Speaker 1: It's the Son of a Butcher podcast, you know the drill.
Speaker 1: We come to you every Wednesday. This week's guest something
Speaker 1: that I've been wanting to do for a while and
Speaker 1: I thought i'd kind of run it back with She
Speaker 1: was the first guest of the podcast when I launched
Speaker 1: it a couple of years ago. Mel red. She's won
Speaker 1: a bunch of times on the LPGA Tour, It's been
Speaker 1: on the Solheim Cup team, and her coach, Jorge Parata.
Speaker 1: Horge is the director of instruction at Liberty National. He
Speaker 1: works with mel He works with Carlotta Siganda, works with
Speaker 1: Bryan O'Toole, and is really one of the good young
Speaker 1: instructors out there in professional golf. But I thought it
Speaker 1: was cool. I was over at the Grant Thornton, which
Speaker 1: was the team event, and was talking to Melanjorge and
Speaker 1: was talking about being on the podcast, and I was like,
Speaker 1: why don't I get both of them on? And it's
Speaker 1: a cool conversation to listen to a really, you know,
Speaker 1: an elite, elite player and their coach that kind of
Speaker 1: back and forth, and that's kind of the world that
Speaker 1: I live in, and I think it's a unique insight
Speaker 1: into kind of the relation between a player and a
Speaker 1: coach and what that relationship is, what kind of the
Speaker 1: rules and the boundaries are. So Melan Horgay do a
Speaker 1: really great job talking about it. There's some really cool stuff.
Speaker 1: Mel's a new parent. She and her wife, Carly, they
Speaker 1: just celebrated having their first baby, so a lot of
Speaker 1: stuff to talk about. So really excited for this one,
Speaker 1: Melon Horge. Sit back and enjoy it. So this is
Speaker 1: a rarity for the pard mel you are our first
Speaker 1: guest for the podcast when we started back there, and
Speaker 1: that's that's a long time ago, because it seems like
Speaker 1: that was a long time ago, but that was pre
Speaker 1: you being a proud parent to a new baby. Boy,
Speaker 1: you're a you're a parent now.
Speaker 2: That's kind of scary for a lot of people to
Speaker 2: definitely scary for me. I know it's a scary part.
Speaker 2: I think it's scary for Carl as well, my wife.
Speaker 2: But yeah, he's also he's coming out to a month
Speaker 2: old now and obviously life changing and yeah, my life
Speaker 2: looks are very different now and than it did a
Speaker 2: few months ago. So it's awesome. Yeah, we're obviously still
Speaker 2: learning and still adjusting. But wouldn't change it.
Speaker 1: What's been the biggest surprise in being a brand new parent?
Speaker 2: You just don't know what you're doing, do you. Let's
Speaker 2: be honest, you just try to do your best. You're
Speaker 2: just trying to keep the thing, you know, stopping from
Speaker 2: crying all the time. But he's a pretty good baby.
Speaker 2: He's sleeping pretty well through the night. Carlie's obviously a natural,
Speaker 2: which helps. And yeah, it's just awesome just seeing his
Speaker 2: little personality, even at a month old, to s grow
Speaker 2: every day is just kind of cool.
Speaker 1: One of the things I've been wanting to do for
Speaker 1: a while, and you two are the first ones to
Speaker 1: do it, is to get a player and a coach
Speaker 1: on the pod at the same time. Orgeate, You've worked
Speaker 1: with a lot of really, really good players, Director of
Speaker 1: instruction at Liberty National. I mean, if there's not a
Speaker 1: better place to go to work every day than that
Speaker 1: golf course where you get the view of the skyline
Speaker 1: and you get a PG but a lot of times
Speaker 1: you get a PGA Tour event, you get a lot
Speaker 1: of tournaments there. How many weeks are you're on the
Speaker 1: road you're working with mel give me a list of
Speaker 1: the other players you're working with.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right now, Currently I have four players and they'll
Speaker 3: PG door tool, read any home quiz, and.
Speaker 1: Then she should hit it further. What do you think
Speaker 1: she should Well, she should Carloda hit it further.
Speaker 2: Yes, I've seen I hit it pretty further on the range.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna lie that swings speach. She can get
Speaker 2: up on the range.
Speaker 1: What'd she like to work with? I mean she when
Speaker 1: I watched her hit golf balls, it's like, Wow, that's
Speaker 1: a different, different sound.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's interesting. I've worked with thirsteince twenty fifteen, right.
Speaker 1: And she's always been long.
Speaker 3: She's always been long. She's always been very long. Matter
Speaker 3: of fact, I would probably argue she was maybe longer
Speaker 3: when she was younger. She used to hit not buy intention,
Speaker 3: but more of a draw, so she might have been
Speaker 3: even a little bit longer. But in twenty fifteen, when
Speaker 3: we started working together, she was someone that had never
Speaker 3: looked at her swing on video before, had never used
Speaker 3: any technology at all. I had worked with the same
Speaker 3: instructor since she begun when she was like five years old,
Speaker 3: very old school teacher in Spain. He passed away months later.
Speaker 3: We started working together and the first thing when she
Speaker 3: came to At the time, I was working at TPC Sawgras,
Speaker 3: So she came to Sagrass to see me, and she said,
Speaker 3: I don't care about stats. Don't show me stats. I
Speaker 3: don't want to see my swing on video. You can
Speaker 3: take video and look at it.
Speaker 1: That's a great start. Yeah, and why are you golfers
Speaker 1: also crazy? Why are you guys also crazy?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: I don't want to see stats. I don't want to
Speaker 1: look at my golf swing. Don't talk to me about
Speaker 1: my golf swing. What the hell is she hiring you for?
Speaker 1: So travel with you on tour.
Speaker 3: That's how it started, right, And I said, okay, well,
Speaker 3: I've looked at your stats, and for the last two
Speaker 3: years you've been between forty and forty five on the
Speaker 3: money list, and you've been around the same fairway accuracy,
Speaker 3: around the same green in regulation, around the same putting.
Speaker 3: So we need to do something better if you want
Speaker 3: to make more money next year.
Speaker 1: She said, Okay, it's not about money, it's about trophies
Speaker 1: and legacy.
Speaker 3: But it's true. So I said, I said, I'm gonna
Speaker 3: give you one thing only. I said, I'm gonna give
Speaker 3: you greens in regulation. To start, all I want you
Speaker 3: to do when you go play a tournament, look at
Speaker 3: how many greens you hit for the week, and then
Speaker 3: look at the first three players on the leader board
Speaker 3: and see if you hit more or less. And let's
Speaker 3: start there. If you talk to her now, these many years,
Speaker 3: she knows every player. She looks at everything, not everything,
Speaker 3: but like she looks and she still consults. Right, She
Speaker 3: doesn't analyze herself, but she loves like understanding that she'll
Speaker 3: put track man. She doesn't look at all the numbers,
Speaker 3: but she'll put a track man down with the driver.
Speaker 3: She'll look at club head speed, attack, angle, ball speed,
Speaker 3: and then wearing the face is being hit and that's it.
Speaker 3: With the wedge, she looks at launch, angle, spin, axis,
Speaker 3: carry these things. That's it. Did She like loves that
Speaker 3: part of it. So it's it's being interesting over these
Speaker 3: many years to see somebody grow that way, right, more
Speaker 3: into a more understanding full.
Speaker 1: Completely if I had to describe that more of a professional, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't play competitive golf and never look
Speaker 1: at your stats, never look at your golf swing, never
Speaker 1: want to look at your golf swing. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: just that's that's an impossibility. That's that's not a recipe
Speaker 1: for success. Now as a player, Porge just described Carlos.
