I think there's a couple of things to be worried about with handicaffs. I don't love handicapped for this reason, because now it's eight of your best twenty. I know a lot of golfers that can shoot a seventy eight eight times and they can shoot in the nineties. So are they a seventy eight shooter? No, I think they should be any whatever. Every eighty five shooter. That's what they should be called. And I don't mean we're calling them that bad. I think for them that would help them, right, isn't
that more real? Eight of your best twenty? Now there's golfers that are consistent. There are some that shoot seventy eight to eighty three. They're out there. Then the handicaps is a good number for them. But most golfers are not like that, all right. This is John Delt, golf coach at Soufermilion High School in Clinton, Indiana. We play at Matthews Park and Geneva Hills Golf Club. We golf Smarter. You should too. This is
Golf Smarter Number nine hundred and twenty one. Learn to close your club face properly for better ballflight with Eric Shoulberg. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories 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. Eric Bred it's great being here. Thank you for having me on. It's always an honor and a blast to get to talk to you
can catch up. Well, it's a blast for me too. I really enjoy talking to you because when usually when I have a conversation with somebody that we record, we'll chat for a while and discuss what we're going to talk about. You and I just let it rip. Like Josh Sanders like that too. We just can let it rip. We can go in anywhere, any direction, and it's just fun. Yeah, it's good. Yeah,
yep. So anyway, But one of the things that I want to bring up, and let's see how long we can make this last, what directions we can go with it, is game improvement. Right. This podcast is all about game improvement. It's not about the PGA Tour, but it's improvement for the amateur golfer. Now, we see we try to compare ourselves, which is ridiculous. Try to compare ourselves to what the pros are doing. You know, we try to say, oh I saw that shot on TV.
I can do it. No, you can't. And you know these guys they work ten eight to ten to twelve hours every single day on their golf game with a team of coaches, and we have YouTube, we have podcasts. Right, not everyone takes lessons and not everyone practices and going out to the driving range before year round to warm up. It's not practice, it's warm up. But are there stats? Are there things that we can look at in our game that will enhance our development? Yeah? Right.
I think there's a lot of different ways that you can look at it. I think number one, you have to establish as a golfer what what do you want to gain out of it? What do you want out of it? If you're that guy goes and plays every once in a while and you, like you said, warm up, hit some balls first, your expectations should be can I hit this golf ball? You know, if you're that's the guy plays once, you know, every few months in the corporate something
like that, your expectations should be very low. So I don't think, you know, we're not talking a ton about that guy that guy could be happier with expectations set low. But let's talk about somebody who does want to get better. Then I think you have varying levels, so you have the pros, which is hard to compare to. Okay, but I think you can go. One of the greatest things I think has been Arcos and the data that we've gained from them. With there, I think they're gonna be
over a billion shots at some point here soon. Every time I hear lou Say Lusteigner talk about the number that they're at, I'm like, well, it was just five hundred million, Ou, it's eight hundred million. So I have seen billions come in real soon the data. But what I love it you can look at you know, scratch fifteen twenty five thirty handicap and then it's it's very simple to break down where where you are first off, as you can't go and say where do I want to get to? And
yes, course conditions can be somewhat different over here. It makes things different, but it's just there's a there's a certain yard age you hit the ball if you're a certain handicapped. In general, Okay, it's very hard to say that somebody who carries the ball at two hundred and ninety five yards is a thirty handicap. It's just they're they're not out there. That person is probably a very very good golfer, unless they're you know, just out there,
you know for law drives or something like that. Because you you look at the average mail drives it. Please don't send me hate mail people two hundred and twenty yards, Okay, that is the average male golfers too. Well, I think it's too eighteen actually so, but I know everybody hits a three hundred. I hear all the time. But I'm like, I know my TrackMan launch matter isn't wrong, but everybody has a three hundred.
But so driving distance can be one category we can look at. But then I like to look at it like this, you have if you want to break off down really simple. You can look at driving distance, you can look at fairways hit okay, and you can look at greens and regulation, and then you can look at putts. Those are three simple categories. If you just want to focus on those and say where am I in those three? And you can look at those numbers and say what do I need to
get better? You know if you're forty two putts, you cut down on your putts, right, you have to be the tour guys or let's forget out two guys. If you want to shoot below eighty and then you need to get about nine greens around. That's just a basic fact. You better get nine greens in regulation. You're now somebody can shoot an eighty with six.
