Lesson 6 – A Humbling but Satisfying Game

A Humbling Game But A Satisfying Game
Perhaps no one put it better than the old Scot, who described golf as “a humbling game”.  It is that.  No matter how good you are, or think you are, you can never take the game for granted.  The minute you do, it will devour you as surely as a shanked 7-iron into the lake.  Ernie Els was an ecstatic U.S. Open Champion in 1994, but imagine how he felt after the first two playoff holes, a bogey and a triple bogey.  And almost every player in the field was humbled at the 1999 U. S. and British Opens.
After almost two decades of bungling my way around golf courses, only occasionally breaking 100, I finally discovered the secret and through imitation and experimentation developed a way of playing that made it possible for me to shoot respectable scores consistently.  From this came the Colonel Bogey system.  In the third year after my great discovery I was shooting in the low 80’s a high percentage of the time.  I was so pleased with my performance and sure I was going to get even better that I was disappointed, almost insulted, at shooting back-to back rounds of 86.  After all, with my new handicap of 11, I was very nearly in the hallowed ranks of single-digit handicap players.  Stand back, Jack!  (More of a contemporary than the present stars.)
Then, on the Saturday before Labor Day, a baffling thing happened.  I shot a 91.  And that score was better than I deserved.  I dubbed shots into the water.  Twice, it took me two shots to get out of sand traps.  All in all, I played as poorly as I had all season.  Exceptionally good putting kept my score from soaring over 95.  I really could not believe what was happening.  After all, I was supposed to be shooting 83 or 84 on my way to 79 or better.  And here I had wasted all those good putts on a 91.
On Sunday, I got to the course early and hit a small bucket of balls before teeing off.  I didn’t miss a shot on the practice tee.  My confidence restored, I stepped up to the first tee certain that Saturday had been only a bad dream.  “Maybe today I will break 80,”  I thought.  So, what happened?  I struggled around the course in 93 and felt lucky to be under 100 considering the number of horrible shots I hit.
Looking back at that weekend, it is clear that my lowered handicap fooled me into thinking that I finally had mastered this game.  I assumed that from then on I would shoot in the mid-to-low 80’s or better.  I got my comeuppance.

