Sit back and get ready to take off with Dynamic Golf.
Golf listeners, with me today is my fellow co-host, Sean Klotz.
I am TMac, better known as Tim McElvanagh.
Sean, I thought it'd be a great way to kind of turn the dime a little bit and interview
you today.
So tell us a little bit about yourself before we begin because I've got some really good
questions for you today.
Okay.
All right.
Well, first of all, definitely, hello to our listeners, TMac.
I'm excited about some of the traction we're doing with some of the podcasts.
We've been getting some good feedback up here in the Oakley, Boston, Watertown area.
I know some people are listening down in Florida still too, which is great.
It's funny, TMac, because I've been trying to get ready for this for the last couple
of days.
It's the most nervous one because talking about yourself and explaining what you do
and how you get there.
But no, I just thought it'd be a good way to sort of... My life story, your life story,
TMac, kind of like our friends that are in the golf industry, it's going to be sort of
emblematic of what happens when you get into the golf industry.
So even though we might be talking about some personal things, all the golf pro brethren
and sisterhood that we have, the friends that get into this business, no matter what part
of the business, I think we just have challenges because we don't work nine to five.
That's not our 40 hour, nine to five deal.
Correct.
Yep.
Your kids are... How old are they now?
Like six and four or something?
I've got a five and a two year old.
You know what it's like.
It's tough to have a home life and run leagues or run things in the evening time when most
golfers want to golf.
So it's tough on the home life for sure, yeah.
When we work together at Silverado, we would just kind of divvy up the leagues.
You got three nights of leagues and you're getting home around 10 or 11 o'clock at night.
It's challenging on the family life.
It really is.
It becomes a... Unfortunately, I mean, might as well just start off there.
I got divorced in 2023, kind of separated in 2021.
I don't want to make it too, too dramatic, but it's a cause and effect part of the relationship
of marriage when you are in this industry.
Your hours, like we said, we're not nine to five people.
We're very rarely home on weekends.
Usually never home on the weekends, never home on holidays.
Those are the days that are busy days.
Yeah.
Oh, absolutely.
That's another good point, T-Mac.
When you're on vacation, like some people go on summer vacation.
Well, we can in Florida, we can kind of take that one or two week break in the summer,
but there's no December, Christmas vacation because you're working because there's more
people there.
Correct.
There's the July 4th.
What do we do?
We run a flag day tournament for the people that want to get to the golf course.
Thanksgiving, you're doing... Thanksgiving's tricky.
Sometimes we do a Turkey Day shootout or you still got to go in in the morning because
there's still people playing golf in the morning.
It was definitely, as I prepared for this, it was definitely a cause of the divorce.
This being flat out honest with people.
The thing about it is too, and you're starting to see this already with your girls, it affects
your relationship with your kids too.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
I think that's why I went into the instruction side of it and shied away from being head
pro, general manager, assistant pro.
One, I don't think that fits me very well, but two, being an instructor, I was able to
kind of make my own hours, do my own thing.
That's huge when you have little ones.
I'm sure that was extremely tough for you.
You went through so many golf courses and we're going to touch on that as well.
They're expecting you to be there.
It's kind of like as Scott said, once you walk through the door, people don't want to
hear it.
They want to know that you're there to serve them.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
You have to be on all the time.
Start with that.
When you walk out of your car, you're on.
There's no foul mood.
I love Scott's story about how he actually told a member what he was really feeling when
he was going through one of his days.
His boss, his director of golf, kind of pulled him aside and said, hey, they don't care.
They don't care.
It's not that members don't care.
It's just that, again, our job is to kind of create the experience for them, whether
you're at a public or a private facility.
You're just trying to allow them to get away from their lives for four to five hours.
You're always on.
Correct.
Even the other part of this thing too, as I again, I was prepared for this.
We have to be 100% knowledgeable with no fallacies.
When somebody comes to us for a ruling, we have to know it or be able to have access
to it.
Our judgment, we can't show favoritism for one member or one golfer or one person versus
another.
Employees, same thing.
To run 35 staff members, you have to be the decision maker.
You got to be part friend, part manager, part kind of confidant.
There's so many roles that we have throughout the day.
I'm not whining when I talk about this stuff, TMAC.
I'm not whining.
It's really what I love because I love the diversity of the job.
It does weigh on you.
When you get back in the car and go home, that decompression time is invaluable to get
so you don't bring it home.
Absolutely.
You got to have an outlet.
For most of us, it's playing golf, getting on out there and playing a little bit, getting
that stress reliever on out there.
It's something that you've got to find your way to kind of relax and decompress.
Also you've got to manage to find time to spend with your family and do the things that
they want to do as well.
Not everybody is as interested in golf and everybody's family as we are.
I'm coming to find that out real quick.
There's other things that we have to do and it's a juggling act.
My hat's off to people like your general manager Scott Johnson or your head pro Scott Johnson
who's able to juggle all these balls in the air and has a smile on his face when he talks
to your members or clients.
That's huge.
That's big time.
That's all-star kind of stuff.
I don't think it can be said enough.
That's what we've done.
I've been a – maybe going to the history part of it a little bit.
I became a PGA member in 2003.
Now over 20 years of being a PGA member, we don't have to go back to the cradle but
basically started playing golf when I was 13 years old.
Dad was a huge influence in that.
I'll talk about him a little bit more.
My uncle Jimmy was a huge influence.
My mom's brother, he was a better golfer than my dad.
