It's the Son of a Butcher podcast. We come to you every Wednesday. This week's guest Justin Parsons. Justin's been on the pod before, but we had to get him back on this week coming off the Open Championship that Brian Harmon won. JP is the coach of Brian Harmon.
We shared a house last week not far from Hoylake and it was a very very It was a really special experience for me JP and I. He's one of my closest friends and you know, someone who I have tremendous amount of respect for, and we just huddled in, we we cooked, we ordered in food, and it was it was a really really special week. And to see Brian Harmon get it done and to see JP be part of a major championship is it's pretty special. And
I hired JP. I moved to Dubai in two thousand and eight and met him on a couple of trips and just I just I just he had something and
I sent him a message. I was pretty tough on him in the beginning when he worked for He worked for me for three years, and then when I left and moved to the US, he took over the running of the academy that we had at the L's Club, and I was pretty hard on him, and uh, there were some tough times at the beginning, but I sent him a message on Sunday night that now he knows why I was so hard on him, because I just knew that he he could do what he's done and
and that has become one of the best golf instructors in the world. So really excited to get an opportunity to talk to him again. And I think everybody's going to enjoy it. So sit back and enjoy listening to Justin Parsons. So justin your first major championship as a coach, what was it? Was it different than you thought it was going to be? And what's the last forty eight hours been?
Like?
I think when you texted me and told me to walk around the room and keep breathing, I think I actually kind of helped because I think at one point I was setting hence not breathing, which isn't you know as you approach our tender years, it's not a good way to be blood pressure spiking.
So yeah, it was.
It was nerve wracking, plod I you know, I couldn't really relax until he got the ball into the middle of that seventeenth green. I think he was he's in too good a space to hit to do anything silly down the last, but that's seventeenth hole, Like you could nearly make anything there if you've got you know, if you've got something wrong off the tee and got some bad lies and you know, you and I saw it was like out there, it was it was carnage waiting to happen.
He's he's a very interesting player, you know. He he does so many things well, but he's never been thought of as a superstar. But if you think about it, JP from an amateur standpoint up until Brian Harmon turned pro, he basically did everything that you would say would be the prototype to becoming a superstar on the PGA Tour and having, you know, a Hall of Fame type career based off of what he did as a as a junior golfer, as an amateur golfer.
Well, you know, you and your dad have always helped me with that. Like, you know, you want to see what a player's really capable of. Who did he beat when he was fourteen? How many people was he beaten when he was eighteen, How was he as an amateur? What was he like in college? And as you've just said, you know, Brian was an absolute superstar, you know, really
all the way through those ranks. I think that you know, as I've gotten to know him, his inquisitive, very fast acting mind has probably done him as slight the service and he's had to work very hard. And you probably listened with interest to a lot of his press stuff, you know about the process and staying in the process
and things. And the weird thing is, you know, Scott Tway Country and I have been you know, gently trying to quiet in those appreciour routines, done a little bit, you know, adding structure to the warm ups, doing all of the things that we know that are going to end up kind of calming the player downing. And for whatever reason, the Open Championship he embraced all of it. And he made it, you know, like you and I talk about, he made it his idea and he was able to execute.
I mean, I've been lucky enough to be a part of major championships with players before, and I can never put my finger jp on what's different about them that week. But we spend so much time around these players. You know, we devote so much of our lives to them and and in a lot of ways, I always say tour players sometimes are like dogs. They communicate with you non verbally. You can see when they're in good moods. They don't have to tell you. You can see when they're in bad moods.
You can see when things are all Was there anything different about Brian last week that's been different than times when he hasn't won a big tournament.
There was definitely some sort of psychological shift, There's no no question about that.
You know.
We we've done some things at the back end of last year to try and assist and then Brian that the Renaissance Club started taking ice bats, which you know, there's a lot of research and it's a very popular little thing.
You know.
You see people you know all all over, from Joe Rogan to other members of the you know, the sort of the mainstream, you know, advising that that's a great thing for you know, athletic recovery, getting yourself into the right head space, being resilient.
And it was weird. I said to again, I said the country on Friday after he shot that low run, I said, you know, Brian's had a bit of an aura about him in the last two weeks and we started discussing or and without getting to Yogic, you know, he definitely started to there was a very much more of a calmness surrounding him that was different to some of the things in the past. And we had, you know, really.
Good conversations, a lot of humor of Renaissance and and lots of fun on the on the range really at Liverpool too. So yeah, I mean, it's it's a very hard thing to pinpoint. I'm glad that you referenced to her players as dogs and I didn't, but they they are a you know, they're an incredible They're they're incredible people at what they do. They do things that we've always kind of in the game, you know, many of us wanted to do and they do it at an
extremely high level under the greatest of pressure. And I'm sure I'm just like you that I'm kind of in awe of them when they're able to deliver those big performances.