A Game Not To Be Underestimated
The same thing happens to most people who try the Colonel’s Way and who find their game improving dramatically once they learn patience and start thinking their way around the course.  And even though we complain, it is the fickle nature of golf that makes it a great game that most of us can never get enough of.  No one, not even Nicklaus in his heyday or a David Duval or Tiger Woods, can take golf for granted.  Golf is a sport and, therefore, it has the same kind of attraction as a lot of other sports.  But there is something more to golf.  Do thousands of cartoons or jokes exist about tennis or any other sport where the punch line is something like, “Yes, yes, I said I’d marry you today – but only if it rained.”
Why is golf different?  Like many others, I think the difference is that golf is a microcosm of life itself.  When you step to the first tee, you are, of course, looking for relaxation, for sport, for competition, etc.  But you are also looking forward to the challenge of you against the course, you against the elements and, ultimately, you against yourself.
Sadly, for many thousands of golfer there is little joy on the links.  They suffer through their rounds, beating themselves far more efficiently than any opponent could do.  They never seem to accept the fact that there are good bounces and bad bounces and that over the course of a season (and usually within a round) they even out.  They think they alone experience exhilarating highs and disappointing lows.  They never notice that the same top professional who won last week’s tournament with a blistering 18 under par missed the cut this week.
Golf is like living.  You have your good days and your not-so-good days, your good holes and your bad holes, your brilliant shots and your flub-a-dubs.  Many duffers suspect that good players know a secret about swinging that no good player will share with a duffer.  As you know, the good golfers do have a secret, but it is not the swing, ball, or equipment, it is patience, patience, and patience.  A patient golfer can play reasonably well even when having an off day.  For example, the 91 and 93 I lamented about at the beginning of this lesson were horrible scores only because of my improved game and even more improved expectations.  A few years earlier they would have been great scores for me.  Remember the old story about the two simultaneous clubhouse scenes.  In one corner there is great joy and celebration because one old member has broken 100 for the first time.  In another corner sits the club champion with his head down muttering about quitting the game because he shot a 79.
A good mental attitude toward the game begins with facing up to the fact that you are never going to conquer the game, that you can never take it for granted and that good days follow bad just as surely as bad days follow good.  If a graphite shaft or a cork center ball or a putter with whistles and bells suddenly made it possible for everyone to routinely par and birdie their way around  the golf course, it would not be long before we would have surplus golf courses for sale throughout the world.
Happily, no invention will make that happen, nor will any player, not even a Tiger Woods.
Why Not You Ask?
Because 80% or more of the game is played on the five-inch course between our ears.  If your opponent has just sunk a 20 yard chip shot, leaving you with a two-foot putt to halve a hole you thought was yours, it really doesn’t matter when your heart is pounding and your knees shaking if your putter is the latest pro model or a Salvation Army reject.
Who can’t sympathize with a Loren Roberts who in 1994 missed a four foot putt on the 18th hole that would have made him the U.S. Open Champion.  Sure, he’ll never completely forget that putt.  But I’d rather remember the 10 to 12 foot putts that Roberts made to save par on the 18th hole and first extra hole of the playoff.  They really showed what he is made of and because he knew he could make such putts, rather than thinking about the miss, Loren made over $1 million in the first six months of 1999.  By now I hope your own experience has convinced you that golf can be a very satisfying game even if you are a weekend player whose swing is not much to look at.  Yet, judging from some of the mail I’ve gotten, I know some of you are resisting playing the Colonel Bogey Way.  After years of swinging from the heels on every shot, going for it, even when the odds are against it, playing for pars and even birdies, the idea of being patient, that is of playing smart seems to some of you like a copout.
So I get questions like these: “Does the Colonel’s philosophy work only to turn a poor player into a fair player?  “Does the Colonel’s Way limit future improvement by emphasizing the safe shot?  “Over the long haul, does it lessen the excitement of playing golf?”
The questions are not new to me.  Not long after I hit upon the basic tenets that make up the Colonel Bogey system, I was interviewed on a network educational radio station.  After I explained how the Colonel’s method works, the interviewer asked, “But doesn’t playing that way take a lot of the kicks out of the game? Doesn’t it make the game a patty-cake game that loses a lot of the thrill of hitting the big ball and reaching a par five in two?”
I told the interviewer, and have repeated the answer many times since, “Absolutely not!”  For almost 20 years, I said, I approached golf the way most weekend duffers do, and I scored many a par and many a birdie, but I rarely broke 90 and frequently did not break 100.
Yet, less than three years after I started playing the Colonel’s way, I found myself playing in a club tournament against a solid 10 handicap, getting only one stroke in 18 holes and winning.  I told the interviewer that that one thrill more than outweighed the combined thrills of my first frustrating decades of golf.
Success Is Thrilling
Winning was doubly sweet because after the first couple of holes I knew my opponent thought it was going to be a short match.  He could see from my swing that I wasn’t going to hit the ball very far, and he was a long hitter.  Yet, hole after hole, I just hung in there and usually matched his bogey.
We played on a dry day, when it was no easy thing to get down in two from further than 30 feet on the greens.  Hole after hole, he would reach the green in regulation laying 40 or 50 feet from the pin.  I usually was short of the green and would pitch on within no more than 20 feet of the pin and some times a lot closer.  Most times he was lucky to get within six feet on his first putt.  I usually putted up for a “gimmie” but had a few one putts.  Then he would have to sink a four-to-eight-footer to tie or win the hole.
The match went back and forth, neither of us ever getting more than one up.  Finally, I beat him on the 18th hole.  By then he was talking to himself.  He knew he was a much better golfer than I was, but that’s not what the scorecard said.
So, as I told the radio interviewer, golf is not a patty-cake game, no matter how you play it.  What counts is how many strokes it takes to play a hole, not how you took the strokes.  If the real thrill of golf was hitting the ball far and sinking holes in one, then owners could carve up golf courses into driving ranges and just let people hit away.
And for the person who cannot learn patience, who still thinks power is the essence of golf, my advise is to stay on the driving range.  You can get a lot more thrills there in a lot less time for a lot less money.

The Swing

One final word of advice on your swing for everyone, whether or not you decide to read the next section.  Trust your swing.  That is, picture the shot you want to make, then trust your muscle memory.  Do not think about swing mechanisms on the course.  It can only mess you up.  The one exception to this advice is the slow backswing.  If you feel as though you are starting your backswing in slow motion, the chances are greatly improved that you will hit a decent shot.  Remember the old story about the man who traveled half way across the country to take a lesson from Bobby Jones.  After observing one practice swing, Jones suggested, “you might try hitting the ball on your backswing.”  End of lesson.

