Golf Smarter number four hundred and fifty three.
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You've probably seen people with very short backswings, So if you can actually create.
A little bit more of a backswing, you're going.
To have a much more fluid fallow through and that just adds ten to fifty to twenty yards. And as I've been doing this now for six years, have slowly increase my driving distance like aboute five to ten yards
every year. And that's an accumulation of all the flexibility stuff, of all the balancing on trying to get my shoulders a rotate a little bit farther, sort of like lessening my upper back muscle mask because I'm not training really heavy and during a summer anymore like I do during the winter for when I ski, and it's just basically bouncing out and trying to do things that are applicable for your bent over is one of the hardest things
on back compared to doing exercises where you're standing up right, and when you go on golf posture.
A lot of people can't stay in golf posture.
They have either a c spine it's very rounded, or it's overextended, and it's almost like a hyper extended state, and that creates tremendous pressure in their back and a lot of guys stand up and as soon as you stand up, you've lost your swing.
Two hundred and thirty seven rounds by September first in Canada with Michael Hammel. This is Golf Smarter. Welcome to the Golf Smarter Podcast.
Michael, thank you, Gred. Finally great to talk to you.
Well, finally, you know, it's so funny that I'm welcoming you to the Golf Smarter Podcast. You're very familiar with this program, aren't.
You, Yes, I've listened to it. I thinks it's day one.
Wow, it's seedback you and I have to tell you how much I appreciate the friendship that we've developed on email. This is the first time we're speaking, but you've you've kept me up to date on your game, You've kept me up to date on the weather, and it's really been fun. I really enjoyed getting to know you this way.
It's been great.
Absolutely, you are definitely responsible for where I am today, without question.
Wait, I know you speechless.
I know where you are in golf, not in live.
In golf and my excitement for the game of golf and the reason why I went back to school for titleists and so on. But you started the ball rolling and got me excited in golf that I could realize I could actually do it.
Well, you were playing golf before you you found the podcast.
Right, No, no, no, I did.
I just started. I just started listening to it. Was not playing golf, was not interested in golf.
So and and what what got you interested in golf? Why did you get started?
I was just tired of my clients, my personal training clients and friends ask me to go golf, so I thought maybe I'd give it a try. And so I didn't want to look too foolish, so I started googling some stuff and I found this thing called a Golf Smarter podcast, and I thought it would give me the information regarding what golf was about and what I needed to know. And I just started listening and it sounded interesting and it was probably something that I could probably
do for the rest of my life. And that's just how it started the ball rolling and got me excited about understanding the game of golf.
Wow, so you were just a neophied, a brand new golfer at the time. And tell me where's your handicap today?
Unfortunately it's gone up to about a three point two.
So do you know how many people would love to say, unfortunately, I'm a free Why where was it? Where did it get to?
It got too low as a two? Oh?
My, so that's pretty remarkable. But how much golf do you play?
Well? People are gonna hate me, but.
Oh they already hate you. You said you're three. We all hate you already, Michael.
Okay, yesterday I said another personal record on two hundred and thirty seven point five rounds for the season so far.
Here we are in the beginning of September. How many days in this year so far?
Are you? So?
How many? How many rounds a week are you playing?
Roughly to a day? So up to sixty rounds a month? Oh?
Yes, we we collectively hate you.
Okay a day.
Don't you work? Yes?
A lot.
Well how much. Wait, let's let's talk about where you're based and how much sunshine you get during the year.
Well, like I tell people, I'm not a fair weather golfer, and in Calgary, Alberta, we can get from Like. Yes, like I said earlier, we got snow yesterday south of us, about two to three inches and it literally rained all day yesterday. And I was besides me, there are two other guys dressed like people that were going to go to the Arctic.
I was.
There's only three of us that were on the golf course yesterday, and I needed to get that round in to tie my last year's personal best of two thirty seven rounds. And I just golf whenever, whenever I get a chance, because the season up here is so short, and last year I never had a chance to go away because we had those epic floods and for the month of July, I never played much golf because I injured myself and I was basically homeless for four weeks because of the floods.
So, oh my gosh, I'm sorry.
Yeah, it was tough up here.
And then you guys have you know, all that drought, and then we have all this excess rain.
So we need a.
Pipeline between Calgary and California. Huh absolutely, so yeah, yeah, well we just uh, the last episode, we talked about drought conditions here in California and you're experiencing the complete opposite. Huh. In the you're in the north. You're in the central North.
No, southern part of southern part of Alberta, just maybe about three hours shy of the Montana border.
Oh, you're in central Canada, but on the southern part of it Western Western that's considered the westc.
BC and then Alberta and then Saskatchewan and then Manitoba, and those are usually for western provinces.
Okay, yeah, Well, I've never understood the west thing. When they talk about you know, like Ohio is they consider the west, and to me, that's the mid east. It's the middle eastern part of the country. But because this country is so east coast centric that California is like way west, but that everything from California to Illinois is the West. It's like, what how do you do that? Anyway?