I'm sure you've done it. Fred, You've had a great day of chipping and putting, okay, but just in general, you better think you're going to be eight to nine and you know the number goes up to get to low seventies. And that's Those are the barriers you can look at. And I could even send you a link if you want later to some of those breakdowns to look at of what they are. To know, this is what I have to get to to be at a certain handicaff if that's where
I want to get to. So I guess to answer your questions very easy to look at data and figure out where am I at in those three categories. And if I want to get better, then I need to get better here. If I'm missing fairways and taking penalty strokes, I have to become a better driver somehow to get to the next level. Okay, so that's just those are the numbers, and that's that's not how we get better, but those are the numbers of what that needs me done to reach the different
level. And I think that's what it ought to be based on. If you're trying to break a hundred, or you're trying to make ninety, or you can look at a handicap if you want, or trying to make eighty five eighty and working down that way. If you're a golfer, I think that's the best way to break down. If that is the planer trajection you want to look at. You don't go from one hundred to eighty, it's just no, no, you progress slowly down the path, just how it
works. So I'd say that's the first step, and then the fun part is going to work on each of those areas that you need to. But it's it's the process. So I one of the things I get to do for is I every student I bring back to my teaching bay, I have to drive by the driving range to drop once doing off and I pick up the next So I typically will make a comment about what I'm seeing to them so hoping that they'll learn. I'm never making fun of anybody. It's just
an observation of what do I see, so simple observations. I see. It's driving ranges, hitting one ball one after the other. The feet do not move at all. I call it raking. You keep your grip on and you just grab one ball and you like, raak it in right and you swing again. Here's the funny thing, though, if you hit two balls in a row, one you shank one, you hit perfect with their steven iron or whatever it is. Your brain has no idea what happened different.
You didn't do anything in between to say, body, this is the if I'm trying to make. This is what I'm trying to do. Now, you stand on that range with a seven iron. Most of us, if we're athletic at all, are going to get into some kind of little groove something where we start feeling a little better about it, right, and
we may be able to start hitting that seven hour a little better. By the end of our one hundred balls, we probably got Some of those guys usually got a large bucket of balls, so they'll start probably feeling a little better about it after hitting that. But it relates to zero. To the golf course, that will absolutely relate zero, because how often do you stand hit the same club in a row on a golf course and you're playing well.
I guess even if you have even if you have to go get another ball because you hit one ob or something, you are going to move your feet. But I think that's really a fascinating observation about about people in driving range who don't move their feet, right, yeah, rac and swing and rake and swing and rake and swing. Yeah. And it's so different than
it would be on the course, you know. It's like what I suggest for people is if you're working and you have something you're working, you have to do that in between swing and number one, don't buy a large bucket balls, get the small bucket, step behind your ball, go through your routine play golf. While you're out there, you go through everything you do, do your practice swing or whatever you normally do. But have something you're working on in between so you can get some form of feedback. If you
don't have any feedback, there's nothing you're learning feedback. I can't say it enough. You have to have feedback in golf, whether it's your video, whether it's something you're putting on the ground, whether you're putting something like the headcover in the way if I hit the hit cover, my path was wrong or whatever it is. It's the only way you're going to learn. Otherwise, how do you know what you're doing? You don't, So just kind of a few things I guess that I noticed and see, and then I'll
try to point out so that they don't fall into those traps. And I know everybody out there at the range thinks that are working on it, and they're exercising though, and you know, I wish I could just go up there and say stop, let's get better. And I think us would do it. I think most just don't know. I do think it's also harder to practice the way I would ask you to practice than it is just staying there nack golf balls. It's it's it's I would say, kind of brainless
hitting seven irons in a row possibly right verse? What if you had to step back and do you know, like I prescribe like some kind of slow motion move or whatever it is, so you can really feel it that takes work right, and feedback maybe a video to see did I do it correct? So there's ways to do it that take less time than it would hit
your large bucket of balls and get much better. So waste do Yeah, there's too many questions to ask, but we're not gonna do it right now because we're going to take a time out and we'll be back right after this. It's so interesting because when people are on the driving range and they're just you know, rake and swing and rake and swing. I don't know if they're looking at the ball flight, if they're looking at you know, or feeling the contact. Are they just going for distance? You know, let's
go back to the seven. I are not your driver. And even if they they know immediately once the ball leaves the club face that the ball flight's gonna be either what they want or what or what they're not hoping for, it still has to be analyzed. You got to look at that ball flight and say, what does that mean? Right? Huge? Huge? I see this And I don't know if you've seen this too. I'm sure you had been on golf. How many are hitting the next wall for the last
ball? Lands? Oh, I've done that. I know, well, I know if I if I have a shot that that was not what I intended I'll go ahead and do it again, but yeah, but I probably don't step away and restart, probably keep my feet locked in and just like scrape it up. So yeah, the moving of the feet, the repositioning, the stepping away, going through your whole shot routine. Yeah, yeah, is something that you know. It's like that makes a big difference.
