Hi, This is Paul Parvidus from Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I play a game that has a four letter name, but they called it golf instead. I play various courses about an hour's drive outside of the city. This is Golf Smarter number.
Four hundred and seventy nine, published on March ten, twenty fifteen.
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Every great player with no exception, and trust me, I've been inside their heads. They see things differently. They're so focused on the target. Their visualization is dramatic. Arnold told me the first time I work with him that the only thing that he tried to do in his golf was with his right hand. Feel like he's shaking hands and touching the target because he convects his wrists and really cleared deep, almost shaking hands with the target with
his right hand. I mean, I've been at Nicholas's house when he displained how he plays the Masters, which is phenomal. Talks about looking at the trees, see where the wind's blowing in the trees, and the ripples down in the pond. Where's the flagstick on eleven, and what's the flagstick doing over on twelve? And he said, quote, Guys, it's almost like I'm in a fairy land. It's almost like I'm in this imaginary world. I just kind of feel my way along seeing the targets and the shape of the
shots with the wind. And again, the average high handicapper just stands up there and hits it out there somewhere in hopes it ends up good.
Your twenty seven point plan for better shot making with fitness expert Roger Fredericks.
This is Golf Smarter Premium.
Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome to the Golf Smarter podcast. Roger, Hey, Fred, how you doing.
It's been many moods. It's good to talk to you again.
It is great to talk to you again. We met years ago doing a piece for the Golf Channel with Catherine Roberts Swing Flaws and what was that swing?
I think it was an eight part series. Catherine and I get on the golf channels called Swing Fault Solutions.
Yes, it was, and I was the guinea pig on one of them.
You were the star of one of our episodes.
No, no, no, no, it was the guinea pig. You were the star. It's a lot of fun though, and it was great to meet you. You've got a phenomenal history with the people that you've worked with. I want to you know, established who you are, what you do, who you've who you've helped, and then we'll get into how you can help us. Okay, So are you a PGA certified golf instructor? Yes, I am, okay, and but you are. Now what came first, the fitness flexibility part or the PGA teaching pro.
Well, what happened was, I'll make this real quick. I had a pro golf career cut short a long time ago, back in nineteen seventy two, and I shattered a real complicated bone in my wrist, and I consequently ended up having two surgeries on that, very serious surgeries where they took bone graph ticke a bone out of my hip and transplanted that in my wrist. That didn't work. Then they put a prosthetic in there which is still in there today. And over the next maybe eight years, you know,
I ended up with even more problems. I had two knee surgeries on my left knee, which is not on common. If you look at most golf injuries, most of them and the surgeries are on the left side for right handers because the less stable you know, side usually takes the brunn of and finny wears out. But anyway, I went through that probably got out of the golf business.
But I had a guy look at me. And by the way, I went to countless and I mean countless orthopedic surgeons, physical trainers, rawfice herabologists helped practitions mainly for my knee, and nothing worked. And one day a guy looked at me. He was gutting Rick McDonald. He was the head trainer for the San Diego Chargers, and he
just I never told him anything about myself. And he looked at me and he said, you just watched my gate And he said, hey, you must have one heck of a sore left ankle when you hit a lot of golf balls, and my ankle would swell up and my knee was history. They won't to have another surgery on my knee, but anyway, and I said, how do you know that? And he diagnosed my posture to me,
and he said, your posture is horrible. At the time, I was thirty three years old, and he diagnosed my posture and then he got me completely out of pain. And guess what my golf game, which had been at one time pro tour material. Then I got injured, and then it went up to about an eight handicap. It was fifty to fifty whether I'd break eighty or not. Then I got my bat by body back in shape and I started playing great golf again, and soon after I set two course records in San Diego. And I think,
wait a minute. You know I used to play. I used to be young, and you know, in a good shape and played really good golf. Then I got myself into real horrible shape, surgeries and all that, and I played bad golf. Then I get myself back into good shape, and I played great golf again. I've been playing decent ever since. It's like, hey, eventually I got into it.
I made my career out of it. And right around that time, a lot of research was coming out on the biomechanics and the physiology of the golf swing, and we learned that good golf demands it has to have ample flexibility, especially in the upper trunk and anyway, So I got into that movement, got myself really flexible, and then started my own golf schools, and I used to put in besides the normal half day one day school's, private lessons, beginner schools and all that, I put in
golf fitness schools. For this is back in now we're back in nineteen eighty eight, and I couldn't pay people to take them. But eventually I learned the right way, I think to market it and sell it. And I've
been doing that ever since. So one thing led to another, and I started working with a bunch of tour players, mainly the senior tour guys, and you know, Arnold Palmer came across a lot of people referred Arnold to me, and so I got together with him, and then you know, he bought into it, and we really helped him a lot, and he and I he funded an infomercial for me which went on the air, him being Gary player Donica Pone, and it was called Roger Fredericks Reveals the Secrets to
Golf Swing Flexibility. And the rest is kind of history. So I've been, you know, I've been mainly I asked you a question in my long winded fashion, the golf, the golf plane, and instruction came first. Then I learned that the golf swing is a demanding athletic endeavor, and then i'd you know, taken off from there. So that's kind of the story of my life in twenty five words or less.