I mean, I still don't understand Pittsburgh is in the in the middle part of the country, and Okay, that's geography is not my best part, but the golf is. Let's talk about your amazing accomplishments on the golf course. You've been playing for I guess if you've been six years now? Okay, so we've been doing the podcast. Is our tenth year of doing the podcast. You've been playing golf for six years? And what were your struggles when
you first started. I mean, if you're already down to it, you've been down to a two, what have you struggled with? And is really banging balls? You know, thirty six holes a day really make the difference.
Well, like we talked about before before we were going to do this, and some of the stuff that I've seen since I started playing golf, people practice very poorly, not the way they play. And when I first started, I could not hit a straight ball. It was all slice, banana slice, because no one told me that I had to release my hands, and not until I actually heard Tiger say that on one Golf channel and said, you
have to shake hands with the target. And as soon as I started shaking hands with the target, I started hitting the ball straight. I started controlling a little bit of a draw, I started practicing more short game and in the beginning, I actually did hit a lot of balls on the range, but I also tore a bunch of ligaments in my elbow from overdoing it and hitting mats,
and it never taught me anything. So unless someone actually has a golf pro readily available watching what you're doing, you just basically solidifying bad habits by just swinging endless balls with no purpose.
That's interesting. Tell me more about the shaking hands with the target. I want to back that up a second.
So I'm a lefty, okay, and I played my whole life playing hockey left and back when I in nineteen eighty and grade ten, we went out in high school to go play golf and my teacher gave me right handed clubs.
And I.
Played hockey in my whole life left handed. Why would I play golf right hand? He said, well, no one should ever play golf left handed. So I tried hitting the ball around right handed, and it was not normal for me, and so I gave it up. So I never took anything up to it. And then when I started playing with my younger nephews left handed clubs, I started getting the hang of hitting it, but everything was a slice, and so now you righties are gonna have
to follow me as a lefty. So you basically, when you take your swing towards the back, your thumbs will face behind you correct and as you go through the target line when you hit the ball, your thumbs are now straight out in front of you. And then when you actually proceed, I'm gonna say this for a righty, your thumbs are now going to start facing the target.
And if you finished that.
Hand position with both thumbs, ninety nine percent of the time the ball will go straight with just a little baby draw. But most people don't finish they hold they you don't finish the swing at the top, and they don't finish it at the back.
And you have to shake.
Hands with not only the target behind you, but you have to finish with your thumbs facing forward to the target line as well. And that's one of the biggest Eureka moments I ever had. That when I saw that on the Golf channel, when I went out to the range of that day, I could hit the ball straight for the first time, and it was so small of a little thing, but it was the biggest thing that changed my golf. So and I've had people watching me and stuff like that, but they didn't know what I
was doing wrong. And what I've found out in the last six years, golf is really finicky with the people that you meet. Fifty percent I think of the people don't know what's wrong with a person's golf swing.
And now the other fifty percent, No.
But they really don't want to share those secrets with you because they don't want you to improve.
Why would they, Oh, because they're instructors. They don't want to improve because they're all business.
No, not necessarily instructors, but there are definitely some instructors that I've actually put in heads with that I've helped people on my golf course and I've managed to tweak their game and they've had some of the best games ever and it was just the littlest detail. And you know, some unfortunately golf coaches want you as because that's their profession. They want to keep you around. If you fix something,
they may not need you anymore. But just like with me being a personal trainer, I'm not going to be able to save someone's body and fitness just within one session. That's sort of like an ongoing thing and from there I get feedback from other clients and referrals, and that
just keeps the whole ball running. With personal training, and now that I found a passion for golf, I'm able to do that and actually see what's wrong with people's golf swing because I had all those bad flaws coming and probably more so so, and because I play so much golf. Now I'm trying to play catch up to all you guys who are playing golf since you were fetuses.
That guy I'm so far behind in my will be fifty this year, and most of you guys have been playing golf since you were single digits, so.
In age single digit and age.
Yes see, not single digit and handicap.
I don't understand what you're trying to catch up. You've surpassed most players as it is.
Oh I know, but what alamsos once you have you ever played hockey?
No?
So what amsos for you to learn to play hockey? Now all your patterns and motor skills have been solidified already, you might be able to take some of those things from baseball and from golf and simulate probably a better hockey swing, but you're never fully going to get the hockey swing.
I'll never fully get the golf swing. I started playing in my forties.
No, that's that's not true, but it's it's much put it this way, it's much harder bo mechanically and connectic wise, to.
Take up the game later in life.
Yes, and then when when you started, like when you look at mac Roy's swing when he was five, it's fallless. He's better swinging at five than did most guys have swung their whole career when they started at twenty or thirty. But you know what, golf is pretty much the only sport you could probably do for the rest of your life. And that's why I just found so much passion with it. Because of all the things that I've done to my body.
I've had nineteen serious lower back injuries and two dislocated palvises. Golf is not one of the biggest things for me to do. So the body does not want to do rotation, flection, and extension all at the same time. And then when you do it poorly, you actually create even more injury potential. So I have to rethink my training, I have to rethink my practice all that stuff in order to get to where I am today. So I, like they say, it takes a village to you know, create a child.
And with your podcast, with my friends and clients and the TPI stuff, I just managed to condense it a little bit quicker than most people do in ten or twenty years.
So as a TPI, let's talk about what it is to be a two GI instructor and what that's done for your game.
