Analyzing Tony Manzoni’s Lost Fundamental Swing Method Based on Ben Hogan’s Secret

Chipping. The way that Donia teaches basically takes a lot of guests. Look, so you talked about different carrying row proportions. Generally I like to teach the pitching which the iron six irons, depending on the cost conditions without about fifty percent carrying roll one third and then one quarter. So for example, if I'm faced with a downhill chip that normally requires may eight irons, take out the pitching which the key thing is, I put all of them around

the same type roll of fun is it? The seven iron is where you grip right to the end of the shelf that approximates the putter height. It gives you more or less the same feel as you put You want things to see more or less consistent. And because you're using a chipping run, the stroke is very very small, the smaller the strokes than left in goal. Hi. This is ten sites from Fort Colums, Colorado, and I play

at Mountain Lifter Green. This if golf Smart number eight hundred and four analyzing Tony Manzoni's Lost Fundamental Swing method based on Ben Hogan's secret with Justin Tang. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from great golf Minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ. Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter podcast. Justin thank you, Fred, thanks for the invite again to talk about mister Tony Manzoni.

Well, you know, it's interesting because you and I have been since the first time you were on the podcast, We've talked a lot about Tony and actually what you've learned from him, because you're the type of instructor that likes to absorb what all the other instructors are talking about and incorporated into the way you teach golf. And I think that's really amazing and I truly appreciate thank you for using Golf Smarter is one of your resources. Thanks for it.

I think a lot needs to be fit about golf instruction right There is no one way. Jack Nickliff didn't write Golf the Way, but he wrote it my way. He called it Golf my Way. Similarly, mister Benogan wrote the Five Lessons. I like to think that he wrote the Five Lessons more of as a reminder of what he did in his golf thing and not what you should do. Certainly, it provided a framework, a roadmap if you

will, for budding golfers looking to improve their technique. But I'm sure a lot of these top golfers flash instructors never meant it to be a prescriptive. Now, as a golfer instructor, you see golfers of all shapes insides, even if they were of the same physical they mentioned, everyone thinks differently, and therefore, as an instructor, you need to accommodate for all these nuances

in physical build and and a cognition. Mental cognition and gold Smarter has helped me a lot in the sense that it pulled together all these great instructors from around the world. And as an instructor or, all I can do is to learn the various delivery methods. I think most of us are saying more or less the same thing, right, things like a flat less risk, things like proper weak shift set up. But all the key thing is this,

all of us are seeing it in a different manner. Now, how I describe a proper group and how you describe a proper group maybe entirely different. My method may resonate with one player, yours would resonate with another. Now, as an instructor, if you only have one way of doing things and it doesn't sit well with a student, Then what happens. You can't force the student to do it how to or do it more and somehow hope that he gets it. Everyone learns differently. I just cannot emphasize that point

more well. Also the fact that Golf my way, not Golf the Way, and also Ben Hogan's book were written a long time ago, and so much has changed, not just an instruction, but the equipment has changed, the balls have changed. The way courses are maintained is radically different. Then. You know, if you look at old videos of even when Arnold Palmer was playing, you'll see the greens are not as you know, pristine like tile floors. Is they as they are today? Yeah? That's good.

So while agronomy has improved a lot while teaching, the tools we used to teach, golf have changed dramatically. The club that we've used to play has changed dramatically, especially the ball. I think a lot of instruction has relatively stayed unchanged. Let me explain a lot of people say that this saying the

more things change, the more things stayed the same. Now on one non negotiable from way back in time is this, If you land the club in front of the ball, you will hit the ball and then take the divil. That is non negotiable. There's never going to change in the next hundred years. All the top players did that, and they did it in a manner that was they achieved that while moving their body in a manner that was comfortable to them, that was in line with how their bodies would were me

if that makes sense at all. So if you look at Benhogan, you look at Jet Nicholas, you look at Arnold Palmer, all great ball strikers, all great players, all multiple major min it All of them did it differently. But the one thing that they did demintedly was they struck the ball first ball and then just that doesn't change. Now Tony wrote a great book. He passed away October twenty eighteen, almost five years now. He wrote

this book that was based on Benhogan's A Secret Letter. So apparently someone came in through his door. One of his golfers on the golf course they were teaching at came in through the door and said, hey, Tony, I've got this letter from Ben Hoogan, and it what the letter from mister Wogan explaining how he hit his driver and up till then no one really had that

sort of information mister Holden. Now, as Tony watched the video and read the letter, he realized this thing that mister Holden shifts to his center of gravity to the left prior to the completion of his backshing. He had to rewatch that over and over again. So modern technology today has confirmed that, hey, all the players, you need to have players, any amateurs, all their all of them, get their center of pressure less as soon as

