Sit back and get ready to take off with dynamic golf.
Hey team Mac, how you doing today?
Doing great, Sean.
How are you doing today?
Good, man.
Good.
We're taking a little break from our podcast for a second.
We thought we'd kind of talk about the place we do some of our teaching down here at One
Stop Golf Club.
Great facility.
You know, if you're somebody, especially during the winter time, I find this to be a great
facility with the weather being what it is, being cold.
It is such a treat to come inside, play a round of golf, or give a lesson, whatever
it may be, but it's just a great atmosphere, especially during the winter time, to come
in and play.
So for $60 a month for our base membership, you know, it's a great value.
Great value.
I mean, think about all the other memberships people are paying for for real golf courses,
struggling to get tee times, $60 a month.
I mean, you're going to pay $40 just for a round of golf, right?
So here for $20 more, you can play virtually every day if you wanted to on a different
course every day.
Unlimited.
Unlimited play.
I mean, I just think it's a great deal, great value.
And from the teaching perspective, and you know, when we say teaching, we actually mean,
hey, you come in and work on your own game.
You can see a lot of numbers on Trackman.
Absolutely.
It's such a good way to be able to work on club head speed, trying to improve that.
Or if you're trying to have trouble with your, you know, the face is going left, but you
think your face is going left on the range, but you can actually see the numbers with
Trackman.
Driver is great in here because of the spin rate numbers and how to.
So it's a great facility for you guys to come in and use on your own, but then also obviously
to come down and get a lesson from Team Acre for myself.
Absolutely.
It's $60 a month, one stop golf shop, FL.com.
That's our website.
Easiest way is to really just go on that website.
If you want to contact me, Sean Klotz, the owner at Lake Bernadette, you can do that.
Or Tim Malkovana has Swing Theory Golf.
We've both been doing lessons in here.
And like you said, winter time, you know, it's dark at six o'clock now.
So I've been doing a lot of lessons at six now.
Yeah.
It works well for the people who have to work from nine to five.
Correct.
There's that working guy, you know, and it's nice to be able to come inside because there
is no driving range really around the area that has lights.
So having a facility that you can practice at, teach at, and having all the toys that
we have here is absolutely amazing.
I just find that for a teaching standpoint, you can get to the issue that the student
has so much quicker, identify that issue, and you're giving them tangible data.
It's just not a shot in the dark or, hey, this is my opinion out on the range, right?
This is real data that we're using to improve your game.
So the cameras that we have in here, the data that we have in here, I just find it so easy
to help improve our students at a very rapid rate.
Yeah.
Perfect example, I had a gentleman come in at eight o'clock this morning because he's
got to go to work, you know, at nine o'clock.
And we did a half hour session.
He's got some stuff to work on for the week.
And now he knows what to work on.
That's the whole key of our teaching in general is to have a plan when you go on the golf
course on the range rather than, which is what he said to me.
I watch a lot of videos on YouTube.
I'm like, well, that's great, but nothing's really relevant to what you're doing.
Correct.
You do the things you do.
So from the club perspective, $60 a month for the individual membership, $130 for a
full membership.
And then again, we've got a Bluetooth speaker here.
We've got a TV that's got all kinds of TV channels, sports channels on it if you want
to.
So it's a place to practice, but it's also a place to enjoy yourself, entertain, have
fun, bring in your own food, clean up after yourself, which is what you always ask.
But the members have been great.
The members have been great.
So really nice facility in Wesley Chapel just outside of Zephyrh Hills.
Very easily findable.
www.one-stopgolfshopfl.com.
Sean Klotz.
Tim McElvanagh, swingtheorygolf.com.
That's it.
So thank you guys very much and come on down and see us.
Thank you.
I thought it would be interesting.
We talked about it a couple of weeks ago, but like, you know, we've been interviewing
different people from the golf community, but I'm not sure the listeners and kind of
the viewers kind of know who we are.
Yeah.
You know, we kind of obviously throw out our teaching philosophies and some of the things
we've done in our past.
I thought it'd be nice to kind of get like a good in-depth look at what you've done and
kind of where you're coming and where your goals are and that type of stuff.
So basically first question I might have for you and the viewers is how'd you get into
golf?
Like did you start when you were young or how'd you get into the game?
Yeah.
So as a kid, I started when I was about five years old.
When I was a little guy, my dad was a struggling attorney.
My mom was a secretary of life, it's Pasco.
So my grandpa would pick me up from preschool or kindergarten, whatever it is at that age,
I'm not really sure.
And he would take me up to a driving range up in Bushnell, which had a driving range
and it had one of those old, you know, had a batting cage, but had one of those old arms
that went like this, so it would throw the ball.
And he would sit over there in the corner and he would read the Wall Street Journal
every time.
He was a stockbroker as a trade and a very good accomplished golfer.
And he taught me three things that I think I still work with today, at least two of them.
One was the grip and two was he'd always told me to place a pole from my head to my rear
end and rotate around that, which to be honest with you, we still use to this day.
Yeah, some of the simple things, right?
Correct.
And still work.
Did you play a lot of sports when you were growing up and you were a baseball player?