Oh that was tremendous down two and a half days down in Mesa with you top quality TPI titleist professionals of LPGA, MDS, PGA tour players, the personal trainers, Cairo's physios put together twelve assessments, of which fifty percent of the people that have actually assessed fail and they have failure built right into them. And so for me actually assessing myself, I actually found out that I actually had a left glute that would never fire.
And if you can't fire your glues, which.
Makes up eighty percent of the golf swing from the ground up for power wise, you're not going to have a very efficient game off the tee as well as your mid irons.
And it actually even affected my short game.
So it just showed me the full aspect on exactly what the tour pros have to go through to get golf fit and that it was fit before of doing a powerlifting and being a bodybuilder and stuff like that. But I wasn't golf fit. I did all the wrong things not applicable to the game of golf. And that's what was an eye opener. And so when I came
back to Calgary, I revamped my entire training program. I understood the flaws that my clients were talking to me about their aches and pains, because as I start to get into golfing a little bit more, I understood what they were talking about the game of golf, and then that completely changed my passion for fitness and it was all specifically designed just for golf fit.
Fascinating. Let's pursue the concept of golf fit and what you learned about it and why is that different from what you were doing as a bodybuilder.
Well, bodybuilder is just aesthetics from the outside and trying to have your upper and lower balance with your sides and your front and back.
But golf that's not necessarily So bodybuilding is not necessarily a fitness it's a display.
That's it.
So even when I was a powerlifter, I looked totally different as a power lifter, like very bulky, very thick, compared to when I was a bodybuilder, completely two different physiques.
Wow.
Like the powerlifter was extremely strong and powerful, but not very cut and not very lean because you want to have a little bit more body fat to protect the joints. And where as a bodybuilder, my joints hurt all the time because I was so lean. I was less than two percent body fat and like paper thin skin and tired all the time. But I wasn't that strong. Interesting, but I look strong, because.
That's that's that's surprised me. It was always when you see bodybuilders, they look incredibly fit and amazing shape.
But as you get leaner and leaner and leaner, you don't have a lot.
Of body fat to protect your joints, and you're extremely exhaustive from trying to maintain such a low body fat level. And it kind of makes you go crazy too, because you're carbol depleted and you're tired, and you're you know, training three four times a day and of cardio and weights.
But when I went to the TPI and took up the golf fitness there, it was a complete mind blowing experience that I needed to now balance out both sides a little bit more efficiently, more rotation from not only my wrists, my elbow, shoulders, you know, mid thrastic upper back neck.
And at the same time, I really had.
To watch on over torquing for my lower back, and I did tweak my back a few times when I first started on trying to swing too hard and especially trying to keep up to guys that were I was playing with that could just crush the ball eighty tow one hundred yards farther, and I thought I just needed to swing harder, but it was there was just no power in my swing. I swung, but absolutely no power. And I learned how to slow it down like Freddy
Couples and Ernie L's and get more rotation. And now you know, I'm within ten to fifteen yards of these guys when I started.
And you're probably ten fifteen yards beyond.
Them some of them.
Yeah, yeah, because if I you know, I know how to play a cut now with my driver, and I know how to play a draw, so I can play both sides. Because one of the guys I used to play with what was taught by Moon Norman, our Canadian legend and Billy Casper, And one of the biggest things that they said is you never ever fight the wind. So in a draw wind, for me, left to right it's my go to shot. And when there's a right to left wind, I've learned how to cut it into there.
And sometimes my longest driving in a cut wind so far as three fifty six yards.
So I got all that one that day. Yeah, you did.
And you weren't swinging hard.
Absolutely not.
I was actually choked down and I just cranked on it and I hit up on it and I just left it into the wind, and I said, just see.
You, and I'll see you when I get to you.
And by the time I lasered it and put it on the GPS with another guy who came out to three fifty six. That's but that's something that most people are not willing to learn to hit it. A little cut and a little draw, and those things are game savers. And that's why I've dropped my index so far, because half the holes on my track out of twenty seven holes, half of them are cuts and half of them are draws.
And I have to be able to work it around from right to left, especially on the long par fives, or I'll never get there in uh sometimes he even three because it's such a hard dog leg left on some of them when they go when I go down into our valley that I just can't get home in three because I'm stimmied by trees.
So all right, now more about golf fit, what that means and what we need to do.
To get there.
Well, the biggest thing, eighty percent of it is glutes and abdominals, and most people don't have strong enough glute to balance out both sides to stay stable. And like one of the guys I golf with, he's about a plus four. It basically is from the ground up. You have to be stable from the ground up, creating power and be able to transfer, you know, for a wrighty
from right and load it to your left hip. And most people, when I start training them, they have absolutely no hip power whatsoever, no flexibility, no rotate, And most people just are arm swingers and they've adapted to swinging
with their arms. But eventually that gets to create tremendous torque in their back, their hips, their ankles, their knees, and after you know, you get after age fifty and stuff like that, you start losing sonovia fluid in your joints, bones start to reb on bones, and the golf game is not that fun anymore.
So that's why I can.
Do what I can do, Like I can go fifty four holes in a day and the only thing that is sore is just my feet from walking.
But other than that, my back is perfect.