It's less time, less expensive, you don't have to buy as many balls, and it's way way more fruitful. I know the place I work, they charged like thirty dollars for balls now, so it's like everything's getting crazy. So yeah, I think you, you know, bring up some good points. I I just fact there's you follow those do those right little things at the range, and the payoffs can you know, be absolutely huge.
But you have to have some source. And I think you brought up the greatest point of all in golf that I work very hard with every student to try to understand. So if you go play golf or your driving range and you hit a shot and it's you know, it starts left to your target and curves off to the right, what percent of people I'm gonna asking you you could analyze that shot as the nine ball flight laws what happened at impact? What percent would you guess? And I'll tell you what I think as
the percent that could say this is what happened. Let's just say with path and face, those two, only those two, this is what happened with my path and face on that golf shot. I know for a fact this is what happened. I mean, it's got to be a number. I think it's just way lower than that from the leasons I see. And I yeah, because I can see good golfers that don't know. Yeah, sure, even good golfers that don't know. I have no idea, so real
simply if you you don't need a launch minor figure this out now. It may be good to be with the pro at first to do it so you can kind of calibrate and say this is what it is. But if you if you were in general, the ball is going to start pretty close, especially on the loger the clubs to where your club base is pointed. You know, you can say, you know, seventy five eighty five percent probably
on the driver. You know, see wedge is gonna it's not going to be as much, but you don't have to worry about it because the ball doesn't move that much off when you're with your sandwich. So your typical seven iron. Just assume the ball started pretty darn close to where that face was pointed. Okay, so you saw your target was straight ahead. You saw that ball start off to the left of your target. So what do we know right now? Before anything? Your hips weren't open. No, that
doesn't matter. We're not worried about your hips or your shoulders, because that's why I hear at first what happened on that shot? Oh my hips were I don't care what happened with that Right now, we have to analyze club face work first and then we work backwards to the body. Yeah so club faced, Yeah, you left in your head. Okay, so your club face had to be pointed left right, and the only way for that ball to curve to the right would be with your club path further to the left.
Now, how much that ball curved is how how much your path was to the left. So the greater difference between your path and your face is the more curvature that you have. Okay. Now, obviously a driver is going to move more because it's in the air longer. But if you have if you start the ball on your target line. Like a lot of people who swing over the top will start of the target line and they swing way left. Okay, so it may start right on the target line for a
second, that peels way up to the right. That tells you you are swinging your club path is way to the left. So you golfer have to figure out your club path. Your club face was on the target line, right, but you have to figure out how to swing your path on that same line. I mean, you're gonna have to learn to close your club face a lot more too, at the same time you're doing that. But it's a simple analysis if you think about it. If the ball starts off
way to the right, which most people do, what happened. Your club face is wide open. Learn to crank that club face down. Get yourself a really strong grip when you look down at you. Most people, I say, the weakest grips like weaker than John Rom's. Okay, and you better see three to four knuckles most golfers. Okay, that way, it's going to help the club face close on its own. You're talking about a
lead hand, right lead hand, Yeah, sorry about that. It's going to help the club face close on its own and you'll be twisting the shaft more and that gives you a chance. But what happens, and I've been fortunate to see this a couple of times. I saw athletic young golfers, juniors. They hit a shot, a good swing inside out, the ball
went by twenty yards to the right. And these are brand new golfers, okay, So within three to four shots, their path was probably fourteen to little left and then their face got more center now or their face was even left, so it curved into the right. So they're happy now with their shot. But if somebody would have been there right at the right time, said buddy, great swing path, let me just show you how to close this club face, they would have been off to the races. But everybody
relates. This is why it's important. They always relate it to the club path, what the ball is doing when it starts. So if you know that it wasn't that it's your club face, then you'll know that your big air and golf golfers is your club face. Mainly, fix your club face and you will find life and golf will be much more fun. And that's all done with the grip. Well, there's basically a couple of ways. I'd say three ways to close the clubface. One is what most people do,
unfortunately, is they have a real weak grip. They take it back and they square it up right in front by throwing the club face. Okay. The other way you can do it is by this real rotational move like this, which a lot of us were brought up to do. Okay, it's so hard, it's impossible. And like even the pros they talk about that have done it, they talk about two thousand shots a day, and if you miss a day, it takes them three days to get that back.
