changed for the worse Saturday night, giving us a cold, gray, breezy day for our maiden voyage of 2008. It wasn't all bad, but it wasn't all good either. The good news: The lesson I took the week before did me some good. The bad news: I didn't always do what the pro told me to. Just as in any human endeavor, from assembling a kid's bike to baking a cake, when the directions are followed, results are good; when not, they're not. When I leaned back on "feel," I made goofs that reminded me why I saw the pro in the first place.

Fairways and greens (as well as front and back lawns) have been slow to green up and fill in this Spring - the nights have been too cool - so the course was a little scruffy, but the rough was not yet up, so you could say it was playing "friendly." Of course, this is muni golf we're talking, so I was reminded a few times about needing practice from bare and hardpan lies. The bunkers here are a mix of sand, soil, and gravel - you wouldn't dare take a shiny new wedge into one of these! My new Nickent hybrid was put to use, it does the intended job for the most part, but I need use it a few more times before I really trust it. I did notice that in direct sunlight it has bit of a red sheen to it, which was kinda neat.

The Blade, who is nick-named for his putting prowess, didn't show a lot of that famed skill on Sunday - at no time did his Ping sing to it's potential. He's just getting warmed up... We played with two other walk-ons, Donnie and John, both friendly fellows, both playing well enough to elicit a few cheers, and we all kept a similar pace. In my many, many rounds of muni golf, I can count on one hand the number of times I've run into genuine jerks on the course. Virtually everyone I've played with has been a good playing companion, some have been memorable.

Aside from the birdie on the par 4 10th, my shining moment was on 11, a short par 5, where I hit a bullet of a drive (following my pro's instructions) that cut the corner and bounced and rolled to 155 yards. My low moment: Hitting my second shot on 11 so fat that the chunk of half-dormant sod flew about 40 yards, or half the distance that the ball travelled before resting in a fairway bunker.

The tally: A handful of "others," a handful of bogeys, a handful of pars, and the season's first birdie. The actual score? Well, let's just say that a season's scores are like waffles, the first one's never quite right, and ought to be thrown away (or fed to the dog..)

The other good news: The Blade and I joined with our other golf buds at the home of The Commish that afternoon to watch The Masters final round while imbibing from one of those little Heineken kegs, and scarfing down sausage, peppers, and onions on Italian bread. The perfect start to the 2008 season.

GF

Reflections on The 2008 Masters

That grand Spring ritual that heralds the beginning of the golf season for us northeast floggers - The Masters - has come and gone for 2008. All the tradition and ceremony remained intact, like the schmaltzy theme song, like Nantz' schmaltzy commentary, like the tributes to the past and the connecting threads woven to the future (does it get any better than Player passing the torch to Immelman? You couldn't write a script like that...)

The Masters looks a little different than in the past - it was my first Masters in high definition, and it looked fantastic. CBS, by the way, clearly has the best quality hi def of any network. The pictures on my 42" LCD looked almost three dimensional. How about that computer-generated ball-flight tracker, which shows the curvature of the shot from the player's perspective? Pretty edgy stuff for a tournament that won't allow a blimp (a rule I am strongly in favor of.)

There were new players and plot twists added to the continuing story of The Masters, but here's the rub: Most of the key moments were disappointments of one kind or another. Couples misses the cut. Tiger's hopes (and ours) for a modern, single-season grand slam are dashed. Heroics are few and far between - Tiger's pitch from the 10th fairway to the 18th green on Friday was about as good as it got. This Masters Sunday back nine was all about failure, and failure is an ingredient used only sparingly in the recipe for memorable competition. If failure were salt, this tourney left us parched (to stretch the metaphor...)

We seem to have entered a chapter in The Masters' story in which this grand old tournament comes to resemble the U.S. Open - and that's a bad thing. The thrilling Sunday back nine has looked more like an episode of Survivor; "Who will make it through the wind and water challenge?" Instead of the roars for which this tournament is known, we heard hushed moans when Sneds dunked it on 13, when Flesch splashed down on 12 before imploding, when Immelman fell short and wet on 16. There were no smiling faces coming up the 18th fairway, even from the leader! Following his tee shot on 18, Immelman let out a sigh of relief. After making his final, winning par, instead of jumping for joy, he had the look of a man who just got a repreive from the Governor! Hats off to Trevor, he played great, withstood the pressure, and earned his first major, but he and a few others might need a little counseling to avoid any PMTSD: Post Masters Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Perhaps this will change with the weather, and even Augusta National's management can't dictate that, but we already have a golf-war-of-attrition every June, ending on Father's Day. The folks at Augusta need to pay a little more attention to how The Open is set up (British, that is) where they seem to continually strike a balance between challenge and reward. Come Spring and the daffodils, the azaleas, that music, and the green jacket, we want to be thrilled! We want to be reminded of what makes The Masters the premiere golf event of the year! We want to be reminded of why we are anxious to make our first tee time of the season! We want to be reminded of how good it can get!

Bring back the roars!