Yeah, I played a lot of baseball, played soccer, played football, you know, tried every sport
that I could.
Tried tennis.
I was terrible at that.
Oh, okay.
So, you know, my parents really encouraged me to play a lot of different types of sports
and stuff like that.
Yeah.
Baseball was my main love at that time.
Yeah.
And that was really all I had there.
And you went to Zephyr Hills High School?
Yes, sir.
All right.
Yes, sir.
Graduated in 95.
Nice.
Played all four years on the varsity baseball team.
Okay.
Starting center fielder from there all four years.
Did you have any prospects to go play college and now you went to USF?
Yeah, I got a scholarship to play at a little school up in North Carolina called Belmont
Abbey.
Okay.
I was up there for two years.
Okay.
I think I got a little homesick.
Oh, okay.
I came on back home and then enrolled into PHCC at the time and then transferred to USF.
Nice.
And then, you know, we've worked together obviously in the past and stuff and obviously
good friends and sort of, I know you've done a lot of different jobs in the golf industry.
Yeah, yeah.
And you've kind of been from maintenance to head pro to general manager to cart guy to
hot dog man like we do all the time.
I think there hasn't been a spot in the golf industry I haven't worked.
Yeah.
And I think that gives me a great perspective, you know, when I talk to other people in the
golf industry is that if it's the maintenance guy or if it's the bartender behind the bar
or if it's the guy behind the shop, I've done all those jobs before and I can kind of relate
to their frustrations and what they're trying to do.
But, you know, golf is one of those things and I think you know it very well, you've
got to wear a lot of hats.
Yeah.
You know, especially as a general manager or head pro, you've got to, you know, fill
in a lot of gaps at times.
It's something that reminds me of that all the time is PGA school, you got your class
A PGA card a couple years ago, I think.
Is that right?
Yeah, two and a half, three years ago now.
Yep.
So basically when you go to PGA school and kind of get your, they've changed it up to
course curriculum but basically you used to go level one, level two, level three.
And you have to like physically go to the sites or whatever but I remember PGA level
one, kind of like one of the old school mentor guys who's kind of leading the lecture.
Yeah.
You know, and you go into this classroom and there's a list, he's got this list of PGA
duties.
Yeah.
And it's like 54 items long.
Yeah.
Golf cart technician, right?
Oh yeah.
Again, how to fix the toilets.
Absolutely.
Hey, maybe if you're a little bit of a teaching pro that's good, you get that concept.
Can you read a P&L statement?
Like there's just so many things.
So many things.
And I think the public doesn't understand how much the golf pro and what he does behind
the scenes.
Yeah.
You know, they just think that we take tee times and give lessons and just sit in the
office.
Right.
Or play.
Oh yeah, they think we're always playing.
It used to be, right?
That's a concept that used to be and I think that's changed a little bit with some of the
corporate ownership of places that they almost don't, they don't want you to play.
No, they want you to stay, you know, tied more to the office, more customer relations
and stuff like that.
Yeah.
And it is kind of a shame because, you know, a lot of people get into this industry because
they are good golfers and their game certainly diminishes as they get into it.
But it is definitely, you know, a job where you've got to wear a lot of hats.
Right.
You know, and people pay for it.
So again, being friends the last 15 years or whatever, I think you've kind of, to me,
maybe found your niche.
Yeah.
Is that a good way to say it?
Absolutely.
And kind of what led to that over the last three, four years that you kind of started
your own company with Swing Theory Golf?
Yeah.
You know, just for me, you know, I think having so many different jobs in the industry, you
kind of figure out what is best for you.
What, you know, when you go home at night, what job do you do that gives you the least
frustration when you come home?
Or what you're good at, by the way.
Yeah, absolutely.
What are you good at, you know?
And I found that my skill set in the world of golf was more teaching.
I'm just, I've tried the general manager, I've tried the head pro and stuff like this.
I'm just not a person that is going to be in the pro shop very much.
I like being out on the range, I like being outdoors.
And I've always been that way.
You know, even in school, I was always the kid that was running to the door for P.E.
or trying to get out or anything like this.
So I'm doing much more.
You did maintenance for Jovita.
Mm-hmm.
I did maintenance for Jovita.
I started with Saddlebrook at 16 as my first job doing maintenance there under Al Schramm,
an old name if you guys know him.
And just, I enjoyed everything about the golf industry, just being out there on the course.
You know, I think there's just something about it, especially early in the morning,
when you get on out there and you see the dew and you see the sunrise come on up,
there's something very special about that.
Even the nighttime when we play the leagues during the summer, very cool,
very fun to see the sun going down.
Absolutely.
Me and you have both played a million rounds of golf.
We're trying to get in, trying to rush in the last four balls.
Oh, yeah, we're getting in and dark, you know.
I can't tell you how many times we've come up Silverado at 18 and it's pitch dark.
That's exactly right, exactly.
So you developed your own company, essentially started your own company.
So tell us, talk to us.
So I developed a company called Swing Theory Golf.
And what it is is basically my teaching platform to help people, you know,
better with the game of golf.
I envision it being, you know, a full-size academy way down the road, you know,
someplace where it has instructors.
