“Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing.”  – Ben Hogan

When you think about the professional golfers who play on the golf tours around the world what do you think of? For some of you, you marvel at the prodigious distances they hit their drives. For others, its their remarkable skills around the greens. But for many, the attraction is their golf swings and the effortless and seamless power and accuracy they generate that facinates many of you.

Is there such a thing as a “pro golf swing?” Do the tour pro’s that make their living striking golf balls down fairways and putting them into golf holes have some secret?. I personally don’t believe they do. If you think about it, there are literally thousands of professionals competing in small to large tournaments around the globe and the one thing we can be absolutely sure of is that no two golf swings are exactly the same. What there is is a Tiger Woods version, a Phil Michelson version, a Lorena Ochoa version and so on. They are all different in style, and they all function differently because their styles are different.

 

 Some golf swings are shorter than others, some are faster than others, and some are radically different than others. Of course the reason behind this is very obvious, we are all shaped differently. We have two hundred and six bones in our body and roughly six hundred muscles depending on the expert you listen to. There are thirteen major joints in your body that move within three dimensions making every golf swing totally unique. When we move our bodies to swing a golf club the amount of flexibility we possess in and around our joints will have a significant effect on how we move our golf club, not to mention our physical strength as well.

Tall and thin golfers will swing the golf club quite differently to short and round golfers who will swing it differently to strong muscular golfers. So as I said, there isn’t a “pro golf swing” as such, however I believe that there are pro golf swing principles that every professional golfer and competent amateur golfer practices and develops. Now this is where confusion reins, simply because these principles are packaged up and learned in very different ways.

There are three primary elements involved in the playing of golf. (not including the golf course, type of equipment and weather etc)

• There is the golf swing you use
• There is an impact with the golf ball
• There is a resultant ball flight

Now every element is as important as every other, but the preference of the golfer will dictate how they are learned and practiced. Some golfers will focus on developing the style of the golf swing more than focusing on how the golf ball is impacted or how it flies. Some golfers will build their golf swing around controlling the impact conditions with the golf ball, and some will work mainly on improving their golf swing by focusing on manipulating the flight of their shot through “swing feel.” They are all reasonable approaches, just coming from different philosophies and strategies.

So the pro golf swing can be thought of as any golf swing that can do the following three things consistently;

1. Produce a high degree of control over the golf balls trajectory
2. Produce a high degree of control over the golf balls curvature
3. Produce a high degree of speed as the golf ball departs from the club face

So Tiger Woods and his fellow professionals can all control trajectory, curvature and ball speed. In my next post I’ll explain how they achieve these three critical factors and how you can learn to develop them in your game.

Until next time.

Lawrie Montague

We have found a strange footprint on the shores of the unknown. We have devised profound theories, one after another, to account for its origins. At last, we have succeeded in reconstructing the creature that made the footprint. And lo! It is our own. Sir Arthur Eddington – English Astronomer

In the golf matrix (Golf culture) there are established rules and accepted practices for those entering and living within its domain. Sadly for many who live within this matrix (Called golfers) they are often sad and frustrated and lack confidence in themselves because they do not play golf like the superior golf beings who also inhabit the matrix. Also, they do not even know that they are in the golf matrix, they simply believe that the only reality that exists is there’s. The superior golf beings, like the gods of Mount Olympus control what the lowly golfers do and need to know within the matrix through their scribes, which are called the media.

The superior golf beings hold the sacred golf scrolls that only they believe they can fully comprehend. The sacred golf scrolls have been around since time in memoriam and the writings are a closely guarded secret. It is believed by the scribes and superior golf beings that the sacred golf scrolls hold the eternal secret for attaining golf enlightenment.

Now, it is the purpose of the scribes to confuse and complicate the message from the superior golf beings, so that the golfers within the matrix always live with hope, but never rise to become superior golf beings themselves.

The superior golf beings and the scribes love to frustrate the lowly golfers by convincing them that the ultimate secret to golf enlightenment is “the perfect golf swing.” They laugh and laugh when they share clues to the secrets of the pro golf swing with the golfers inside the matrix for they know that this is the greatest deception of all.

The lowly golfers, superior beings and the scribes worship “the chosen one” (Called Tiger Woods) and the scribes write and observe everything that he says and does. The chosen one plays a game with which the superior golf beings are not familiar, and they are very envious of his obvious powers. The superior beings and the scribes know that the chosen one has mastered the teachings of the sacred golf scrolls and has the ability to move in and out of the golf matrix whenever he so chooses. He is the only one that can do this as far as we know…

But the chosen one keeps the information about how he mastered the teachings of the sacred golf scrolls to himself and feeds cryptic clues to the superior golf beings and scribes. The superior golf beings want to know “the ultimate truth,” but alas they too are frustrated and disappointed that they cannot know the ultimate truth. So they must satisfy their hunger by spreading false truths and misleading concepts to the lowly golfers to feed the ever growing delusion that exists within them.

In the matrix there are those who once held elevated positions within the superior golf beings hierarchy, but decided that they were on the wrong path. Now they sit on the edge of the matrix and observe the goings on within. They are called golf seekers, and they know who they are. The golf seekers search for the true meaning of the spirit of the game of golf. It is their quest in life to teach the lowly golfers the pathway towards achieving golfing enlightenment without becoming a superior golf being.

The pathway to becoming an enlightened golfer is a challenging one. Many lowly golfers travel the path of least resistance, rather than the road less travelled. They are comfortable in the matrix and they don’t realise that they have the power to alter their perception enough to play a much better version of their current golf experience.

But wo betide the individual who tries to remove himself from the clutches of the deluded scribes and superior golf beings.

Are you up to the challenge?

Do you want to follow me down the rabbit hole?…

Lawrie Montague – Golf Seeker