I don't overswing, you know, and some days they're windy and I just play within myself. But it has to do with golf fitness home basically an example of what golf fitness can do that most people you should be able to golf thirty six holes.
Pain free walking, Yeah, you should be right, but most people with apems is there, they don't train correctly.
Well, I don't think most people have the stamina to do thirty six holes in a day.
Exactly, just like on the one email saying that one guy I was golfing with that could already get through eighteen because he smoked a cigar the entire time and he was hot, cat coughing and hack and I I was surprised that he would walk and smoke that size of a cigar for the entire round, and by the time he walked up on one of our hils, he literally had to take.
A five minute break wow, and we were.
Getting behind it and we pretty much almost had to leave him there on the tea box. So it all depends on what's important to you. And for me, I'm probably a different breathe than most people. My grandfather taught me about if you're gonna have something to do in life, have to do it with passion or don't do it
at all. And I took up the game of golf, and I gave it three years to see whether or not I could figure it out, whether or not my back would take care of itself and I wouldn't injure it anymore, and I just fell in love with it. So and like I said, I rechanged my training to be more golf fit, more rotation, more flexibility.
And I've got ten fifteen years in Taekwindo. So I didn't lack.
Flexibility, but golf flexibility. And in martial arts that's a little different flexibility than in golf. So I started bouncing out my left and right sides. I started swinging with an orange whip.
I don't know if you ever heard of one of those.
Sure, sure, I actually I have the version of it by skills.
It's incredible, absolutely incredible device. So it creates leg time, it slows down your speed. I have an impact bag, I have PVC balls that I throw against the concrete wall. Abdominant work. Plus I specialize in bodyweight training suspension systems, and that's all has to do with rotation and getting the body loaded. And so basically I trained my clients pre season so their bodies are already ready to swing a golf club and the little finesse stuff that'll slowly come.
But most people injure themselves within the first couple of weeks of playing in the season, especially when they're in Canada, if they don't go away, and they injure themselves because their body is not ready for that torque. So I get them ready for a golf swing and they're ready to go out. They may not play the best because they haven't tweaked their short game, but their bodies are ready to swing golf club and fairly hard.
No, we don't want to swing hard.
I thought we said no, But what amsos.
Most people think they need to swing hard when they first start out. And you'll see, guys, we've you know, we've discussed this. I've actually even heard it on your podcast where guys will crank out the big dog right away on the range. Yeah, and they won't work their way up on the bag, and so they think they need to swing really hard. And I see it every day at my track, and I'm going to see it again this afternoon when I go play. Guys will crank
out the driver first thing. And that's the worst thing you can do for your body. It's it's such an overloaded shock to the body that you need to slowly warm up the hands and the little muscles and then the big boy muscles will autom actually come.
I was doing some analysis of my statistics and you know, I hit the driver seven times around, you know, because I hit my four wood off the tee a lot three wood forward. I heard I hit that all off the tee. If it's if it's narrow or I know I can reach, you know, trouble, or I want to position myself better so I won't take the driver, and
I don't hit the driver that much. So that's for me that that is the least important club to be working on when I'm on the driving range, and sometimes when i'm when I'm on the driving range the driver. I try to hit it like one hundred yards. I try not to hit it really hard. I try to take a nice, easy, slow swing and you know, do something different with it, but not just crank it out. I'll take on the range. I'll take two or three swings with the driver I have found And please concur
if you found this to be true as well. But my scores are going down because I'm working more on everything inside of one hundred yards.
Did you want to know a big secret just between you and I? Because no one else is going to hear this.
Right, nobody, nobody?
Okay, what I have found in the last six years, and not only from my game, but the guys I play with that are near scratch.
They play to a shot that they know.
They're going to get to within a hula hoop, and mine is my gap witch around eighty eight yards eighty nine that's usually Birdie and my clients hate that because they like to get on in two on a par fives And what happens those nine and half percent of the time they put it in the woods sand bunker and they come out with a bogie or double and I'm coming up with Bertie because I lay up to eighty eight to ninety yards and I never go for
some par fives anymore. I lay up and I play the whole backwards to one hundred yards.
Or less out.
Like you just said, that's the biggest Eureka moment that I've probably had in a game of golf, that there's just sometimes opportunities, unless it's downwind, that I just won't go and try my track at some of the par fives.
And two it's just too much to risk.
And I already have kept my stats, and I know now that the Game Golf has come out, I've kept my you know, greens irregulation and fairways and putting. And on the days that I lay up to like a front pin, I may not have a greener regulation, but I only have one putt because the chipped it tight.
H Well, listen, you're a Golf Smarter member. You you know about the game golf and getting your extra discount, and thank you for being a Golf Smarter member.
I appreciate that. Thank you.
Oh yeah, no, no, no, it's I'm I'm glad you found value in it.
Absolutely, Fred, And we had this discussion way back in the day where I could not believe that you were given that type of information for free.
I was shocked, you know, from elite you know.
Doctors like doctor Bob Ertel and Retella and like there's hundreds of people that you've had on that. I was shocked that, you know, it wasn't even a paid service. So I'm feel guilty too for you know, listen to it for free.