We have, you know, mental specialists, nutritionists and stuff like that.
But right now it's just kind of the cornerstone of just getting it to just me, myself,
and getting really understanding of, you know, what works best for teaching people,
you know, my philosophies and all that as I try to build this corner around
and try to build it up.
So not in a good or bad way, but there's many instructors that have like,
almost like you have to do it their way type of thing.
I think some of the better instructors are the ones that kind of work with the player
and adapt our philosophy, our theory to them.
Again, when you're going through PGA school, there's some principles and laws about,
hey, you can't grip the club like this.
You have to put your hands together in some fashion, overlap or interlock,
whatever that is.
So do you have, I guess maybe again, philosophy-wise, is there either,
who do you like to teach best or what, like, do you prefer certain, you know,
age groups, skill sets, skill levels, and it's fine to say, hey,
I like working with juniors, I like working with more skilled players,
like whatever that is, or are you pretty comfortable with all
and you can kind of work with it around all?
Well, with me living in Zephyrhills, you know, our main clientele is going to be
older retirements and beginners.
And to be honest with you, I've really found a great niche with that.
I enjoy working with beginners.
I've worked with some elite players, but there's something about when that
beginner hits that first good shot and they turn around with that,
oh, God, look, you know they're hooked.
They're absolutely hooked and they're going to chase that feeling that they got
there for the rest of their life.
And you know that you've made a call for your industry.
Where, not that I don't like working with elite players, they're great,
but they're going to play the game for the rest of their life anyway.
You know what I mean?
So for me to bring a new person into our industry, into our game,
is really my main philosophy or goal.
The rest is, as you said, it's just principles and rules and laws and setup.
And just, you know, try to get them as comfortable as they can with their setup.
I think it's really the big philosophy for it.
And then, you know, work on the swing as it goes through.
But just making sure that I work with beginners and get them comfortable on the
course and enjoying the game is my main goal.
Yeah, that's great.
And there's so many new people getting into the game.
Yeah.
For the last three or four years, you're probably seeing a little uptick in that.
Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
There's a lot of, you know, a lot of ladies, beginning ladies,
wanting me to introduce them to the game of golf, which I absolutely enjoy.
I mean, I think a lot of pros kind of, you know, steer away from that because
they're not the elite player.
They're not going to have that beautiful swing on the range where everybody's
looking at them.
I think if you can just get away from all that and just understand that you're
working with somebody one-on-one in that little bubble and making them better,
that's all I care about.
Yeah.
I think from that perspective, just kind of that, we'll call it, you know,
middle to senior level golfer, maybe some ladies, maybe some guys.
To me, what I've experienced is there's a lot of people that have either sat in
an office for 30 years, so they sat down.
Yeah.
Right?
So their flexibility isn't what it should be.
Correct.
Might be, you know, a little out of shape.
It might be whatever that is.
Maybe just not have the muscle mass like the elite players have.
So they don't know what they don't know.
Correct.
That's my point, right?
Correct.
They don't know that they're supposed to turn a certain way.
Yeah.
Right?
They're trying to do it with their arms instead of their turn.
Yeah.
So whatever those things are that really end up, like you said, they get that look
on their face when they hit the good shot.
Correct.
You know?
Yeah.
That's what brings them back.
That's what gets you as excited as a teacher.
Absolutely.
I think that's the most excitement you have is when they hit that ball and they
look around to you.
And you just, you know, it's kind of like for me, I've got a five-year-old home when
they open up that first Christmas gift and they're, that whole shock.
I just, I want to have that.
I'm addicted to that.
Right.
To be honest with you.
So.
Do you like teaching driver versus irons versus short game versus putting?
Like, is there something of those four or five or even mentally, you know, course maintenance
or course management?
Like, kind of give us what you feel.
I like honing personally into the short game and into course management.
I think there's, personally for me, I think that's where more of the scoring is going
to happen for the player.
But you know, just as well as I do, everybody wants to hit the long ball or the iron or,
you know, have some understanding of how to hit those.
And just in the lesson today that you had, giving the guy a perspective of hitting up
on the driver.
You know, I think, you know, giving him some kind of understanding of, you know, drivers
are up and irons are down or, you know, major, you know, things like that.
So.
To me, it's like, to me, I've been teaching since, and I got my card in 2003, but probably,
you know, secretly teaching since 98 or whatever, you know, we're just taking money on the
side.
But, so let's say that 25 years, like, it's almost like Groundhog Day every day to me.
Meaning like you just got a new batch of people.
Yeah.
And had it this morning with actually one of our guests, Tom White.
Okay.
And he's like, I'm in here at 8 o'clock talking about some chipping stuff.
And like me and you, and I'll say it this way, and I think you see this when you teach.
What we think is obvious is not obvious.
Correct.
That make sense?
Yes.
So like what we think, hey, you should, when you chip, the club face should go towards
the target.
Yeah.
Tom, who's a very accomplished player, hadn't heard that before.
Yes.
Right?
So I think those are some of the things that are cool to be able to share with people.
Yeah.
And to get them, again, we sometimes, like we blow by it in a lesson.
Yeah.
That make sense?