With an asterisk. It's amazing that you have helped define for everybody. Is golf a sport? I guess when it comes to injuries, Yeah, it's a sport, right, There's so many people who just be, oh, you're not. It's not just because it has a ball doesn't mean it's a sport.
Well yeah, I mean we're pro golfers, and just about all good golfers are really great athletes in that we all have super tremendous strong legs. Why because we all started the game and we're kids, and think about around the golf is about a five to seven mile walk, and we're walking eighteen twenty seven thirty six sols a day since we're little kids, you know. Plus we're in a semi squat position doing a semi lunch. We're walking on average around maybe ten to fourteen miles a day,
bending over and all that. So we do this, you know, day after week after month after year after decade. We end up with incredible leg strength without even knowing it. And then we're doing this gymnastic uh you know, rotation of the spine we end up with. We're doing that millions literally of times. We end up with superb upper body flexibility, almost gymnastic, you know. So we have the super strong legs to stabilize our body and provide the
power and support. We have an incredible upper body flexibility. So you know, yeah, I mean it is a sport. And you look at so many great athletes that turn to golf, and you know what do they have. They have super strong legs strength for you know, running around in their individual sport. They have great upper body flexibility, and most good athletes you know, don't have that part
of a time on playing good golf. And then you have the other side of the coin where you have the average person who grew up with a real job, you know, and you know they go to work every and they're sitting down. They don't have the leg strength they don't have the upper body flexibility because they're forward rounded shoulders all that, and they come out and they really have a hard time of playing golf. So, yeah,
the golf swring is a very demanding athletic endefforent. It does look like it because we're not jumping and sprinting and you know, doing a lot of burst burst speed type of stuff and all that. But it's a you got to be You have to have pretty good function in your body to play the game, that's for sure.
Yeah you're not you're not doing any of those activities, but you are wringing your body like it's a wet rag and you're trying to get all the water out. You're just twisting it and doing things to it. You mentioned needing to have strong legs. You were saying that pro and good golfers have great strong legs, but you also just talked about having terrible posture and that that ruined your golf. So now we've got both halves of the body that are working against us as amateur golfers.
Absolutely, And even though over all these years, you know, I've gotten a reputation as the golf flexibility guy with Catherine and I always kid ourselves because a lot of people call us the King and Queen of golf yoga.
But you have one. Roberts will fight you on that one. But that's good.
But like you're saying, but the truth of the matter is, yes, the good golf swing demands flexibility and I've I've gone that route. The whole thing is I have. My whole thing is just about it's really been to get people back into proper posture. And I am one hundred percent convinced, and you can hold me to this right now on your show. A posture will be and is becoming the next big movement in health and fitness. Years ago we've seen that. We've seen jogging, we've seen AEROBICX, we've seen
pilates and yoga. Last ten years it's been core. I guarantee you posture is the next thing. It is, without question, in my experience, the most neglected and a misunderstood aspect of health and fitness, and in the golf swing too. The body has one design for all of us. We're all created equal. We have the same amount of muscles and joints and the same design, and the giant design is simply this is all on my website. But design is simply to have the ear over the shoulder, over
the hip, over the knee, over the ankle. And you look at little kids when you guys, when we're done at this show, I want everybody to go out and look at little children, especially up until maybe five or seven years old. They're perfect little machines. Their feet are straight ahead, their head sit right top, run on top of their clavicles, and you can drop them, throw them, you kick them. They don't break. What happens though.
He can't do that anymore are.
Our hunters and gatherers. We don't do that anymore. We sit down at cars and desks and computers and do golf, smarter radio shows. Sitting down, we end up out a proper posture, and we see rowdy shoulders, forward head, especially the most common one. You know. You know right off the bat. You don't need to be a rocket scientists
to figure this out. When you see a person with roundy shoulder, forward head, all that means is, in layman's terms, the muscles on the front side of their body have shortened. It's tightened, and it's pulled the person forward, and then the back muscles restrict too. So when that person comes out to play golf, they try to make a shoulder turn,
no comprehenitive. They can't do it because the muscles just will not expand, and then they end up compensating, and then that usually creates compensations for compensations, and then it's you know, we're in trouble. But again, I'm now verver. I'm not to say veering off, but I'm going more into the posture reconstruction restoration programs to really get people not only flexible, but get their bodies back into proper design so they can function better, not only in the golf but in their life.
I would love to be able to make a living out of working out on my golf game. And but I know, of all the professional golf people that I speak to, none of them get to play golf anymore. They're too busy. But I'm a desk jockey. I've been a desk jockey for most of my thirty plus year career, so I'm sitting most of the day. Now, I'm sitting in front of computer screens. And I found that chairs and sitting at a desk has been the worst thing
for my back. Of everything that's bad about my pasture and my lifestyle as far as how I hold myself. I've learned how to sleep differently, which has helped my back. But so many people use like one of those inflated balls that the big rubber balls to use as chairs, right, And I have found a chair that kind of mimics that but in it so it does engage my core and it has really helped my back. But I'm fairly certain my posture sucks.