He was the one who maybe gave me the instructions at the beginning.
The first set of old Hogan apexes, the old heavy stuff.
We would never let our juniors hit now.
Yeah.
It'd be a John Daly swing for those kids then.
Yep.
Wilson Staff, Persimmon Driver, which was smaller than any three that's on the market
currently.
Jimmy was the one who got me going.
My dad was the one who would drop me off every morning, every – pick me up every night.
Mom would have the food ready for you.
Kind of the classic American sort of upbringing.
My brother was five years older.
I tagged along with him whether he liked it a lot or not.
Whether he liked it or not to everything, every sporting event, baseball, basketball,
golf with the three main.
In the full circle of life, that's how I met Scott Johnson, which is the ironic part
of me being up here in Boston now.
But 13 years old playing and kind of having to make that decision between golf and baseball.
I've said it before, I wanted all the glory.
I just got frustrated pitching and having kids making errors.
I may not have been the best pitcher ever, but at least we could kind of get the ball
in the strike zone and with some speed and a little curve.
I just saw that happen early from 10 to 13.
I'm like, uh-oh, I need to find something where I can do –
It was always that kid in the right field that couldn't catch the ball.
You know what I mean?
It drove me nuts.
I know what you're saying.
Is that about the time that you started at that age starting to think maybe I can turn
what I love into a profession?
Did you think maybe at this age instead of being a professional baseball player, maybe
being a professional golfer might be an avenue for it?
Did you think about that at this age or was that a little bit later on down the road?
Yeah, I think it was more of the college experience.
So high school up here in Massachusetts, went to Peabody High School, kind of a good state
player we'll call it, kind of went to states as an individual.
When you realize even at that point you're like, okay, there's a difference between
me, maybe the top 20 in the state versus the top five in the state.
Those kids are going to Florida, Texas, Duke, those kids are good.
But it was good enough to go to University of Tampa, play college golf.
I mean, part of that story is I went my freshman year and I didn't make the team and I probably
didn't deserve to make the team.
I was kind of 13th out of 12 and I was not happy with it at the time, but I'm now 1500
miles away from my home and in college and what am I doing type of thing.
So it's one of those checkpoint moments in your life where you say, okay, well, either
you get better or you give it up and do something else.
Came back, worked hard during my freshman year up here in Massachusetts and literally
went to see Scott Johnson when he was at Tedesco and got lessons from him when I was 18, 19.
He would have been 24, 25 and worked hard that summer, came back and went to University
of Tampa and literally made the team.
This is a good life lesson, made the team my sophomore year, but I wasn't picked.
I was seventh out of 12, but there was kids that had promised scholarships who got the
positions instead of me.
I mean, that was another huge like gut body blow type of thing.
Like what now?
What are you doing?
Now you're two years into your college career and you're still not playing.
I'm playing every day in Florida and Tampa and again, it was the best place to be and
it was good that you didn't go home and Salko or whatever.
You just kept trying to get better.
I'm sure you see your scoring average probably went down tremendously in that two year period
right there.
What were some of the things at that point that you're really trying to focus on?
Was it more the short game or was it more the golf swing itself you think?
So like our least favorite term when somebody comes to us for a golf lesson is they want
to be more consistent, right?
I was trying to learn how to score so I could shoot 76, but I could shoot 82 at the same
point and the sort of rhyme or reason, the mental part of it, the how do you keep it
together when you do make a double?
How do you make three or four birdies in a round to offset the one or two doubles?
That's where I had to get to.
So it was a little bit of a mental act.
Yes, you're always working on physical things and again, kind of working on golf swing,
always chipping and putting love still to this day, to this moment.
One of my favorite, you mentioned it earlier, like therapies is for me to put on headphones
back in the day they were like Walkman type of stuff.
Listen to Spotify, listen to iHeartRadio, listen to our podcast.
Dynamic Golf.
Exactly, just a little plug.
Listen to music and go chip for three hours and just love it.
It's just about that being by yourself, working on your game, trying different things.
I think there's a huge part of experimentation that we kind of forget when we're learning
the game of golf, we're so adamant about the mechanics of it, we forget about the imagination
part.
Correct, yes.
You hear Tiger talk all the time about, you hear Phil talk about all the time.
There's a reason their short game is so amazing because they were just trying shots and seeing
what happened and did it.
They weren't so by the book of ball has to be here, face has to be here, weight has to
be here.
You can do it different ways and you can groove anything.
That's another thing to say, you can groove anything.
Yes.
Do it in bad.
Even in incorrect motion, I was going to say you can even groove that too.
You're persistent and again kind of life lesson.
You don't sometimes realize as you're going through it when you're 20 you're just more
frustrated why am I not making this team when I just beat five kids but somehow I'm not
going to end up making the team.
So you go back, you do your work again your sophomore year, you go see Scott Johnson again,
keep working on stuff and then by the time junior year it's a little bit like when you
see the I think it's like those college athletes that go to Duke or go to Texas for basketball.
They're not ready.
They need more than one year of basketball but they're lottery picks in the NBA so they
just throw them into the NBA and they're not ready yet.
I wasn't ready yet.
I needed to keep doing the work to get better, improve and get the scores to be more 72,
74, 76, 72, 74, like get in more of that consistency terminology rather than having to blow up
holes and coach season 82 he's not going to put you in because he knows in a tournament
if you have that capability but if he sees you consistently shooting between 72 and 76,
okay we trust this kid.
Yeah absolutely.