Well that's okay, because I never had Bob Rutella on the show, didn't you. I'm pretty sure I's never talked to him. I've always want it. I've always wanted to Joe parent lots of the time with Joe Parent. There you go episode number one, and then golf and probably about seven or eight more times after that as well.
Yes, you know he's he's.
Been fantastic for the mental gal absolutely and his books are amazing too.
Uh.
What what are your favorite exercises to do for the glutes in the core that you can share with us for free?
You know, just a simple lunch.
I've actually started working on uh an invention based on glute thrusts where you actually lie down on the ground with your knees bent and you lie on the ground your hands face down and you basically are lifting your butt in the air. And it's one of the ones that actually got from TPI, but we actually do it with single leg and I actually worked on single leg glue thrusts and if you want, I can send some pictures and we can actually put it on your side
if you want. That was one of the number one things that actually got me to reactivate my left glute, because, like I said, I've had so many injuries that I've actually had satic problems for the last probably thirty years. Yeah, and so that was one of the biggest things on getting the glutes more bounced for more power.
But it's more usable power.
And usually when muscles are tight, they're always being fired and they actually bring in other muscle groups that continue the firing process and that leads to more injuries. So you want to have muscles that can fire at the smallest little reaction, but then also learn how to relax. And being seated is probably one of the worst things we can do as human beings, So I teach my clients sitting down is one of the worst things we can do with our body because it actually deactivates things.
And most people don't squeeze their glutes and their abs. So I have people actually sit on Swiss balls at work and they're actually bouncing around on the ball to keep their bodies active. And then I also make them drink a lot more water, so they actually have to go to the washroom at least once an hour, and that sort of deactivates some stress in their body from sitting for a six to.
Eight hour day.
Oh interesting, So I have a lot of the glute trusts for building glutes abdominals. You don't want to build up abs that are so thick and so strong that actually they limit the ability for the body to rotate. So you know, tons of rotational stuff with like I said,
those PDC balls up here we go and killgram. So roughly around a five to ten pound ball that actually bounces, and it's a solid ball, and you throw it up against the wall and if from about five feet out, and if it actually bounces back to your hands, that means that you're using the power of your glutes that
actually brings the ball back. And most people who actually are arm swingers will throw the ball against the wall and it'll fall right to the ground and there's no power there, and then that means they have to stand too close to the wall.
So if you can actually throw, you know, one.
Of those ten pound balls from five to six feet at a concrete wall and it bounces back to you in the same force, in the same direction, that's a lot of glue power. But most people can't do that for ten to fifteen reps aside, So, and also.
The biggest thing is flexibility.
I specialize in flexibility as well, so tons of hit flexibility, hamstrings, growing the side, hips, the lower back, shoulders, wrists.
Basically it's a full.
Kinetic from the wrists all the way down to the ankles and feet. So and out of the think of almost a thousand games now played in six years, there's a thousand different ways to swing a golf club. And but Titleist says, there's one, only one efficient way to swing. And people are basically designed to swing a golf club at an early age. And if you've taken it up at you know, your twenties and thirties and forties, based on your past physical history, you're gonna swing it a
certain weight. And I've seen some horrific swings where I can't even watch the people swing It literally causes me back pain when I actually watch them swing. So they're holding their breath like they're grunting and almost like a Monica Sealis tennis match.
So but and you can tell it it's.
It's a powerless effort or effortless rather than effortless power And you know, like Freddy Couples, we just had them up here on the weekend and he won is the senior tournament up here at the Champions Tour at Keny Medals and just incredible fluid swing.
So what you mentioned holding their breath. What negative impact on your golf swing is holding your breath? Because I've seen a lot of people do just that just before they take this swing. They'll take a huge gulp of air and hold it and then do their swing versus somebody. And what I try to do is take a deep breath and let it out before I start my swing. What kind of negative impact is holding your breath?
Well? Have you heard of the valsalva maneuver? No?
I have not.
It's where deep divers that have no tanks on will actually do this breathing exercise to get more O two in and more less CO two out so they can actually dive farther down. But what happens, though, is it creates tremendous pressure in your abdominal wall, and you could actually get a massive hernia. You could blank out, you could pop blood vessels in your eyes. Like you said, the biggest thing is that, you know, you take a breath in and then just slowly about half of it out,
just so that you're still stable. It's like trying to lift a really heavy weight and let all the air out. Well, you're not going to be able to do it. But if you take too much air in and put all that thoracic pressure in, you're going to cause some trauma. And now you're not only work in your body in a lateral fashion, you're actually doing rotation, flection, and extension all at the same time, and those three things together, if you do one of them, you're in a world
of hurts. So you want to be able to have a little bit of breath in there to hold your transverse abdominance in on the inside. That sort of like stabilizes the spine, but not to the point where we're actually putting tremendous pressure on your spinal calm as well.
It's all you said you didn't that it's not good to build the abs too much. No, what are your favorite exercises for people to get enough ab strength but not overdo it and still retain the flexibility that they need.
