Justin Parsons and Aldrich Potgieter

Claude welcomes fellow golf instructor Justin Parsons back to the pod to discuss the success of his client Aldrich Potgieter, learnings that everyday golfers can use to improve their game, and the direction golf is going in terms of speed and distance.

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
It's the Son of a Bunch podcast. I'm your host,
Claude Harmon. We've had him on the pop before. Justin
Parsons JP. Obviously it's always great to talk to you.
But your players keep winning. Aldrick Pottgeiger I hope I
pronounced that correctly, gets his first win on the PGA
Tour British Am champ in twenty twenty two. Played some
on the corn Ferry. But one of these players that

(00:23):
everybody has really been talking about for the last two
three years, just unbelievable speed. How did this kind of
partnership come about? Did he reach out to you? Did
you see him at a tournament?

Speaker 2 (00:35):
How did that happen? Well, you know, Claude, really since
since you and I have really gotten to know one another.
You know, we worked at Ernie ELS's golf course in Dubai,
and Ernie was a planned of yours and someone that
I learned a great deal from. And you know, from there,
I was fortunate enough to work for Charles Schwartzel for
a couple of years, and I've been working for lou
Ustausan for seven or eight years. And you know, it's
easy for those of us who see these guys. You know,

(00:56):
the South African players are their their hero worship done
at home and Louis is a great academy down there,
and Aldric had been in his academy on a couple
of different occasions, with a brief hiatus where he moved
to Australia. So you know, really the coordination of that
was through Louis and you know, Aldric's family trying to
figure out who they might go and see in the

(01:17):
in the United States, and you know, haven't had some
experience with the way that these guys from South Africa think,
and obviously having some experience with one of the guys
that they hold to high esteem. You know, when Aldrick
came along, I already had a little bit of trust
in it. And you know, again like you and I
talk about a lot, you know, the pedigree that this
lot had. He won the Junior Invitational at Sage Volley
by you know, I think it was more than six shots.

(01:39):
I'm not sure it was ten shots or eight shots,
but won the British Amateur Championship. We saw him, you know,
putting his head up in Mexico and probably could have
should have won the ned Bank this year in South
Africa as well, so incredibly gifted player. It's a privilege
to be working for somebody like we have to keep,
you know, reminding ourselves, like your father is always till

(02:00):
me that your prime objective is don't screw them up.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
The speed this kid has, I mean everybody's been talking
about it, but ball speed, clubhead speed numbers. What type
of speeds are we looking at? Was he cruise at
with the driver?

Speaker 2 (02:12):
Well, the incredible thing that he really cruises from a
ball speed perspective of about one ninety two to one
ninety four with the driver. You know, it's also interesting
that when he's doing that, he doesn't even look like
he's going that hard on it, which, you know, I
think his testament to his athletic base and his sequencing
and his natural ability. You know, we saw one pop
pop up to like a one ninety six, so you know,

(02:34):
I'm sure he's capable of clubhead speeds in the mid
one thirties if he really wanted to do that. But
you're relatively speaking to the way he swings the club
and the way he moves. You know, for a for
a long hitter, he's relatively disciplined. You know, his footwork
for a long hitter is excellent. And you know, we've
obviously seen our thoughts on footwork change a little bit
in the last couple of years as to what Scottie

(02:55):
Schaeffer has done. You know, but certainly one thirty five's
he would be capable of, but a crew using clubhead
speed of one twenty six, one twenty nine, ball speeds
in the upper one eighties and into the one nineties
when he's into adrenaline fueled kind of moments and does
it with a lot of ease. So you know, part
of what you and I have spoken about is that
that leaves some big gaps in his in his golf bag,

(03:18):
and he's got to control his spin and he has
to control his distance and with his technique. One of
the things I've been trying to help him with is
to help him understand, you know, when he is these
big gapping issues, what mechanically kind of breaks down in
order for him to lose control of the golf ball,
not the way most of us lose control of the
golf ball towards us, but loses control of the golf
ball away from him. And you know, when he gets

(03:40):
the golf club inside alongside of the very close, relatively speaking,
closed club face that he has. You know, he delofs
it further and probably turns it over a little bit
from right to left, and that just you know, is
indicative of something, you know that's going to go a
little bit too far. So he's done a really nice
job keeping it in front of him. We worked really
hard on the Friday of the PGA Championship. I've traveled