Yeah.
And you know, it's funny that you say that, I mean, because we'll get to the point of
just like the grip and the stance.
And you'll look at the guy and you're like, wow, this is a lot to take in.
And you're like, this is just that part of it.
That's it.
I mean, we've got this much more to go.
And it really is true.
We do take it for granted that these people are learning it for the first time.
You know, they're really, they're trying to take this all in.
Yeah.
And really there's times where it's 35, 40 minutes just working on grip and setup.
And it's tough because you've got the engine behind you going, I want to go, I want to
teach them more about the swing, but you've got to slow down to their pace.
Yeah.
You know, I think that's the big thing is that you've got to understand that you've
got to teach them at their own pace.
Yeah.
And they have, I mean, the fundamentals of it, like, again, there's a reason why it's
PJ Laws, PJ Fundamentals.
And then they're sort of like, hey, you can do some things differently in this part of
the swing.
Right.
To make different things happen.
Correct.
You don't always have to be exactly, because even now, even now on the PJ Tour, no two
golf swings are the same.
Yeah.
We saw that more 20, 30 years ago with the difference between Jack Nicholas on the Palmer
Gary player Lee Trevino.
Yeah.
Ray Floyd.
Those five golf swings are completely, they look different.
Yeah.
Right.
But Jim Furyk looks different even though he's kind of past his prime now.
But he's literally probably the best ball, or one of the best ball swingers.
One of the best ball swingers of all time.
Yeah.
So he took the eight.
Mr. 58.
I mean, come on.
Right.
So his takeaway looked odd compared to the traditional Adam Scott, Tiger Woods, you know,
the Luke Donald, the guys who just look so precise with it.
Oh, perfect.
Yeah.
But it does come down, okay, you can do some different things, but when you get back down
to impact, these are the things that we're going to make sure of it.
Correct.
So again, if you're a grip, we'll just keep going with the grip.
If your grip is like this, so to me, when I get the guy who's got the grip really strong,
right, that's when you say, that's the hard one to change.
Yeah.
Because most people don't come in this way.
No.
They're usually this way because they're either hockey players, baseball players, whatever.
Yeah.
So those are the ones where, again, as your students, this is kind of what I like to know
from you, but as your students, you're like, okay, yeah, yeah, I got the grip.
Can we talk about the back swing?
No.
We've got to stay on this point right here.
I definitely see that, especially with the grip.
I see so many different grips, and the old saying is, when I was coming through the PGA,
and it's changed now since I started to wear them, is that if you change a grip, you lose
a customer.
Right?
I mean, you'd never, the whole thing, and then at the end of my PGA thing, they said
that if you don't check somebody's grip, you're not worth a darn as an instructor.
So you're kind of like this.
But I really do believe that the first thing you should start with is the grip.
Right?
Just look at the grip, make sure that's correct, and then everything else behind the line.
It's funny you say that, because you'll get the customer, the client, who is so averse
to changing grip.
And I think that to me is sort of the better player, that 10 to 15 handicap who is trying
to get down to eight or seven.
And they're so used to their grip, and they don't want to change.
Right?
The lady, the senior, the starter, the beginner, the junior, you can kind of get down, okay,
hey, this is, you know, we're going to start with the club, we're going to grip it from
here, and then, it's almost the starting, they don't have any bad information.
Correct.
But the guy who's got eight handicap, who's been getting it around the golf course with
the bad grip, and wants to stop hooking it and hitting it low, hey, we've tried all the
other things.
Right?
We've tried all the other tools in the trade.
Correct.
And if you don't, and if you don't start with this one, so we're not always talking about
just grip, but we're just using grip as the example.
Correct, correct.
You know, you've got to, you know, it's tough with good players, single digit handicaps
to change those certain things, because they have a certain belief in their mind.
And it's funny that you'll go to some, you know, they'll tell you what they think's wrong
with their swing, right?
Right.
And then you visualize it and you see it, and then you tell them something that wasn't
even on the map to them, right?
And it's tough for them to kind of come around and say, this is what you need to do.
It's not what you think it is.
Right.
It's this root problem right here.
Right, right.
And that's the toughest, you know, that you get from it, especially with the lower handicaps.
Yeah.
And I talked to you, we talked about that on a podcast a couple months ago where I went
to get a lesson from Tim Poults.
Mm-hmm.
Right?
I thought, there was this going on in my golf swing, and he didn't even come close to that.
It was something totally different.
Right.
And it was back to grip for the record.
It was actually back to grip.
Hey, you're too weak.
Your left hand's too weak, and you're not holding on to the club face, it's going to
move it up and down, and you're weak grip, and the ball's going to go right.
So strengthen your grip up, or literally strengthen the pressure.
And I think that's a sign of a good instructor.
Yeah.
Somebody that's able to see the things that you're not.
Yeah.
And point those out, because obviously you're coming to me or somebody for a reason, right?
Yeah.
And your ideas and your thought process is not correct.
Yeah.
Right?
And then when we kind of see that and we put you on something else.
Yeah.
I think it starts to open up their game and their mind, and they start to look at different
avenues of where their swing is.
Definitely.