So at that point it comes down to do you want to win or is it just putting your favorites
out there?
The Olympic team right?
What's that?
The basketball Olympic team up here in Boston, Jason Tatum not playing in the gold medal
game or in the basketball part of the Olympics was really not well received up here because
Coach Kerr he's got confidence and trust in Curry and LeBron and Durant so Tatum doesn't
get into two games.
I was going to kind of point towards Zach Johnson a little bit with the Ryder Cup.
I think part of being a coach is understanding and putting that pride aside and saying listen
I've got to put the best player out there.
Just my little plug on that though.
No, I think that's great.
So anyways got through two years of University of Tampa, played some college golf, really
enjoyed it.
The experience was great.
Our team was not as good as it was when Scott was there but we were very good.
We just weren't like national championship worthy but I'd say the average the number
one guy probably shot between 70 and 73 and you know the number six guy would probably
be like a 76 or below.
So it was a good group of kids, a good group of guys and just that experience of playing
golf every single day with good players makes you a better player.
Just out of curiosity what course did you guys, what was the home course for University
of Tampa at the time?
Yeah, Rogers Park.
Okay.
Unicipal golf course in Tampa with a ton of history to it but that's where we played
and then we actually played our tournaments at Wentworth which was a new course at that
time, really difficult golf course, very challenging.
I've talked about it before on the podcast but one of the tournaments that we hosted
at Wentworth I shot 101.73 same day and that's just, it's the thing of if you're not hitting
it good how do you let the round get away from you and mentally and then also how do
you bring it back within a literally half an hour time span where you got to go back
out there and figure out something with duct tape and Elmer's glue or whatever to get your
golf swing to work where you can get the ball around.
Absolutely because you know you're mentally fragile at that time and it's just, it's like
anybody's ever told me you're one swing away from thinking you can win the Ryder Cup and
you're one swing away from wanting to quit the game.
You know so you're very mentally fragile after a round like that, you know you've got to
go out there and perform again.
It's tough you know and I think if I know you with all the gut checks that you had it
was a gut check and you went out there and you proved your test if I had to make a guess.
Yeah you change your definition insanity type of stuff, you can't keep hitting driver on
every hole.
The course is narrow, let's hit a three wood or five wood off the tee, let's get the ball
in the center of the fairway.
Very rarely do things happen poorly from the center of the fairway.
Right, let's almost hit it to the 150 marker.
You know you're a good iron player from 150.
Let's start hitting center of greens, let's stop putting so much pressure on your short
game like it just kind of all snowballs and if you do it the correct way so for the players
as the you know people that are listening now sometimes we hear about as we're in the
shop you know guy will go out and shoot 50, 38 or sometimes it's the opposite where they
get the round of the life going shooting 36 on the front and then they shoot 48 on the
back because they start thinking about the process and forget about all the things that
got them into that.
Absolutely.
You know into the good runs and all so it can work both ways but yeah.
And wouldn't you say from the mental side of that wouldn't it seem like at least for
me it always seems like the game is being played at slower speed like when I'm playing
bad I feel like I'm playing it fast forward and when I'm playing good and hitting fairways
hitting you know greens it's a very boring kind of you know slow process you know everything's
very there in front of me but it seems like when I start playing bad and maybe for you
too everything just feels like it's you know like you just got thrown into the NFL and
you're the running back you know what I mean.
It's quick yeah.
I mean the heart one of the hardest parts of our sport is that we're active in 18 whole
round for I think around one minute one minute and 20 seconds is what we're active for because
the golf swing is you know 1.4 1.6 seconds long.
So during this four hour process or sometimes five hour process how are we keeping our mind
engaged and I think Scottie Scheffler currently is the best at this in the world.
Tiger at his peak was the best at it you know Jack Nichols at his peak was the best at it
like the guys who can compartmentalize.
Scottie Scheffler got arrested on a Friday and he goes out and shoots 66 5 under.
Yeah kidding me.
Yeah.
He's in jail four hours before.
Yeah that's that's mental fortitude right there without a doubt.
I mean wow.
To me that was the round of the year.
People keep talking about some of the other you know great rounds and the last day of
the shot shot flea shooting the great round to win the British like I mean yes is great
round I just think that one stuck out to me as the golf pro guy like how do you compartmentalize
being in jail two hours before now you're going to go play a PGA Tour event but you
know in any event what Scheffler said is and you hear this a lot of times from athletes
in general.
Once they get in the lines everything else goes away.
You know, they let their their inner athlete as you've said just kind of take over and they're on autopilot
You know that that slow feeling everything's just kind of coming. It's not a lot of
Active thought there's a lot of thought going on. It's just not a lot of active thought, right?
Yeah, so
So as you move through your golf career and moved into more of your professional career
How did you turn this this kind of you know hobby this love for it?