You mentioned playing. I mean, you grew up wanting to be a player, Ricky. We were flying home. I got a ride home with Brooks from Liverpool, and Ricky Elliot, who caddies for Brooks, was on the plane and we were when you won. We were talking about it and he said, you know, justin you know, I know, I mean Ricky. You and Ricky have known each other pretty much your whole lives. You played junior golf together and
you wanted to be a player. Did you ever envision when you were younger growing up in Northern Ironland and playing playing in these am your tournaments, and playing in the rain and and all the things that you have to go through in Northern Ireland, did you ever let your mind wander to one day coaching and coaching someone that that wins the Open Championship and lifts a claric jog No.
I think that probably happened a bit later. I mean, I think you know, and I.
Know it was. It was never massively part of your like professional story. You weren't.
You weren't in a position where you ever really wanted to do And I think I think had I been knew, I think if I was around the people and the players that you were around, it would it would have quickly occurred to me that I wasn't good enough to do it. You know, you're you're growing up watching you know, Greg Norman and Davis Love and people hit golf shots, and you're you know, you're probably immediately aware that I can't do that.
I mean, that's just so. I think we were a little bit in dream in dreamland before before the Internet and all of the information that we have. But you know, certainly it's a I wouldn't say it's that. I think when, like you said, you join a very illustrious club. Brian Harman joined in the illustrious club to.
Be able to be a part of a team of individuals who assisted a player to win a major championship. I mean, there's not that many people like that around, so I can't say that it would have been a frontal kind of goal. But you know, to see it happen, it just makes it. It makes it even more weird. You know, Brian sent me a text last night. They left Liverpool at three am Monday morning. They got to Paris.
I think he must have texted me from the plane in Paris and he said, I'm afraid to go to sleep because it might wake up and it didn't happen.
Oh that's I mean, that's amazing. I mean, what are it is? I mean when we were texting, I was on the plane. We're somewhere over the Atlantic, and you know, we were looking online. The Internet was kind of sporadic, and Brooks was saying, you know, we we were counting down the holes and Brooks was saying, Okay, if he
gets through here, he's fine. And then once once he made that long pot at fourteen, I was looking online and I said to Brooks, I said, he just hold it from forty feet on fourteen and Brooke said, well, it's game over now, he said, because he's got two far fives coming up. And even if something disastrous happens at seventeen, he built such a big lead. I think one of the impressive things JP he slept on a five shot lead two nights in a row, which is very,
very difficult to do. And we stayed together last week in the house and we were talking about it, and you know, we were overdosing on curry and red wine for the week, but you know we talked about that and you kept asking me questions. I mean, I remember on Friday night you were saying, you know, what's you know,
what's what's going to happen. Who's the threat. I said, listen, the big lead, it's tough, and it's at catch twenty two of the big lead is great, but the big league can go quickly and be over in two holes. And I think what was really impressive is he didn't get off to great starts either Saturday or so, but as the rounds went on, he really seemed to calm down and almost play his way into good golf.
Yeah. I think you're probably right.
I mean, I think the advice that you gave me on Friday night, when you know Jeremy Elliott, who's who was there all week with with Brian, he he had texted me and said.
You know what am I going to do now?
With with Brian until three point thirty on Saturday, which is a really late tea time, and you know, I'm thinking, should I look up museums, go for a walk of the beach, you know, do two work? And you just said to me, you know, having having had experience of this, well, you've got to tell him that this is the way it is at the Open champmanship. Jack Nicholas has done it,
Tiger's done it, Louie's done it. The boys that you know, they've had that tea time, and they've had they've had to accept that this is part of part of what it is to be one of the few people who could even have claimed to ever get close to winning an open chapmanship. And and whether or not Jeremy passed on that or whether or not that they embraced it, I'll find out you later. But I thought that was
great advice because you have to embrace it. You have to look at it full in the face and say, right, I'm going to take this on.
And I think he did take it on, and you know, and the rest of its history. But I agree with you.
He you know, if anything, the brain was probably moving pretty quickly the first two or three holes and as he got into his process, and you know, as he got through it, you know, you and I talked a wee bit about the fact that, like he's his iron play has been something that we've we've been improving, I think fairly steadily over two years. And I think Link's golf really helps him because it makes him get on top of the golf ball and makes him drive the golf ball out a bit more and be a bit
more aggressive with a strike. He's you know Jack Glunkan who was in my thoughts a lot over the weekend.
You know, Jack always said, never let Brian help the ball up in the air.
You know, because he's not the longest player, he doesn't hit it way up into the sky. And then mechanically if he ever starts to try and help it up in the air, it really you know, it puts him in a bad spot with his you know, with his pivot and with you know where the golf club starts to get delivered from.