Well, I try to do three or four things at once. So the biggest one is that PVC ball through. So when you're standing on the ground, now, you've got to try to get your body weight, lower your center of gravity, which stimulates a golf swing. You're taking this ball, you're swinging it in your arms, you're throwing it up against the wall, it's coming back to you. So that's tremendous power on one side. And then you switch it and you do the other side, so you have an equal
opposite reaction. And you've probably seen people with very short backswings. Yeah, and so if you can actually create a little bit more of a backswing, you're going to have a much more fluid fallow through. And that just adds ten, fifteen, twenty yards. And as I've been doing this now for six years, up slowly increase my driving distance like about
five to ten yards every year. And that's an accumulation of all the flexibility stuff, of all the balancing on trying to get my shoulders to rotate a little bit farther on, sort of like lessening my upper back muscle mass because I'm not training really heavy and during the summer anymore like I do during the winter for when I ski, and it's just basically bouncing out and trying to do things that are applicable for golf that you're bent over is one of the hardest things on back,
compared to doing exercises where you're standing upright. And when you go on golf posture. A lot of people can't stay in golf posture. They have either a c spine which it's very rounded, or it's over extended and it's almost like a hyper extended state, and that creates tremendous trusure pressure in their back and a lot of guys stand up and as soon as you stand up, you've
lost your swing. And like I said, there's some of the stuff that I know now I never did six years ago on my training, and so I try to do things that are applicable to the rotation as well as the stability and try to do I don't do the stuff I did when I powerlifted, and I don't
do the stuff I did with my bodybuild. They're completely opposite to what golf is and most of it is just applicable with rotation and staying centered and working from the ground up, and that's mostly with the glutes and the hip fletchers.
There's so much conversation of golfers today spending a lot more time in the gym and lifting.
Right, and you know, some of the stuff that you watch if you watch the Golf Channel and the Tiles Performance Institute, that's similar to some of the stuff that I do in actual gyms. But a lot of my clients that I train, I train on at this one park.
We trained yesterday and unfortunately we trained a little bit in the rain and at the client's homes and they don't have all that equipment, so we make do with the suspension system that I use, rubber bands, balls, PVC balls, and basically matt work and stuff that they can actually do on their own without actually having to go to a gym.
And I'd love to have.
One of those huge TPI gyms that one of our guys at Jason Glass out at Vancouver has. It's one of the biggest in Canada and it's absolutely huge. Is like two three thousand square feet and it's massive. They got every piece of equipment in there, kettlebells and everything. But that's not applicable to most people unless because they have to actually go to these gyms and actually train. So I try to make it very simplistic for my
clients that they can do stuff on the road. And a lot of my guys are executives of oil companies and stuff like that up here, and they're on the road and they don't have access to gyms sometimes because they're in their hotel, and so I get them to do stuff that's they can actually just do right in their hotel room. And most of the stuff I do now is body weight training. Only your body knows what your body needs. So most machines that I have my clients from five feet to six foot two, they don't
fit in the machines. But when you use your own body masks, your body mask knows what your body can do because it's applicable to your own joints and your levers and the kinesiology regarding your anatomy of your body. It's all and that's coming, that's coming back. Body weight training stuff is now finally come making its way back again, and in my four years of gymnastics, that was probably that was probably the best shape I ever was in my life when I did four years of gymnastics.
Can a golfer be too flexible?
Um, Yes and no in certain areas, like I'd love to be able to have Adam Scott's shoulder flexibility, but I don't think I'll ever have that. My shoulders are just too big from all the years of powerlifting, and it takes me a while to detrain them.
And so that's what I'm.
Going to do over the winner on trying to get a little bit more shoulder flexibility. You can definitely have a little bit too much spinal flexibility, like you know, the John daily swings like that, and eventually, as he gets older, that's going to be a little bit less. You know, Tiger's reduced as swing And it all depends on, you know, if it's actually helping you or not. So too much flexibility you're wound up like.
A rubber band.
But can you generate the same ground force when you actually swing the club?
And everyone is different.
I have some clients that virtually have no flexibility, and yet you know, there are single digit handicaps, and they've adapted to that swing, and they're always on the fairway. They may not drive it long, but you know, they're always on the fairway. And I don't drive it that long either, but I'm always on the fairway. My best club in my bag is my driver. I can steer that thing, choke it down. I can punt one out under the wind. And you know, it's almost like a wedge to me.
So have you gotten a game golf yet or you think about getting one?
Absolutely, that's that's probably something I'm definitely gonna do in twenty fifteen.
Oh well, you know, if you want to take advantage of that members only discount, you got to jump before October first?
Was that the date?
Yeah, they put October first on it, so you can get that extra members only discount, and I'd be really fascinated. Well, first of all, I want to get you on on our challenge. We've got a challenge going for the month of September that for low score. But you know you're you're you're starting low, so it's going to be hard for you to have an all time low score to win our.
Prime LA month.
But I just think it would be fascinating to get your thoughts on what you're learning from from you know, from the statistics and the data that it's coming through the game golf. I'd love to hear what you.
Get out of that, well most people, from what I've kept my stats on and I started kind of doing stuff with my GPS and stuff like that and my laser, and I don't hit it as far as I think I do, and libody I know is that that's sad, and it's it's as you know, unfortunately, I think I still have a ego thinking that I'm actually going to hit it farther, but you literally have to peer it. And you know, our course is wet and in the
mornings it's cold, the ball doesn't compress much. And it's basically taken me that I literally have to be my own caddy and say, you know what, Mike, you got to take one more club and just choke down and swing easy. And I'm getting actually more balls to the
to the flag and actually rolling past. And in the past I was always afraid to go buy the flag, and now I'm actually getting more balls to the flag and passed, so at least I know I have a chance to actually hitting one, and that's just an ego thing.