So the other group of clients we get is the, well, my buddy's a really good player, and
he told me to do this.
Okay, well, how many lessons has your buddy taught?
Correct.
He might be a two-handicap.
Yeah.
He might be able to get the ball around and do things on, might have a different body
type, might be stronger, faster, different athletic ability than you.
Yeah.
But that's not what the problem is.
Yeah.
So, and then the last component to that is I'm trying not to pick on the husbands.
Okay.
Oh, I know where this one's going.
But the wife who comes in, she's tried a couple rounds, she's tried a couple range sessions,
her husband's telling her something.
Yeah.
And then they come in, okay, well, my husband told me to keep my head down.
Okay.
That might be something at some point in the golf swing, two months from now.
Keep your eye on the ball.
Keep your head still.
I mean, it's the most common advice I ever hear, especially with the ladies that I play
with.
They're being told by their husband.
They're being told by their husband, right, who's played for 30 years, 40 years.
Yeah.
Not well, probably.
Probably not well.
Right.
I wouldn't have gotten a lesson from them either.
But it's their only reference point, right?
Right.
They're trying to get introduced into the game.
Right.
And they look to the only person in the household that's played it.
Yeah.
And they're trying to go with any advice that they have.
Yeah.
And one thing that has crept throughout the whole ages from maybe Bobby Jones all the
way down is keep your eye on the ball.
Yeah.
Right.
And I don't know any sport or anything where I'm keeping my eye on the ball as I'm tossing
it or throwing it or making a motion.
Right.
Always target on it.
Correct.
Yeah.
So getting women to understand that they've got to let their head rotate through the swing
is a huge accomplishment for them.
And to be honest with you, I hear this all the time.
Boy, that's a lot easier on my back.
Right?
Right.
It's an athletic motion.
If I was throwing something, everything's going in that direction.
My eye's not staying on the ball as I'm coming through.
Yeah.
That's right.
And that's one of those things when I get the beginning lady, they kind of go, huh,
really?
And I'm like, that's the worst advice.
Don't tell your husband, but don't do it.
Right?
I'm pretty adamant.
I just tell them, I say, hey, bring your husband next time.
Yeah.
Let me tell him.
And it's funny because what I'll do is I'll say, luckily sometimes I'll have somebody
who's a decent player on the range and I'll say, watch their head.
Right?
Yeah.
That's a good way to do it.
Watch their head.
Watch what they're doing.
And it's kind of like an eureka mode.
I can move my head.
I have that freedom to do that.
Right?
And I think as golfers, I think they think there's more restrictions than there is freedom.
Keep your head still.
Yeah.
That's what they do.
They keep their head still and it limits every body motion that we're trying to do.
Correct.
So that's a real big one.
I touched on a couple things there.
So one of them is to me, I was watching the Instagram video last night, which I do almost
every night.
We kind of go down that rabbit hole sometimes.
Absolutely.
We do it just as much as you guys do.
Absolutely.
But one of the things is like when you're, a great point when you said about like throwing
the baseball, shooting a basketball, you know, when you're shooting a basketball, you would
never look at your hand and the rotation.
No, never.
It's where, it's what am I trying to go to?
It's what's the target?
Baseball, you're looking for the glove or you're looking for the side of the plate,
right?
Which part of the plate we're trying to hit.
Absolutely.
And it's also a very mental image in your head because when you're back here and you're
turning to throw the pitch, you can't look at the plate.
So you have to have that plate in your head.
So where I go that for golf, and this is what I was watching yesterday, was they were talking
to Rory and the other tour player they were talking to, but basically it was Cameron Spett.
Okay.
Great, great putter.
Gotcha.
Arguably one of the better putters out there on tour.
Without a doubt, yeah.
And they were both then, we don't take practice when it's putting.
And the reason they said don't take the practice when putting is the timing that it takes to
take the practice swing, right?
When they get up over the ball, they've lost the target image.
So they really want to be, they get over the ball.
But there's a reason to take a practice swing on a seven iron, because you're trying to
get the feel for it.
Yeah, your low point, right?
Putter, you know how to make a putt.
You know what you're doing.
Somewhat.
Exactly, yeah.
But the point is once you get over the ball, their point was look down at the target.
And we've talked about this, when you bring that target back to the ball, the mind's eye
thing, they want to go.
They want to go as quick as possible.
That's sports news reactionary.
Yeah, you lose that, and that's the baseball thing too.
You lose the target part of it.
And the more that your head, mind can keep the target in your head, you're going to,
what is Tiger's putting?
I think I was just about to say, what is Tiger's whole philosophy?
Putt to the picture, right?
Putt to the target.
You know, he's got that mental picture, and he sees that ball rolling into the hole.
And I've got to be honest, I think that's how he's made most of his putts, is just willing
it and seeing himself doing it.
And there's a small corridor between reality and fantasy, I think, that if you can get
that mental image like you're talking about, your game's going to go up.
Absolutely.
And I see the ball, and I know when I putt it in my best two, I see the ball roll over
the cup in my head, over the front end of the cup.
Okay.
Right?
Like I see it happening.
And then I'm just doing what I'm seeing in my head.