And I think link skof really helps.
And we saw him play well at some nundrews and you know he quieted himself doing I think he had that strike on it and he was deep in his process and he showed the world what he can do.
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you know, in the house last week. You know, I was asking you what you were trying to do. Tell us JP, what the process that you and his caddie, Scott Tway, whose brother is Bob Tway, who won a major championship. I think you know Scott. Everybody calls him country on tour. I think Scott's a calming influence for Brian. But what is what is the process? And and I know that that you've talked a lot about one of
the keys is alignment and having consistent alignment. And in twenty twenty three, there aren't any Instagram golfer influencer people doing videos on alignment right they're they're not doing any videos and on grip, posture, stance, alignment. But so much of what goes into great golf at the elite, elite level, I think people will be surprised that a lot of times it is the basic, basic fundamentals that you have to look after. And you talked a lot about the alignment.
Talk me through what you've done with his alignment, what the tendencies were, and how you've helped him kind of create a consistent alignment.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, first and foremost, it's like you know, you and I talk about those tendencies. I mean, I've been I watching him at tournaments, watching him on practice rhymes, and when he aims too far to the right and he ends up like underturning, because he's already a little restricted.
He's got a very very square trail foot, if you can imagine, So he's already restricted underturns, has a lot of lateral movement, and his down swing club then gets a little bit underneath and he has to kind of tran and swing it out towards the target, so he loses all his kind of rotary pressure on.
The golf ball.
I mean, that's so that I can do all that on Instagram when people would love that. But the fact is that that comes from him aiming too far to the right, so and then.
And unless you fix the aim, you can work on the other stuff. And that's what I don't think a lot of people listening understand that. The domino effect of what is all the things that you talked about that everybody that's a golf nerd loves to hear, you know, lateral slide, club laying down all of that. Those are all the effects. They're not the cause, they're not the reason why he's hitting the bad shots. The bad shots come from the alignment gets off and then the domino
effect of everything else. He has to do what he has to do. My dad is always you and I've I've said this to you a million times. You know, when we work together back in the day in Dubai. You're never doing what you're doing in the golf swing because you want to. You're doing it because you have to do that. So the alignment, how did you get him to buy into being a consistent you know alignment.
And there's been some great pictures on Instagram, you know, on social to where there's a shaft for his foot line and then there's a shaft kind of in between his feet for his ball position. Was that something that that you implemented and came up with.
Yeah, I think we did.
I mean we had we've had variations of that over the last couple of years, with the shoft on the ground like you've described, the horizontal for the ball position, and another shaft just to the to the left of target as it would be. And he's always having us because his tendency would be to start it too far to the left, so as he starts at more to the right, then he starts to get.
A feel of getting on top of it and keeping good pressure on it.
I would say that more recently he's really double back onto that right. I'm going to do that in every single session, and I see you see golf alignment I think is extremely difficult. I think you're you're aiming at targets that are different distances in front of you. You're hitting golf shots with clubs that are different lengths, You're standing with different distances from the golf ball, and the golf balls land on the ground in front of you.
So I think it's it's a constant training of the eyes. And the best players that I've certainly worked for, I would say have a much more acute understanding and awareness and respect for alignment than the rest of us do. And I think part of Brand's, part of brand structure, part of his journey, has been to understand that we had a really interesting little thing that happened last year, not this year. Last year at Health and Head he was on that eighth hole, you'd probably notice like a
par four, there's a hazard on the right. Second shot, there's a tree, and he realized that he could kind of like close the face a little bit and stay aiming pretty square and then hit like what we'd call a pressure cut, and he hit one shot, and that one shot resulted in him playing really really good golf for about I'm going to say most of the summer of last year, und of the fall, because he finally understood that he didn't have to open up way to
the right in his case to cut it. He could kind of stay pretty square and cover it and get on top of it. And you know, we went he went away from it a little bit, took a lot of time off over Christmas, and then gradually we feel like we've been piecing it all together, and then you know, the process has been really good. He uses that DST the Bendy Club, which helps people kind of do the same type of thing. He gets his alignment really well structured.
He uses a smart ball between his arms from time to time just to soften that early set that he has in his takeaway, and that makes him very kind of pivot driven, and you know, he's got a really good engine when.
He gets it. When he gets it, going and you know, you could see like people think.
He's obviously he's not six foot five, but he's you know, he's still in and around with a waterproof suit on cruise in about one hundred and sixty seven hundred and sixty eight miles an hour of ball speed, which you know, it's it's not what DJ can do, and it's not what Rory can do.
But you know, he's hitting driver more often than a lot of other players, and he's.
Very comfortable doing that. And when you combine that with a putting performance he put in he was unstoppable one.