And how did you say listen, I want to turn this into a passion where it's a career of mine
Yeah, I think so. Yeah going back to like the college colleges when I started realizing maybe okay
Not good enough to play PGA Tour, but what else could I do with the game?
so after college my my year after I got out I
Went back to Tampa because I was definitely considering staying up in Massachusetts and that's where I was from and whatever and I I met
a teacher his name is Billy London, and I've got like a list of
Just influential people in my life and and and Billy's on there
It's funny to see that because again. I was thinking about this like I remember these people like
Lyman Done was a coach that I had or a teacher at Thompson Country Club
I'm 13 years old Bill Flynn is the owner great PGA member Lyman
Done is a teaching pro at the place Rick Quinn was a
Assistant pro when I was like 16 17 Dave Hart was an assistant pro when I was 16 17
My point is like I don't know if I can remember my eighth grade teacher
but I can tell you the golf pros that have
influenced the development of who I am and the things that I teach to this day and
They shouldn't be forgotten like these guys are just mentors that yeah that they're just doing their daily work, which is what we do now
Mm-hmm in every day right yeah, we've picked up the torch that they they've they've handed us right
So so Billy London was the guy after University of Tampa came down 23 years old met him at Rocky Point
That's where I met him okay another public public course right
I'm hitting balls that range at Rocky Point. You couldn't hit more than six iron. It was like a
180 length baby okay, I'm hit balls, and I mean he sees me over there
He's teaching whatever he comes over to me one day. We start talking
Literally 13 years later. He's still my coach so 36 years old. I've been with him. I was with him for 13 years
He
Charged me at the beginning meeting the first year after that he never charged me for 12 years in a row
Wow take him up dinner or lunch or whatever
Help out with you know he might need some gas money or whatever
And he was just a great guy, but he was trying to pay it forward because he had been taught by a
guy named Johnny Farrell in New Jersey when Billy was
13 15 years old Johnny Farrell like I think I think the claim to fame is I don't know if he won the US Open
But he was like a top
Pro in that Jersey New York area, but if somebody googles Johnny Farrell
They're gonna find out that Johnny Farrell had an amazing career and Johnny Farrell taught Billy London
And now I meet Billy London when he's like 60 years old 55 years old and now Billy London's teaching me when I'm 23
Like the the circle of life type of thing is amazing to me
So Billy teaches me I was just gonna say that yeah, he won the 1928 US Open so
Yes, he won the 1928 US Open and he is a world golf Hall of Famer
So he's just not some hey, this is a pro down the road. This is
Yeah, that's that's pretty stout stuff. So go right ahead. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I just
Know that and I'm like, holy cow. That's that's a wonderful lineage to have
It's just funny how the and that the other part of this is that it doesn't change the the techniques the
Keep your hands in front of the ball at impact like the make sure your weight shifts to your left side
That didn't change in the last now hundred years. We're going 28 to 24
I mean it just gets passed down. It's you know, like I don't want to get too much like it's not biblical
But Bible stuff was taught was kind of taught from from oral history
Down through the you know, I'm saying so yeah same stuff like there wasn't YouTube in 1928
It wasn't podcast in 1936 like no it was taught through either books or the or just generation to generation
So Billy was an amazing impact on my career and the way that I've told this before
The way that he taught me how to teach was he gave me a left-handed golf club and said, okay
I'm gonna teach you like what are you doing? He's like, you don't know anything. You don't know what you're doing left-handed
You know everything right-handed
So we need to teach you how to teach somebody from the perspective of they don't know which end of the club doll
Yeah, they don't know which which hand to put on top
They don't know which foot to put in front like and that was a great lesson for me that I still use to the day like
You got to take that beginner golfer. I just had a beginner yesterday brand new golfer guy 35 years old pretty athletic soccer player
one of the members, you know son-in-law's
And it's just funny teaching somebody from brand new
Okay, you know put your your right-handed golf. Okay. Well, we're gonna place your left hand on the club and they look at you
Like what do you mean? Oh, yeah, I got to back up
I got to show them which finger to start the shaft in so they can put their left hand correctly on the club
Yeah, I mean you got to get down to the the basics of just putting the club right across the right knuckles and then closing fingers
You know, I've gone to that and and you know, they're like what you just don't grab the club
Like you you would a baseball bat or anything else or a hockey stick. I'm like, no, there's a there's a certain way
So you're absolutely right. You got to be fine-tuned
Yeah, so he was he was just such a good influence and taught me
You've seen me do this before too like swinging one-handed left-handed
You know making contact with the ball it really shows you to use your front side of your body
Your whole control of your swing should be with your your lead arm
Not your not your trail arm
And and that's something again, like I I'm learning this when I'm 24-24
Like I i'm learning this when i'm 24-25 after playing college golf after having a one handicap for five years
Learning this at this point and it's it's helped me in my golf swing to this day now
um
You know, he just he was just such a good
He got ornery in his old age those we all do type of thing, you know, but
And I would I would do and I would say this to anybody who ever wants to get in this profession
One of the things I did the most was watch him teach
Watch him teach others
right
We do
Absolutely
I can go on a rant here, but we do such a poor job of of um
assistant pros or pga of america
Of how do you teach somebody how to teach? Yes
right like
It's a learned art. It's something you have to do repetitively
You're a better teacher than you were two years ago. You're a better teacher than you were when you worked with me five years ago
So because you've taught a lot in the last two years. Yes
Well, I think the and for a little plug for you is that and and you you come up to a good point
No, most of the assistants are stuck in the in there
But you would always find some time to either most of the time not sean because sean was he was usually behind tim poults
Usually, you know listen to him
But you were very kind and courteous with your time to take me on out there and say hey listen
I'm gonna you know, give a lesson or you know, I want you to observe me and you did that for a good
You know six to eight months when I first got there and and you know
You did a great job of paying it forward there, too
So don't don't ever sell yourself short on that partner now
But the difference to you mac is you wanted to learn that's the difference like you were you were so curious about club repair
You taught yourself club repair. You know, you want to learn how to become a better teacher and uh, and we always said it like
Well, we don't know everything but we can learn from each other
So I teach stuff that you've taught me and you were teaching to other people and then you teach stuff that I taught you
And I taught other people when you're watching. Yeah
That's that's how you become better at it. It really is so no it's and
Maybe to one of our ultimate points of this podcast
One of the reasons why I still am a golf pro is because of teaching like that's probably one of the pinnacle
Paramount type of things that I got into the game
I didn't know that maybe that's I got into the game for but as I got into the career part of it the business side the
The um, okay, you're going to be the general manager. So you're in charge of the budget
Profit and loss statements reading a spread balance spreadsheet
managing people
Yeah, those are all the things that golfers want to get into right shaw
How do you golf cart fleet management rules of golf like
Exciting stuff right there. Oh my gosh when I went for level one pga. They do it a little differently
Now you got three levels still but level one pga
You know you walk into your first seminar and there is a board
Out front and it says pga members are responsible for this and there is 29 different things
That the pga number is responsible for
And it still is probably a small list
You know, it's as as like we talk about with scott my brother
Um, who's a pga number since he's got over 25 years in the game
Um just our different friends, uh, keith keith, uh colzer. Yep, jeff leonard
The they're on the ground these guys on the ground doing the work daily. Yep. Yep to promote the game
Absolutely, you know, I guess the big thing for me is that when I got into the pga I was like why am I learning about fleet?