Yeah.
Just like driving, like all the things that we do when we don't get in an accident, like
we're seeing the thing that's happening in front of us, but we're not focused on the
wheel.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
Like we'd never do that.
We'd never look at our hands.
No.
Or the steering wheel.
Crash, right?
So for me, I do a little bit different mental imagery.
What I do is I'm a big YouTuber, so I go and I watch Tiger eating putts.
I watch him putt.
There you go.
And in my mind, when I get over the putt, I'm envisioning myself eating Tiger Woods,
baking that putt.
That's a good one.
You know, do I make it every time?
Am I Tiger Woods?
No.
But I get that vision, and I really love the putt that he made on Torrey Pines at the US
Open.
Yeah.
I know which one you made.
I make it every time, every time in my mind, and I try to conjure that putt.
You know, I try to conjure those feelings.
That's the hard part, where the water's in front of it?
Yeah.
Where he's got the broken leg?
Broken leg, where he gets into the playoff.
Talk about unwilling himself to.
Absolutely.
So I mean, I think that's just the epitome of what Tiger Woods could do.
And I think if you can kind of, at least for me, if you can envision another golfer, maybe
another golfer swing, like Nick Faldo would always envision like Jack Nicklaus's swing
or something like that.
I think if you can just get a mental imagery of somebody else, it just kind of bleeds into
your game.
Yeah.
I may not get all the facts correct on this story, but I know Freddie Couples was being
interviewed back around the mid-90s, cutting a report, and he wins the tournament, hits
the six iron in from like 180 or something to like six feet on the last hole.
And the challenging shot, you know, pressure field or whatever, reported, and it's such
a Freddie Couples kind of personality type of thing.
The reporter says, hey, Freddie, how'd you pull that off?
How'd you hit that six iron?
Because do you know how many six irons I've hit on the range?
All I did was think, just like you're saying about what Tiger, all I did was think about
all the 10,000 good six irons that I've hit in my life.
That's what I was thinking about.
I wasn't thinking about the bunker left, the water right, the fact that this is, if I hit
this in close, I'm going to win this event.
None of that factored in.
I just factored in, hey, I'm going to hit a six iron.
I've hit 10,000 of these.
Let me recall those facts and go do it.
And to our listeners, to our viewers, that mental imagery, we can't stress it enough.
Absolutely.
Because what do our people think?
Oh my gosh, the water left, all the bunker left.
I hope I'm stalling.
I hope I'm on combat.
People behind me.
Right.
Oh, yeah.
I don't want to hurry.
And the ladies, I feel bad for the ladies.
They always feel like they're pushed.
And they're pushed by guys who are behind the work any better.
They're terrible.
You know, they're just knocking and dumping it just as bad as they are, right?
Yeah.
But yeah, definitely, if you can get that mental imagery, it just, it quiets the mind.
You know, you stop thinking about the problems.
Especially for me, when I get on to 16 at Silverado, I say to myself, okay, I've got,
what is it, six more good swings, right, and a couple of putts.
And all I think about is those swings.
I don't think about the problems or the troubles.
I just think you need to hit these six swings good, right?
You need to hit them as good as you can.
Yeah.
Right?
And if I just focus on that, I usually have a good last two holds or something like that.
Yeah.
And going back to your lesson and the people you bring out there, I think that's really
important because if you bring the 10 to 15 handicapper out on number 16, 16, the par
four dog wig right.
Yeah.
Very simple, just a straight dog wig right.
Typically, that 10 handicapper who's trying to get to eight or seven will tell us when
we're on the tee box, okay, what's your thought?
What are you trying to do here?
Right.
Well, I'm trying to go over the trees and try to cut the trees and go, why, why, why
don't you just go for the 150 yard watcher, right?
Exactly.
There's a huge fairway in the middle.
Your chance of percentage of carrying those trees is minimal at best.
Yeah.
There's a reason you're a 12 or a 16 or whatever.
And you know, we're not picking on people.
No.
We're just trying to show you how you get to these three, four, two handicap levels.
You don't factor those in.
You just hit, hey, I'm really good from 150, 160.
Let me hit there.
Let me take three wood instead of driver.
And we talked about that.
You know, if you took a less club and really you went to the range and you just wore out
the 150 yard marker, I think your handicapper just skyrocketed.
You know, but you know, definitely, you know, that's where that course management comes
in.
Making sure that, you know, instead of taking this 12 degrees over here, let's make it,
you know, 13 degrees over here and get into the fairway.
Right.
And, you know, especially when I read, you know, books on like strokes gained and stuff,
the higher the handicap, the more you should aim to the left fairway because they slice.
Right.
And they find that, you know, as you statistically go more left, you're going to find the fairway,
more fairways, more greens.
So knowing what your miss is and understanding that and playing to it is what you want to
do.
And even in that regard, like as instructors, you would tell the person who keeps slicing
it to not aim more left.
Correct?
Correct.
Right.
That's how we're going to fix it on the range.
Correct.
But when you're playing golf and you're doing a course management lesson, hey, you are who
you are.
Correct.
You dance with the girl you brought.
Right.
That was in the college.
Absolutely.