Hundred and forty two and driving distance going into the week. He's five six weighs about one hundred and fifty pounds. I read and I saw some things that mentioned the fact that he hits So there are a lot of players, you know, DJ, Rory, the bombers, you know, the big big bombers. They can't hit driver everywhere they're hitting you know, driving irons or hitting three woods. But I saw and
noticed that he hits driver a lot. How do you feel like him hitting driver a lot plays into a strength for him.
I think it plays into a great strength for him, And I think you know there are golf courses that we go to through the year where we almost know that Brian has a competitive advantage with that, Like the seventeenth hole of Travelers. He has a competitive advantage there because he aims at down that left or off draws it three hundred dish down the middle and hits a wedge, and a lot of guys are hitting four iron off that tee. It does the same at healthon.
Head hits hits driver an awful lot more hits driver down four at the Players Championship in sawgrass and hits a log wedge, and a lot of guys are hitting hybrids or long arms on that tea.
And that's a big advantage if you can stand up on holes like that and hit driver where everybody else because then if you miss. The other thing is if you if he's hitting driver where everyone else is hitting you know, three wood iron, if he hits the fairway and they miss the fairway with a four iron, now they're miles back and they're hitting it out of the rough.
So there is a distinct competitive advantage there. I have not I would say that he's been a really elite level driver of the golf ball for a long long time, you know, really since he went on tour and you.
Know, country let him, lets him go with the driver. And the other thing.
I think with the speed he's he's very rarely like one rep max speed with his driver.
He's extremely versatile.
He tees a lot of them low hits, little squeezers hits, some little off speed ones, and so he is positioning it because you know, I know we've worked here. You know, I've seen him do fifteen in a row about one hundred and between one hundred and seventy one hundred and seventy two ball speed. But then I'll sometimes look and he'll hit driver and it'll be a one fifty eight. But he's just probably teed at low and kind of squeezed it out there and gone a little bit of run.
And again, you know he's got an advantage from that.
You mentioned the putting. He gained almost twelve strokes and strokes game putting fifty eight out of fifty nine from ten feet. He mentioned that he found something in Scotland the week before, got a little training, aid what do you put down? I mean the elite, elite putting that he put on display last week at Hoylight.
Well he is, like he said, I would say, I remember Phil Kenyon. You know Phil works here, and Phil had to look at him, and you know, Phil and I were kind of comparing notes because Phil knows that I'm going to kind of keep assuming that kind of the overall the head coach role is such an and Phil said, look, this guy's been in top fifty and putting for eleven years, so he is a really really
good putter, so he must be mindful of that. Like, it's not we're not going into We're not going into this with someone who's really maybe not very good at it, and we need to make a real wholesale change. But in looking at the mechanics of it again, Tennessee, similar to the full swing, aims a little too far to the right, tends to kind of hood the face on the way back backside of it a little bit on the way in, and kind of pushes a few putts. So the little template that he got just encouraged the
correct amount of rotation for his stroke. When he gets that little bit of rotation and he has a beautiful release on it, his head doesn't back out of it at all, and he really gets a rolling end o Bran.
I think the greens being those sort of flat greens. I think when you get as good a role on it as he gets, I can imagine that you know, you're kind of going just up against your alignment because he's he's hitting the golf ball beautifully. And I think you could see.
A lot of his putts were hit what appeared to me to be fairly straight, and they held their line and they went in the center of the hole from various distances. And again the links courses like that, you know a lot of them. The burrows are very subtle, and as long as your alignment and your your strike is really good, you've got a chance.
To me, one of the marks of a great putter is you never see a different putter in their bag. He's got a I mean, I think it was the first of the big kind of tailor made putters. I mean, it's a massive putter. It's a game improvement type putter. But he rolls shit out of it, and he doesn't he never does he mess around with putters. He doesn't strike me as I mean, I've never seen him with another putter in the back.
He's classic. He sometimes he'll turn up with another putter, you know, and he'll put with it for a bet. I said, you're gonna use this?
He goes, no, I'm just making the other one jealous for a minute.
He mentioned that on Saturday after I think two bogies in a row, a spectator said to him as he was walking from tee to green or from the green to the next, he made a comment that you don't have the stones for this. And he mentioned it in his press conference and he said with a smile on his face, that helped on tour. Brian has a reputation for being a killer, of being someone that isn't out
there to make friends. He's not trying to be the most liked, and I think one of his big strength is the fact that he's mean and he likes the fight.
Yeah, there's no quote.
I mean I think it probably stems from you'll never be in the tallest veggest. You know, he's a very he's an extremely accomplished athlete. If you speak to the trainers and stuff here that work work with him. But you know, people have always probably said, now you're too small to do this, or you're not going to be able to quite do this. You're not the right frame and they'll you know, and he loves proving people wrong.