possible. A lot of indeed players actually say that once they get their shaft parallel to the ground on the backshing, they feel like they're beginning to sprout their dancing. And Terry Hashimoto, the founder of body Track, a pressure play a pressure mat so two to see how to see where your center of pressure shifts on the golfing. He's confirmed that also with the pressure trace this. So that's the amazing thing. Although technology has penny evolved, what the

human body has done is doing hasn't really changed. Technology is just confronting them. So I wouldn't oh the irony, the irony of Tony's video and bo lost fundamental. Maybe it should be called I don't think we've left at home. Well, well, you know, we're talking about Tony Manzoni. And the reason we're talking about Tony Manzoni is because, as Justin said, he passed away in twenty eighteen, and he was a regular on Golf Smarter for for many, many years. And over the time that he was on twelve

or thirteen times, I would get letters every single time. I'd get emails every single time of people saying, this guy is figured it out. I don't know what it is, but he's singing to me. He's like, you know, it's like being at one of those concerts and he was looking directly at me. The way Tony was able to explain what he was doing and how he was teaching really resonated with so many listeners in the Golf Smarter

community that since he passed, we've started running those episodes again. And when I like to do it is to open each season. I guess, you know, the golf seasons really kind of starts picking up in March in April, so all during March in April, I take all of those episodes and I run them one week after the other, and we run them on golf

smarter Mulligan's. And so when Justin had talked to me and told me how much he appreciated what Tony was teaching, I thought, what a perfect thing to do is let's kick off the next Tony Man's only season with some praise on his instruction and maybe even a little bit of insights into what he was saying. So with all of that explanation, I also want to say that, like when we talked about Ben Hogan, he his stature, his size,

his body was very different than so many amateur golfers. And so even though what he was doing it was about getting the club, hitting the ball, then hitting the ground right, having the bottom of your swing in front of the ball, which is a revelation for so many golfers. Indeed, so instead of Tony, Tony should have caught his book that Pine left fundamental instead of the Fundamental, because I don't think it was muff at all.

And a lot of comparisons have been made between Ben Hogan and for example, Stack until a golfing machine morette I think that theme the csain differences the same nesses are that a lot of all of them pivot around a single access which is the left hip. But how they do it all of them have some differences to their method. But the beauty of moving around a single pivot access

is this. It prevents you from making massive weak shifts, massive and movements of the body and the head and allows you to allows your contact point. The contact point is basically where the club land makes contact in relation to the ball on the ground. It allows it to stay in front of the ball. Now, this was very different in the times of mister Hogan, where the predominant teaching method was to make a massive shift to the right and then

make a massive shift to the left. As you can imagine, as you start trying to shift your weight right then left, and you don't do it correctly, you're gonna move the base of your net off the ball and then you're gonna try to move it back on the ball, all in a matter of one plus second while swinging a heavy clip. I don't think you get very consistent results as that. So Tony's Tony's loves fundamental if you will help

a lot of people. The sense it when when you set up with your weight sixty fourty on the left and it progresses the seven thirty on the top of the sing you suddenly take one one side of the body out of play. You're just shifting around like a door around a fixed axis at the door jam. Nothing else moves, so the less moving parts the lest can go wrong. Now, when people start start hitting the ball first before hitting the ground, it's gonna increase the enjoyment of the game. It's going to create

a sense of Hey, you know what, I'm actually quite talented. Let me start practicing other areas of my game. Or let's try the love of fundamental on this short game, which is Tony's big thing. Tony was always let's get let's get you doing the shorter lower strings correct before you progressed. Let's talk a little bit about Tony's approach to teaching, Pony. All Right, we're gonna but we're gonna do Tony's approach to teaching. But you know what I've got to do. We gotta take a time out. We'll be

right back. All right, justin and just to make sure that people understand that you're in Singapore. If I am and a golf smarter listener and an instructor there at at a country club in Singapore, correct, Yes, I'm based out of the Tanamera Country Club tonight. I want to go back to getting more deeply into the sixty forty concept. Can you explain it a little

bit more so that we really understand what it meant. Yeah, So, Tony always wanted students to set up with small week on the left link or the neat side for left handed golfers, and the whole idea was to rotate around the left hip pocket. Now, if you did that correctly, you're going to feel that your right side, the right side of your body is very light. You're not going to put any pressure on your right foot, You're the base of your neck is not going to shift older the right knee.