Wow. Yeah, yeah, So tell me how you're our amateurs are going to time that out. You're not. You may stripe one every once in a while, but like you said, it's impossible. And the third way is you can be like the pros. You get a stronger grip. So the pros, I don't always have to have stronger if they've learned to do what's called twisting the handle okay, and if if Fred can see my
hands, but what I'm doing is I'm twisting. Okay, So I'm going from my left my lead wrist is extended here that cup so by the time I can do the top of this wing, I have a choice. I can flatten it out. So what did I do. I closed the club face and if I just hold that more flat on the way down, my club face is closed. The more I'm like this coming in with cup, guess what the club face is wide, wide open. Okay, So the pros what they typically do, say like John ram or whatever. He'll swing
up and he's twisting the shaft. John Rahm has done a lot of it on the way up. That's why he's bowed. He's actually releasing on the way down to an extended position that way. But most golfers, let's say more that are more neutral. We'll get to the top and they're twisting the shaft like this. If you guys, folks to see my hands. So I go like this. It's like a motorcycle move. If you've ever rid a motorcycle or anything that has handles that you turn for the throttle, you
want to take your lead hand is taking the throttle off. Turn it the other way. Now, try to do that with a really strong grip. You'll see the club If I have a really weak grip, Look how I can barely turn my hand stronger. Look how much I can turn this thing over. That means I can take the club and whip it down. Okay. So most golfers need to fix their club face and they'll find out golf will change forever for them. They were so hard path and they work and
everything. Fix your grip and then fix your club face and get your club face in a much stronger position on the way down. The number one checkpoint, i'd say for all golfers. So when you get to here, which is P six where the club is sticking out like right here, your hands are here? What do you mean? What's P six? Okay? So I we have got you know, the positions in golf, So we have we have P one address P two. So let's say, let me give roll some P fours when we get to the top, okay, is P
four so we have two three, which is arm parallel. P four is I'm at the top. P five as we're getting back to arm parallel. P six is club parallel to the ground before P seven is impact. Okay, So P six is club parallel to the ground on the way down. That club should be parallel to the ground. It should be a little bit behind your hands and the angle of that club face. Most golfers see how this angle is. That'd be matching my back angle if I was hitting about
like that. See it. Most golfers their clup faces like this wide open. So when your face is wide open at p six, what do you do? You stand up and you throw it. It's the only way to hit it. That's why you see every golfer. Most golfers early extend. They thrust their pelvis into the ball and they stand up because what is your body doing. It's helping you get that clupface closed, but you're throwing your pelvis at You're slowing things down, and what do you do? It helps
you square it, but you're just you're throwing it at the ball. That's why your arms are extended at the ball instead of having more of this look. But it's all bait. Did everything I say there was all based on an open clupface. It wasn't based on anything else. So don't roll that club face open on the way back, have control of it, have that thing down, feel like it's shut as can be, and then learn to
just do that, because here's what happens. The antidote to the closed club fase is guess what, your hips clearing out of the way like the professionals, like everybody wants to have, right, it's not an artificial clearing. It's your hips go, Holy smokes, I better get out of the way or this ball is going a million miles left. What is the antidote to the open face? Your hips stopping for you so you can close the club
face. So if you want to look like Rory is not good, to the top of your swing and flip your hips all the way because you're just spinning out. It does you no good. You close your clup face and after a little while your body goes, you know what, I gotta get out of the way, or this's going way left. And that's the antidote to the left. And guess what, then you start clearing out. But everything I said there was based on the club face, yep. And don't
do what I do, which is tinker with it during your round. All right, we're gonna take another time out. We'll be back right after this. We talked about the nine different flight paths early. You mentioned it, the ball flight laws, Yes, ball flight laws, Yeah, take go
deeper. I'm fascinated. Yeah, so they're really cool. It's it was something that the old ones were wrong because the PJ had said that the ball started closer to the path than the face, and when track Man came out, they said, definitively, no, that's wrong, it's more on the face. So we learned a lot of a lot about golf then, and you know, it's really interesting. People asked how I taught back then?