Speaker 1: If you had to describe yourself as no bullshit, not
Speaker 1: not trying to be funny, not making a joke, but
Speaker 1: if you had to describe yourself as a golfer and
Speaker 1: as a player, how do you tell me what you
Speaker 1: feel like?
Speaker 3: Your game is?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 1: What Horge is? When you're looking at a coach, what
Speaker 1: do you want? What do you want to look at?
Speaker 1: What you don't want to look at? I think everybody
Speaker 1: is different, right and I work with you know, players
Speaker 1: across the board. I work with for a long time,
Speaker 1: and he's a very close friend. He's been on the
Speaker 1: podcast Trevor Mulman, who now does an amazing job at CBS.
Speaker 1: Trevor wanted. I couldn't give Trevor enough information. I couldn't
Speaker 1: give him enough video. I couldn't send him enough video.
Speaker 1: We couldn't look the swing, We got the dinner and
Speaker 1: we'd be looking. You know, it's he just he needed it,
Speaker 1: he wanted it. And then Brooks and DJ they want
Speaker 1: no information. Now, what kind of player would you say
Speaker 1: you are with regards to your game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm a bit of a nutter in a different way.
Speaker 2: He's I don't know, you might agree or disagree with
Speaker 2: me here. I get very obsessed with my own golf swing,
Speaker 2: and I like to ask a lot of questions, but
Speaker 2: not really helpful questions, like I'm like, why do I
Speaker 2: do this? Though? Why don't? And he's like, stop, just
Speaker 2: do what I'm trying to tell you to do and
Speaker 2: just trust me. And I'm like, but why. I ask
Speaker 2: a lot of whys. It's just the way that my
Speaker 2: brain works. I like to understand why things work. So
Speaker 2: he has to just basically just take me aside and
Speaker 2: just how many shut up?
Speaker 1: Most of the time because I've talked me down yet,
Speaker 1: I've talked to players.
Speaker 2: It stresses me out.
Speaker 1: I've had players on the podcast to say, listen, I'm
Speaker 1: a soldier. I just want some to tell me what
Speaker 1: to do. I just want someone to go do this
Speaker 1: in my golf swing. Okay, I'll do that. Do this
Speaker 1: from a caddie. Want my caddie do this on the
Speaker 1: golf course. This is the yardage. Hit this shot right.
Speaker 1: So there's that thing to where I think as a player.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of players struggle. We see Orge,
Speaker 1: We see players struggle because they're trying to be somebody
Speaker 1: they're not. They're trying to have someone else's pre shot routine,
Speaker 1: someone else's view of golf, someone else's approach to golf.
Speaker 1: Do you think it's important Mel to kind of not
Speaker 1: get wrapped up because you can, right you ask you
Speaker 1: You've asked me tons of questions. You know when when
Speaker 1: we were in the pandemic and you were down in
Speaker 1: Jupiter at the Floridian, you played a lot with Brooks. Indeed,
Speaker 1: you were asking them a lot of questions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like I liked it.
Speaker 3: Then.
Speaker 2: I've always I've always loved to learn, like especially with athletes,
Speaker 2: Like I've just always been fascinated, not necessarily just with golf,
Speaker 2: Like I'm you know, you want to see other athletes.
Speaker 2: I ask them about the workout, Like what do they
Speaker 2: do for their practice. I'm just very intrigued by athletes
Speaker 2: and how they get the best out of themselves. So yeah,
Speaker 2: but it's funny like when I'm on the golf course,
Speaker 2: like I take full control. Like Greg my Caddy, he's awesome,
Speaker 2: but he's more there for support. He's great at his
Speaker 2: job and don't get me wrong. And there's obviously times
Speaker 2: I do rely on him, but I take a lot
Speaker 2: of that. You want to make the decision, make the decisions. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like I enjoy that, but with well, hey, I just
Speaker 2: I just like driving him nuts. To be honest, I
Speaker 2: just I know I'm a bit hard work. Sometimes we
Speaker 2: all are in a different way. But I just I
Speaker 2: love learning. But sometimes it's a bit of a detriment
Speaker 2: because I don't just do what he tells me and
Speaker 2: trust what he's telling them. I do trust him, but
Speaker 2: just understand that this is what we're trying to do
Speaker 2: and stop getting on a spiral over here somewhere.
Speaker 1: So all right, I'm gonna ask you both this question.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna ask Mel first, and then I'll ask you, now,
Speaker 1: what do you like about your golf swing? And what
Speaker 1: don't you like about your golf swing? And we only
Speaker 1: have the memory cards don't have a lot of yeah,
Speaker 1: hours of memory.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think it looks an athletic golf swing.
Speaker 1: So you think your golf swing passes the eye test.
Speaker 2: For yeah, most people? Yes. And then I think I.
Speaker 1: Would say, for if anyone's listening, it hasn't seen I
Speaker 1: would say, and I think you bucked up. You have
Speaker 1: a more classic golf swing, a old school classic in
Speaker 1: the vein of kind of Tiger two thousand, Adam Scott
Speaker 1: to where the club gets in a good position. You
Speaker 1: you don't have a lot of idiosyncrasies or a lot
Speaker 1: of extremes in your golf swing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like my face is usually pretty stable through the
Speaker 2: golf ball. Things that I don't like about it. I
Speaker 2: don't like the way my legs work. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I just I feel like I don't utilize them the
Speaker 2: way that I should.
Speaker 1: But all right, all right, coach, all right, coach went one,
Speaker 1: you got more? Okay. So when you when you first
Speaker 1: met Mel, right, it's always the eye test for an
Speaker 1: instructor is if you're going to work with a player,
Speaker 1: you either think you can help them, you like them,
Speaker 1: you like their swing, you like their game. So when
Speaker 1: you met well Mel, what did you like about her
Speaker 1: golf swing? And what were the things that you went
Speaker 1: I think I think these things could improve.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I would say I'm and when I work,
Speaker 3: when I start working with that plan. This is something
Speaker 3: I developed obviously over the years. But I have a
Speaker 3: questionnaire that I send players and I remember when Susanne first,
Speaker 3: Susann Petterson, when she first approached me, and she had
Speaker 3: just finished working with your dad because your dad was
Speaker 3: not able to travel as much, she wasn't able to
Speaker 3: see him. And she asked me, hey, would you help
Speaker 3: me next year? And I said, and then you.
Speaker 1: Sent her the questionnaire and she told you to go
Speaker 1: fuck yourself.
Speaker 3: Basicly, yes, she called me that.
Speaker 1: Yes, pardon, I apologize for any kids listening. But I
Speaker 1: knew as soon as you told that story and you
Speaker 1: said you were going to send Susanne Penderson a questionnaire,
Speaker 1: I pretty much knew the answer was going to be
Speaker 1: two words, maybe three. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And if I honestly, if I had, I would have
Speaker 2: done the same thing, because I was like, what the
Speaker 2: hell is this question?
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, Wait a minute, I'm trying to hire you.
Speaker 1: You're the I said, wait a minute, who's hiring? Am
Speaker 1: I auditioning for you?
Speaker 3: Right? So, and and honestly, a lot of those questions
Speaker 3: and I have them now, and I just sent them
Speaker 3: to a national team that I'm gonna work with. But
Speaker 3: I sent them to sixteen girls, so we'll see how
Speaker 3: many answer them. Right. But the idea is to for
Speaker 3: me to get to know the player. First of all,
Speaker 3: what you were talking about earlier, Every player is different.
Speaker 3: Every player has a different mentality. So one of the
Speaker 3: questions I have in the question is do you consider
Speaker 3: yourself a structure or unstructured human beings?