Now that there's absolutely a key to hitting has just been shot for most golfers. Certainly a lot of golfers will take videos pictures of pop professionals. They say, hey, look this guy shifted your hit way to the right. Well, if you did, it's undeniable that fy V golfer actually shifted their pressure to the right side. But you got to understand their background. They've been doing this since they were five years old, and they've been doing

every day. So that level of coordination that they've trained in their body started at a very young age for a very long time. You've picked up golf in your late forties or thirties as the case, maybe it's not going to happen the path. Your path is very different from the golfer. So there are always exceptions. So there will be some golfers who say, hey, I've tried Tony's method, didn't work for me. Again, there will be exception. And Tony never said. Tony never said you do this, you're

gonna be a scratch golfer. But what I'll say is this, Tony had a very exceptional track record as a college coach. I beneath. He taught for twenty nine years at the College of the College of the Desert, and he walked away with five state community championships and twenty eight other type of conference type of I believe, Yeah, they won the conference championship twenty eight. That's correct. So this this method I have should did they use method?

This system that Tony was teaching, as we will get into shortly produced results over a long period of time. This wasn't a get rich quick scheme or lose fifty pounds overnight type scheme. It stood. It stood the test of time, and as we mentioned earlier in the episode, modern technology has confirmed whatever Tony has if teaching from mister ben Holden's love letters. So a lot needs to be fit about that. So while Tony thought this system, he

also wanted you to have your own signature about it. If you look at Tony's teachings on the DVD as well as the book that's available on Amazon. He was never prescriptive about most other things in the golf sing. He certainly didn't prescribe a particular grip. He didn't prescribe a particular look about this thing. It was all about principles. He was happy to let you use your

own grip, whatever let's felt, whatever felt comfortable to you. So if you are a golfer that is predisposed to having a strong grip underhanded grip, then just need to know that your back string is going to be flatter than a guy who has a more on the top grip, and consequently there will be slight differences in the look of your string and also in the pressure you put in the ground as the result of But the principles stay is this team.

So the principle that this set up with your B sixty fourteen on your left side. Now, the next thing you want to think about is this if if for the listeners they are listening to this, let's just put our hands around our body as though we were hugging ourselves and just made a turn to your right while keeping your right side light. So as you turn to your right side, you want to feel that you're wait increases in the proportion

of seventies to the left and thirty to the right. Now, if you do that, you will feel that the base of the net leven really shift this way. It doesn't shift to the right, so it doesn't shift the right. You don't have to bring it back to the And you also notice that your shoulder turn is not as big as you would think it necessary. It's certainly not ninety three or one hundred degrees or one hundred and twenty degrees that the case may be. Now we're going to take our hands off our

chat. Now we're just going to put our left arm across the chest. Now, this is the key thing. This is the backswing that Tony that Tony taught. Once you're in your setup, as you take your backswing while keeping your right side light, you just want to pull your left arm across your chest. That creates a connection between the left upper arm and the left pectoral muscle. Now, as you do that, notice that you're left pump is more or less pointing up that thous us that the faith they didn't fan

open and they didn't close on the back fin. So the club faith is basically controlled by the inclination of the torso and the rotation of it. As you Now, as you take a golf club and make you're saying, you'll see that the blade should stay fairly square. That tells us is all you continue, all of you. If all you do on the dancing and mean and do not disrupt the inclination of the cup phase in relation to your torsore, it's probably going to get a pretty square face at impact. So these

are again principles. Now, what was holgan pepret Everyone said that he had a secret A couple of breasts. But this is the secret as interpreted by Tony mister Hogan tailbone when to the left of the target just prior to the completion of dispatching, that was the move. That is the move that's going to move your center of your weight distribution fifty forty, etcnt the bad f and at impact you want to have eighty percent of your week on the left

side, twenty percent on the right side. If you finish, it's gonna be ninety ten. So wow. As listeners incorporate this, he could in their game and did, They're saying, they will notice that the contact point where the club makes contact with the ground ball more often than not be ahead of the ball. You're gonna you're gonna create a one to call a hit

and run accident with the club face against the golf ball. You will shoot the ball first and then they divid You will automatically have a flat left wrist. At impact, you will automatically have sharpening. And this is highny. This is critical. A lot of golfers take a an eight iron, they add loss to it, They increase sharpening, so it decreased sharftly into the right side. The eight iron becomes a pitching which if they woven took an

eight iron, it increased shaft lean towards the target. The eight iron became a seven iron. Nothing about this. Right, when you start needing the shaft forward the street spot, the sip of six nine of the club fix. But to make contact with the ball, you lean the shaft that lets you're going to make contact on the first and second groove of the golf club. This is why mister Holden and tell pros any amateurs, the air ball