Yeah, Well, what happens when you and I are talking right now and we're sitting down the most powerful muscles in our body, the upper part of the legs, and what's called the hip flexors ILLEO sos in particular our hips. Now there, right now, you and I are actually working out. We're actually exercising because our hip flexor muscles are actually in contraction, just like if I were to you can see that if I'm going to flex my arm here, my bicyple up here in the top part is contracting,
and that's what our hips are doing. And we do this again all the time, for hours a day and for years. Those muscles find me shortened, and when they shorten, they pull the pelvists forward and then what's the pelvis attached to the spine, and the spine finally starts to wear out. And what you're doing, you're on the right track because the Swiss balls are definitely they definitely help.
And the best thing, though, are these stand up desks, and they're becoming more and more popular, and for good reason. You have those desks now that stand up and you put your computer up there. You don't have to sit down, and almost assuredly with most people, the bad problems will go away.
Is it okay? I've got a physical coming up in a couple of weeks. Is it okay if I tell my doctor that you told me that I'm exercising all day along at my desk?
Sure, okay, hips, But you don't know one more thing. When when we're sitting down, all of their weight, the entire all of our upper body weight is going right down where on our organs, and the organs are getting squished. Our organs in our pelvis were not designed to bear the weight our feet and legs were, and now our organs are getting squished. So when we be all that
weight now plus we get one sided. You know, almost everybody, you know, most most people in our culture the world for that matter, is right handed, so you know, you over use one side of the body. Tennis players get tennis elbow, Baseball pitchers blow out the rotator cuffs, and Tommy John the golfer's milu is a tight right hit for most of us, and then that it dominates the
left side. But now we're sitting down and our pilvis is out of position, and then you know, eventually our prostate for us guys starts wearing down as we get older. Women they get real tight in there. Many many women now are forced to have cea sections because the birth canal gets squished and the seed can't go up the pillopian tubes and urinary infections, you know, the urine pools and there. It goes on and on and on, and mainly,
I really i'd love the statement. We don't love it, but I mean it's accurate in that I know that sitting down is really the new cigarette smoking. It's it's this is destroying our health. And we're seeing more and more and more hip and knee replacements, back surgeries, carpal tunnel I mean, shoulder surgeries that's becoming epidemic by the way, and plant our fascy eyed, his bunions falling ours all because the body's out of its design. And again it's
just we're just not getting the proper motion that we should. Beginning.
Is running a bad thing?
Long is a wonderful thing. If your body is in line, if you if you're if your hip, knee and ankle are lined up and you're walking, you're landing heel ball tow. You can run to your heart's content. But most people have. When you see duck feet, when a person has feet that are inverted, the feet, the feet and knees tell you what's going on in your hips. And when you see a person who's running duck footed the media, the inside part of the knee now is getting you know,
is getting the brunt of it. It's called joint centration. So yeah, I mean you're gonna blow out your knees and your hips tighten up and you get back problems and on and on and on and on. So I get asked all the time, what do I think of this exercise, this machine, this new exercise, workout or whatever. And my standard answer is are all exercise is good? And my answer is, well, pretty much, yes, Are all
exercise is good for all people, no way. More and more and more people fred are coming to me, you know, Roger, I don't get it. I work out all the time, I take care of myself, and I'm still I'm still injured. My back still kills me, my knees still going out and again because their body is out of proper alignment. You see, we're seeing this on the pro golf tour. I mean, the Pro Golf Tour is becoming a mass unit. And I've written a couple of articles and done some
interviews recently, be coming out pretty soon. Guy called it the dark side of the golf fitness movement. And you look at these pros out there, and everybody say in ah, what great shape they are, and they are, most of them. But you know, how about all the injuries. I mean, Tiger is the poster boys had four knee surgeries, back surgeries, I mean Achilles problems, shoulder problems, and he's only one
of many. And these think about it. These kids, since they're little children, infants are hitting golf balls, you know, millions of times, and they get one sided, just like I mentioned the tennis players and baseball pitchers, and they get one sided in the right side dominant. And now they go and they get workout ors. They're trying to keep up with Tiger, and you know the rest of the guys, and what do they do. They go out and some of these guys overdo it and they work
out too strenuously, a lot of them. And as I say, they're putting Ferrari engine on weak internal Volkswagen frames and you put that kind of stress on there. They're getting injured too. So you got to watch it. You've got to watch your workouts, make sure you're doing the right stuff for you.
That is so interesting that for years we've been talking about the Tiger effect on the industry and now it's coming, you know, it's coming around to where the industry is struggling and courses are closing and people are leaving the game.
And they're still blaming Tiger for all this. But the fact that you're bringing up the exercise element, which he changed the business, He changed the golf world by coming out being such a fine physical specimen, and now that he's deteriorating at a young age, it's like, oh wait, we didn't really sit back and watch what's happening before we get you know, and try to be exactly like him. And right now look at him. Oh wow.