And that guy, you know, that guy helped him an awful lot because as soon as you know, again, Country and I like, we've we've tried to figure out some strategies, sometimes without really annoying him, you know, because you don't want to alienate a player. But how could we use that I want to prove you wrong mentality in a in a training system, you know, if you know, if we turn around him and say, well, you can't do this, he could construe that as well. These boys don't believe
in me anymore. But whether it's like a guy in the crowd like that and he says, harmon, you don't have the stones for this, and Brian's just saw I'm going to show you who's.
Got the stones for this.
And and I think that was a you know, that was a lovely insight into, you know, some of the things that can create and assist some of these performances. Because I saw on the Golf channel David Valla the similar thing happened to him at the Open Championship that he won. Somebody said that like somewhere through the back nine. Don't worry the value of time to throw this away, I think when I'm definitely not going to throw this
away now. So it's a it's an interesting study in psychology that but he did.
I mean, he's coming off with two bogies. It's a flip and comment. The guy's probably been boozing all day. He obviously he doesn't know Brian at all, is just a spectator. But he says something. But I thought it was, like you said, a unique insight into the way he thinks. Because he said it really reset him, and that could go the other way too, right, I mean, you're you're just bogie two holes. You know you're playing against You're
obviously not the favorite. I mean the two favorites last week, you know Tommy Fleetwood, and then you know the favorite every week is Roy McElroy, and the press makes him the favorite every week, regardless of how he's playing. But it was an interesting insight into he said it. It it gave him a little reset. I've heard other players say it's kind of a wake up call to where you go, oh, okay, now I need to focus in and really really kind of stick to what I'm doing.
It'll be interesting to see how that plays out, because I mean, that's a huge that's a huge turning point in a round that could have gone the other way.
Yeah, I think the word reset is a is a cool way of looking at it because I think ten years ago Brian might have got angered by that. But he uses the word reset, which is almost like, Okay, now I need to go back to the stuff that I'm doing really well and then proceed, And that's how I'm going to show them that I'm going to be
able to do this. Rather than like being really angry and being upset with it all, he just reset, And I think I think if he's using it in that way, I think he's beginning to use some of the fuel in the right way that he may have may or may not have used it in the wrong way in the past.
I mean, if you look at what this could do, I mean, even though he's in his mid thirties, but if you look at the caliber of players that were on that leader board. You know, we talked about it, like I said, you know, I think it was dinner Friday night, you know, I said, listen, John Rahm's going to make a run, right, He's going to make a run. I mean, he's just that good of a player. He's going to get out early. He's going to make a run. Rory was making a run. You had some elite, elite players.
And what do you think this does for Brian's confidence? I mean, he goes to third and Ryder Cup six in the FedEx. He's top ten in the world now, in the world rankings, if you still believe in the world rankings, but he is now. I mean, on top of having a major championship, which he'll be a major champion for the rest of his life, this puts him in a really really interesting position for the remainder of
the year. I mean, had he been talking at you guys on the team been talking about Ryder Cup at all, or or is that just something that out of nowhere. He goes to third and he is going to be on the plane going to Rome for the US T.
Yeah, I mean I think we would.
We would avoid those kind of outcome based expectational type of conversations with with Brian. It's he's much better as many are better served and continue to get into his process and do his work. I think that I think he got so lost in it that all of those things, you know, if they did rear there, if you know, he talked a little bit about thoughts coming to him and he was able just to go and think about something else.
I'm thrilled for him. You know, he's played two walker cups. Like you say, he's.
Had a an unbelievable pedigree, and that was one of the things that really surprised me that every time he looked like maybe having a wobble, he was able to resiliently move forwards. And I was also quite surprised that, you know, nobody else was able to kind of get up to the ten eleven under mark and really get after him, because you know, like you said, I mean, these are these were the best players.
In the world.
I thought Rory was playing for the most part, playing very very well. I think John Ram's an unbelievable player.
I was.
I was thrilled to see Tommy Fleet would play so well in front of the galleries, and I was although I obviously had a dog in the fight, I was disappointed that he wasn't able to do anything on Sunday and a test them with the Tommy Fleet would one of the first things I saw when Brian was walking from the eighteenth to the to the scoring team. Was Tommy putting his arm around him and then congratulate him. And that's how good a human being Tommy Fleet would is.
And the first person that he sees when he gets to scoring is Zach Johnson. I mean, obviously he's part of the whole Sea Island crew. How important is that crew that that? I mean, you're at Sea Island now. But Sea Island is one of those places very similar to to where I am down here in Jupiter, to where there are a ton of players. There's a bunch of people that play on tour. It has a it has a history and a tradition of having tour play.
Talk to me about Sea Island and what do you feel like all those players being in that one area does not only for Brian, but for all of them.