WARNING: It may be a mistake for you to read this section.  Before you do, ask yourself two questions: 1) Are you reasonably well satisfied with the way you are striking the ball?  2) Does your game usually go to pot whenever you try to make any changes in your swing?  If you answered both questions “yes,” you should think twice about reading on.  On the other hand, if you have not developed a consistent swing, if you do not hit the ball reasonably straight most of the time, then I hope this section will help you.  It deals with swing techniques to help you get the clubface to the ball squarely.

The reaction from many people who have tried the Colonel Bogey system is very positive to the suggestions in lesson #3 (straight left arm, shorter back swing, etc.)  so some of what follows is a review of that lesson and then I’ll take it a step further.  As you know, the secret to playing consistent respectable golf, is more mental than physical, but it requires being able to hit the ball off the tee at least 150 to 170 yards for men and 130 to 160 yards for women on the fairway or close to it, and being able to follow up with a second and sometimes a third relatively long (long for you and me, not for a pro) and straight shot.  Maybe this will help.

Over the years, I probably have read as many books on golf and articles as anyone.  Instead of getting a clearer and clearer notion of what a sound swing should look like and feel like, for many years I just got more and more confused.

I would read terms, such as, “one-piece swing,” “turning in a barrel” and “weight transfer,” thinking I knew what they meant.  I’d look at the pictures, read the text, then grab a club and try to get the hang of what I had just learned, or thought I had learned.  Many a time, I thought, “I’ve got it now,” only to be disappointed on the practice range or on the course.

Now, after years of trial and error, I think I have developed a sound swing — admittedly with a short backswing, but basically a sound swing.  (A pro once told me, “You have one of the most efficient swings I’ve ever seen.  You don’t have much of a swing, but you get 95% out of what you have.”)  I think I know what I am doing right and why the swing works well for me.  I hope to give you the same feeling.  Please follow the directions carefully.

If you have a club handy, put it away.  You will not need it for a while.  Depending on how long it takes you to get certain “feelings,” you may not want to apply these techniques with a club for several days.

The first feeling I want you to get is standing up to the ball with your weight on your heels.  You may see references to having your weight back, but I prefer to have you think of having your weight on your heels.  Here is how to get that feeling.  (See drawing)

#1 – Stand up as though you were getting ready to address the ball.  Let you arms hang down comfortably at your sides.

#2 – Spread your feet apart about the width of your shoulders.  Place a book about an inch thick under the toes of each foot.  Then sit down slightly, as though you were about to sit on the edge of a high chair or a bar stool.  Flex your knees.  Now you should be able to feel your weight on your heels.  Feel how powerful a base you have.

Remove the books.  Resume the sitting position, this time leaning forward and letting your weight settle on the balls and toes of your feet.  Notice the difference in the way this feels.  Again put the books under the toes of both feet.  Assume the sitting-on-a-bar stool position and flex knees.  Feel the weight on your heels.  After switching back and forth several times you should begin to feel the powerful base you create when your weight is back on your heels.

#3 – Put a golf ball in front of you approximately where it would be if you were preparing to hit a mid-iron.  With your weight on your heels, in the quarter-sitting position, knees flexed, lean over just slightly at the waist, enough so that your arms, when hanging down straight, clear your body.  Now fold your arms so that you have an elbow cupped in the palm of each hand.  Imagine that the upper part of your body (from your hips to your shoulders) is a unit that moves independently of your head and your lower body.

#4 – Turn your upper torso to your right until are looking at the ball over your left shoulder.  Your weight should still be on your heels.  If you have trouble keeping it there, use the books under your toes until you get the feel of it.  In making a full turn, notice that your left knee is drawn toward your right.  This is natural and necessary, as long as you don’t lift your left heel more than an inch off the ground.

Make sure you are turning your body and not swaying.  To check, do the exercise with your right foot flush against a wall.  You should be able to make your turn without coming close to the wall.  If you brush the wall, you are swaying, not turning.  Repeat the procedures from #2 through #4 several times.  You are making a shoulder turn.  Get the feel of it.  You may never have experienced it before.  The position you are in when you are looking over your shoulder at the ball is the position you should be in at the top of your backswing.  (However long or short your backswing is.)

Go through steps #2 through #4 again.  Pause when you are looking over your left shoulder.  At this point, you should feel like a coiled spring.  To start unwinding, you must move your left hip to the left.  Lee Trevino says this feels like a slight lateral sliding of the hip, which is how it feels to me; Jack Nicklaus describes it as rotating the hips.  (Who cares who is right.  Whatever works.  It’s how it feels to you.)  Unwind completely until your belt buckle faces where the target would be if you were actually hitting the ball on the floor.

Repeat the whole sequence several times.  Do you have the feeling that you are turning in a barrel?  Now do you see what is meant by that phrase?