So I know I need to change that aspect of my game if I if I definitely want to get down to a scratch golfer, I don't know if it's going to be at the end of this season, but we have a club championship Saturday Sunday, and I've been doing a lot of practice and trying to stay in the moment and listening to the positive stuff in my head and being a good caddy and taking more club and you know, and that's the biggest thing on trying to get it there by playing within my own strengths,
and definitely the game golf would be absolutely amazing to figure out all that stuff that you know within five or ten yards that you know today, I've got to be hitting my five iron this amount, and I'm going to trust that, right.
I'll tell you, I am blown away between game golf and the statistics that I've learned and what Dave Stockton said in our episode a couple I get months or two back when he talked about taking two clubs to
every shot and not deciding until he's standing there. I was starting to see that most of my shots are my approach shots are coming up short, and so just like, okay, so you're not going to hit you're not going to crush this one, but if you hit it, well, you'll be at the hole or beyond it, you know, instead of coming up short all the time. And that's been a huge change for me as well, getting closer to.
The pin right.
And I've like, I'm helping this one guy right now that got me started in one of my best friends in nineteen years.
I'm actually helping him with his wedge game. He's had the.
Worst happy hands that I've ever seen a human have in game. And he's great off the tee mid irons, but his short game is just horrendous and it's tough to watch sometimes. And I always tell him, I said, you know, Kevin, that's not his real name, but I'll use anyway.
Is that yes?
To protect He already knows he has issue with his wedges. I just said, you know what, buddy, take one more club, choke down and swing fluid. And he's flying that ball straighter to the target and he's got a new putter and this putter is on fire.
And I said, that's all you need now.
You don't need to impress me by trying to hit that nine iron one hundred and eighty yards, because you're not.
You're going to thin it, You're gonna fat it.
And then you swear and you know it's it's it's a rough game from that point. Go take that aid iron, choke down and let the ego go. And now he's starting to enjoy the game a little bit more fun.
But what what what are happy hands?
He has the yips, so he had does the DC chin all the time, so.
He has now you're really speaking in Canadian what.
He double taps the ball, so he stutters his hands on his practice swings. He's like a Charles Barkley, perfect swings. But as soon as he steps up to that ball, something triggers in his head and he spends a little bit too much time over the ball. Now he's got massive swing thoughts, and I can tell Enough pulled him off the ball several times.
To back off, And I said, Keavy, you got to back off. You're you're thinking.
Now I can tell the wheels are rolling to practice swings. So one of the drills that I gave him is he steps behind the balls off to the side. He takes a practice swing, he walks forward, practice swing, and on a third swing he actually hits the ball, and
nine percent of the time it's on the green. But the longer he spends over that ball, he starts changing the club loftly angles and so he either fins it or he opens it up and he swings too slow and the ball comes out of the grass and he actually double taps it the.
DC chin.
Wow, And that's frustrating to watch. And he does that once or twice around, or he'll fat it or he'll fit.
It out the back.
But it's just something that most people just don't spend enough time on practicing their.
Short game, right, completely agree with you, yeahs.
And now that I've gotten to that point, Now that I've gotten to a point where I'm starting to see significant improvement in my game, I see it's because of the short game. I've talked about it for such a long time, but since I've been working on it and see the numbers going down, it's like, oh, now I get.
It, absolutely, And so that's what I tell people when when I play, and probably i'd say seventy eighty percent of my rounds have been with perfect strangers.
And then they figure out what I what I do? You know, they always ask me.
What he do and they go, oh, well, we get free lessons today, and I go, well, not really.
I'll be your caddy, but I'm not going to give you a lesson.
And so I guide these people around my track because they've never played it, and some of the stuff I give him advice. And one guy was from a sun corepor executive here and had never played our track the head as a son in law and daughter, and I guided him around. He never shot under a hundred, and once I kind of figured out his game, he pretty much put the driver back in the bag and hit his three wood. I've never seen a guy hit a pure three wood off the deck than this guy.
And at the end of the.
Round, he shot in eighty eight and he'd never shot under a hundred before because he was such a poor manager of his game that he always thought he needed to go go for every green, but his three wood kept him in the fairway and his wedge play take one more club.
I helped Rede's putts.
Where the green was on how to bring the ball in. That's a huge thing on trying to manage your golf game. Leave the eagle in the trunk and play to your strengths. And if your strength is one fifty, go to one fifty yards. If you can hit a driver that day, leave it in the trunk. Don't be tempted by taking that out. I'd rather see someone hit a three wood two fifty, you know, two twenty five or whatever.
But hit two straight shots. You're on in apart.
Five awesome, and everyone sing along with me. Never follow a bad shot.
With a stupid shot.
With a stupid shot. Yeah, it's so big because like, oh no, I'm in the woods here. That's no problem that. You know, the ball's covered well everything. There's a root behind me and there's tree trunks. But I can get there in two Yeah right, No you can't. And you know what, you're gonna double maybe triple bogie the hole unless you just hit it right out in the fairway. Take that shot and bogey the hole.