Even if she's ugly, you're dancing with the girl you got.
I mean, whatever you have that day.
Yeah.
And that's what these guys on tour do.
Yeah.
My dad, my dad always told me, go with the devil and you're not.
Go with the devil.
Go with the devil, you know.
Yeah.
When you're out there, and we talked about this, is that you don't want to play golf
swing.
You want to play golf.
Right?
And if you go on out there and you're hitting a 30-yard cut, just accept it for the day.
It could be the wind conditions.
It could be a lot of factors.
But play your shot.
Play what's comfortable to you and don't go trying to take risks that you really don't
need to take.
Right.
Bring in double bogeys and triple bogeys into play when it could just be a bogey.
Yeah.
Again, the same thing.
You've got a tree that you've got to cover or something.
And if you don't have the shot, you don't have the shot.
Yeah.
Chip it out.
Make five.
Make bogey.
Go live to play another day.
You might make a 30-foot cut.
Yes.
Give yourself a chance at it.
Yeah.
But if you're out in the woods on your fourth shot and trying to get on the green one, you're
probably making double or triple at that point.
Right?
Yep.
Absolutely.
What's kind of the dream for some or the dream place that you'd like to play or maybe
you've already filled your dream, maybe you've already played Augusta that I don't know about
or something?
No.
I mean, I think everybody would love to play Augusta or like con ballad.
Okay.
Something like that.
Yeah.
I think my foursome would be very, very simple.
I think it'd be a threesome, to be honest with you.
I think it would just be my grandpa and my dad and me.
Oh, nice.
You know, you could go play with all the great golfers and all that stuff.
But at the end of the day, I really want to play with people I know.
Yeah.
I want to really just get into a conversation with and enjoy the whole 18 and not try to
run somebody or figure it out.
Yeah.
Would I love to play with Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus and all those guys?
Yes.
I'd be nervous, by the way.
I'd be totally nervous, right?
I'd feel much more comfortable playing with my own, you know, my grandpa and my dad.
Yeah.
But if I had my dream, it would be those two.
Yeah.
Have you been to tour events or like is there something that you like to like maybe tell
the audience, like do you like to go to the range part of the tour event and watch them
hit the ball?
Absolutely.
Or like how do you take in the tour experience?
So for me, I love, I went to Doral.
Okay.
Had a great experience there.
I got inside the ropes and followed the guys around, which was absolutely great.
I followed, I want to say, I'm trying to remember the guy's name.
I'll come back to it.
But got to go inside the ropes and all that good stuff.
It was a great experience.
But what I really enjoyed when I got there was getting to the practice putting green
and watching how much those guys practice on the putting green.
And to be honest with you, from, you know, here to the screen, they're just thinking
putts routinely.
I mean, I watched Jordan speak, he must have made 40 putts with one hand on the phone.
And I'm like, this guy's amazing, you know?
But just to see those guys and how they practice and how they interact and the mental coaches
that are coming up and talking to them, I just find it amazing and it's such a buzz.
You know, it really is.
It's a buzz around the whole area.
Yeah.
That's a cool thing to even bring back to your students is kind of explain, you know,
we, kiddingly, you saw me in here teaching this morning.
Like, you give a student something to work on and you're like, okay, and my tagline is,
okay, 499 more.
Yeah.
You know, go do it 500 times.
Yeah.
Just that one piece.
Yeah.
Because again, our exposure, the fact that we're lucky enough, blessed enough to be able
to go to tour events and be able to see what these guys do and have friends who are not
tour players, but maybe tour, but Keith.
Keith, yeah.
Keith Kuller.
He's qualified for the senior open a couple times.
And been chapter of the year player multiple times.
Yeah.
So you get to these levels is my point.
And you see what good, consistent players do.
And they don't walk from the parking lot to the first tee.
There's none of that.
With a red bull in their hands.
Yeah, there's none of that.
And you know, I'm not even trying to be negative.
It's just, again, kind of you put in what you're going to get.
Correct.
You know, so if you're going to continually put in good practice sessions, your game's
going to improve.
Absolutely.
But if you, you know, not fearful.
Because fearful is a little term that we hear sometimes in golf, like that's why golfers
don't take lessons.
Yeah.
Right?
Because they don't want the throw to screw them up.
Yeah, they don't trust them with their swing or they're worried that they're going to go
down a rabbit hole and get worse than what they are before they get better.
And I think you've got to understand that the learning process is that you are going
to fail before you succeed.
And I think that's the fear that you talk about is that people are like, I don't want
to address what I've already learned to go forward.
I'll just keep what I have.
And that's why I think they kind of shy away from instructors.
So again, again, more YouTube rabbit hole.
Yeah.
I've seen some clips of Michael Jordan.
I've seen some clips of Kobe really recently.
Basically, the kind of summary is every day they're going to fail.
They're going to fail every, they're not going to make 20 out of 20.
Yeah.
Right?
They're going to fail 50% of the time making shots.
They're going to fail 20% of the time on a free throw line, but they're also going to
make 80%.
Correct.
They're also going to make 60%.
They're also going to make 70%.
When they, in the game, when they need the shot, they're not fearing failure.