And even though I'm I've been propagating the golf fitness movement for mid nineteen eighties, you know, to me, it's good news bad news. And the good news is, yeah, more and more people are getting fit. They're increasing their bone density and muscle mass and flexibility, and they feel better and they're more confident, and cardio and all that. It's all good. It's wonderful. But the bad news is, you know, like I said, more and more people are
getting injured. So, and I hate to be contradictory, but if you look at some of the greatest players some probably almost all of the great players in previous generations, you know, the Hogans and Sneeds and Trevinos and Nicholas's and play I mean players like Gary's an exception, but Johnny Miller, I mean, go on break down. None of those guys worked out, you know, but they got their workouts.
They got their function by growing up naturally. They did grow up playing Nintendo and Xbox and you know, sitting in video and all this kind. I mean, I have a teenage son and he comes up every night. Guess where he gets his homework. It's online and they have computers in the classrooms, so we're producing I believe the sickest generation I think in this in the history of the industrialized world. I really believe that. And you can see it. And what are we seeing? More and more
back surgeries? Like I said a minute ago, I mean, it's really it's really kind of scary.
I think very interesting. Would you mind talking for a moment about your relationship and how where it started and how it evolved with the big three, which is obviously Arnie, Gary and Jack.
Well, first it was, you know, my mentor in all this is a guy you probably heard of named p. D. Goscu, and p as far as I'm concerned, is the most knowledgeable person on the planet, you know, as far as physiology and the design of the body and all that. But anyway, I became fright. I kind of played a pretty big part in Pete's career and I got him off the road. In the old days, he just had
house calls. But bottom line was, he came into our clinic and started doing his stuff and we weren't even open like I think thirty days and Phil Rogers had referred Jack to come E, Pete, and you know, so he came in there and then they were it was our second meeting. I believe their second session, and I'm like, an, awe.
I'm sorry to be stupid. I don't I've not heard of p D Goscue.
Okay, that's right. I want to look him up. It's uh find him at egoscue dot com. But he's been Jack's trainer for so.
He's a physical he's not a he's not a golf instructure. He's a physical.
He's a physical trainer. But as far as I was above that, but he's uh, he has now he has clinics. I think he has close to thirty clinics all over the world called the Egoscue Pain Centers.
And how do you spell goscue E E G O S c U E.
Okay, But anyway, we were. I think it was Jack's second session with Pete. And Jack comes walking in there, and you know, Pete had completely gotten Jack out of pain like he does most people, and and Jack said something. Jack asked him a question. He said, Pete, why do I have this flying right elbow? And Pete doesn't even play golf and wasn't had no experience in golf, said what's the flying right elbow? And he said, well, my elbow by backswing, when flies like this, it lifts up.
It doesn't fold and stay, you know, close to my site. It lifts up, and then I seem to come out of by shot. My heel comes up too high off the ground and then it slams down too hard, and I'm prone to hit pull hooks. And Pete goes, well, you know that makes sense, he said, But you don't have a flying right elbow. You have a frozen rhomboid and trap your scapula, doesn't you know, you're thick. People with thick chest up in here like Jack had and still has, thick like that don't have the range of
motion and their shoulder blades. So Jack would lift up like that, he said. Now Frederick's over here, he's a more rounded shoulder, you know in those days, and so my elbow will come under my left arm. He said, it's perfectly okay. That's how you that's how you're built, Jack, and that's how Rogers built. The whole thing is basically weight shift in rotation. So you know, and those my wife, my ex wife or my wife at the time was nutritionists, and Pete would always send all of his clients to
her for nutrition. So then Terry, my ex became They were still really great friends. She became Jack's nutritionist and for their family, and then so I got a really great relationship going with Jack ever since those days. Then periodically I'd run into him from time to time on the tour and then I'd videotape his golf swing and we'd look at me because he knew I understood the body so and he wanted to know that. But back
to that first, I got to share this. Back to that first that session when Jack was, you know, asking Pete about his body. Jack looked at him and said, boy he said, you're telling me, then, Pete, that I physically can it's not good for me to keep my red elbow in like that. And then Pete says, correct, because you're built. You're built differently then, and Jack said, boyd he see all these years I've been criticized for that. I used to put head covers underneath my left arm pit.
I'd put straps around my arm to keep more connected. And you're telling me that it doesn't matter. And Pete says, that's correct, and I'll never forget this because Jack looked at piece of boy, this is really powerful stuff. We got to get this out there and I can help you, Pete. And at that moment, right then I knew where my career was going. And we had the biggest fish in the sea out propagating the golf fitness movement, and he helped us a lot, for sure. So I have a
really nice relationship with him and have for years. If Arnold out, I was on Golf Academy Live. Then was this two thousand and three, I think alother with Tommy Jacobs and John Jacobs who had just won the Senior of two thousand and three Senior PGA Championship, And I was on national television explaining how the body functions in the golf swing. And some of Arnold Palmer's people saw that I was imitating what happens to so many seniors,
you know, the round his shoulder, forward head. And I guess, as a story goes, somebody Artell. He's at the Tradition Golf Club and some of the guys are said, Arnold, that's you, that's you. And then they turned to my friend, they said, can this guy help Arnold? And then he said, I'll call him. So that's how Arlie got together. And
then he Arnol really bought into it. And I go down to bay Hill all the time and spend a lot of time with them where I beat him over in the desert, and then we did that infomercial together with Gary and Donna and then it was great. But he's just I learned a lot from him being in his kingdom, that's for sure.