What I told people? And you told some people wrong stuff because you would have them swing more the right, which would cause a bigger hook for somebody that would do it. But after a while we all knew that something's not right because I'm telling this guy swing way over there on the ball's hooking more. How can I tell them swing more to the left. This is working. So even though we were told this and didn't understand it as coaches, if you did it long enough, you figured it out, even though you
didn't have the data to prove it. So when TrackMan came out with that tonus that the ball flew closer to where the face angle is, then we learned a lot. So if you draw a straight just a straight line towards your target path and then you had one go you know, like you pushed it to the right, the other one you pulled it to the left. Okay, there's three of them, and then you would have basically branches out
of each one of them. So I have the left, you'd have that straight pole right, and then you would have one that would be a poll hook as an option, and then you would have that pull, fade, pull, slice, whatever you want to call it. So there's three there, and then the same thing. The straight shot would have one that went dead straight. You would have one that started on the line and then drew, and then one that faded off of it. So there's you have three
off each one of those. So off of each one of those, you can deduce what happened to any of your shots. And when you understand that, you can make the changes that you need. So if I look at a shot, a typical problem I'll have is I'll swing too far out to the right and look it back in or leave a push out there, you know, so I'll have a push draw or just a push just push it straight out there. So if I push it out to the right, I know the ball started to the right, and let's say it doesn't curve.
I know my club path and club face were exactly you can say exactly say pretty much the same degree, Okay, So if the ball stays straight, it doesn't matter if tragments those four degrees or six. Like I got an idea about a little bit because I'm only a certain amount off to the right. I know that my path and face are exactly the same, and then the So that's the one part. The other part is knowing if it curves the right, your club path is inside of the face. If it curves
the other way, your path is outside the face angle. So I think if you just see the chart once and understand those three, then you can figure out any golf shot. And and the thing is where like, without knowing those how do you fix your golf game when you're playing? You can't because you can't see your golf swing. And then for you to hit a shot that you most people for you you know a pull cut or something in
there, you don't know for sure that what happened on that shot. So it's like when you understand the ballfight laws, then you can go look at a shot and go, I know what happened with my path and face and our bodies are really good at organizing the other stuff around that. I mean, you got to build a good foundation somewhat, get a good grip. I tell people about golf. You know, if you build a foundation of a good posture, good stance, you know your alignment can be different.
It's matchups for alignment. Get a good golf grip, you know, understand a good posture, and then understand those ballflight laws. Then you'll understand what path you need to make this work any I use ropes to teach people to swing. Every time I put in a rope in somebody's hand that has a twelve degree path to the left, way over the top right, they think, oh, I can't fix this. I put a rope and I goes. I stand on the right, I'll stand up the left. At first,
I swing to me. They do it really easy, and I'll walk over about twenty feet to the right and say swing to me. That go and swing right out to me like you did it in one swing. You swung out to the right. So everybody can pick his path. There's nobody that is like, I can't do this, But they don't understand the relationship between the two. And when you understand that relationship. It's fixable. I'm not I'm not trying to claim golf is easy, but golf is very very
hard when you don't have that basis as a framework. And I think if everybody had that basis, golf would be golfers will be much much better. But most golfers are just playing in the blind unfortunately because of that. Sure, yeah yeah so, and trying to feel it while you're doing it is also really that's why video is so great. And I've been using the Arcost. You talked about Arcost earlier. I've been using the Arcos and uh it
says that my my average drive is two thirty three. Okay, so a little bit above normal, right, but sometimes I'll have a two eighty five drive, right, and it's like yeah, yeah yeah. But then also there'll be time so I'll have a one seventy five drive, you know. That's why I'm a two eighty three. You know? Yeah? Are you so? Year after a round you fix it. But you're able to go
through with arcos, which I love. Now you're able to look at it and say, this is why are you set against Because I have an idea probably where you are as a handicammer, you set against a scratch or a five or what do you set yours against? To look at ten? So your goal is to be a ten and you're a what about nine? Six? Okay, so you're looking at where you are in that arri's because I know you can also set it against like a scratch and say yeah, okay,
I was like four behind that. Yeah, yeah, I don't want to do that. I want to play like i'm playing. I want to play consistent to where I am right now, and if I get improved on it, that's great. But I'm not trying to be something i'm not. And the fact that I'm I'm just around to ten right now is still amazing to me. Well, I don't know what percent of the nation. I can't remember what ten is. It's top I can't remember. I mean, you're in the top fifteen percent. Maybe I think it's a big number.