flight takes on a totally different trajectory from the average golfer. Just street spot contest, just physics. So if you start doing the lost fundamental, you're going to experience this more and more. Now, don't get excited and say, hey, let's go out, get me a small bucket of balls, take a six iron, start doing it. Doesn't work that way, So how do we do it again? Tony was a big advocate of starting small. He would first get you to do the lost fundamental while chipping, so

he advocated the chip and run putting. The lost style advocated using nine, eight, seven and six iron from around the tween. Now againstead of in the same manner sixty forty bias to the left, crept down on the call an eight iron, nine iron, stand the shaft up as common in those days. Again, coming back in Vote one Tour, if you stand the shaft, you will find it. If the soul on the toe end of the club, they make contact that they clown. You get a very tiny

footprint as opposed to putting the entire club underground. Let me just get a club for your thing. M hm. No, this is this is one of my secret weapons that I talk about a lot. Is how Tony taught me to to to bring the shaft more upright. Yeah, and have the toe down correct when you're chipping, just to get the ball onto the green and rolling. Yeah. So look at this right, this is the entire

soul against the ground. Have you standing up the very tiny footprint. It's very hot to stop the chip shots in there and when you when you do that, you're gonna make contact with the pole stud of the club face. You minimize black spin. It produces a very predictable roll of the ball. That's the That's one of the main issues with the amateur spind they start chipping, they get too much soft lean, create too much ball speet. So your ball speet and your ball spin, when I say they do not match,

you get a very unpredictable outcome. So all right, listen another time out and then and then I want to come back and talk a little bit more about what most of us do as recreational amateur players, how we approached chipping onto the green and how we're approaching it wrong. But we're going to do that after this again, we're just reliving the lessons of Tony Manzoni with Justin Tang, who was introduced to Tony Manzoni by Golf Smarter. I mean,

it's not like you ever had a chance to meet him. You only got to hear him the show. But you read his book, You've you've watched his video. You know this idea of chipping up onto the green with a eight seven eight nine iron by bringing the shaft more upright instead of leaning it back and being up on the toe of the club. The point of this, and I think that a lot of people try to fly the ball as close to the hole as they can and hope it stops, but they

don't know how to do that. And most instructors that I've spoken to about chipping onto the green is you want to use as much as the putting surface as you possibly can. You want to get the ball onto the green as quickly as you can, but you may not necessarily want to put from off the green because that rough. Whether it's the first or second cut that you're putting over is pretty unpredictable. You may not know you know what you're going

to get. So you want to get the ball just slightly over that, get onto the green as soon as possible, and let it roll as long as you can. Now, the longer, I should say, the lower the club numbers. So of a seven iron, it's going to roll a lot longer than a nine or a pitching wedge because of the loft of the club. Correct. Okay, so I've interpreted this properly. Yeah, games

really interesting. This is why I tell both of my players the information that's in the short game is at least three times that of the man game. Wow. And another thing that I have to my players is let's get it high off the tea and low around the green. That's great, So low around the greens we always start. Can I put it? If I can't, Can I chip it around it? If I can't, I've got to pitch it and your lob birds, your your flop shot. That really only

for emergency purposes. It's a shot of last result. Short game is where you get to express yourself, your creativity. I use and use all sorts of grips but there are three different heights to crip the club depending on the required shot at hand. So chipping chipping the way that Tony teaches basically takes a lot of guests foot. So you talked about different carrying row proportions.

Generally I like to teach it this way. I use the pitching with a iron six iron, depending on the cost conditions without the ABU fifty percent carrying roll one third and then one quarter. So for example, if um basically downhill chip that normally requires may eight iron, probably take out the pitching. Which the key thing is I prep all of them around the same type roll of thumb. Is that the seven iron is where you grip right to the

end of the shop. That approximates the putter hype. It gives you more or less the same feel as your butter. You want things to see more or less conscious bent. And because you're using a chipping run, this stroke is very very small, the smaller the stroke than left in golong. And because it's so, is it more like a is it more like a putting stroke? Yeah? Actual swing. That's great. The great Raymond Floyd called it putting with loft. Yeah, I thought it set up with the shot

as though you're going to make it. But the only difference is this, you want to lean this shop a little bit more forward and just make it butping stroke, try to get contact on the tour of the clock. You'd be surprised with how effective this shot can be. So when when you're making a chip and run stroke in the manner that Tony taught, it's going to be really slow. Now when it's slow, here's the magic. And it's slow, you're able to feel the lost fundamental looking for you, theft the

thing ring. Everyone conceptually gets the idea of the lost fundamental. They think, because I know it, I can execute it. That as far from the truth as it gets. Now think about this. I'm right handed. I certainly know how to write as it with tiny sixth elphebe, but that does not mean I can immediately pick up a pin with my left hand and right it at the same speed of my right hand. Just doesn't work that way. There is a process where your brain and your body has to go