All they're thinking about, and Tom Brady, you go down the list of the best players.
The greats, the greats.
And I think their way of embracing failure is what makes them successful.
They know they're going to do it.
They know that, you know, there's a point as an athlete, you're going to fail at some
point, but you have to, you know, at some point get over that mental hurdle and just
do it.
And the more you get rid of those thoughts, it just kind of, you get into the zone.
Yeah.
You know, just get into that zone and you quit worrying about all the mental chatter
in your mind.
So again, put the work in, right?
If you have the 10,000 six-ironers like Freddie Couples had, if you have all the pucks that
the Tigers made since he was two years old, which that's what he's calling back on, on
Torrey Pines on number 18.
Absolutely.
Right?
They don't think the negative way.
No.
That is why they get to where they get to, you know.
Even, you know, you and I, playing at our skill level, we probably don't, because we
don't put the practice, I'm sorry, I don't put the practice in.
No, I mean, we, you know.
Pines, kids, parents, all the stuff.
Good stuff.
Yeah.
So we were better 10 years ago, 20 years ago, because we had the ability at the time
trying to do it.
Well, it's funny that you say that, because we talked about Keith Coles and it's just
an old joke that he'd always tell me.
He says, the older I get, the better I was.
Yeah.
You know?
So it really is one of those things, you know, especially when you get into the golf
industry.
We all get into it because we love golf.
We play well at it.
We are good or successful at it.
And then when you get into it, it just kind of goes down.
Yeah.
Absolutely.
But you're absolutely right.
The more time that you can dedicate to it, you're going to see the results out there.
Okay.
You know, it just takes time.
Yeah.
So I'm a big fan of, if you're going to go practice putting, which is the first thing,
like literally getting yourself up off the couch, okay, I'm going to go practice putting
for a time frame, a number of putts, whatever that is.
Yeah.
Right?
Don't go hit 20 footers.
No.
Why would, you know, you want the positive reinforcement of the ball going in the cup.
Right.
So I would literally sit there at college, after college, three to five footers, just
trying to make as many as I could.
Yeah.
You know, 48 out of 50, 60 out of 100, whatever the number was.
Yeah.
But I didn't want to put 15 footers because I know the make percentage on tour is roughly
maybe 20%.
Yeah.
Maybe.
Yeah.
Hit that.
Right.
Yeah.
For 15 footers.
But again, when you go tomorrow morning when I'm at work and I see you guys warming up.
Yeah, I understand getting an idea of feel for distance.
I don't want to start with three footers.
I don't want that ball with green.
I want to start getting confidence.
I want to see the ball going into the hole.
Yeah.
I think there's a reason why when you go buy a putty mat, it's not 20 feet.
There you go.
It's eight feet.
Right?
So, you know, I think if you can, you know, work in that three to four foot section around
the hole more than anything, even just going to get a lag feel.
Yeah.
If you could just work on that, I think you'd see a big reduction in the numbers, especially
on the green.
Yeah.
So, when you play in a tournament and you go to the range to warm up, what's the first
club you're pulling up to warm up with?
Personally, for me, I like to grab the old wedge and I like to hit small little shots.
I like to feel just tiny little shots and then it's to the putter.
You know, I like to do a little what I call circle of depth where it's about three feet
around.
I put about eight balls down, putt there.
Right.
I don't want to see the ball going in the hole.
Right.
I don't, I'm not worried about the stroke.
I'm not worried about it.
I just want to visually see the ball going in the hole so I can recall that when I get
there out there on the course.
Yeah.
You know, so I can go, ah, that's what I want to see.
Point being that we're not taking the four iron out to the range first.
Correct.
You know, same thing.
Like, I want to see nice wedge shots coming off the club.
I want to get my body loosened, but I want to see good positivity in my head.
Correct.
Titching wedge, nine iron, eight iron, but beat those clubs up.
Absolutely.
You know, and then, yeah, I'm going to pull driver out.
Yeah, I'm going to pull driver out because I want to feel what's going to be on the first
hole.
You typically hit the driver on the first hole.
So I've got to, maybe have that mental call back from 15 minutes later when I'm on the
first tee box.
Yeah.
And if I just hit two good drivers, you know, just, you know, that recover type thing.
So that's great, man.
Do you, let the listeners know how we get in touch with you and all that type of stuff?
Yeah, so I'm at swingtheorygolf.com.
Okay.
You can go to my website or you can go to Pick Time.
Okay.
I think we have some times here at One Stop Golf Shop.
There you go.
If you want to get ahold of me here.
Awesome.
You know, but I love working with beginners.
Don't mind working with elites.
Yeah.
But I'm really more of a beginner.
I love working with short game.
Yeah.
And I love just, you know, helping them out.
That's good, man.
Well, hey, good to know you better.
Thank you.
I certainly appreciate it.
Absolutely.
Thank you so much.
We really appreciate it.
Yeah.
Thank you, listeners.
I'm going to see you guys on the next podcast, but I think this is a good beginning.
Yeah, and you're next.
Yes, sir.
Exactly.
A lot of pressure.
All right.
Thanks, guys.
Yes, sir.
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