You know how much space that the golf carts need when they're stored i'm like
What is that going to help me with but?
Yeah, you realize it all interconnects and it all kind of goes together, but you're right
I mean the thing that gets us into this game is is not spreadsheets. It's not rules
It's we we do enjoy that, you know at a certain level
But the thing that we enjoy is watching somebody hit that ball for the first time
And you see that shot go to their heart and they look at you like just bewilderment like oh my god
I can do this and you're like i'm done for the day. That is that is all I need
That is my high for the day. I am good
Let's I could probably go into the counter and do eight hours and that would be tough for me
I will say too that uh
That part of what we do is and you you know for maybe the younger listeners out there the guys want to get and girls
But definitely please the girls that want to get into the pga program or whatever
You may not know it's just like college like you may not be able to declare your major
Meaning you may not know exactly what you want to do when you get in the golf profession
But when you get in the golf profession is don't limit yourself to the opportunity
I would never even knew what track man was three years ago. Yes, right, right. I never even I
Definitely, I definitely had in my head as brantley the owner of silverado
Unfortunately as he got sick towards the end
I mean we had always talked about trying to purchase that golf course
I started putting together a buying group and literally made
presentations to five different people to buy a paula beach golf and sea club like
Your your career kind of morphs is the point. It doesn't stay stagnant. Yes
Okay, i'm just gonna sit behind the counter and take money
It it does if that's what you want it to be
But I really started getting the idea of like I don't want to work for somebody else. I want to work for myself
Correct, and you know and you've embodied that so much
I tried it for four years and i'm not saying I won't get back into it in the very near future
But ultimately we are as pga members almost always
some exceptions
Independent contractors
We typically don't work for a corporation. Yes, there are some but ultimately
You still are the independent like we're not a labor unit union person, even though we pay labor union dues
Yeah for the pga
Um, so I I guess what i'm trying to say is like I really started getting excited about the opportunity of buying my own golf course
um getting in front of investors and saying hey
Look, here's the deal. We need 1.5 million. We got five people interested. That's two two hundred fifty thousand dollars each
Here's the business plan. Here's the expected income. Here's the model
are you interested in buying it and
And five people said yes, and we put together that proposal to buy a hollow beach golf and sea club down there in campa
It didn't work out because another bigger company came in and offered more money to roger penske
And they took that deal and that happened sometimes too
And that's penske motor oil, correct?
Yeah, yeah exactly the trucking company and the racing company roger penske. Wow
But even now to enact that deal still isn't done because the county
They put the kibosh on it because they're like you it's it's environmentally sensitive protective area
You can't build condos on top or you can keep it a golf course
So it currently stands closed no business at all. That's a shame but it's it's like, okay
It's like okay that happened. So from there then I decided okay. Let me try to
Open up a retail golf store with track man in it and with being able to sell golf clubs and do club repair
My my kind of overall point is like don't be stagnant. Let your let your career keep morphing
Yeah, whatever it's gonna be
Well, I think he brought up a really good point at the beginning of this conversation is that when you walked into the board it says
PJ professionals are responsible for these 29 different things
And I think you're absolutely right everybody goes into the idea of thinking well
I'm gonna work behind the counter and i'm just gonna be the pro shop guy or the general manager
Um, but you're gonna go to eight hours or whatever right? Whatever correct
But you you come to realize that when you're in this industry
You're touching all aspects and there's going to be ones that you really enjoy a lot more
And there's a lot of unique avenues, especially like with your business that you had down here in tampa the one-stop golf club
In brandon and in zephyrh hills
You know, it's
I'll let you talk about it
But I think that is going to be the the wave of the future what you're what you're trying to do with that business plan
I think it's got great potential. So
If you touch on that, please
Yeah, definitely. I mean the retail is talk. Retail is hard retails hard period the end amazon made retail hard ebay made
Retail hard
You're gonna go get a better deal somewhere else. You're not gonna get custom fit from your clubs
You know, you're gonna come back to us when you aren't correctly fit and your clubs aren't working