through. It's creating a habit essentially, before you can execute the various mortal movement pattern at more or less the same speed as your dominant hand Now if it took me, I'm forty three years. Year, it took me forty three years to do a certain to reach a certain proficiency of a certain task, It's not going to take me just six months of hard work on my

non dominance like to reach that same level of proficiency. Once you have felt the lost fundamental and you can execute it at a fairly good speed with your chipping stroke, then Tony would want you to move on to the pitch shop. So again, nothing else changes. Sixty forty on the leartht The only difference is you're gould use a fifty six or fifty four degree. Now you are able to move your left arm so that it's parallel to the ground on

the tapshing. How As you do that, you're gonna incorporate a little bit more of the weight shift that we've talked about and get your sensor of gravity. Move it so that your weight distribution and siventy thirty on the left foot. Again, the speed and the length of the pitch shot if considerably lower than that of the full sin if you worked through it and feel the loft fundamental, which again is simply shifting a center of vity the left pride of

the completion of your back sin. You have a better chun of adressing this more when you try to make a full sin with Heaven nine and then perhaps if the trisa or if three would Tony was I don't want to say obsessed with, but he spent so much time studying and analyzing everything he could about Ben Hogan and his swing because he just loved I think he even got to see Ben Hogan play once, probably more than once, and he You know,

there's so many times that I've talked to instructors who said, you know, I've figured out ben Hogan's secret, and everyone had a different interpretation. Yeah, everyone seemed to be onto something. Yes, I would say Tony is one of the few instructors that they saw mister Googan make that shoot the

left. But here's an interesting bit right we mentioned earlier about the other treat While mister Hogan had a secret, my interpretation decides this the sensitive gravity moves that he knew his string, he knew the various components, he matched them up to make it his string. I think that was his genius. I see too many good golfers these days. They go out own to copy this guy. Adam Scott copy thy would sing, but hey, you're you're built

that Yan Musnum. While you trying to copy here this left type of sin, it just doesn't make sense. So if you're six foot four, I think you shouldn't copy the look of ben Hoogen swing. That's why I tell a student, I can help you hit it like Ben Holden. I may not be able to make you look like Ben Holden. There's a chromatic distinction there. I can help you hit a power feel. Tell me what you exactly that that difference. Go into detail on that when you talk about there's

a dramatic difference there. So, mister Hogan, how you hit the ball, very strong trajectory, power feel right, hit the ball before you hit the cliff. I can help you do those things. But if you if you want your swing they look like ben Holden's, I may not be able to do that for you. A good starting point if if you built like a Davis Love and you try to swing like at Ben Hoogen, You're not gonna look like Ben Hoogen at all. From the from the videos that I've

analyzed, it looks like mister Hogan's were his spring spent. If you were to stand in a crucifix position and you measured him from finger tip to finger tip, it looks like it's more or less the same as you's. Like. Now, if you're a guy like me who got arms like an ad very long arm, it's not going to look the same. At the top of my back thing, my arms are going to be further behind me than mister Hoogan. That means I've got to get them out in front again,

so I've got that extra move to make. Now, it's my instructor doesn't teach me to make that extra move, or physically I'm unable to do it or coordinate it. Mentally, I'm not going to be able to play decent goal because I'm not swinging according to my DNA. Everyone has a particular DNA. How you rotate on your back string, which side you feeither, whether you head moves right or left or up and down. All these have predisposition.

How you grip the club, all these are predisposition. You do a simple test like this, you can see me goes above the right shoulder. I've got some students who are here that tells you where you're armed should be, what kind of plain you should be using on your vac sine whether it's high track above the right shoulder, medium trap at the right shoulder, or lower trap, and your transition all are determined by your your anatomical proportion in

relation to one body part to another. You've got a longer tosso versus a shorter tosso, how you look like when you addressed the ball hold selection is all going to look different for me. For example, if if I'm not mindful of my longer arms, and I go go to the golf shop and just pick a set of clubs off the rent, off the shelf, I'm not going to play good golf. I need shorter clups. So guys were longer armed, That's sorry, guys were shorter. You need longer and slept

the life. The way I explain it, it sounds logical, but a lot of people don't think like that, and they are things that All right, we're gonna take we're gonna take another time out. Sorry to interrupt you. I'm gonna take our last time out. We want to come back and start talking about the full thing. Just picking up right where you left off.