Well, I think one of the coolest things that they do is that they are friends. They hang out and they're extremely competitive, and frankly, I find that quite difficult, like if that was me, you know, and they pull for one another whenever they see things like what Brian's doing, you know, coming to fruition, and they also you know, they also are inwardly wanting to win at all at all costs, and I think it's a very very healthy thing,
you know. I see Paton and Harris and Brian. You know, they'll play some practice rounds together and they'll have some fun together. But at the same time, you know, once the gloves come off, they want to win, and you know they're doing a.
Nice job here.
Obviously, the performance center is incredible. I think the varied weather that we get down here is helpful for them. We've got some really really good variants in our golf courses Ocean.
For US Frederica and the three courses here at uh at Sea Island.
So I think it's uh, you know, it's a kind of a cool project to be a part of. I go down to Florida, but as you know, to see Gracie and and and those sorts of guys, and I get a sort of a similar feel sometimes at the Bears Club. I think there's you know, there's some some
cool stuff going on. I don't know whether you guys all see one another as much as we would here with you know, there's not that many you know, restaurants and bits and pieces, so there's a lot of you know, there's a lot of people that see one another socially here too. But you know, it's pretty cool with with the performance center, Randy and Tom doing the fitness stuff, Phil coming in and out with his with his putting work.
You know, we've got a we've got a really good backbone here for for people to get better when they're when they're at home.
You know, Jp, One of the things that that I love about you as a coach is that you don't have a method, you don't have a theory, you don't have a swing that you're trying to teach everyone. You work with players of all different shapes and sizes that work that hit the ball very very different. Is that
by design? Is that something that was important to you to to kind of see the player as as as an individual, as opposed to saying, Okay, I'm gonna have my ideas and I'm going to put them on the players that come to work with me.
Well, you know, without without being dogmatic, I can't I can't really think that there is any other way to do it. I just I can't understand how we could ever treat two or five or eight individuals in the same way and expect to get the same results. So you know, for me, it's it's you know, I absolutely
understand the question. I think it's an excellent question, but I don't I don't really understand how it could be done any other way because all these people like you know, and and and you and I are in the same boat with that. They're all so different. They've learned different things. They've they've had different parents, they've grown up playing different sports, they see out of different eyes, they be there different. You know, they're left handed, right handed, their their bodies
are different, their brains are different. So you know, for me, it's just it just doesn't make any sense to do it any other way than to sit down with each person as an individual. And yeah, I think I would have learned an awful lot a lot of that through you know, what your family do and how they've seen golf and helped people to play better golf, and they're you know, I think it's your daughter always said, we're not you know, we're here to teach. We're teach people
to play golf. We're not teaching golf to people. So you know, the human being always kind of comes first.
For me, you made a big decision you know, you and I worked together. I moved to Dubai in two thousand and eight. I think I hired you in the summer. Easily. One of the smartest and best decisions that I ever made was was hiring you to be on my team. And I lived in Dubai for three years. You ran our academy there. You can get really comfortable in Dubai. It's a great place to live. It's an easy place
to live. The decision when I remember you called me and said there was an opportunity for you to go to Sea Island, and you were a bit hesitant. You know, young kids, young family, you know, great lifestyle. Obviously it worked out, but your changes are tough to make. That process of saying okay, I'm going to pick up my family and move from Dubai and move to America. Talk
me through the process at South Georgia. I mean, I keep telling you if you get a pickup truck and and and and where the pinpoint belt and start hunting, you and I aren't going to be friends anymore, you know, I mean, But but it must have been a big decision. I mean, I've done it. I mean a lot of people have, but it's a daunting decision to move to another country and and and hope it's all going to work out. Yeah.
I mean the guys that having done some research about Sea Islander, you know, it's a very very classy organization, they're not gonna they're not going to entertain hiring someone without really wanting them to be a part of the kind of the family here. And they've been, you know, they've been absolutely unbelievable. I always thought of Dubai as really more of a young man or young woman's time, you know. I think it's it's a fabulous place to be,
you know, Claude, it's fast, it's ever changing. People move in and out of different different positions.
So as a father of two kids at that point, who were you.
Know, what's Henry Molly was maybe seven or so at or six and Henry was three or four, you know, something like that, I'm thinking to myself, like Dubai is it's it's a brilliant place, but it's also it can be quite transient and things can move pretty fast, you know, the goalposts can shift a bit. So I think I saw some stability and pursuing something different. I was also traveling as you know, I was helping Peter Uline, Louis Ustaus and Charles Schwartzel.
At the time.