Easy, what's the problem any save a shot?
Yeah, at least one.
So another secret between you and I. One of the best things that I ever did was actually enter an amateur contest.
Really what I got, what.
I got out of that was I actually had to become a caddie to myself on what would I actually tell myself, under no pressure from the side, What would I tell myself? What would I do in this situation? Well, I probably wouldn't go through those trees like I normally would. Golfing with the guys to see if I could prove I could do it. And I won my first amateur last year. So and I started playing managing my golf game.
I started working the whole backwards to my strength. I started learning how to slow my swing down a little bit, more more tempo, the breathing stuff, and playing within my own strengths. Just like Arnold Palmer said, you know, play your own game, and most guys do not play their old game. Most guys right away to go to the tips.
Oh, we got to play from the long teas well.
At our track at one hundred and forty slope and seventy five hundred yards, that's way too far from most people.
So that's a long day.
Yeah, And one hundred and forty slope is not an easy track, no, that is.
And it's long, and it's tight, and you go into a forest and you're going down the valley. You know that has minus six slope from the top down to the bottom, and most guys take double par or worse.
It's all wow, Michael, it's so great to finally get to talk to you and for you to share what you've learned and what you can teach us. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Oh thank you for contacting me. I'm this is what I want to do now. So this is my passion. And and like I said, I'm trying to get caught up to all you other guys that have been playing golf for so long, and and I just want to share what I've learned and grow the game because I know it's suffering and and I know we need to have more juniors in there, like I train the Golf Canada Juniors here and if the parents golf, the kids
will golf. And we need to get that going. And we need to get more people into the game of golf because it's something that you can do for the rest of your life. And I've met some amazing people from around the world in the last six years of playing golf.
So all right, so what's your cure. How do we get more people to the game?
You know, what we need to be friendlier on the golf course to each other. We need to help people out, right, We need to help people out.
We need to.
Yeah, but that's for the people that are already or how do we get new people out of the course.
By bringing someone out? And I know, we definitely need to have a lot more par threes. And like that one thing you had years ago, that one golf course where you could actually play three holes.
At a time. Do you remember that?
No, Yeah, a golf course that has sets of three holes, you can play as many as you want. You can play three, six, nine, whatever. But we need to have easier courses. We need to have a golf superintendents having pins that are much easier, you know, with regard to the whole size. Well, we're putting we're basically playing golf on the level that the pros played. And you know, pin placements that are inside of slopes, on ski hills, on ant hills, that are pins that are inaccessible, it
slows the game down. And in the tournament, yeah, go ahead and place the pins, you know, in ridiculous places. But for the average population to have a good game, and when you leave that day and you say, man, I had a great experience. I'm going back to that golf course. You don't have to prove anything that. Yeah, our track is one hundred and forty slow because we
have the pins in stupid spots. And unfortunately we've had that the last couple of years because we've had people cut in our grass but don't necessarily play golf, and they put the pins in places that no one's ever told them not to put them there, so it actually slows things down and when everyone is four putting, it's very frustrating.
And golf you need to have it as.
An enjoyable experience, and unfortunately, from what I've seen, it's not that enjoyable anymore. And you need to have people have a great experience. It's going to be a long day. You know, you expected four to five hours or more. By the time you get there is probably longer. But give them a good experience, good memories, and they'll come back.
And that's what I try to do at my track as a golf member. Now I'm finally a member at.
A track for the last three years, and I try to give everyone that I play with a great experience. I lead them around with their own personal caddy and you know, cracking jokes and stuff like.
That and just making it a little bit easier your because golf is tough. It is a hard game to master.
And just me think you've got it, someone taps you on the shoulder and gives you a slap in the face and it's like you take a eight right on.
The four or four.
It's like, oh no, I had a par street going and then boom to blow up.
So, Michael, if people wanted to see your stuff online or get in touch with you to maybe get some flexibility and strength training lessons or TPI certified work, how do we get in touch with you and where do we find you?
Well, I've got about three or four thousand training videos.
I'm a little obsessed with my videos on top cop Guru. So I was watching cops one night and that was the only thing that actually came to mind that I could actually use on YouTube. So just top cop Guru and you just put in the browser bodyweight training, suspension systems, golf.
So a top cop Guru is the YouTube channel.
Yes, okay, that's or all my videos.
Are, and I'll put one of them on our blog. I'll share one of your videos. Which one do you think we should see.
Something that I trained with clients. I also use the assistant called Birdie balls. That is one of the best things.
I love the Birdie balls if you can find them anymore.
Great friends with John down there, and he keeps sending me because I'm the only guy I think in the world that actually hits him in minus ten or fifteen in the winter time. And I put them through the test and I've literally worn out two boxes and I hit those with real balls into a net with my
impact bag and orange whip. And so if you look up anything on birdie ball in training golf in the park under my top coup threw site, okay, you'll find it and all my other informations on there with regards to my email.
Address and stuff like that.
And if people want something answered, I'll be more than happy to help them out with the best I can.
Well, thank you and again thank you so much for sharing in your time and and for your support for such a long time.
Oh and I'm sorry to go play now. Mm hmm.