Yeah. Somebody said, somebody asked me recently, are you a good golfer? And I said, I'm not good, but I'm not bad. Yeah, I know. I think it's very respectable. I mean it's you know, I feel like, but you have a good you have a good knowledge. You also do other things too. I mean, I don't we don't know what Fred would be if he had. I think you always have to factor in your ten handicap with you don't practice a ton, you don't play
a ton. What would you be if you had five days on the course a week tired, tired and achy, Ay, dude, I'm sixty eight years old, I'd be I'd be in a lot of pain. I mean, it's hard to hard to think that. But because you don't look at thank you, well you're welcome. Yeah, sponsors, you'll know why, Well, yeah you do. But you do it right, yeah, one hundred percent. It doesn't You got to work on it. But I think that's the same as golf. But I think it's how you do it is
fine. You know, setting against ten, so you go have a round and you can look at it when you didn't play as well and say, well, I was plus three in my putting or whatever. You know where you were off and probably I don't know yet if you're do you see trends when you're going the wrong way, Possibly you have to say, oh my putting's going a little or this is going a little awkward. It's Another thing people have to have is arcos or some kind of something to tell them because
yeah, the feed. Yeah, I mean, the thing that's so interesting is the first thing I'll look at is on it's my total number of putts. And you know, I know that if I can keep it into the twenty nine to thirty one thirty two range of putts in a round, I'll
have a decent score. But then if I have a high score, I'm like, oh, well, you had thirty nine putts today, you had forty putts today, and you had four three putts and okay, so that means the four three putts also could mean that I'm not picking the right club on my approach shot because I'm leaving myself a sixty foot putt on my first pot, and that's yeah, a sixty foot putt is like, okay, that's gonna be a three putt perhaps, Yeah, yeah, I think over
thirty I think when you tour average, they go once it's over thirty two feet, that's when they creep into a possible three putt. So at sixty foot we have a pretty good chance. Yeah you said thirty two. Yeah, so I think once it goes are thirty two, their putts go to thirty, they go to two point oh one. At thirty two feet or thirty three feet is when they finally break over over a two point oh one
and they had at thirty two or thirty three feet. My last couple of rounds, I actually started looking at what's the length of my first putt. That's the one of the number of things you can do that first. That helps on the approach, right, because now it's telling me if I'm using the right clubs on my approach shots massive. It gives you this massive new level done it than just gi rs or how many pots. That number is absolutely crucial to having. It makes a world of difference huge. So that's
good. That's good, you're getting that data. Okay, we talked about earlier about comparing ourselves to how pros improve how versus how we improve. When we come back after this break, let's talk about how a fifteen handicap versus a three handicap, you know, because three handicap is not someone who's gonna be making the tour at anytime soon, no matter how good they think they are. So let's let's find out what's happening on golf Smarter Mulligans this week,
and then we'll back right after this. This week on Golf, Smarter Mulligans is the second conversation with legendary coach Jim Hardy, just after he published his book Solid Contact. You know, recently I heard someone say golf's a simple game that's really hard. Well, in this hour long episode with Jim, he puts it this way, Golf is a ten thousand different pieces,
all some way glued together. And the ball flights of mystery and the impacts of mystery, and our swings a mystery, and we've got timing, tempo, rhythm and balance. We've got a strong grip, a week grip. You bendo where you stand up, you put the ball forward, you put the ball back, You make a long back swing, a short back swing, you take it straight back, you take it to the inside, You cock your wrists, you're across the line, your legth off. I could
go on for hours, but that's why people look at golf. They look at golf as though we've got all the colors of the rainbow going on, plus fall the sounds of an arch distract going on, and it's just too complicated. That's Episode two hundred and thirty seven of Golf Smarter Mulligans, the second of two episodes with Jim Hardy after the release of his book Solid Contact.
Originally published as a member's only episode in April of twenty twelve, this is the first time this episode has ever been shared publicly and it's a good one. So if Golf Smarter is one of your favorite golf podcasts, then don't miss the chance to get two episodes each week, Golf Smarter on Tuesdays and golf Smarter Mulligans episodes from our archives that revisit the best of Golf Smarter that cannot be found on any podcast platform anymore. They're both available for free
from wherever you're listening right now. So golfers who would love to get to a low index, and I'm not even gonna call it scratch, because that's just to be a scratch golfer, your consistency has to be on such a high level and it doesn't even come close to what the pros do. Because even the best player at your local course, if you're country club and they're playing the same course over and over and over again, or you're on the men's club, are you just you know, you like to compete locally.