And then realize that maybe you should have just kind of invested 75 hours in a club fitting
But again, even when I was working with you at silverado like we didn't do club fitting we didn't we didn't
That wasn't part of our deal
But as you as I decided to okay, i'm gonna i'm gonna stop working for other people
I'm gonna try to work for myself. I've got a partner who's an amazing person who was the capital guy the money guy
And basically said look I I believe in the money guy
And basically said look I I believe in you which you need for the record. You need that in your
Personal life and professional life you need something to believe in you. Absolutely. Absolutely
Yeah, and realize that um that you can do this
And i'm not disappointed that we didn't make it like we lasted three years starting a small business
for the record
February 2020 was when we incorporated we opened june of 2020
2020 didn't expect covid to happen as you're developing these
Business models of plans. Yeah, right. You don't expect supply chain issues to be a problem for a year
Yes, you don't expect right you don't expect i teamac
I fought with my landlord for a summer eight months because our air conditioning broke
So I had fans in there. You remember coming down, right? Oh, yeah
We had fans in there in the middle of the summer in a retail store and people still came to see us
And they still did fittings even though it was 85 degrees in there
Absolutely, they're sweating and they were so excited to get the information that you were providing on that track man and and all that stuff
So yeah, right. Yep
So, you know every business has obstacles stuff that happens things
again
Personal life was was challenging because you're trying to keep being a good husband keep being a good dad
Keep trying to run a business like trying to make that
$6,500 every month, you know that when you open up the door on on the first of the month your lease payment is
$6,500 and
What I learned was hey, that's too high
That's too much
But you had signed a 36 month lease so you have to honor it
so you do things throughout the
three-year time period to make that happen and
and what it led me to on the positive side was a
Ton of great relationships great friendships of people that I've met during those three years. It was awesome
Awesome to have my daughters come down there and work with me
You came down again
You came down with some of the people you were teaching doing club fitting and you'd see my you know
One or two of my daughters in there. Oh, yeah
Pretty much all the time. Yeah, right
Yeah, and and we never really saw them over at silverado if you know what I mean
It was always go go go for you, right?
I mean I saw them every once in a while but it seemed like yeah
It seemed like it was kind of like a your work but still kind of like a dad's hangout. You know what I mean?
Yeah, so my my point with that is it showed them
That if you believe in something dream something up
Decide to do something if you put the work in and the effort and have the plan
That's what I like. That's why I'm like not disappointed the store didn't work
but to me is the better life lesson for the girls my daughter's is
That if you decide to do something and you put your mind to it, you can get it done. Yeah
You know again about the the peripheral of all the rest of it of why it didn't work
You know, it's there's just maybe just bottom line too many obstacles
in the small business world as soon as the
Inflation went up in may of 2022 like I can pinpoint it to the month
Our sales were going good and then without getting into politics of it inflation gets to a whatever
30 year high may of 2022
The buying habits change of the golfer. They decide to buy more stuff that is used on ebay and on amazon
They come in more for $50 golf lessons instead of thousand dollar golf sets
You can't give enough lessons to generate to do
$6500 in in monthly rent plus pay yourself plus pay your vendors, you know, so
The the ultimate part of it is okay. So now i've got this track in this $20,000 machine
And I literally you know, again, there's a cycle bar three doors down from the store
And I keep thinking about i'm like, why are they not open? They're only open from
5 a.m. To 8 a.m. Maybe 9 a.m. And then the girls who are doing the spin classes
They come back at like 4 p.m. And they work from like 4 to 8, but there is
Eight hours a day where nobody is in that building
How how are they doing it and i'm like
I some light bulb clicked during that time when i'm like, you know what if I take track man
And it's such a great tool for teaching and for playing virtual golf and we find a space for it
And then we do turn it into a private hitting facility
Where yeah, there's plenty of birdie bars and these different places out there would have that have liquor and food associated with them
But I wanted it where it was a private club. You you've got your four digit code to the front door
you
Booked your t-time online
You never saw anybody in the place because it was your time when it was your time was your time, correct?