Speaker 1: Mel Or you're a structured or unstructured human being? Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't. I'm not. I'm not going to ask you
Speaker 1: about your personal life because I know the answer to
Speaker 1: the personal life question. I think it's not structured.
Speaker 2: Every single day works because there he's like, where's your
Speaker 2: a liments stick? And I'm like, oh, oh yeah, I
Speaker 2: was just sitting like you know, and he's like, no,
Speaker 2: just get your linments stick out. I'm like, okay, I
Speaker 2: mean for alignments.
Speaker 1: Alignment is the lowest hanging fruit on the planet. Day
Speaker 1: and the reason why I think I said this to
Speaker 1: a kid the other day, he was like, well, how
Speaker 1: do you know?
Speaker 3: Kid?
Speaker 1: He was over from Finland. Kid's got really good action
Speaker 1: and he hit one and it was miles off line
Speaker 1: and I was like, okay, what was that? What caused that?
Speaker 1: And he was like I'm like okay, first and foremost
Speaker 1: are you aim there? So where's your target? Okay? It
Speaker 1: was a flag. I said, We've got the alignment stick.
Speaker 1: I said, so you just miss your target by twenty
Speaker 1: five yards to the left. So the alignment stick on
Speaker 1: the ground you can eliminate. Okay, I wasn't aim there.
Speaker 1: So then you can start to work backwards from that
Speaker 1: right right, And I think the alignment rod. You hate
Speaker 1: him telling you to get the alignment rod because you
Speaker 1: forget Yeah, And I would say, right like she okay,
Speaker 1: whatted what percentage of the girls you asked that? Or
Speaker 1: the plan or you asked that? When you send a
Speaker 1: player a question and you say, listen, are you an
Speaker 1: unstructured person or are you a structured person? From a
Speaker 1: practice golf standpoint, what's the ratio of structured to nonstructured?
Speaker 3: So I would say when I answer that in two parts,
Speaker 3: if I can, and.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna throw a caveat in there, is have you
Speaker 1: noticed a difference in players that are higher up the
Speaker 1: rankings in their structured nonstructure?
Speaker 3: So I have not noticed a difference, and that, but
Speaker 3: where I have noticed the difference is most people, majority
Speaker 3: of people, not everybody. Majority of people answer structure. Okay,
Speaker 3: But after we get to know each other, I would
Speaker 3: say about fifty percent of the people that I answer structure,
Speaker 3: we switch it months into working together to go on structured,
Speaker 3: to go on structure, because they realize they answer that
Speaker 3: question based on what society made him think is the
Speaker 3: right thing to do. They think when I worked with Jonahs,
Speaker 3: which is when we met started working with Jonahs Blacks,
Speaker 3: he was extremely unstructured. And what I mean by that
Speaker 3: is he woke up in the morning and he knew
Speaker 3: he wanted his lag putting to improve. Let's say it
Speaker 3: was a Tuesday before a tournament. He knew his lag
Speaker 3: putty needed to get better. He knew he wanted to
Speaker 3: work a little bit on his wedges. He knew he
Speaker 3: wanted to work a little bit on his start in
Speaker 3: line with his driver, and he knew he wanted to
Speaker 3: get nine holes on. He had no clue what he
Speaker 3: was going to do.
Speaker 1: First.
Speaker 3: We would show up on the golf course. He looked
Speaker 3: at the putting green and say it's too busy, Let's
Speaker 3: go to some wedges. And he wouldn't care. But also
Speaker 3: he would never leave the golf course until everything was done.
Speaker 3: Melts a little bit that way, she knows what she
Speaker 3: wants to get done. She goes and does it.
Speaker 1: She doesn't have an action plan, but she will stay
Speaker 1: there and get it all done exactly.
Speaker 3: So what happens when we grow up, we go to school,
Speaker 3: and when we go to school and we're growing up,
Speaker 3: everybody tells us we have to have a routine, we
Speaker 3: have to do things in.
Speaker 1: Order, and if we don't do an action without a
Speaker 1: plan is a wish, all the cliches, and if we don't.
Speaker 3: Do those things right, we are lazy. I don't believe
Speaker 3: it to be true. I believe and you know G
Speaker 3: for example, and you know G. That's why I bring
Speaker 3: her up from sports box. Yeah, extremely unstructured person, went
Speaker 3: to Yale, went to Pan, played golf on tour, top golf,
Speaker 3: c right, fantastic. She's a boss, very unstructured. She will
Speaker 3: tell you. She calls herself a chaos muppet. Okay, very unstructured,
Speaker 3: but she knows what she wants to do and she
Speaker 3: gets it done. It just doesn't mean that she gets
Speaker 3: it done in an order. Now, there are other players
Speaker 3: that I've worked with, susaying very unstructured, not a what
Speaker 3: she was going to do at each time. There are
Speaker 3: other players that like to put the close out a
Speaker 3: night right down tomorrow morning breakfast, eight am, putting a thirty.
Speaker 1: I remember when Tiger came out, they made him have
Speaker 1: a mandatory press conference. Right when Tiger first turned pro,
Speaker 1: he was, you know, every single week he was having
Speaker 1: a press conference, and the press conference was at the
Speaker 1: same time every day, right, So we had a day
Speaker 1: and a time, and the time was normally in the afternoon.
Speaker 1: And when Tiger first came out on a tour, he
Speaker 1: would go out and play nine holes and my dad
Speaker 1: would be like, dude, you gotta got a press conference.
Speaker 1: He's like, oh, they'll come get me, right, and he
Speaker 1: would make them come get him. And as he became
Speaker 1: the greatest player the game has ever seen, in my opinion,
Speaker 1: his life became so much more structured. And my dad
Speaker 1: said the years that he worked with Greg Norman because
Speaker 1: they had so many obligates off the golf course, and
Speaker 1: I think Tiger's life got like that as well. He
Speaker 1: had so many other things going on. Right, when you
Speaker 1: reach a global icon status, your time is very limited.
Speaker 1: So I watched Tiger as he got better, become way
Speaker 1: more structured and incredibly diligent, and you could mark your
Speaker 1: watch by when he was going to walk onto the
Speaker 1: range when he was going to go to the tee.
Speaker 1: He was a robot in his structure at his best.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's probably how his mind worked naturally.
Speaker 1: How can people listening guys figure out which one they are?
Speaker 2: Well, I think for me, I even in my personal life,
Speaker 2: I like plans. I enjoyed plans, but I don't necessarily
Speaker 2: like structure.
Speaker 4: Drinking plans, oh deary may Yes, I do like a
Speaker 4: structure for drinking, but but like I enjoy, I don't
Speaker 4: enjoy structure.
Speaker 2: So like, I know what my drill, I know what
Speaker 2: I need to get done, but it has to be
Speaker 2: the way I want to do it, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2: And I think that's that took me a lot, like
Speaker 2: quite a while in my career to kind of figure
Speaker 2: that out. I was always trying to be the kind
Speaker 2: of more of the structured to feel like I was
Speaker 2: getting the most out of my day. Whereas now I'm like, right,
Speaker 2: I know I need to do this drill. I know
Speaker 2: I need to do this movement doesn't kind of I'm
Speaker 2: a bit more easy going in a sense of how
Speaker 2: that's going to be approached, but I definitely get it
Speaker 2: done and that's helped me. I think be a bit
Speaker 2: more about like the quality instead of the quantity.