Oh, I bet the way he.
Treats people, being on the inside, the way he treats people is absolutely it's nothing short of amazing.
It's legendary.
It is he in an age where most celebrities are ducking the crowds and trying to get away, he's the opposite. He literally will go out of his way at bay Hill or any place and walk over to strangers and
buy him a drink or sit down with them. And because he knows, he knows that when he does that, he's making those people happy, because those people are going to go home and say, wow, Arnold Palmer came over and bought me a drink, and this and that, and he knows he's helping those people in the sense, and he loves it. I mean, he loves you know, everybody loves Arnold. I can tell you something. Arnold loves them,
I think even more. And it's really it's really a and I learned a lot from that about how to how to treat people. And he's an incredible guy, that's for sure.
Yeah. I had an opportunity in the early mid eighties. I was doing some work around Major League Baseball and I was in a conversation with who was a hero at the time, later become vilified, Mark McGuire. And Mark would talk about how he would sign autographs at the ballpark all day long until the last kid was done.
But if he's sitting at dinner in a restaurant with his family or friend, whatever, If he's a restaurant and somebody walks up to him and asks for an autograph, he says, you know, I'm really sorry, but this is my private time. And if you catch me the ballpark, no problem, but I'm not going to do that here. And he knows that people go, well, Mirke McGuire's a jerk man, you you know, So you tell the story. Arnie just loves everybody at any time, and everyone walks
away going he is awesome. Yeah, amazing.
I did a special show on the Golf Channel. It was Golf Academy Live. This was a two thousand and eight I think, and Arnold and I did that. It was all about, you know, the flexibility program I put him on. And anyway, the day before the show, I had to go down to the Golf Channel and kind of go over the script and the segment. There probably seven segments on that show, and I had to go over with Jerry Foltz and Jerry was the host of that show. And we sat down and Jerry starts to
asking me all these questions about Arnold. Jerry said something that I'll never forget. He said, you know, somebody wrote he said, everybody I know has an Arnold Palmer story. I went, wow, I never thought about that. And the thing is, I mean every single like you just mentioned, every time Arnold's name gets mentioned to me, or they asked me how what he's like, or all that, they'll they'll go off without a story.
Well.
I was in a bar one time in ames Iowa and it was a pro am and Arnold came in and he came over. I mean, every single person almost has a story about him, about how well you know the king traded him. It's a it's amazing.
So well, I am one of those that still does not have an Arnie story. But I'm waiting. Okay, Well, someday something.
Schedule us and then you can go up to him yours.
Well, we'll talk about that later. And now Gary player must be a hero of yours as well of all of us. But I mean, for how old is he in his eighties yet?
No, it's funny because he and I Gary and I have the same birthday. Oh do you really met him? I owned the golf school and I owned the driving range over Atapouli, Maui between let's say where nineteen ninety five and two thousand and two.
Oh, I'm playing there next week.
Oh really, you lucky dog.
Yeah.
Well, I forgot to tell you that my fee for this interview is a tu over there with you.
Hey, listen, you're coming. I got. I got from calif from Oakland to Maui three hundred and sixty seven dollars round trip. How can I not go?
But you gotta go.
Yeah, I have a friend who lives there and he lungs to Mali country. And so we'll get some interviews. About that in the next couple of weeks. But yeah, I'm really fired up to go to White my golf for three or four days.
This cold weather over here.
Oh yeah, I'm miserable. Yeah here in California. Yeah. Anyway, So Gary.
I was I got because my golf school and my video stuff was right in the middle of the driving range. So the first Conna poly scene that they hated. They had the seniors there every year, and all the pros that started coming over to me and wanted me to film their swings, and then I started doing that, and then years went by that I became Every year I would work with a lot of these guys, like the Hill over seventy of them, and one of the guys
was Graham, Marsh and Swampy. So anyhow, Graham had played with Gary this is nowhere in nineteen ninety seven, and they had played Gary played really bad. So they after the round, they brought him over to me and Graham said, hey, would you look at Gary, And I'm like, oh my god.
You know, Gary was really the first, you know, great player that I really worked with, and so we sat down with him, and then we got into the fitness thing and I explained some stuff to him, and then we went down and then it's been a wonderful relationship ever since. But he's we had the same birthday both November first, and so we talked about that a lot. But he Gary Player is without question, the most inspirational human being I've ever been around. I mean, he's just
so upbeat and positive. It's it's just contagious.
And in phenomenal shape.
Oh yeah, he's incredible. He's a little bit four with his shoulders, but he's.
I asked, we won't tell him that.