And you know, again as a young young ash father going from Dubai to la and Dubai to Fort Lauderdale, and I remember pitching up at your house and you know, at seven in the evening and fall asleep on your clutch you if, you know, it was it's a it's a hard lifestyle and trying to travel like that. So it was becoming clear to me that I either embrace the role of trying to teach some of the better players in the world or or kind of stay put
somewhere a little bit more. And you know, I felt like I still really wanted to do that, and I'm still very passionate about about doing that. And you know, see Islands giving me the chance to kind of do a little bit of both, you know, be able to you know, do some teaching here when I'm at home. You know, a pretty quick flight from Jacksonville at Lander or Brunswick to Atlanta to get to most of the the tour venues.
That we go to.
And you know, a beautiful environment here for kids to grow up in.
You know, the islands.
The island's beautiful, they've got some some independence, they've got some good friends that they run around with, and they're in and out of swimming pools and so yeah, so far, so good.
Obviously, there's a long list of major champions to come out of Northern Ireland, but you're you're now part of that fabric of major championships as well. I think every
country needs role models for young instructors. And I think you may not have thought of this, but there'll be someone that's teaching on a driving range in you know, Banger, you know, somewhere where it's not great, where the weather's not good, where the ranges aren't good, that will see, you know, Justin Parsons, who's from Hollywood Golf Club, has worked with a major champion. Have you let your mind think about you know what that means from you know, a Northern Ireland standpoint, And.
I don't know a little bit.
I mean I think I think, like you know, you and I have talked about it's it's nice to it's nice to consider that you could use some of the achievements that you've had and players have had to try to give a bit back.
I think you get to.
Again to our sort of stage where you know, and I know you do some of this with you know, with your broadcasting and things that got but to get a bit back and to try and try and help some people along the way, it's it's amazing. I mean, the minded text messages and WhatsApps and stuff on Instagram and things that that I've got, it's it's really quite humbling to to consider that you're in that kind of group of people who are who are thought of in
that way. So, you know, as I sort of process it and try and figure figure some stuff out, I would like to try and arrange how to how to give a bit back with with people and and you know, like I was very fortunate to get to become a part of your family and be trained and taught and helped by you know, the first family of golf instruction, I mean, and some of those boys and girls back
there doing that won't maybe have that chance. But maybe if I can give a week bit back to them and help them on the way, I would like to do that.
Has my dad messaged you multiple times?
Yes, he was very he was very excited. You know, he's been he's been amazing to me, you know, his his his approach with treating the human being. He's like a chameleon, as you've you've seen many more times than
I have. His ability to communicate with each and in every individual in a slightly more nuanced and different way, you know, belittles his uh you know, his his rogue americanisms sometimes and he you know, I remember seeing him teach, you know, people who were kind of religious and good living, and all of a sudden he'd be like a like
a pastor or a preacher. And then you know, some of the boys who liked to gamble and go to Vegas for other reasons, and all of a sudden he turned into the frock boy again.
And I was always I was always in, you know, in great admiration for you know, the guy who I think is probably the best that there's ever been at what we do.
JP you you've left, You've left on Saturday. You had a player who's had a five shot lead going into Saturday. You had a player that had a five shot lead going into Sunday, and you chose to go home. It was your daughter's eleventh birthday. And I gotta be honest with you, I was surprised you took off, not because I think you could have affected the outcome, but because I've been lucky enough to be a part of players winning major championships before, and it is a very unique thing.
But you said something that has really stuck with me. You said, listen, my daughter's eleven before she goes away to college. How many more birthdays am I going to be a part of? And I think it's a testament to the type of person you are that you could have easily stayed and been standing on the eighteenth Green and give Brian a big hug and been a part of it and seen it up close, and but you chose to get on an airplane Saturday and go home.
That was a strange one for me. I want I as much as I wanted you to be there for Molly's birthday, selfishly, from a professional standpoint, I wanted to be there to be a part of it.
Well, you know, truthfully, I thought of like, she's.
Not quite at an age where she understands the gravity of what happened on suddenly from a professional perspective, but you know, and at some point she will be at an age where she realizes that I came home.
And that's I mean, that's the balance, right, I mean the balance in what we do is trying to balance you know, the players, the travel, and then the work life. And I think you know, out of all the people that are currently doing it what we do, I think you do an amazing job at trying to balance all of it very well, because you know, I'm I'm terrible at it. I'm you know, I'm I'm not good at I'm not good at the work life balance. That's for sure.
Well on the caveat in there, you know.
And I'm going to say this is we finished off that little putting session on Friday and I and I gave Brian a high five and I said, and I can't held all his hand. And I said, I'm already here tomorrow unless you need me. And he said, no, go home. You're you're doing my birthday party, aren't you.
I went yeah.
He said no, I'd go from here, don't worry about it, and had he said, JP, this is this is a big week. I'd love you to stay and hang on. I'd be the first one on Delta to put that to Monday. But he did, you know, and I checked with him and if he had needed me, I would have been there for him and I'd have probably ended up having to buy Molly a.