Speaker 1: As a player. If you guys are working on something,
Speaker 1: if Orge is asking you to do something or doing
Speaker 1: a drill and you don't like the drill, or you
Speaker 1: don't do it, and are you someone that's going to say, hey,
Speaker 1: I don't really like doing that. Can we find another
Speaker 1: way to do it? Or are you like the majority
Speaker 1: of tour players. You'll do it, you won't want to
Speaker 1: do it, You'll be mad at us for telling you
Speaker 1: to do it, and then three four months later the
Speaker 1: water bottle won't be in the right place, and then
Speaker 1: you start yelling us and you say, and I hate
Speaker 1: that drill anyway? Are you one of those?
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 3: Now we talked, We talked. We actually talked about this
Speaker 3: a couple of days ago. I think I'm very quick. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, I say, hey, I want to get this done.
Speaker 3: I want to move it this way for this reasons. Right,
Speaker 3: we can try. Let's try the first thing. We're gonna
Speaker 3: try this type of drill, which is an avoidance drill.
Speaker 3: So here's this avoid that like this one two shots. No,
Speaker 3: I don't like how your body's reacting to it. I
Speaker 3: don't like how the club is reacting to that. Drill
Speaker 3: is not gonna work. Let's go in a different direction.
Speaker 3: So now we're going to try a visual Q type
Speaker 3: of drill. So try down. Oh you react really well
Speaker 3: to that. Let's stick with down. And usually she will
Speaker 3: tell me otherwise. But we're pretty quick on like throwing.
Speaker 3: Throwing a drill out of the equation. Yeah, if in
Speaker 3: a couple of the first couple of swings. I mean,
Speaker 3: she's so athletic, right, you've seen her, like obviously, you
Speaker 3: know these elite athletes are so athletic that if you
Speaker 3: give them a drill and they don't look athletic, clearly
Speaker 3: there is something between the connection of the mind to
Speaker 3: the body that, in my opinion, is not You.
Speaker 1: Talk about structure, and I think what everybody listening, And
Speaker 1: in my head, I was thinking, Okay, the structure is
Speaker 1: talking about practice, But it's something that I talk a
Speaker 1: lot about, and I think that a lot of players
Speaker 1: that are trying to get to that next level are
Speaker 1: convinced that the only way they can get there is
Speaker 1: to have incredibly structured, incredibly lengthy, incredibly technically overloaded practice. Sessions.
Speaker 1: What are some things that you both think that people
Speaker 1: listening can do from a structure on the golf course
Speaker 1: when they're playing golf, not practicing golf, because I think
Speaker 1: I just see that. I think everybody in golf just
Speaker 1: practices too much. I think we are as golfers, we
Speaker 1: are overloaded with practice and we're underloaded with real real
Speaker 1: time data playing what's happening in the game. I mean,
Speaker 1: would you guys agree that at times practice can almost
Speaker 1: in your head, become more important than playing what you're
Speaker 1: doing on the range. It's like, okay, well let me
Speaker 1: just get back to the range. And it's like sometimes
Speaker 1: you can forget what you're doing on the course. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: I just want to get to the range and work
Speaker 1: on this. I'm like, yep, But it's not a game
Speaker 1: of practice, right, you know this. If golf was a
Speaker 1: game of practice, it would have judges and Nelly Korter
Speaker 1: would win every week and Adam Scott would win every
Speaker 1: week because the judges would look at their golf swings
Speaker 1: and go ten nine to nine nine eight. If you
Speaker 1: didn't have a beautiful, technically sound golf swing from a
Speaker 1: judgment standpoint, you wouldn't be able to do. What are
Speaker 1: some things that you can structure on the golf course
Speaker 1: when you're playing.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think for us, like he discussed me
Speaker 2: more on my target lines, he's pretty structured with that.
Speaker 2: And he's pretty because I again shock, I can be
Speaker 2: a little bit understand it verbally.
Speaker 1: Ask you it's like where.
Speaker 2: You start and Ry, I'm going to start of that
Speaker 2: tree and the one's going to move it. Ryan, He's
Speaker 2: like perfect, and then he's like, hit it hard.
Speaker 1: Because I think a lot of golfers I'll ask them that,
Speaker 1: especially high handicapped golfers, where's your target and they'll say, well,
Speaker 1: the flag. I'm like, you know that's not going to
Speaker 1: work because you don't hit You're not going to hit
Speaker 1: your target given your talent level and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: And I think what you said their mel is really
Speaker 1: important that you're being structured with your target line, being structured,
Speaker 1: with where you're starting the golf ball. I think would
Speaker 1: you agree. I think most golfers are obsessed where the
Speaker 1: golf ball is going, and they're not obsessed where the
Speaker 1: golf ball is starting.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and if you're.
Speaker 1: Trying to hit a draw the ball, damn well, better
Speaker 1: start to the right, and if you're trying to hit
Speaker 1: a fade, it needs meaning, it needs I think a
Speaker 1: lot of players think, if I'm going to hit a draw,
Speaker 1: I aim at right at the flag, and then I
Speaker 1: hit the draw right and then it's curving offline. And
Speaker 1: I think that would you say that's structuring in having
Speaker 1: very diligent, specific regular what's your target? What's your target line?
Speaker 1: Where are you trying to start this golf ball? I
Speaker 1: think that has a tremendous amount of power in it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, even even working with the Elgue golfers, right, obviously
Speaker 3: Elague golfers are different because of you know everything they're
Speaker 3: going through, right, But I remember, uh, you know, looking
Speaker 3: through like even with her, We're on the golf course
Speaker 3: and it's a little windy, and there's a slope right
Speaker 3: to left, and where's your target two years right at
Speaker 3: the flag? Okay, what's your starting line? Two years right
Speaker 3: at the flat? But you have a right to left slope, lie,
Speaker 3: and it's into the wind. Where do you want to
Speaker 3: land it? There's one forty five okay, and the wind
Speaker 3: is making it play one fifteen? No, no, no, where
Speaker 3: do you want to land it? Right? So like the
Speaker 3: even the ability to always follow the same process of
Speaker 3: how you communicate with yourself or with your caddy, with
Speaker 3: your cellphor with your caddy sirt right. So if you're
Speaker 3: an elite level, what's the flag, where do you want
Speaker 3: to land? Now, what's the wind plane? Then what's the
Speaker 3: slope doing? Then what's the total shot plane? Then what
Speaker 3: club do I select for that specific distance with that
Speaker 3: specific light, then go in and execute. But I think
Speaker 3: a lot of times most players will jump all of those.
Speaker 3: It'll be one forty five is playing one fifty, Grab
Speaker 3: my one fifty club or grab my one sixty club
Speaker 3: and try to hit a knock down right, And that's it.
Speaker 3: So it's it's it's interesting. That's what I think. That's
Speaker 3: what a lot of people can really learn is the
Speaker 3: fact that they jump steps to get to the to
Speaker 3: the flag right, or they jump steps to as you said,
Speaker 3: figure out where they want to finish the ball. But
Speaker 3: you know, these elite athletes, they they control the starting
Speaker 3: line much more than they control their finish line correct
Speaker 3: much more.
Speaker 1: And that's the that's the opposite of the average golf
Speaker 1: of the average golfer, I think, you know that's playing
Speaker 1: golf non professionally, non ultra ultra competitively is never even
Speaker 1: thinking about their start line. They're never even thinking about
Speaker 1: where they're intending to start the golf ball. They're just
Speaker 1: hyper focused on where the golf ball is going to finish. Now,
Speaker 1: what type of player are you are? Are you from
Speaker 1: driving range to the golf course? How many swing thoughts
Speaker 1: are you taking with you to the golf course? Are
Speaker 1: you trying to go to the golf course with no
Speaker 1: swing thoughts? If you do take them, how many are
Speaker 1: you taking them? Or you just go and say, listen,
Speaker 1: I have what I have today. I was on the range.