And you kept good care of it
And as far as you know, one stop golf club is still operational and going well patrick's doing a good job with it
I think he's still doing some teaching there. Yeah, I had two lessons this morning over there. Yeah, so it's in great shape. Yeah
Yeah, so
You know from the kind of from the turmoil of one stop golf shop to the positivity of one stop golf club the
Private hitting facility and now I realize now my my friend tal homage
He's got a pretty thriving business
And brandon taking the same exact business model because he was one to help me do the construction on it as we're doing the
Construction at the at the Wesley Chapel location. I think the light bulb in his head went. Oh my goodness
We can replicate this and I said, yeah, I know we can't like we got to get the first one going
And then he had the he had the backing the financial backing and the money and the ability to be able to do it
And you know, I'm just a little bit of a
Part of that just that facility but at the time I just couldn't so he's done a great job
He's got I think 65 members now and uh, oh good. He uses yeah, he uses flight scope
Which is a little less money than track man, but the software he uses is like way better virtual golf
So my my overall point is again sort of like if you can do it dream it do it
And then um, i'm gonna do that that model somewhere up here in the nasa jesus area
Just got to find the right, you know, right space and go from there. Yeah, I think it's I think it's a great
I think it's a great business model
number one
number two
I think taking the ideas that at least that i've seen from the ideas of uh,
You know having that 24-hour fitness center or something like that. You've converted that into this new business model
Which I I go on I go on the pick time. That's the program that's used for his pick time
And you know when we go on there you can see that there's people that that will literally go there at two in the morning to two to
Four because that's their time, you know, and this is a great place to do that
They would never be able to do it now, you know, people have different lifestyles different, you know times of work
So it just allows people to work on their game a game that they love at any time of hour, which I think is absolutely an amazing idea
It's a it's a good concept. So we're excited to do some more stuff like that up here in the future
And I appreciate you asking about that because i'm proud of it. I think it's going to be
A little bit of a wave of the future and uh, no staff
No mess just you know private hitting base. So um
Yeah, I uh
I know we're getting long and I want to be you know, I don't want to bore for our listeners too much
I just if you can if you give me indulge me, let me let me wrap up with one story if that's all right
Please absolutely
I think I think i'm really appreciated that you're doing that
I think it's a great idea
I think we're going to wrap up with one story if that's all right, please absolutely. I think I think i'm really appreciate the fact that
That we were able to do this and uh
My story is uh, my brother's an amazing guy. I think i've you know mentioned him. We've done done some um podcasts with him about augusta
And just kind of his his industry role too. Yeah
Um, and my mom like I said is is just she's always been there for me, too
Um, that's part of the reason i'm up in massachusetts this summer is to be able to see her a little more often
um
but the the story that I wanted to tell quickly I think I might have mentioned it throughout other podcasts but at least for this one
Is this story of so my dad was uh, again the most humble
um
most proud person of his kids of his two sons, but he just
He was uh humble to the nth degree
And lived his life. I literally had a member up here
David chalmers
Aimed me on probably one of my first weeks up here
And he said he introduced himself. He goes now now sean did you happen to have a
Is your dad's name mel clots?
And mr. Chalmers is probably in his late 60s early 70s. I hope i don't get in trouble somewhere in that area
And I said, yeah, my dad's mel clots. I said, how how do you know that?
He goes I worked with your dad at noem of life insurance company from 1969 to 1972
I'm like, what is the small world part of this thing happening up here?
That that and he goes your dad was the most kind gentle
um
Helpful. He was my like my mentor
He was just an amazing person and i'm so glad that you're working here so we can talk about him
And he goes I think I might even have met your mom because she was a secretary
Or she was like one of the persons in the noem of life insurance company, too
And i'm like, oh my gosh, so just chills going through my body. I'm like, this is so crazy
um
So I think that's just a cool little oh, that's amazing
right
Watertown uh story so um
so my dad, uh
Had a lot of health issues. I I would say the last time he died when he was 71 years old in 2007
2007, um, I would say the last time he touched the club was probably around
55 or or 58 years old like the last 13 years
He couldn't he just couldn't hold the club team back. He just couldn't his fingers were so bad with arthritis
You know, we tried the the jumbo shimmy clubs grips and stuff
Um, but he just couldn't hold the club. So he had no strength anyways, you know, most he ever hit it was 180 yards. Anyways, um,
We just kind of gave it up. Okay
um, we
I'm going to reference people if they want to go listen to the augustin story, please do that that augusta podcast
The ad is amazing. Yes, I won't tell that story, but we did take him to augustin me and my brother in 2004
so, um
I talked to him on a tuesday night in 2007 or 2007 in june
he passed away into on the thursday two days later and
As with everybody's parents typically your dad too, like, you know super sad time. I wish I could talk to him every day
Uh, you're gonna continue to find out team act that you're gonna, you know as a parent
You wish you could talk to your parents more because they were pretty smart, right? Yes. Yeah
Well, especially at times like now you you'd love a little guidance, right? Yes
Somebody's walked through those shadows before to kind of help guide you through so yeah
I know what you mean exactly
So, um june of 2007 so i'm at green valley country club. I was there from 2004 to 2008
Um, it's the following father's day. So it's july or so or june of 2008
Playing with some members in a normal sunday afternoon game. It's father's day
um
I guess I was playing golf because I was working. I don't know if that means I was a bad dad
But I knew I had to work anyways, whatever
So I shoot a very generic boring 36 on the front nine and it's just
You know, I say that without being i'm not being uh arrogant at all. It's just it was like a non-committal
People would die to shoot 36 that listened to us. They'd be very happy, right?
some of our listeners
Um, and then I start off the back nine and it's par four
You can drive it if you can hit it over the water probably about 260 to go over the water happen
He had a catching good one make an eagle somehow make eagle like driver about 12 feet make the eagle birdie birdie
Then next par three. All right, next hole par five. Yeah, next hole par five
I hit hop and hit a driver and like a five wood on the green another 15 footer make a putt
Okay, now we're now we're five under after three holes
All right
We go we go birdie birdie on 13 and 14. So now we're seven under oh we're looking at course record at this point
Aren't we right right exactly and uh, and basically my my kind of overall point of telling the story is
I've never shot 64 before in my life the first time that I shot 64. I was able to do it again
Uh about three years later when I was at silverado of silver oaks with uh with brantley and actually my buddy ron crump
um
But the first time ever broke 68 by the way was when I shot 64
On father's day the year after my dad passed away
And if you want to touch if you don't want to tell me about like
Godly moments or something kind of like, you know hair on the back of your neck type of thing
That was when I knew he was still with me and it was just an amazing experience. So that's that's amazing. Yeah, there's there
You know, I think there's little hints through people's lives when they lose loved ones that there's
I you know, I don't I don't know how to say it. But yeah, it's kind of like they still walk along us
You know, they're still there, you know, you know, they're
Maybe they whisper something subconsciously that we don't hear about and calms us. But I think you're right
I think they they find time to spend with us wherever they are and whatever plane that they're in but
You know
you know, so
Final question for you here as we kind of wrap up today's uh podcast is in three to five years
Where do you find yourself? You know, where do you find yourself being? What are some of the goals that we're looking for in that time span?