Horse or something like that.
But you know, and that's just the way that the way that I wanted it to be. So if he didn't need me, I'm sticking the planet.
Well, it was lonely in the house on Saturday night, the curry and the red wine didn't taste is good. But honestly, mate, I mean you and I have You're the brother I never had, and you know I never had a brother, And you know, I've learned an enormous amount from you, and you've been such a a stabilizing and positive person in my life. And you know, I certainly wouldn't be where I am today without you and oh your help. So I'm proud of you.
And well, I think if we haven't met, I think at some point a situation in a Dubai bank probably would have taken you into some sort of jail for couple of years that I tried to come.
You know, for those of you who.
Don't know, the story club is asked to sign, I think you were asked to sign fifty two checks.
Yeah, when you buy a car, when you buy a car in Dubai, you have to have you have to you're making payments, and you have to sign a check for each one.
They probably have they probably have modernized that since two thousand and eight or two thousand and nine, So forgive us for.
But they did, and they put it in a safety deposit. One. So you got fifty two checks from the bank.
And I specifically asked you went with me when we when I was buying the car, and I said, do I need more checks because I have to go to the bank to get more checks, And they said, no, fifty two. So we went to the bank, we got the fifty two checks, and we went back in signed all fifty two of them. And then they said, and now you need one more check for the total value of the car. So now we had to go back to Dubiden. We had to go back to Emerts mall.
And Emerts yeah, Emirates NBD, isn't it ever? And we uh and then and I thought you were going to have a problem with mister Muhammad what was it Muhammad Sharif I think his name might have been or something like that.
Well, when he told when he told me, I wasn't signing my name my signature. He said, you're signing your name improperly, and and you put your hand, you put your hand on my shoulder and said, breathe, breathe, breathe.
I did for you what you did for me on Sunday. So we're kind of we're even there, but no, I appreciate all the all love and support club. We've we've been a good old we've had a good old run out and it's it's special for me to do this and have a have a talk with you.
Well, I can't tell you how proud I am of you. I love you, and you are one of the best in the world at what you do. And this certainly isn't going to be the last major you're going to be involved with. So thanks for coming back on and talking to us and enjoy it. You're going to see Brian win.
Hopefully, Brian's gonna fly back on Friday. He went he went to Syracuse, which was the plan, to to see his family. You know, Kelly and the kids have been up there for for a week or so, so I would imagine.
That he'll he'll probably need a little bit of.
Rest, which he may or may not get with his three beautiful young children, but he'll.
He'll be back here Friday. I have no idea. I don't even know whether he's going to play Windham.
Yet, he'll sure as hell doesn't need to.
He does not need to anymore. No, but you know, you know what these guys are like.
Maybe that was on the schedule and there were there were things going on, but you know, we're probably looking forward to the playoffs.
The Ryder Cup will be decided when it's decided. But I do hope that he you know, here is a place there and it'll be nice for him to to maintain that sort of top six thing.
He's third on the list with two events left. He can't fall. He is going to be on the team in Rome. You don't have anything to worry about. Enjoyed drinking out of the Cleric jug. I got to do it once with Ernie Els and it's pretty special. And make sure you pour something in there that's good. I see it. So that was justin Parsons And like I said, he's a hell of an instructor, but he's a better person.
I don't know that there are many instructors with a player trying to win their first major as a player and as a coach having a player win their first major, not a lot of people would fly home, but he flew home for his daughter's birthday. And I think that says a hell of a lot about him as a human being. And he is one of the good ones. And I am so so proud of him, proud to call him a friend, and proud to watch all the
work that he does. So the Major's twenty twenty three in the books John Rahm, Brooks Kepka, Wyndham Clark, and now Brian Harmon, And don't think a lot of people would have picked him, but early in the week it just had. I've seen Brian Harmon play well before he took the lead into Aaron Hills in twenty seventeen, when brooks Kepka won. When I was working with Brooks in twenty seventeen and I had a friend from the US saying, Hey, give me a dark horse pick that nobody's looking at.
And this was on Wednesday. I said bet Ham, Brian Harmon, and he was like, what I said, Brian Harmon, It's the perfect kind of golf course for him. And I mentioned in one of the practice rounds to Brooks that I was staying with JP that week and I said, this is a good golf course for Brian Harmon and PK said yeah, I mean this perfect golf course for the type of golf that he plays. And it turned out to be true. So that it's the twenty twenty
three major championships in the books. Two weeks left on the PGA Tour, We got Ryder Cup coming up live, still has a bunch of events and then the Fall Series, so we'll see what this does for Brian Harmon and his career. Son of a Butcher comes to you every Wednesday. We will see you all next week.