Yeah. I asked him what he does for his workout and then he goes raja. You see, he goes every other day is my weight training day. It's I go look the heavy iron, blab blah blahdy. He gave me his whole schedule. But he does, like I think, what do you tell me? I don't remember now, but I think he does something like two hundred and seventy five push ups every other day. Oh it's something crazy like that, like five hundred sit ups, lifts weights. I mean, he's
he's phenomenal to me. I mean, all these guys that were mentioning, I'm out a roll now. But all these guys. The one thing they all have in common, all of them, and they're all different, but the one thing they all have in common is how positive they're looks are. I mean, they're all so focused and positive. It's it's amazing.
Well that's a life lesson for you.
Yeah, all of them, I mean, no doubt about it.
Awesome. Thank you so much for all that history. But that's not why we're here, Okay. We're here to talk to guys like the average golfer, like me, Like you know, it's like I'm here with all this needle gear so I can ask questions of people like you. I've been following your and everybody should follow your email weekly regular email blasts, and you had one a couple of weeks ago which cracked me up, and I couldn't. I had to watch this moon Moon over my hammies. I just
love that. What and that's just a stretching exercise. Why didn't you walk us through that? And what the benefits are? Moo over Miami?
Okay, number one. I have to give credit to that to Tom House and.
Tom Tom House the former pitcher.
Yeah, former pitching he was Henry Aaron hit the seven hundred run you beat me to it.
He caught he caught this home run that Henry Aaron hit to break Babe Ruth's record. He was the pitching coach at the time, or he was in the bullpen for the Dodgers.
Yeah, anyway, I think it was it was it was Atlanta, mm hmm. But regardless, but he had Tom is that we're both on the TPI, the Titlist Performance Institute Board. I've gotten to know Tom real well. But anyway, he's a great biomechanist and a great physical trainer. I mean they're all going to him now, all the baseball pitchers and Hayton Manning, Archie and Aaron Rodgers, I mean on
and on. But anyway, I prefer generally, I prefer whole body strength, extra sizes and stretching exercises rather than just to isolate a certain muscle group. The whole body is one big working unit. But anyway, because as we've been talking about, so many of us are forward all the time. That simply means that our front sides will get tighter
and the backsides get weaker. But like the moon over my hammies, when we lie in your back, you know, in the so my newsletter, you dig your heels in the ground and you pike up, and that really strengthens your entire posterior chains, your calves, hamstrings, blutes, lower back up, er back, shoulders, so it really helps balance out, you know, the sedentary lifestyle. And by the way, I have to give even more credit. Tom told me because he came up with that. He stole that off of a Denny's.
Denny's restaurant, a Denny's menu, there's like there's a there's a ham and eggs special. They have a dent so on that's where a moon over my handies.
It's pretty good. That's pretty good. Well, now that Denny's has gotten credit, we don't have to worry about anybody coming after us. You know the the video that you did for that exercise, is that available on YouTube as well?
It is?
Yeah, okay, So what I'm going to do in the show notes for today's program, I'm going to put the link to that so everyone can get a chance to see that. You can go and click on the link in the show notes. Absolutely, we do it.
My whole website, so it's gonna be much more interactive where people can ask me questions, I'll interact with them. I'll be some more videos and newsletters a week and so it should be up real soon.
Okay, great, Well it's fredericksgolf dot com. Fredericks is f R E D E R I c K S golf dot com. Fredericksgolf dot com. People should check that out. All right, Well, this has been an amazing lesson, but you your your last newsletter is really what I would like to focus on for our free audience here today. That would be the twenty seven point plan that you learned from somebody. This was a fascinating story with some great advice as well.
Yeah, and I think that most people would do this, but I don't think I know their golf games would improve incredibly. But I'll make this real quick there. When I was a kid, one of the greatest players I had ever played with, and I mean this literally and frankly, I think I've worked with over seventy tour players, seven Hall of famers, but honest to God, one of the greatest players I ever saw was a guy named Ted Richards, and nobody ever heard of him because he never turned pro.
He was the nineteen fifty three US Public Links champion. He won the Southern California Amateur a bunch of times. He won the Bellair Club Championship, I think nineteen times. I mean, he was a great player. And what was so unique about him is that he never played. And I'm not exaggerating. He would he would take two months off, three months off and go out there and shoot sixty seven, sixty eight, sixty six. I mean, it was uncanny. And
he always would beat me by a stroke. I mean it didn't matter where we played, he'd always find a way to beat me. And I was playing pretty good then and one day he beats me again and we're sitting there in the grill room afterwards. I said, ted, how in the world do you do it? How do you play such great golf and never play? And he said, because I have a great program. It's called the twenty seven point program. And I going like, what, what in the world is that? And he said, well, how many
stances are there in a golf swing? He said about three open square clothes. How many ball positions are there, well, basic generally three forward, middle back. How many golf swing paths are there, well, three outside in, straight along and inside out. He said, if you. So he says, that's three cubed, So that that's told. That's a twenty seven different types of shots that are possible generally, I said, correct. He says, start with position. He said, everybody would do this.