GF

The Masters

The sensory cues are all in place: I can see the sun setting later each day, the birds, the local rabbits and other critters are active, and tufts of green grass are starting to show here and there in lawns that are still mostly dormant. I've got a tasty mouthful of remnants of my kids' chocolate bunnies from the fridge. In my hands are the winter's editions of golf mags as I scan them for season-starting tips; I'm holding my 5 iron, practicing my swing in the living room (when the Boss isn't around) and debating whether my first lesson of the year should come before my first tee time.
Then my aural radar picks up the song - "Augusta" - the song they play during Masters coverage. It's a promo for CBS or ESPN, and Master's week is still a week or two away, but those first few notes trigger Masters fever in me in a way that few other things trigger any kind of reaction. Of course, there's that cologne that an old girlfriend used to wear that triggers some pretty strong reactions, but this is a "golf" blog.
The (British) Open Championship, and the U.S. Open have longer histories, and may indeed be more difficult to win, but I would argue that The Masters is the premiere golf championship of the year. I'm still learning about the origins of all the tradition and ceremony that make it so special and so familiar. Start with its heritage as Bobby Jones' August Invitational.... Bobby Jones! Is any other tournament so closely identified with a particular person, any person, and a legend no less? I may never go to Augusta National, but I know all about Magnolia Lane, and the Champions locker room. I know that each hole has a name, I know about Rae's creek, Hogan's Bridge, Butler Cabin, Eisenhower's tree, and the countless other landmarks - it seems there's one visible in almost every shot shown on TV. If there are other tournaments that begin with a contest on their par 3 course, I've never heard about it. Two words: "Amen Corner." Who wouldn't agree that the 12th hole is the most famous par 3 in all of golf? Azaleas, and more azaleas.
Doesn't everyone know that once you put on a green jacket, you're "in" for every Masters for life until you use your own good judgment to walk away? To underscore how important tradition is, just look at what happened when they tried to take those lifetime privileges away.... Tradition is what makes this championship unique - the only major that's played in the same place year after year. When you watch The Masters, you're not just watching a round of golf, you are watching The Continuing Story of The Masters being told, re-told, and appended.
All that tradition provides the strong, reliable, foundation, but what really makes this the premiere golf event is the competition. Think of the most famous rounds, the most famous shots, the most famous wins in golfdom. Think of those moments that keep us coming back, those moments where the unbelievable occurred, where magic happened. Tally'em up, and tell me if you don't find that more of these incredible moments happened at The Masters than all of the other tournaments (not just majors) combined. Who won't be watching this coming week, hoping, even expecting, to see a moment like Nicklaus winning his final major? Like Tiger's unforgettable chip-in on 16? Like the incredible Sunday duel between Ernie and Phil on Easter Sunday before hearing Jim Nance ask, "Is it his time?"
The caddies shall wear white coveralls. CBS shall play that theme song, and there shall be limited commercial interruption. There shall be expanding, but still limited TV coverage. The attendees in the gallery shall be called "patrons." The greens shall be fast, the sand white, the fairways impeccably groomed, and the azaleas almost ridiculously colorful. These, my friends, are among The Standards. Violate them at your peril. They seem a little silly at times, but The Standards combine with the tradition and history to set the stage for the event that unfolds each Spring. The first few notes of "Augusta," like the dimming of a theater's house lights, cue us to sit back and lose ourselves for a little while.
This coming week, I'll be lost, somewhere down Magnolia Lane.

GF

Why We Watch... (and why Tiger Depresses Me)

We watch golf because we like to see the things that we can do being done at the highest level. Most of us can swing a bat, get a tennis ball over a net, make a "swoosh" or two from the foul line, and make good contact between clubface and ball. We can't do these things at the high level we see on TV or at the ballpark, arena, or pro golf tour. Few of us are entertained by watching even celebrities duff and chunk and four-putt - there's enough of that at our local muni on weekends. We love to see the spot-on wedge that sucks back to a few inches from the stick. We marvel at towering drives with 6 seconds of air time. We live for those 30 foot zig-zag putts that hit the heart of the cup, especially when The One is running after it, finger pointed, commanding it to go in. Ahh, The One... The Chosen One... The Greatest of All Time. Are we not lucky, indeed blessed to be golf fans while this kind of history is being made? And because Vardon and Jones and Hogan and Snead and Palmer and Nicklaus have gone before him, we are all the luckier for having the historical perspective. So why does Tiger Woods depress me?
First, here's what thrills me - the sheer excellence of what he does. For sure, he has the raw material - he'd be among the best if he conducted his life and his pursuit of the game like John Daly. He could roll out of bed ten minutes before tee time, and make a very nice living playing this stupid stick-and-ball game. But his raw talent combined with his disciplined pursuit of excellence is what makes him and historic figure - The One. In this way, The One is an inspiration. If all of us, any of us pursued any one thing in our lives with the focus, commitment, and single-mindedness that The One applies to golf, think of the potential we could realize. That's the "inspiration" part of the equation.
The depressing part: No matter how much discipline any of us applies to any of our interests, whether personal or professional, you will never be as good at that thing as Tiger Woods is at golf. My parents always said that they didn't care what I wanted to be "when I growed up;" that even if I wanted to be a garbage man, as long as I tried to be the best garbage man that I could be, that would be fine with them. Well, the sad truth is that I could never be as good a garbage man as Tiger Woods is a golfer. Naturally, this would be difficult to quantify - comparable measurements in the worlds of golf and sanitation are hard to come by - but even within the world of garbage collection, what would I have to do in order for my peers to declare me "the best trash picker-upper that ever lifted a can?"
Nope, I'm hard pressed to find anything that I do as well as Tiger plays golf. I can solve the "Jumble" in the newspaper within a minute-thirty 90% of the time; my privet hedge in the front yard is legendary in my neighborhood for the perfectly straight trim-job that I do (freehand, by the way;) my kids think I can fix anything that breaks around the house... In any of those things, trivial or not, can I achieve the level of excellence that approaches that of The One in his chosen profession? I'm not even going to try.
And that, my friends, is Tiger's biggest edge of the golf course - his competition feels the same way. Phil said it himself, famously, in a press conference about a year ago - as much as he will ever win, he'll never have the career that Tiger has already assembled.
Having said all that, I better get back to work.... discipline.... focus.... c'mon GolfFlogger - get inspired!

GF