Speaker 1: This is what I've got, this is the shape I've got,
Speaker 1: and I'm just going to go play golf.
Speaker 2: So I'm a type, but I do like a swing thought.
Speaker 2: I've got like one with my driver, and then I
Speaker 2: wanted maybe maybe two with my full swings. But that's
Speaker 2: pretty much it. I can't know my feeling that I
Speaker 2: feel most comfortable with. I have like a few that
Speaker 2: we can always revert back to, so like ones not
Speaker 2: working that day, I can go to another one that
Speaker 2: I like and another one. So I have like a
Speaker 2: little blueprint of swing balls that you usually are pretty solid.
Speaker 1: What's the main feeling that you like to take to
Speaker 1: the golf course or does that.
Speaker 2: Hit it hard? If I'm completely honest, like I get
Speaker 2: in trouble when I don't. I guess another way you
Speaker 2: could say is commit. But I don't feel like I'm
Speaker 2: not committing. I'm just don't swing as hard, and so
Speaker 2: that is what manipulates the club and gets my body
Speaker 2: not moving as athletic as it should.
Speaker 1: But org wouldn't you say that when Mel doesn't hit
Speaker 1: the golf ball hard. Those would be the swings where
Speaker 1: she says she doesn't like to wear her legs.
Speaker 3: Look right, Yeah, she gets less aggressive, a little slow,
Speaker 3: little scary.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my legs go before my hands in my body.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I always think it's you can let yourself off
Speaker 1: the hook. If you're trying to hit a good shot
Speaker 1: and you hit a bad one, then it's harder to
Speaker 1: let yourself off the hook when you're not trying to
Speaker 1: hit it obi, when you're not trying to hit out
Speaker 1: of bounds, you're not trying to hit it in the water.
Speaker 1: So you take a club and you don't make an
Speaker 1: aggressive swing, and you're like, I should have just hit
Speaker 1: driver I'm up here trying to steer a three wood,
Speaker 1: and I didn't really commit to it, and I really
Speaker 1: didn't trust the swing. And if I think a lot
Speaker 1: of play people on the the average golfer thinks that
Speaker 1: the majority of their golf swings are bad, and people say, oh,
Speaker 1: you swung too hard, I don't really see that. I
Speaker 1: see what most people do on the golf courses. Their
Speaker 1: body stops and their arms swing hard. They're not swinging hard,
Speaker 1: They're just swinging their arms hard because the body stops.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, it's you know with mel as she was saying,
Speaker 3: I mean, and we used that a lot last year.
Speaker 3: I call it closing the loop. Right, So I talk
Speaker 3: about the what the brain does right, and you, interestingly,
Speaker 3: you brought up archery. This is something I learned from
Speaker 3: a guy called Joe Turner, and he talks about the
Speaker 3: mental loop. So if the if the if the brain
Speaker 3: is on an open loop, any thought can come in
Speaker 3: at any given point where if the if the brain
Speaker 3: is in a closed loop, it's hard for anything to
Speaker 3: come up. So I do exercises with and we did
Speaker 3: it a lot last year where she was talking about
Speaker 3: saying the same word over and over again throughout the
Speaker 3: entire golf swing. So whether it was turn turn, turn, turn, turn,
Speaker 3: and her brain just kept saying turn, turn, turn, turn turn,
Speaker 3: or if it was two swing thoughts, it was right left.
Speaker 3: Let's say with the driver last year, for example, we
Speaker 3: were trying to move a little bit off to the right,
Speaker 3: a little bit through the ball, so right, right, right,
Speaker 3: and as soon as you got to the top of
Speaker 3: the swing, she would say left, left, left, left, and
Speaker 3: the brain was always closing the loop of those two thoughts.
Speaker 3: If you're walking and you say right left, right, left, right, let,
Speaker 3: you can't think of anything else coming around right.
Speaker 1: Tiger said that to me. I mean when Tiger went
Speaker 1: on that run in two thousand, he had that putted
Speaker 1: at Valhalla in the playoff to get into a playoff
Speaker 1: with Bob May he was kind of downhill and stuff
Speaker 1: like that, and I asked him after the season was over,
Speaker 1: I said, what what you're saying to yourself? And he said,
Speaker 1: I'm He said, if you could hear what I was
Speaker 1: saying to myself in my head, he was like, I said,
Speaker 1: he said, I got over the pot, and I was like,
Speaker 1: this put's so easy. My mom could make this. Pott
Speaker 1: and he said basically, once I saw that, he said,
Speaker 1: I just am saying over and over in my head,
Speaker 1: make it, make it, make it. Make that sounds yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, yeah, that sounds simplistic. But if that is
Speaker 1: the mantra and that is the only thing that you're
Speaker 1: saying to yourself, that that can't be a negative, right, right,
Speaker 1: and then that's got something positive has to come out
Speaker 1: of trying to have your focus be on something that
Speaker 1: is task orient and task positive.
Speaker 3: Correct, and is what you're trying to achieve. Right, You're
Speaker 3: telling yourself what this swing thought or the feel or
Speaker 3: the sensation, whatever we want to call it. If if
Speaker 3: it's be aggressive, and you tell yourself aggressive, aggressive, aggressive,
Speaker 3: and the only word going through your mind is aggressed.
Speaker 1: In that loop is aggressive.
Speaker 3: Nothing else is going to come in. It's it's hard
Speaker 3: for the thought of oh, lake right, bunker left, any
Speaker 3: of those thoughts. So, you know, we talk a lot
Speaker 3: about I'd rather you pick a more conservative line and
Speaker 3: make a more aggressive swing.
Speaker 1: Conservative target, very aggressive aggressive.
Speaker 3: Target, and then make a conservative swing right.
Speaker 1: Or a non committed swing exactly. Now, do you find
Speaker 1: that sometimes when you're taking really really aggressive lines to
Speaker 1: where it's a really really dicey pin, you know, forced
Speaker 1: carry over water. You're trying to push it and you're
Speaker 1: trying to be super super aggressive. It's sometimes it's situations
Speaker 1: can get away from you or does that help you?
Speaker 2: If you're honest, I think it helps me, right, Like
Speaker 2: if I've got a tight drive and I in my
Speaker 2: own head, I'm it forces you to have to commit
Speaker 2: to this, like I have to if I've got any
Speaker 2: chance of hitting the drive where I want it, I
Speaker 2: have to commit to this. Like I've got any chance
Speaker 2: of this five iron getting over that water on this
Speaker 2: part five, I have to commit to this. So it
Speaker 2: almost forces me into that space. So yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: I would say I'm usually better, and it's when I've
Speaker 2: got like a wedge in the middle of a green
Speaker 2: that I usually yeahs.
Speaker 1: Actually I spent. I am the only person that has
Speaker 1: ever worked with Bubba Watson. It was two weeks I
Speaker 1: worked with him at Memorial in twenty and for about
Speaker 1: five days at the PGA right, and so we were
Speaker 1: at Memorial and I was asking him about his game,
Speaker 1: and I started to notice something that he would say
Speaker 1: to his caddy, who now Keddy's for Scotti Scheffler, Teddy Scott,
Speaker 1: we'd get be a practice round, we'd get over the ball,
Speaker 1: we'd get to the and Bubba would start going, all right, Petty,
Speaker 1: what do you want to see here? Kind of shot
Speaker 1: you want to see here? So Teddy would give him
Speaker 1: the number, and then Bubba's immediate reaction was what kind
Speaker 1: of shot you want to see here? Because he's got
Speaker 1: every shot he can play right the way Bubba plays
Speaker 1: golf is and Bubba said, listen, when I get in
Speaker 1: difficult situations, I feel like that's when I'm at my best.