Go out to the range, Start in position one, which he calls open stance, ball forward outside in swing path. What kind of shot you're going to hit? So well? High slice? He said, correct? What if you do if what happens if you put the same thing open stance, put the ball back in the middle ofer stance outside in swing I said, won't be as high as a slice? He said, correct. What happens if you put the ball way back wait outside and you're I said, you're going
to hit a low, big, bad or slice? He said correct. He said, if a person would go and practice all all positions, so finally you end up with the closed stance, you know, ball forward, inside out swing path, you're going to be hitting a high hook, you know, add infinitum, and he said, Now the truth is, of the twenty seven possibilities of shots, the average person will probably only
hit maybe used maybe five or six. He said, So a person should go out there and find their bread and butter, what are the shots that they're that's easiest for them to do? And go play that way? I said, Now you go out in the course and you stand, you know, as you ask yourself, I mean non verbally or even verbally, ask yourself. Okay, I'm on a dog leg right here? What kind of shot do I want to hit? Well? You want to hit a medium fade?
And he said when he said, you do that, and he said, you will start playing golf rather than start playing swing and he feels, And I've been on that lesson te giving a lot of lessons for a lot of years. And it's amazing to me how many it happens to me too, how many how many golfers don't even aim, don't even visualize. And you know, I started playing and tend and I would go out in the afternoons.
I finally talked them into it. We'd go out every afternoon at the club in la And he said, okay, R what kind of shot you want to get here? I say, well, I've got a big, sweepy long par five, no trouble on the left. I want to hit a good hard hook. You say, hit it, and I'll tell you. I mean I played that summer, and I played probably the most consistent golf of my life. But like everybody else, you know, I start thinking about my swing and put my mind and my energy back there rather than out there.
And they'll tell you if the average person would do that, it sounds hard because the average you know, the high handicapp or so many of them have a hard time even hitting them, you know, the ball solidly. But if they would start doing that, start visualizing the shot and executing it, it's amazing. It's amazing how how much they'll improve. And the smaller the target and the more your energy is focused on the target, when you miss it, I mean, you'll still end up usually with a much better miss.
I love that saying that. You know, if you shoot for the moon and your miss, you'll still land upon the stars, so you'll still have a pretty good you know, dispense that you're.
Yeah, we had. I remember someone on the show years ago was talking about if if you focus on a target and you miss it by ten yards, that's still a pretty good shot. But if you don't have a target that you're aiming at, if you're just looking out there and not even folks on where it goes and you miss it by ten yards. That's an awful shot, That's right. Yeah.
An old friend was one of the guys that owned our first golf school. Has got hi Ken Blanchard, doctor Ken Blanchard, the One Minute Manager, and he used to have a saying that I always love. He said, if you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. I was like that. But back back to the thing I was talking about. All the positive attitudes and great champions and players and business people have all successful people for that. Now they're thinking the way they
see things is different. But every great player, and trust me, I've been inside their heads, every great player, with no exception, all of them, they see things differently. They're so focused on the target. It's and they all do it different, but they're all so focused on the target. Their visualization
is dramatic. Arnold told me the first time I worked with him that the only thing that he tried to do in his golf swing was with his right hand feel like he's shaking hands and touching the target, because you know, he convexed his wrists and really cleared deep and he was just you know, almost shaking hands. With the target with his right hand. I mean, I've been at Nicholas's house when he displained how he plays the Masters,
which is normal. I mean he talks about, you know, looking at the trees, see where the wind's blowing in the trees and the ripples down in the pond. Where's the flagstick on eleven and what's the what's the flagstick doing over on twelve? And he said, quote they said, guys, it's almost like they'm in a fairy land. It's almost like I'm in this imaginary world. I just kind of feel my way along seeing you know, the targets and the shape of the shots with the wind. But honestly, Godfred,
they're all like that. I mean they all see it different. And again, you know, we're talking about the average high handicapper just stands up there and hits it out there somewhere and hope and hopes it ends up good.
The mid to high handicapper who has just heard your description about the twenty seven point program shouldn't just go out and start doing that. I mean, this is these are shots that you have to practice, and this is these are I would think for shots for people who are comfortable with their swing and not tinkering all the
time too. Right, Well, most high handicappers and mid to high handicappers are constantly tweaking and trying to adjust their swing even during a round, thinking they know what they did wrong in the lasting is supposed to just try to get the same swing, you know, every single time out, be consistent with the swing. They keep tweaking and thinking, oh, well, the ball went right that time, so this time I'm gonna have to do this, or last time I played this hole the ball went in the water, so I'm
gonna have to do a different kind of shot. And they don't know how because they don't practice that shot.
That's right, that's right. But if they go to the driving range, that's what Ted told me to do. And I was already a good player, and when he told me, he says, go to the driving range and just start carving it out. And the thing is, even for high handicappers, believe it or not, it's not that hard. It's not that hard to do. To me. What's hard is you're
trying to perfect a golf swing. And you know, frankly, like I was saying earlier, on the average the average guy who really has no flexibility, no leg strength or no you know, hand eye coordination. You know they're gonna have a hard They can't do most a lot of them can't do the things that their instructors try to teach them to do. They can't physically do it. But what happens is when you even those people, when you when they visualize a shot, you believe it or not.