(Left-handers:  Follow the same directions through step #3.  When you make your turn, you will turn so that you are looking over your right shoulder.  On turning back to the ball, you should feel as though your right hip is leading.)

#5 – Without a club at first, get into the position in #2 again.  Lean over slightly from the waist.  Let your arms hang down naturally and clasp your hands in front of you.  Keeping your left arm straight (right arm for left-handers) turn as in steps #2 through #4 until you are looking at the ball over your shoulders.

STOP! Is your right elbow tucked in close to your body and pointing at the ground?  If you have followed directions, it has to be.  It happens automatically.  It isn’t something you have to worry about.  The reason I mention it is to show you that once you turn properly with a real one piece shoulder and hip turn and with a straight left arm other things happen automatically.

Go through the turning sequence several times with your left arm straight and your hands clasped.  Start the uncoiling by sliding or turning your hips to the left.  Swing all the way through.  Wind up with your hands high and your belt buckle facing the target.  This is what the instruction books mean by a one-piece swing.

You don’t need a club (or even a ball) to get the feeling of the golf swing.  Once you’ve got the feeling, when you put a club in your hands and swing, the ball will simply get in the way of the clubface.  If up to now you have been concentrating on hitting the ball, try thinking instead of swinging the club.  If the swing is right the ball will get in the way and go more or less where it’s supposed to go.

If you have been slicing, hooking or dubbing shots, then, without even seeing you swing a club I would be fairly safe in betting that your swing has been 90% arms.  Chances are you have been swaying instead of turning, leaning over too far, swinging too fast and too hard, worrying about too many things when you address the ball, etc., etc., etc.  Don’t think about trying to treat the symptoms.  Cure the disease by building a real swing that keeps your weight on your heels and uses your body to its fullest.

How far you take the club back once you learn the proper swing is up to you.  My only recommendation is that when you reach the point where your leading arm starts to bend, you either have to restrict your backswing or start worrying about a lot of things that take care of themselves as long as you keep your leading arm straight and turn your upper body properly.

I have not said much about the movement of legs and knees.  They will automatically move correctly if your upper body movement is correct.  The same with keeping your head still.  I didn’t mention it because if you make a simple turn with your eyes looking over your shoulder at the ball, then start back by turning your left hip toward the target, your head automatically stays still.

Now you may be ready to take a club and try out your new swing.  I suggest a 7 or 8-iron.  Practice the correct turn without a ball at first, following steps #2 through #5 exactly, except that you are now holding a club instead of your elbows.  Repeat the sequence until it feels comfortable.  Then try it on the practice range with live ammunition.  As you swing through the ball, keep your eyes focused on the spot where the ball was after you have completed the swing.  Only with the longer irons and woods will the follow-through pull your head up — and that will occur after the ball is well on its way.

One common error of weekend golfers is their tendency to lean over too far and to extend their arms too far from their bodies.  One reason for this is that many weekend golfers try to keep a straight line from their leading shoulder to the clubhead.  That is wrong.  The left arm (for right-handers) should be straight at address, but there is a definite angle between the arm and the straight line of the club.  (Some of the above does not apply if you are using the Heard swing.  I will not go into the details of the Heard swing here but if you are using it, you know what I mean.)

Position a club so the base of the clubhead is flat on the ground.  Step up to the club and duplicate the setup described and pictured in the five steps.  Your arms should hang down comfortably from your body.  There should not be a lot of space between your body and arms.  On any given day at a driving range, you can separate the low-handicappers from the weekend duffers by the space between their arms and bodies at address.  The bigger the space, the bigger the handicap.

Well, this is it.  I promised you six lessons and this is the sixth.  Yet, I don’t think of this as the end of the line.  It’s more like a bend in the road — the road to consistently good golf.  Your goal, whether it is to break 100, break 90, break 80, or just to learn to enjoy the game of golf no matter what your score, is the destination.  The Colonel Bogey Way is a map, that if followed faithfully will get you there.

In the beginning, I said that if you read and put into practice Colonel Bogey’s lessons, you would learn how to enjoy every round you play no matter what the score is.  In addition, you may be able to shoot consistently in the 90’s, if up to that point you were not breaking 100, and in the 80’s, if you were not previously breaking 90 with any regularity.

But, as I said in the introduction, the secret of golf is patience, combined with persistence to develop confidence.  There is no quick fix or a miracle cure.  It is a slow, unspectacular, but steady system to help you both enjoy your game and score consistently better.

GOOD LUCK
&
GOOD GOLFING!!

Colonel Bogey