Speaker 1: Right case, in point winning, the first Masters hits it
Speaker 1: way right at eighteen, the iconic you know, I mean
Speaker 1: the hook to get to get it around, to get
Speaker 1: the ball, to get anywhere close to the green let
Speaker 1: alone where he got it. But he I finally got
Speaker 1: him to admit that the difficulty is seven iron from
Speaker 1: the middle of the fairway to an easy pin, to
Speaker 1: a not a tucked pin, to a green light pin,
Speaker 1: a wedge in his hand from his wedgeyard to a
Speaker 1: green light pin. He's like, that's where I get paralyzed
Speaker 1: because I've got so many options that I can't see
Speaker 1: any and that is such a weird place to be in, right,
Speaker 1: But I think it goes to what you said was
Speaker 1: when the situation demands the most focus, it's easier for
Speaker 1: you to focus in on that, right.
Speaker 2: Like you know, if I do tend to hit you know,
Speaker 2: when I hit a batchet on the trees or something,
Speaker 2: and i'm you know, me and Greg would be like, right,
Speaker 2: we need you know, it's one thing, we needed it
Speaker 2: under this tree. It's just hit a low seven like
Speaker 2: run it up, you know, because this.
Speaker 1: Is a pod, because this is a podcast and people
Speaker 1: aren't watching you. When you started describing that story, your
Speaker 1: eyes your head went down low, your eyes went low.
Speaker 2: But I'm almost described like I'm almost talking to myself
Speaker 2: about the process of the shot.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I take people into the trees and say, all right,
Speaker 1: get out, what do you see? Hit me a hook
Speaker 1: out of this. Sometimes these players couldn't hit a snaphook
Speaker 1: or draw the golf ball to save their life from
Speaker 1: a flat lie with a seven iron. But you get
Speaker 1: them into the trees and you say, okay, you got
Speaker 1: to get it around this corner. You've got a little
Speaker 1: bit of a window. We're trying to keep your ball
Speaker 1: flight down. All right, let's go over see those trees
Speaker 1: over there, see that branch, You've got to hit me
Speaker 1: five ten shots underneath that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's honestly, Like when it just it's
Speaker 2: just clearer for me because I know exactly what I'm
Speaker 2: having to do, and so there's just no for me.
Speaker 2: I feel like the doubt just goes away, like I
Speaker 2: know exactly the shot I'm going to play, Like I said,
Speaker 2: when I'm in trouble and stuff, or if I've got
Speaker 2: a moment where, you know, if I have to bury
Speaker 2: the last even you know, not even to win a
Speaker 2: twenty to make make the cut, you know, I somehow,
Speaker 2: you know, not all the time obviously, but a lot
Speaker 2: of the time I give myself a pretty good chance
Speaker 2: because I know, right, I've just got to commit to
Speaker 2: the seven I'm going to cut off there, and it's
Speaker 2: just very clear. But we've got to try and do
Speaker 2: that on the first till on the Thursday, do you know.
Speaker 2: I mean, you've got to do it straightway, but it's
Speaker 2: difficult sometimes.
Speaker 1: Pregan, I give golf lessons to regular golfers. You are
Speaker 1: not a regular golfer. You are a professional golfer and
Speaker 1: an elite golfer. You play pro ams with the people
Speaker 1: that when we're not on tour that we tea on
Speaker 1: a regular basis, the average everyday handicapped golfer not scratched.
Speaker 1: They're just they're just sometimes they're weekend golfers. Sometimes they're
Speaker 1: recreational golfers. You play pro ams every time you're on tour.
Speaker 1: Give me the top three things that you see on
Speaker 1: a regular basis from your pro am partners, And what
Speaker 1: do you think, for the majority of them is the
Speaker 1: lowest hanging fruit for them to improve.
Speaker 2: They certainly don't hit it as far as they think.
Speaker 2: They've hit like one seven nine two jards once and
Speaker 2: so they think that they should hit their seven nine
Speaker 2: two hundred yards every time. That's number one. I feel
Speaker 2: like they just straight away just grab a log wedge
Speaker 2: every time they need to chip. You can chip with
Speaker 2: a nine nine, you know that's pretty uh. I think
Speaker 2: that would help their short game tremendously and honestly pace
Speaker 2: on the greens. I think that they just try and
Speaker 2: smash it in the hole all the time, or you know,
Speaker 2: they leave it eight foot short. So that would be
Speaker 2: my three things. I think that they actually need understand
Speaker 2: that average distance not the highest distance with each club
Speaker 2: chip with not a lob wedge, you know, we it's
Speaker 2: hardship with a lot budge, especially on grainy grass, especially
Speaker 2: here in Florida. You've got to practice that a lot
Speaker 2: and just honestly paced on the greens. I think that
Speaker 2: if they improve them three and I think it'd make
Speaker 2: a huge difference to the average, the average golfer.
Speaker 1: I know you'd agree where I think the biggest value
Speaker 1: that I have to a student isn't standing on a
Speaker 1: driving range with them. It's actually going out of the
Speaker 1: golf course and just going, hey, don't hit that shot,
Speaker 1: hit this one, No, don't hit this club, hit that one. No,
Speaker 1: don't take that target line, take that one. No, don't
Speaker 1: try and carry that lay up. Play smart. And I
Speaker 1: always say to players, play for the pores, and the
Speaker 1: birdies kind of get in the way. But I think
Speaker 1: what everybody tries to do is everybody just tries to
Speaker 1: play for the birdies, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, it's just and it's I had this situation
Speaker 3: happened two years ago with with one of our members
Speaker 3: at Liberty These lady doesn't play a lot of golf,
Speaker 3: beautiful golf swing and she said I'm not very confident,
Speaker 3: but I have to play this Nexus Cup that we
Speaker 3: have coming up with my husband and two other people.
Speaker 3: I said, well, you have a great golf No I don't. Okay,
Speaker 3: very athletic, very good. Let's go on the golf course.
Speaker 3: A couple of times before she was a twenty five handicup.
Speaker 3: We go on the golf course. We get to the
Speaker 3: first hole. You've been at Liberty, so you know what
Speaker 3: the first hole is. She's like, oh, here, I hit
Speaker 3: three wood down there. I'm like, well, there's a creek
Speaker 3: on the right, there's a bunker on the left. No,
Speaker 3: hit your seven R. But that's not going to get
Speaker 3: me to the furway right seven are seven iron to
Speaker 3: the rough, doesn't even get to the faaway Like, Okay,
Speaker 3: now hit a pitcher wach to that layup area where
Speaker 3: you three would be. Okay, go there. Okay, now hit
Speaker 3: another pitching wach to the right side of the green. Okay,
Speaker 3: two put She makes a bogie. Then we go next
Speaker 3: all this part three. So I said, we're gonna skip
Speaker 3: down and we're gonna go down there. So we go down.
Speaker 3: We get the whole number five lake on the left
Speaker 3: outbound's right narrow. I said, okay, here you can hit
Speaker 3: three with if you want to a driver. So she
Speaker 3: hits it and then it gets really narrow. Then it's
Speaker 3: thirteen yards from the water hause are on the left,
Speaker 3: to the bunker on the right and the entrance of
Speaker 3: the green. She's like, well, here, I would hit eight
Speaker 3: iron on the green. Like, no, we're gonna hit pitch
Speaker 3: edge short of the green. That's a forty yard landing area.
