Does one golf swing fit every golfer?

Let’s focus on the three golfers who were right there at the end of the PGA Championship with a chance to win: Bubba Watson, Martin Kaymer, and Dustin Johnson. As we all know, Martin Kaymer won in a playoff with Bubba Watson.

Martin Kaymer has a “standard” golf swing; it’s a beautiful swing; all of us at the Jim McLean Golf School studied his swing when he’s played at Doral in the PGA Tour event. He’s got a solid game. Bubba Watson and Dustin Johnson are absolute bombers. Their swings are homemade and look untrained; they just get up and whack it, which I love. They have not been ‘overcoached.’ However, they are obviously good enough to play really well under pressure…in this case on a difficult and demanding golf course at Whistling Straits.

Dustin Johnson takes it back shut and, at the top of the backswing, his left wrist is bowed beyond belief; he also has a strong grip and a big dip through impact. However, he has a great move through the ball.

Bubba Watson hits slices and hooks and isn’t in the fairway all the time off the tee. When he gives it a rip, his front foot moves a tremendous amount and he falls backwards. He does not have great balance. Yet he’s the longest on the PGA Tour.

These golfers prove my point there are lots of ways to hit the golf ball. It’s often a mistake to place a method or a template on a golfer, professional or amateur.

Many ‘method’ teachers believe there’s one way for everyone. That’s too simple minded and it’s not correct.

I’ve studied all the great golfers and they are all different.

I teach, and all my teachers teach, within ranges and parameters. We don’t allow total chaos. We keep players within ‘safety zones’ while letting them swing mostly naturally. This ‘method’ has worked for numerous professional golfers and also helps us get great results with ‘average’ golfers.

It’s extremely difficult for a golfer who can’t or won’t practice to adopt a method and make it work. So, if you’re looking for a teacher, you may want to consider one who is not going to change everything…unless you have a lot of time to spend at the ‘rock pile.’

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I was recently interviewed on WFAN, a sports radio station in New York City. Here’s the interview.

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For the Jim McLean Golf School site, go here.

#1 Golf Schools in America

Scott Martin, a copywriter who lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, is helping me with my blog. For his site, go here. Scott’s helping me with a business book I’m going to sell initially as an ebook.

Chaos at the PGA Championship

What a wild finish at the PGA Championship. First, congratulations to Martin Kaymer, the 2010 PGA Champion. He played really, really well. I’m going to talk more about his beautiful swing in my next blog.

But everyone is talking about the controversy surrounding Dustin Johnson’s two shot penalty on the last hole. In case you missed it, Johnson was leading the tournament and was playing the 18th. His drive missed the fairway and ended up on narrow strip of sand. Johnson thought it was a waste area and not a bunker and he ground his club; the strip of sand was a bunker and so he incurred a two shot penalty. This cost him a spot in the playoff and a lot of money.

Never in my life have I seen a situation where hundreds of people are standing in a sandy area and the golfer is hitting from that area and the area is considered a bunker. I remember the same type of situation when the Ryder Cup took place at Kiawah Island in South Carolina; the galleries were standing in the sandy areas adjacent to the fairways and it was obvious the sandy areas were waste areas meaning it was fine to ground the club.

Johnson was leading the championship at the time. There was a lot of commotion and it didn’t look like there was an official right there to oversee the situation. David Feherty, who was with the group, said the ‘bunker’ was just a strip of sand and people in the gallery had been walking all over the area.

There’s no way it was bunker.

The situation was chaotic and a mess and it was ultimately embarrassing. It cost Dustin Johnson a spot in the playoff. Nobody in the world could look at that narrow strip of sand and call it a bunker. There’s no way hundreds of people would stand in a bunker while a player leading a major championship was playing a shot. I’m sure everyone wishes it had been handled differently.

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For the Jim McLean Golf School site, go here.

#1 Golf Schools in America

Scott Martin, a copywriter who lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, is helping me with my blog. For his site, go here. Scott’s helping me with a business book I’m going to sell initially as an ebook.