Yeah, the full swing. We'll be right back. The main reason I wanted to bring Justin on this week's episode is because this Friday is the renewal of our two months of episodes featuring our conversations with Tony Manzoni, whom

we lost to cancer in twenty eighteen. As you've heard me say, and as you can tell by Justin's praise, Tony's lessons and appearances on Golf Smarter received more reaction from golfers around the world than any of the five hundred plus teachers we featured, And because he was not very Internet or social media savvy, there's really no place other than Golf Smarter and this podcast where you can

learn what made him so special. So this Friday on Golf Smarter Mulligans, we kick off nine consecutive episodes dating back to twenty ten, but our first one is actually from twenty fourteen, when Tony talked about a letter from Ben Hogan that reveals his secret that became an obsession with Tony NFL walk in my office and tell me would you like a copy of a letter that Ben Hogan wrote by explaining how to hit the driver. He had some private film that

he had jaken and no one had actually seen him been Hogan swing. I almost jumped to his lap. The first thing I noticed was that Hogan, on the top of the back swim, his weight shifts to the instep of his left foot, and when I read it, I thought, watching he

means the instep of his right foot. And then I watched the film and it was very obvious that he was staying on his left side sixty forty through all the back swing, and I think, when you really center your head to the golf ball, you must be a little bit more on the left side of the right side. I noticed that as right dipp was aligned on the inside of his right foot, and I just noticed that when he swung, he rotated his shoulders around the spine, and his shoulders really were more

level than his earlier swings. And the film that I had was after the accident. That's really when he said, I'm going to start playing off the left side. That's golf Smarter. Mulligan's episode two hundred, number one of nine, featuring our friend and mentor Tony Manzoni. Stay tuned to the end of this episode or check the show notes to learn how to get Tony's book The Lost Fundamental, One Simple Move, Better Golf Forever and gain access to

his video of the same name. Please subscribe for free to or a sister podcast that revisits the best of the Golf Smarter podcast called Golf Smarter Mulligans, being released every Friday from wherever you're listening right now. One of the things that Tony really impressed upon me over and over again was keeping your arm attached to your left for a right handed golfer, to your left pack or your left hit. As he would say to um, keep it connected as you're

making your swing, as you're making your full swing. So when you make the golfing thing about it, if and integrate the motion like all other spots. You don't hear a separation of arm the thin, but you don't hear the arm body debating other spot if not even a thing. It's only in golf. Oh no, I you feel that the swinging of the arms, but you know what you're stinging with your entire body. If you throw a

Jevlin, you're not gonna just you your arms and throw the income. And if the Jelyn fun better go very far thinking about this as an integrated motion. But the same time, instruction must be relative relative to what you feel. So if if the student came to me and he presents a certain motion, I might tell that the student, Hey, you know what, just feel that you're using all armed or all body as the case me being based

on what I've seen hearing too in person. So we talk about being the left arm acraft the chief that simply allows the body to look in an integrated manner. A lot of the beginning of offers, they certainly just used arms just to motivate the club hit. Now, golf swing is not about singing the club hit. The golf swing is about swinging the entire club. If you think of swinging just the club hit, unless risk is going to bend

like there's gonna den like this, you start adding loft. But if you think of swinging the entire club, now the left the left arm stay is connected to the chest. How important is this when you're um wrestling right, If you're just using the the rotation of your upper arm, you show the soccket you're going to lose a lot of unwrestling matches. But if you use your so called body weight, you're going to win more than your fair share

of unwrestling matches. So the same excuse me is the same principle, but of keeping the left arm across the chest, and it also maintains the square clop. Say there is no independent articulation of the elbow joint, no excessive le arm supernation or extension of the left wrist where you cut it, flip the club, none of that. And when you do that, the whole

thing actually feels much slower then you think it should be. No, when you have the less arm across the chest and you make one enough golf thing, call it while your arm and your body, I'm making one revolution. Because of the law of the level, You've got a very long level or left arm straight in line with the club. Show the speed the mouth per hour at the end of the head. It's higher than if you had bent your lever. So while you feel slower, the speed is actually much higher

because of the unbroken lever. A lot of people go it doesn't doesn't feel right, and say, hey, give this a show, And then when they do it correctly, they go it, Hey, I'm actually hitting the ball the same distance, if not further, with the same effort. They say, hey, golf becomes much easier that way. Well, because because you're using the club in the way that the manufacturer intended to be used.