Speaker 3: Hits pitching ed. I'm like, now hit a wedge. Hits
Speaker 3: a wedge to the middle of the green. Two puts bogie.
Speaker 3: I'm like, okay, you boggy bogie right. Take that, you're
Speaker 3: one under. We're playing holes that you have two strokes
Speaker 3: on some of them. You're one under. Part Let's go
Speaker 3: to the part five. Go part five driver. I go
Speaker 3: seven iron lake right again, rescue left, very dangerous. She's like,
Speaker 3: normally here would hit my three with to get as
Speaker 3: close as I can. I'm like, yeah, you'd hit it
Speaker 3: on the water. You hit it in the fescue. Seven iron,
Speaker 3: I said, pitching wedge, another wedge into green. Two putts right.
Speaker 3: So she's like, I never thought about playing this way.
Speaker 3: I said, well, what I want you to do for
Speaker 3: the next cup is I want you to add the
Speaker 3: strokes and put my par right, my par and put seven, five, six,
Speaker 3: whatever it is. She should's eighty two and they win
Speaker 3: the Nexus Cup and she's like, I.
Speaker 1: Never thought I could play that good.
Speaker 3: I go just play to your skill. You play to
Speaker 3: your level, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think everyone thinks their level is much
Speaker 1: higher than it is, right. And I think that's because
Speaker 1: we watch people like you, Mal and we watch golf
Speaker 1: on TV, and we watch all you great players do things,
Speaker 1: and we're so prediposed to the numbers that you all
Speaker 1: are hitting and the shots that you all are hitting.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, certainly on the men's side, it's
Speaker 1: rare that there's a par five that everybody in the
Speaker 1: group isn't going for, right, Nobody I mean on the
Speaker 1: PGA to or the majority of the guys, as sure
Speaker 1: as I learn't laying up, they're gonna try and smash
Speaker 1: it down there and get it. And I think the
Speaker 1: viewers watch the way the best players in the world play,
Speaker 1: and it'd be like watching Max Versaff and drive his
Speaker 1: red bell left one car and then going and getting
Speaker 1: in your Toyota Corolla and go try and do the
Speaker 1: same thing and it's just not gonna work, right. And
Speaker 1: on top of that, you don't know how to drive anyway,
Speaker 1: so the car is not going to do what you're
Speaker 1: trying to get it do, and you don't know how
Speaker 1: to drive it at those speeds. I think that's why
Speaker 1: I find that fascinating. I don't think there's any other
Speaker 1: sport that people play recreationally where I think golfers are
Speaker 1: at the top of the list of over expectations, right.
Speaker 1: They just their expectations are their golf swing is going
Speaker 1: to improve as the day goes on, that their golf
Speaker 1: swing is going to get better on the golf course.
Speaker 1: So they're just gonna keep trying stuff on the golf
Speaker 1: course because they're going to improve as the realm. And
Speaker 1: it's just that shit just doesn't happen, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean it's each person has a certain level of skill, right,
Speaker 3: and that skill gives them variants. If you want the
Speaker 3: variants to be smaller, you must improve your skill, and
Speaker 3: if you want your score to be better, you must
Speaker 3: manage your variance. But you can't do both at the
Speaker 3: same time. So if you want your skill to improve,
Speaker 3: go improve your skill. That's fine. It might take a month,
Speaker 3: it might take six it might take five years. I
Speaker 3: don't know how long it's gonna take. But go improve
Speaker 3: your skill. If you want to score better, take that
Speaker 3: same variance you currently have which your skill gives you,
Speaker 3: and manage it the best you can on the golf course,
Speaker 3: and then you will get your best score for you,
Speaker 3: your best scoring average over the course.
Speaker 1: The best score for power, not the best the best
Speaker 1: score for you.
Speaker 3: For your current skill level. Right. I mean it's you
Speaker 3: see these working with your players. They don't hite it
Speaker 3: where they're looking all the time, and they don't know
Speaker 3: if the push cuts coming, or if the pull cuts coming,
Speaker 3: or the one that goes straight at the pins coming.
Speaker 3: Before they swing the club. They don't know which one
Speaker 3: is coming. But their skill is so high that the
Speaker 3: larger percentage of times they hit it somewhat where they're looking.
Speaker 3: And then a worse golfer, even a professional golfer at
Speaker 3: a lower level, a lot of times the variants may
Speaker 3: be a little bit larger because the skill is maybe
Speaker 3: slightly worse. But what they do, unbelievably well is they
Speaker 3: manage that variants the best of their ability and they
Speaker 3: manage their game, right. I mean, I remember watching Brooks
Speaker 3: at Bethpage. If I remember correctly, I think he hit
Speaker 3: forty seven or forty eight percent of fairways that week
Speaker 3: and he won with what appeared to be absolutely no problem.
Speaker 1: That was probably at the end, but you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, like the cruise to the first three rounds
Speaker 1: and you would have thought that he basically hit every fairway.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but he managed as soon as I was saying,
Speaker 3: and I've being a beth Page and you've being a
Speaker 3: beth Page obviously, I don't know if you've ever been there.
Speaker 3: It's a beast, a beast. And you could see like
Speaker 3: tuck left pin right, talk shore left pin from the
Speaker 3: left rough somewhat right side of the pen, somewhere on
Speaker 3: the green, put it backwards, waited until the next It
Speaker 3: just looked so manageable, even though I'm sure internally for
Speaker 3: him it wasn't right, but it looked manageable. And his
Speaker 3: skill level is what it is.
Speaker 1: But I think what I hear you saying is, whatever
Speaker 1: your skill level is, try and play to your skill level,
Speaker 1: as opposed to trying to do something that you can't
Speaker 1: do or isn't your skill level.
Speaker 3: Right, or even try to improve your skill while you're playing. Yeah,
Speaker 3: tried to hit it better than you actually have the
Speaker 3: current ability. Right. We talked, I mean with mel. Yes,
Speaker 3: they were doing the practice round. She wasn't feeling great
Speaker 3: practice round and I said, well, you haven't competed in
Speaker 3: three months. And I said, but at the back nine,
Speaker 3: it said, but I'm hitting it thin so well in
Speaker 3: the back nine, how many birdie PUDs do you have,
Speaker 3: like inside twenty feet? We started counting. She had five
Speaker 3: out of nine inside twenty right, and I'm like, well
Speaker 3: inside twenty feet you're better than you know, you're better
Speaker 3: than number one in the world in those nine holes.
Speaker 3: But yes, she's on the practice round trying to improve
Speaker 3: this skill, meaning she's trying to hit it more solid,
Speaker 3: more of the central face that feels a little better
Speaker 3: than the swing. And I was like, what you have
Speaker 3: right now is these manage that you did great at
Speaker 3: managing it, and you hit a lot of balls inside
Speaker 3: where if you if it was a competition and you
Speaker 3: stayed patient, you would you would shoot a pretty good
Speaker 3: round at nice. And then we went on. We went
Speaker 3: on the driving range, and it felt it felt better,
Speaker 3: and I said, okay, well, and then today it was
Speaker 3: much more solid, right, but I'm not sure that she
Speaker 3: hit as many inside twenty feet but it felt great,
Speaker 3: but it felt better. So the skill versus the managing right,
Speaker 3: managing that that ability and that variance and that skill
Speaker 3: and playing that's what these players are so unbelievable.
Speaker 1: At last, question for you both, No, you can answer
Speaker 1: first life changing year for you off the golf course,
Speaker 1: welcoming your first child, you recently got married. But grade
Speaker 1: wise for this year you're on the LPGA tour. What
Speaker 1: grade do you give yourself and what do you feel
Speaker 1: like you need to do better next year?