You know you can your body will obey your mind rather than try to get your mind to obey your body, if you know what I mean, you know, I mean it's like the old like the old Buddha. You know, the Buddha used to say, all we are is a sum total of our thoughts. That's all we are. So we can if we can think differently, we can change our behavior. And we change we change our behavior physically, then you know, we start changing our outcome, our destiny.
Interesting, but when you're going out and practicing this twenty seven point program, you shouldn't try to do all twenty seven and now, well, you should just focus on a couple each time you go out and feel comfortable with it before you start taking it out to the golf course.
Definitely, yeah, definitely, obviously the better point. That's a good point. But I think most people should say, you know, start with position one and start hitting some really high slight until you have that down right, and then and it won't take long. Then, like you said, move back and then go real slow. A good player can go a little bit faster because they pretty much know how to hit these shots anyway.
Right, Yeah, but most of us don't. Yeah, most of us don't even know how to don't understand shot selection. I think, you know, it's like you see him talk about it on the tour, you see him talk about it on TV and instructors, But when it comes right down to it, you know, and then you go, even if you do practice it at a driving range on a mat, then you get out on the golf course and all of a sudden, the ball is six inches above your you know, above your feet, and you've got
to make this nice high slicing shot. And it's like, yeah, right, I practice that, but not this way.
It makes it very art of shot making. It's almost becoming a lost art. Yeah. The equipment today is so good, you know, and you can you can look at the club faces now on the drivers, I mean they're gigantic, you can miss it all over the club base and still hit decent shots. So you know, but I love watching guys like Bubba Watson, guys who are still shot makers, who still you know, try to work the ball almost
every time. That's these guys who are just like robots and just drill it dead straight every time.
Yeah, and then he hits it far. He hits it far. To close off this episode, can you give us a tip on how to increase our flexibility?
Okay, it's hard to do sitting down, but everybody, I mean, the overwhelming majority that people of people who stretch don't get flexible. And I start most of my seminars on saying, if you don't want to get flexible, if you don't want to gave improve your range of motion, if you want to stay stiff, then just get on a stretching program, And that usually gets their attention. But it's really true because if I'm going like like I'm really trying to stretch,
there am I doing? I'm holding my breath and all all flexibility is is is relaxing the muscle that comes from breathing. So if I breathe like you ever been in your car and you drop your keys and you're grinding to try to reach over there and get it, you camp. But if you let go, you can actually, you know, go another who knows eight inches a foot longer. So breathing is what gets you flexible, not stretching, and when you the reason most people don't breathe is because
they don't. There's a lot of reasons for that, but one is because there they breathe from up here. It's like they breathe from up here in their lungs, and the breathing has to come from your lower diaphragm. So I tell people to get fat. So if you can try to stand up here, if you get somebody to put their fingertips right on your love handles or even tie a belt or something around on your abdomen here and when you watch when I inhale, now watch what happens. And I do this all the time in front of
my audience. As I say, okay, everybody, stand up, grab a partner and have the partner behind you put their hands beyond on the love handles of the person there, and take a two thirds deeper inhalation with their nose. Here's what I see. They breathe with their traps. So again I encourage everything, everybody. And as simple as the sounds, I can't tell you how dramatic it is if people would start to learn to breathe from their lower diaphragm down in here. So when you inhale, it goes out.
When you exhale, it comes in. And when people get on a stretching program, they should not try to stretch. They should breathe into the stretch, or as we say it, relax into stretch. And if they would do that, they will increase their range of motion dramatically. Not to mention that they will start getting oxygen up into their head. It permeates throughout the body, and their body then starts
to breathe properly. And guess what, when they breathe properly and they're breathing from the lower diaphragm, they get back into perfect posture with their shoulders over the hips, over the knees, over the feet, straight ahead. So, as simple as it may sound, breathe and breathe from the diaphragm in here and practice that. You know, most guys try to look cool down there at muscle beach, you know, And we tuck it in, and that's exactly what you
don't want to do. So breathing is the key. I have a lot of videos and tips on my website that teach people how to breathe. So that's the best thing I could teach people what to do, is breathe, babe.
That's awesome. And you know it's true because like when you're talking about leaning down and reaching to pick something up, most people or even stretching, they're going to hold their breath as supposed to breathe through it, right, They'll like, and then they'll try to reach it over and it's like, that's the worst thing you can possibly do.
Right if you see that in golf too, I mean, now that's one of the biggest.
People take a big breath and hold their breath.
I get people in their setup, I said, okay, and when they're when they're addressing the ball, like here, I'll go put my hand right on their under underbelly button. I said, okay, now right, be pray, take it back, just let go, just let it not just relax. You watch a free throw shooter, what does he do you know? Or the tennis player they bounce it. I mean almost every baseball pitcher. Almost every sport, they will automatically intuitively
exhale gently right before they started back. And most golfers are you know, they suck it in and tense up. So golfing will not allow tension or for life of that matter,