Yeah, great question. Um
Challenging question because of uh, I really enjoyed my time at oakley this summer
right now the plan is to come back for next summer in 2025 and
Kind of learn it and do it again because uh, as scott says you're the first year
You don't really know what you're doing the second year
You start kind of getting an idea because you're starting to things are starting to slow down a little bit
You're starting to understand all the and by the time you get to the third year
Yeah, basically I should be able to run the place for him at that point, you know, great
So so I think as I look at it right now, you know a little more flexibility with the personal life of what I can do
Um, I really do want to get down and see my daughters again, you know
But they're they're 24 and they're 22 and they're they're 19. They're doing their own things now
Living their own lives
Yeah, they don't need me to be in the same
City or state or whatever. I wish I could right now financially. This is definitely the best opportunity
I really like the membership up here at oakley. It's kind of that
the private club feel with a little bit of like a
Working man's clientele, but there's also some people that have been very very successful in the world
um, and I I just
I think there's going to be some type of ownership of some type of
Private hitting facility as well. Okay. I love what we're doing with the podcast and I I want to keep doing some more youtube videos
You know so kind of staying in the golf world just again sort of like we talked about throughout this session like
I don't want to pigeonhole me to one specific thing
But keep spreading that that word of how to get better at the game
And uh, and just you know, let's keep doing what we're doing. Let's keep having a good time and
I'm not going to be apologetic that my hobby turned into my into my career
That's kind of the bottom line and and it kind of goes back to the old idea
If you find something you love you'll never work a day in your life, right?
And I I think you know that that's what we're trying to go for right at least for me. I I enjoy what I do and
That's it
You know and to the other point I think with with the podcast and youtube and stuff like that
Um, you know, let me ask you when you first got into the pj
Did you ever think that and i'm going to do a podcast about golf or youtube?
No, it was instagram 20 years ago. There's no no facebook. No youtube. No, it's got to evolve
You got to you got to mold your you know, kind of keep moving on and you get stuck in that
Um, you get stuck in that cycle of just doing the same thing every day
You're gonna probably just kind of have the same results. So
No, you got to be excited and eager about it and uh, keep keep going keep trying
Yeah, I I think if you come with that same attitude, you know that we do with golf with the same industry
You know idea, you know, I want to experiment try different things and be excited enthusiastic about it
um
Good things come I mean and there's and there's going to be
You know
I think the better bigger thing is that we've got to be able to change and morph and we also got to look that
There's going to be a lot of different things to come to the golf industry in the future that we don't even know
about or even think about this current time and
Um, I think you're kind of on the wave of that future with the indoor simulator idea and the the concept of having the country club
Feel inside those indoor simulators. So you know, I i'm excited to see what that blossoms into and what the next evolution is for that
That whole I mean the whole track man thing and I mean now be a little arrogant
I consider myself to be an expert in track man teaching and fitting
And how did I get there? It just got there because I did it for three years for 10 hours a day, right?
And you you come down and you saw me do some fittings
And I think that you can feel pretty comfortable about doing doing club fittings as well now because you again same thing
Like we do with the golf lessons 10 years ago. You showed interest in it
Um, there's you know, if we can be an expert in certain parts and that's what we are as golf professionals
We are experts in our field
Right people come to us for a reason
We do a good job. We don't do the greatest job of monetizing that because we kind of give away a lot of advice
but
But that's kind of that's kind of the
I the tradition of the game, isn't it? I mean
My lawyer charged me 400 hours an hour. She wasn't upset
You know, yeah
My lawyer charged me, you know $50 for every 15 minutes
Of an email that might have taken her two minutes and i'm not bad mucking the lawyer
I'm just saying as golf professionals, maybe this might be another podcast
Topic we should we should really discuss how we can
Maybe grow the pga kind of like the the apprentices and kind of show them that hey
There's money to be made out there
We just got to do a better job of maybe being a better role model for you guys and girls or 20 and 25 years old
And deciding to go into the corporate world because you you don't want to kind of
Become an assistant pro because you know, they're not going to make enough money. I think that's a
Just make that a podcast topic in the future. My podcast on that would be taking the pga from a
Nonprofit to a profit and I think that that would be the big start right there for that conversation, especially for professionals
Yeah
so
All right. I want to say thank you to everybody. Thank you for listening my dynamic golf listeners
I am your co-host tim mclevanna with me is my fellow co-host shawn clots shawn
Hey really really good session there. Hope we didn't bore too many people gave some good stories and uh look forward to the next one
We got the historian for the oakley country club coming up here dan me and the next uh next podcast
So that'll be a great one for our listeners. And what's he a historian of he's the country club and yeah
basically like a board of directors position where you're literally the historian of the club and
He's been you know, he's excited to share. He wants to he doesn't want to keep this stuff in a box. He wants to
tell
Tell the people of the story of how this became
Oakley country club with the donald ross influence
Yeah, I mean, you know the the whole thing about a historian and i've got a history degree
We learn all this stuff from the past and we want to we want to bring it back to the future and let people know
That you know, hey, this is knowledge of keeping to remember
That's it. So all right. Well, thank you so much and we look forward to the next podcast. Thank you