If they're a place for flipping, yeah around they been flap shot, good shot, but that these are the only places where you actually one it cut left with impact or extended left with that impact. So there is the time and place for everything. It's it picks a wisdom to know when do you use eeting. Everything is permissible, but is it the time for it? Right? Right? A lot of people will compare stack until to a Tony did, what would you how do you compare the two? And what would

you say to people about that? So it's just like stack and tell the way Tony did it. So again the thing that says of this right there, they encourage a e golf thing that's based up one axis. That's that's where the differences end. So Tony flash with the Hogan encourage a more old election of the torso it's set up and the back sing back until it is a little bit different. They encouraging more, they encourage more extension of the

upper tosso on the back swing. So when you look at these two, when when you look at two golfers one doing a lot of fundamental undering stack in two, you will see that from face on the stack and tilt golfer will have shipped the less side of his body more in a straight line, whereas the ben Hogan will have his spine tilted slightly more to the red side. So that's the away from the away from the target, away from the target. And again you can see this on the than the PD of that

you're going to spend the Yeah, but all of them. So again these are these are the main differences. But depending on your your your build, how you you you see and preceive certain things in the golf thing. If stack and still looks so you and helps you get a flat left rist and get your contact point in front of the ball, great. I think a

lot needs to be shipped about adapting various systems to shoot yourself. I certainly don't want to demonize any methods or a single I say this is the only way or this is not the way, because for every ten golfers that they tastill doesn't work for me, I can show you another ten guys that work or that that can still look for you. You show me five guys with say I've got foot blinks stack, and I'll show you five did your third

pass. Who is it? This is the best thing for that decks any mythshit, well enjail you if you don't do it correctly, well said, I get. I frequently will get emails from people saying, so you've had, you know, so many different people on what method do you use? And it's like all of them, you know, it's like, I don't

incorporate. I take bits and pieces of everything and every that I learn and everyone that I talk to, and some I incorporate more than others, and some I'll try it and if it's not working, I just I'll not use it anymore. Doesn't mean that it's not right, And that's that's part of my position here on the show is that I'm not a PGA professional, so I'm not here to judge whether what this person wants to teach is correct or

incorrect. What I want to do is put it out there, let the audience absorb it and use it or not use it aside for themselves if it's valid or not valid. And if you don't like it, come back next week you're gonna probably hear something completely different. Yeah, that's just the thing and the thing right, he has missed the right just not right now. So a lot of a lot of concepts that you see discussed in golf media. Yeah right, but are they right for you? Again, there's not

so much about about whether it's correct. It's it's relatives doesn't resonate with you. That's the thing. I discussed this with some other instructors before I say, there's only one non negotiable in the golf thing that every one of us can agree upon. It's not how you set up, because you can look at set up and you spectrum it. Some guys am we right, some guys am we left. Some they have a very neat grip, some have a very strong grip. Vex things again and other another area where that a

ton of spectruming can be done. You've got a met wolf vatching, and then on the other end you've got a rieky fouler vatching. In fact, another area where there's a lot of spectruming. You got guys up on their toes, guys like Dustin Johnson, more more squatted, more rotated, then right arm wakin emon metoperera, and then you've got on the other end you've got guys who like Brian Gay fully extended Ben because there's food fully extended,

so lots of spectrumming at P seven impact. But one thing that all these guys can agree upon it they're trying to do. But the club hit the land flightly in front of the ball, so that we hit the ball and then to that is non negotiable. So what I do with students there generally the let's trying to make a sound in front of the ball using the club hit. Now, how you do that? What you look right? When

you do that? It's going to be different from the guy in the next third b. But the key thing is this all of you are should doing the ball firth and then taking a difference and then from there, now we've got a pretty decent cannabis to work around. Then we start optimizing certain things.

If your grips suitable for you, we put them through a battery of test, if the ground forces that you use a compatible with your for example, if you're anchoring all these things compatible, and then we start this journey to what's optimizing your golf friend, But we never lose sight of the non negotiable. Not fundamentals could be one of the systems that I use the Staton to. It could also be one of the systems that use the right side.

That sin could also be one of the sisters that I use. But I never lose that these are merely delivery methods of helping me get the student be the non negotiable. Now when I am able to do this with students, they are what I calls stinging according to the DNA. And when you swing according to your DNA, it's very difficult to forget on the first team. Now, if you're predisposed to making a little shift to the right hand, found there and say you've got to go stack and tilt all or by

feversa on the first day, you're going to be confused. But if your found according to your DNA and say, hey, ball to the target, and then I need to get ball to the target. I need the clock hit. You may have found in front of the ball. How difficult is that? Just stick in the implement after this thread, Just take a stick and make a sound against the topet. You will see that your body yourself all the night and do whatever it's necessary to carry out the intention. Not

difficult this thing. I think of the golf club as a golf club, because when you do that, you suddenly have this a lot of preconceived idea about what you should do with the club, but instead just look at it as a state, make a sound against it. If you're right, I'm street then so if you get if you have to do it with more rotation of the tosso so we but let's get that non negotiable going fast. And