Getting to a low index versus versus scratch is a tremendous amount of work. Getting fifteen to attend takes work. I mean, it all takes work. It's not a game of perfection and it's not a game of consistent progress. And anyone thinks they can get better every time out is fooling themselves. Correct, that's a good point, I think, you know. So we have
so much data now to know the difference. You know, as I think I said earlier, to look at if you're fifteen, you want to become a five, which a lot of people I see say that they want to attain a certain level. And I'm like, that's great, So let's sit down and look at what is the difference between you and then. And that doesn't mean I'm showing them a swing of what a five is, because I think there's a couple of things to be worried about with handicaps. Is this
is that you can look at golf. I don't love handicapped for this reason, because it's now it's eight of your best twenty. Okay, so what kind of I know a lot of golfers that can shoot a seventy eight eight times and they can shoot in the nineties. So are they Are they a seventy eight shooter? No? I think there should be any whatever, every eighty five shooter, and that's what they should be called. And yeah, I mean we're calling them that bad. I think for them that would help
them, right, isn't that more real? Like eight of your best twenty? Now, there's golfers that are consistent. There are some that shoot seventy eight to eighty three. They're out there and then that's then the handicap is a good number for them. But most golfers are not like that. Oh no, No, I mean like I got to a point recently where over my last twenty rounds was a ten stroke like seventy six to eighty six where it was my you know, the range that I had that is incredibly consistent
for me. I couldn't believe. It's like wow, over twenty rounds. I you know, I know that a handicap is there for gambling purposes, but a handicap shows your potential. It doesn't show what your average score is. And I think that for the gambling purposes you got to go. You know what I might generally I shoot an eighty three. Okay, let's work from that, not ye a nine hands cap. You should have your last twenty if you entered them, average them. You know what I mean.
It's if you're honest with your score, just average it and then that's. Oh, it'll tell you. It says your last It'll show you on the gin USGJ. Yeah, it says, here's your last twenty rounds, your high score, your low score, and the ape score of those twenty. Use that. Use then you know what else, and you know what else, and then move up to the test. Moving back. Everybody the ego
I hate this. Okay. You know what, if you want to play the back tease, you're going to get in less trouble because it's designed for your skill level. And that's why they put the bunkers where they do, in the water where they do. If you want to not get to the bunkers, move back. Okay, fine, fine, But if you want to have more fun playing golf, play it forward. Man. What How what distance do you play your corset? I don't know about I usually,
honestly, I never look at the distance. I look at the slope. I look the slop okay, so you're you do a better job that way. I think it's I don't know, it's I have not run into this yet. I so I try not to judge people yet because I hope I'm not one. I usually am not ego driven with so many things. So
I don't like when I go play golf with my wife a lot. I'll play the reds with her, but I don't whip a driver oute ever, like I'll hit an iron off the tee and have fun because I don't want to go back and forth to tea boxes, and I just I think it's fun for me and her just tea off the same tea box. We're more together instead of a part. So I hope that is a thing for me saying I'll be able to do it, but move up, don't. I don't think I'll have that ego issue. I don't know why men do,
because I don't think people look down on anybody for it. And I feel sorry for those guys that when you hit a three wood or a hybrid every time in the second shot, and I teach those guys, I'm like, isn't that get tiring and old? And they're like, well yeah, but I'm not going up to those teas. Well. You know what, that's an interesting point is that you know, no one's going to look down on you from moving forward, but boy are they going to have judgments if you're
playing from the back teas and you don't belong there. Oh you're that's where the judgments are. Yeah, and so like, dude, you should not be playing the black the back tees. You should not do that. Yeah, it's interesting, but people, I think, equate it to the other way, which is really interesting. So yeah, I hope, I hope I don't have an issue, and I hopefully if you are getting better. I just think I don't know what it was. I don't know if it's
the ladies tea that it got called and you're not. I don't call them the lady's I know, and I think I don't know if that. I think my point is by saying that for so many years that that got in men's minds that they can't move forward. But I you know, I don't know they have you know, T boxes that are a part of it. I don't I just know I would never want to hit a three wood out of the fair rate. I don't like hitting it now on part fives.
I don't love hitting three woods, like I'd like to have an iron in my hand, so if I wouldn't do it all day long. So you know, I'm not going to play a T box where I have hit three woods, you know, but fourteen of the holes to it hopefully to the green I mean on my second shot, and probably end up short. So I'll move up, I promise. Oh wait, wait, wait, you don't use driver? You lost me on that? What? No, I don't love even hitting three woods on a par five from me if I play
that tea is like I like hitting irons. I would hate to have to do it fourteen times in a row, have to hit a three wood because I'm short, you know, like a lot of people have to, you know. So it's like I would I like it. I'd rather play a T box where I have an eight iron in yeah yeah, oh yeah, yeah yeah. Well the whole idea of playing forward was play like the pros do you know. It's like, but what do they do? They hit? They'll hit driver or three wood and then a wedge or a nine iron
or an eight iron. That's what we do. We're hitting driver and then a hybrid. Yeah, it's like I think a good way to think about it is most people, if they watch golf, look at the clubs they use on their second and find the tea box that fits that, right. I mean it's like if they're hitting driver nine irons, drivers, wedges, drivers, some iron, then find t boxes that allow you to hit driver some iron and that'll be fun. It'll be much more fun. Look.