Speaker 2: I'm gonna give myself a little bit of grace and
Speaker 2: that you know, I was injured towards the end of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty two. Wasn't sure. I didn't have great status
Speaker 2: at the start of the year, and we had only
Speaker 2: a certain amount of events to get that back, which
Speaker 2: we did. I couldn't play the Asian events at the
Speaker 2: end of the year just because obviously Carlie was we
Speaker 2: were expecting and you know still finished eight second on
Speaker 2: seeing me. So I'd say overall, with all the circumstances,
Speaker 2: we had a pretty pretty decent year. Considering be minus
Speaker 2: plas minus minus B minus, I would say I think
Speaker 2: we got a lot of great work done. My poeing improved,
Speaker 2: my driving distance was good. So yeah, I mean next
Speaker 2: year's going to look different. I think. Obviously having a baby,
Speaker 2: now we're going to have to manage our structure, manage
Speaker 2: our time better. Is he going to travel, Yeah, he's
Speaker 2: going to travel with us. Yeah, for sure, I couldn't
Speaker 2: do otherwise. So you know, for me, I think I'm
Speaker 2: just gonna have to be very very present during my
Speaker 2: practice sessions and when im at the golf course so
Speaker 2: that I don't take it home with me. I think
Speaker 2: that that's something that I'm going to try and develop
Speaker 2: as quickly as I can. But yeah, I mean I
Speaker 2: feel like, yeah, I haven't played in three months, but
Speaker 2: you know, I came down last week and I felt
Speaker 2: like the base of the swing was pretty good. Obviously
Speaker 2: I'm a bit rusty, which so I'm proud of the
Speaker 2: work that we've done together and obviously he's helped me tremendously,
Speaker 2: And yeah, I'm looking forward to next year.
Speaker 1: What do you think or what does mel need to
Speaker 1: What are the strengths that she can carry to next year.
Speaker 1: And what are some things that you guys are looking
Speaker 1: to improve as a team.
Speaker 3: So I'll give you real quick, I'll give you migrade
Speaker 3: on this year. So and this is because, believe it
Speaker 3: or not, I never judge ever, And if you ask
Speaker 3: me or ask I never judge a year based on results,
Speaker 3: ever they will. I don't. I judge. Like if I
Speaker 3: ever say I'm proud of somebody, it's And if I
Speaker 3: had a kid, this probably would be the way I
Speaker 3: would raise my kid, not saying it's the right way
Speaker 3: or the wrong way. Probably the wrong way because I
Speaker 3: don't have one. But I would be proud of your effort,
Speaker 3: your intention, and the attention that you paid to that intention.
Speaker 3: Those are the three things I judge somebody on mel
Speaker 3: this year, probably I would give her as this year.
Speaker 3: And I'll give you one example. She started the year
Speaker 3: with medical because of last year, she knew how she
Speaker 3: had to play. For the first six events. We felt
Speaker 3: we were in a good place from the off season,
Speaker 3: and then the results weren't coming right, missed, a few cuts, made,
Speaker 3: a couple, was not going to reshuffle in a good place,
Speaker 3: was not going to maintain her full status. Mel of
Speaker 3: any other year Liberty National event comes up, it's my
Speaker 3: home course. She asked for an invite, she didn't get it,
Speaker 3: and she was gonna get into shop right the next week.
Speaker 3: But that was the first event after the reshof Mel
Speaker 3: of any other year would have stayed home, practice at home,
Speaker 3: be with her wife, right. And I talked to her
Speaker 3: and I said, you made the choice. I'm just gonna
Speaker 3: give you something else to think about. Worst case scenario,
Speaker 3: you come up here, you work with me Saturday and Sunday,
Speaker 3: away from a tournament. I'm my home course. I have
Speaker 3: all my stuff here with the practice rounds. You play
Speaker 3: the Monday qualifier, you miss the Monday qualifier, and you
Speaker 3: go back home and you're at home with Carly Tuesday
Speaker 3: through the next Tuesday. Because Shop price a Friday start,
Speaker 3: you still get seven days. Worst case scenario, you saw
Speaker 3: me for three full days. That's the worst case. Worst
Speaker 3: thing that can happen. Best thing that can happen. You
Speaker 3: come work Saturday, you work Sunday, you make it through
Speaker 3: the Monday qualifier. You're in the torn. Second best thing
Speaker 3: that can happen. You come, you work with me Saturday,
Speaker 3: work with me Sunday, you miss the Monday qualifer on Monday,
Speaker 3: but one of the girls who already has an invite
Speaker 3: makes it on the Monday, and then you get the
Speaker 3: next thing, and then third one is by Monday, your
Speaker 3: second AlterNet. Right now, by Monday, somebody pulls out and
Speaker 3: you're in the tournament. And she can tell you this.
Speaker 3: She thought about it. She made the decision to come up,
Speaker 3: which she probably would have never done.
Speaker 2: Before I have never done.
Speaker 3: She came up. She came up on Saturday morning. We
Speaker 3: worked on Saturday, worked on Sunday. She played the Monday. No,
Speaker 3: she didn't play the Monday someone pulled out, and Monday
Speaker 3: morning before she had to play, she got the last
Speaker 3: spot because somebody got injured. And I said, that's karma.
Speaker 3: Whether you're believe in karma or not, we can call
Speaker 3: it whatever, right, but but you got the spot. Then
Speaker 3: she starts making makes a cut, makes another cut, goes
Speaker 3: to KPMG, is near the lead after two days, and
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, all of that roles right. Her
Speaker 3: year completely changed after that, completely change. And that's why
Speaker 3: I am proud of this year for her, because she
Speaker 3: did things that she would have never done. In the past,
Speaker 3: being with her back on against the wall. She didn't
Speaker 3: take the easier route and it paid off to regain
Speaker 3: her full status even playing a small amount of events,
Speaker 3: full status for next year, restart with a good card,
Speaker 3: and being a good friend of mine. So that's why
Speaker 3: I give an it.
Speaker 2: George, I like Itice was spending last six out of
Speaker 2: eight days with me, isn't it.
Speaker 3: He had to say that. That's how I judge. That's
Speaker 3: that's how I judge everybody.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you both for talking to me. Mel Like
Speaker 1: I said, you were the first podcast guests. Cool to
Speaker 1: get you back on. I hope I get video when
Speaker 1: the little guy starts swinging, Has he had a golf
Speaker 1: club at his hand yet?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm trying to get him into real football. So
Speaker 2: he's got he's got some big feet on him, so
Speaker 2: I'm I'm already getting him into his little movements.
Speaker 1: But real, thanks for talking to us guys.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 1: So that was a really cool insight into the player
Speaker 1: coach relationship. And listen, I'm always fascinated by it. I'm
Speaker 1: right in the middle of it with working with players
Speaker 1: and stuff, but I'm always interested to listen to how
Speaker 1: that relationship between a player and a coach works, and
Speaker 1: and and what makes those partnerships gel and and be successful.
Speaker 1: And I thought Mel and were I did a great
Speaker 1: great job on that, and that's something that I'm going
Speaker 1: to try and do more, is get a coach and
Speaker 1: a player on, or maybe even a caddy and a
Speaker 1: player on at the same time. I think that would
Speaker 1: be a really, really cool discussion. But I want to
Speaker 1: thank everyone for listening to the pod. It's twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1: We're going to continue to get as many good guests
Speaker 1: as we can and hopefully give you all some information
Speaker 1: that helps you with your golf swing. Son of a
Speaker 1: Butcher comes to you every Wednesday. We will see you
Speaker 1: all next week.