then because optimizing the other component the golf thing excellent excellent advice. Well again, um Justin has put together a really nice PDF that honors Tony Manzoni, but it also goes deep into um what he's learned from Tony and also comparing it to stack until that he's been teaching for quite a while. And I am going to put this all on this PDF. I'll make this available on the blog post at Golfsmarter dot com for this episode, and also we'll make

sure to remind everybody that Tony's book is available on Amazon. We've been able to get it republished and it's available on kindle format as well. It's called The Lost Fundamental, One Simple Move, Better Golf Forever. And if you're interested in the DVD that he created that's no longer in print as well, but here Golf Smarter is the only place you're going to be able to find it. We have a link for it on a private YouTube channel that we

can get it out to you as well. So we really look forward to having all of you reach out and start listening to Golf Smarter mulligans and you'll hear Tony Manzona, you'll get if you have not heard him before, you're going to understand what we're talking about. And if you have, you're going to be glad you're listening to it again because we always find a new nugget whenever you're listening to too. Justin thanks so much for your time, your

patients, and your energy and putting this together. Than do you mind if I complain about a good thing. The bad weather that's gripping the US these days has delivered more rain in northern California than we've had in years. The great thing is that we really really need the water and the snow that has been absent during this state's driest period on record. But it's really been tough to get out and play, at least for a weather wimp like me.

I can hear so many of you in the northern states of the Continental us rolling your eyes and yelling at me to shut up, because every year you have to wait anywhere from four to eight months to get out and play in short sleeves. So I apologize to you and want you to know that I understand and feel your pain. But a couple of weeks ago we had a break for a few days and I got to go out for a full round it one of my favorite and most challenging courses, Foxtail North in Sonoma County.

Again, I've not played regularly since November and having practice in my yard that much either. Well, the rounds started out pretty well, getting pars on number one and number two. Number three is a par three that I hit a low shot that actually rolled up and gave me a shot at birdie, which I made. Number four a par five, great drive, laid up for position, and then I overshot the green by about four yards on my third shot, but actually chipped in for birdie. Okay, two under

after four holes. Yeah, I shot a thirty nine on the front, but then it all went downhill, scoring a fifty one on the back. There was something weird going on there because I couldn't get the yardage on my club's right. So I went to my local club fitter last week, who's also a playing partner, and asked him to check the lie angle of each of my irons, especially my five, seven, and nine irons. First thing he noticed was that the shaft on my seven was bent. Okay,

now we're getting somewhere. And while I was there, I mentioned that I was considering taking the four hybrid out of my bag and replacing it with a five wood. We started testing different fairway woods and he asked me when the last time I was fitted. It was actually about nine years ago that we

put a four wood and a new driver in my bag. He then observed that he'd played enough times with me to know that my swing and my game has evolved since then, and it was time to replace the four wood with a three wood and that hybrid with a five wood because I was hitting some

of the new clubs about twenty yards longer than the old ones. So I'm hoping to get my new clubs and some new shafts later today, but we've got rain predicted for the next two weeks, so I won't be able to report in my prog us until things warm up, and they better warm up soon. Because I've got a trip to Bandon Dune schedule for June and want to make sure I'm playing to my potential. And yes, I'll be doing at least one episode on Bandoned Dunes in the next few months. Stay tuned

for that. I want to thank Tim sites a Fort Collins, Colorado. Tim is selected to receive a glove and glove storage compartment from our buddies at Red Rooster golf dot com, the unique glove subscription service that offers many styles of gloves in twenty six sizes. You two can win a golf Smarter gift and have your choice of which you'd prefer. And here's all you have to

do. Send an email to Golf Smarter podcast at gmail dot com and request our simple instructions to leave a voicemail at our toll free golf Smarter line, and when you do, you can choose one of three gifts. You can get a dozen balls with the golf Smarter logo from Oden Golf, the golf brand that sponsors and pays three day golfers. These tour quality balls are a fraction of the price of what you'll usually pay and when you use the code

Golf Smarter. At checkout, you'll receive an additional twenty percent off the order. Their link is in today's show notes. You also have the option to receive a private online link to Tony Manzoni's video of the Lost Fundamental and that third choice is the Glove and Glove storage compartment from Red Rooster golf dot com. So please send an email and I'll get back to you with some simple

instructions of what to do and what to say. Just right to golf Smarter podcast at gmail dot com or click on the Hey Fred button at golfsmarter dot com. And lately I've been posting more short content from the podcasts on social media, so please follow at golf Smarter on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, or Fred Green as Green with an EE. I'm

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