Yeah, so you know, getting back to your point on what somebody needs to do to get to if you're everybody's going to have a little different path to go from twenty to fifteen to fifteen, ten, ten to five, handicap five and down. If we're using handicap as the as just the general. You know, Art Coast uses that a lot because it makes it easier to look at numbers. But you're going to find out when you grab those numbers what you need work on. Okay, and typically people aren't as good
as punt. If I had a prescription for somebody that you just want to score better, it's going to be within one hundred yards. Okay, you're going to get your one hundred yard game better. But that doesn't mean that's the prescription for everybody. You need to get your usually your whole game better. But if it's like Eric, I have one month we're getting I got to get as good as like can in a month. I'm like, okay, we're getting really good short game here. That's that's where that's the low
hanging for you, right with everything. But if you have to improve your whole game, you need these metrics to say, and I'm only hitting five greens per round. If I want to shoot an eighty, I have to get to eight, eight to nine greens. You know you do have to get there on average, right, So that's a good metric right there. You know you're driving distance probably can't be from a back T two twenty and do that you're knock hit three woods in and get down to a five handicapped.
You better have a lot of irons in your hands if you want to go down to a five handicap. So if your business doesn't match less ease, you better get up to the right tea that'll allow you to hit the right irons in. But it's a pretty simple formula when you look at it of what you need to get better at to reach whatever handicap you want.
When we have the data in front of us, so you know, if you go get a lesson, show up to your lesson and have some stats, if you play and say this is what I get, this is typically where I am. I want to get here, and then you can kind of build a plan off that and what you need to do based on whatever
the golfer does. So it doesn't have to be I think golf it's really complicated, but it doesn't have to be as as complicated I think as it is, especially with the data we have today, should make it much easier, not harder, to get to an answer of what we need to do to get better. And it's typically you can break it down, like I said greens and regulation. You can look at how many putts and like green
putts fairways hit. You know, to get your fairways hit up. So somebody say well, I always get kicked back from somebody to say well I hit I hit twelve fairways. I'm like, okay, you probably drive it one eighty two right. That's the only way somebody's sitting that many fairways. They aren't hitting it far right. So then they run into that. Everybody everybody does something different and you always get comments from somebody, well my foursome.
Nobody does that. I'm like, well, this is uh Arcos is nine hundred million shots, not your foresome. So remember that. It's a it's a general look at things that you can base some numbers off that are pretty good, you know what I mean. So it's just the general idea, a way to break it down. But I think going back, if you want to become a better golfer and you want to get down, go back to a lot to what we talked about, learning your face angle and
ball flight, those ballfight laws. Get your learn to close your garden club face so you can get a more piercing shot that comes off lower with more spin. You'll quit hitting behind it, no more tops. You'll get spin and you'll hit you'll hit the greens, it won't roll anymore. But that's
all having a nice clothes cup face. Awesome. All right, we're and you're still teaching at I teach up at McCormick ranch back with the range you got teaching bay there, and I teach online Arizona, right, gott Arizona. Yeah, so you can find me an ejs goolf dot com. And that's where basically all my stuff is and do some I think you see me on some social media stuff. Are doing a little more. I'm doing more YouTube stuff because I like long, long format where I can talk like I
did here and get more in depth. I just feel like it's hard and minute to three minutes to get out what you you know, what you want to talk about, and help you absolutely the whole golf yep. Ye. Well, it's great to talk to you again. As we started out saying, let's see where it goes. It went and it was a lot of information and a lot of helpful information and insights and as always Eric, it's a blaster to talk to you. Thank you man, but love talking to
you and hopefully make golfers there today. Man, I just loved hearing from Golf Smarter Ambassador John Delil, the golf coach from South Vermilion High School in Clinton, Indiana. As he said in the opening, we Golf Smarter, you should too. John chose to receive Tony Manzoni's video of the Lost Fundamental, which I'm sure he's going to use for himself and for his students. Now, I'd love to tell you that there are tremendous benefits to being a
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