(04:02):
down to a golf club near Aiken in South Carolina
called Old Barnwell and we spend the day there and
you're really get into some good work and he finished
sixth in Colonial, so he was you know, I wasn't
particularly surprised he went well in Detroit. He'd been in
South Africa and had a nice long break, which is
good for you know, for those who are from there,
they tend to do really well after like a little
bit of a mental reset. But to see him when

(04:24):
was a great thrill.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
And I'm going through this right now with Noah Kent,
who I've had on the podcast. I mean, speed can
be a blessing, but when you get to these really
really high high speed right we saw this with Bryson.
There is a rate of diminishing return the faster you
swing the golf club, because the further you hit it,
the further off line you're going to hit it. And

(04:46):
then like you talked about, and I had you know,
the other big tall South African, James Hart. I had
him on the podcast a couple of years ago. He
was talking to me about the yardages that he hits
all the clubs, And I don't think the average golfer
realizes that you can have so much speed that you
can get a shot on the golf course from you know,

(05:07):
a guy like Oldric from one hundred and fifty yards,
he's trying to manufacture some type of golf swing in
some type of movement to hit the golf ball a
distance that a lot of people are making full swings.
So yes, it helps from a distance standpoint, But what's
his wedge game like? And have you had to make

(05:29):
any tweaks JP to his wedge game to find him
some shots, because I'm sure there are some dead zones
in his yardages to where he doesn't have a club
or he doesn't have a shot to hit.

Speaker 2 (05:42):
Yeah, you know the guys from titleist Liam McDougall, in particular,
Liam has become a great friend and kind of compatriate
a mind with working with players, and he's definitely, you know,
helped Aldick understand how equipment can be your friend when
it comes to distance control the golf ball, to spend
on the golf ball can be your friend. Making suit
that the wedge gapping has done really really well. And
you know what I've tried to do is help him

(06:04):
understand just in the same way that you and I,
you know, eight or ten years ago, we started really
talking about speed is a skill that you can develop
and something that you need to be respectful of. I
also think we have to help the young players recognize
the distance control is a skill that you can develop.
And the main thing I think with these longer ones,
as I've gotten to know over the years, is it's

(06:24):
kind of doing that in a way that makes them
feel like they can still hit it hard enough and
still be athletic. Because the one thing that really good
athletic ball strikers don't particularly like doing is slowing down.

Speaker 1 (06:35):
Yeah, no, I mean, I think that's that's always the
thing to where you take someone with a lot of speed,
so like a race car driver, right, they're fast, they
keep crashing the car. You're trying to get them to
control the car and get the car around the track
without crashing it. I watched the video online where Aldrich
went out and spent some time with Craig Rose and
Dave so Ups a TPI and Gregg kind of took

(06:58):
a deep dive into kind of what he did from
a forced standpoint and what he did from a sequence standpoint.
Ground force reaction is now something that we are hearing
a lot of and the video that Greg talked about,
he talked about, you know, ground force, that idea of
pushing from the right and then pushing to the left.

(07:19):
But the best players in the world they apply that
force and the long hitters that force gets delayed, and
that was one of the things that Greg was talking about.
Aldrick's ability to kind of break later really helps him
create a lot of this speed and a lot of
his power.

Speaker 2 (07:40):
You know, Aldrick's is as good as anybody in the
game about and I think you know testament to that
is when you look at people who do that really well,
they tend to exhibit really nice rhythms in the golf
swings like Xander Chelfley would be an example of that
and somebody who maybe also has a has a really
nice kind of transition sequence. So when that club's kind
of hanging around at the top in the transition and

(08:01):
there's lots of action going on underneath, you know, and
to Greg's point, you know, Aldric pushes, pulls and squats
and gets ready to get up out of the ground
as well as anybody in the game. And you know,
as we know, if there's if that's happening really really
quickly at the wrong times, the club face is going
to get a little bit potentially less stable. But with
his orientation of his grip and it certainly I remember

(08:22):
whenever Aldrig and I first started, whatever I called you,
and I said, hey, look, you know, let's talk me
through what you did with DJ whenever he first started,
and he had a very strong grip and a very
strong club face. And okay, his left wrist conditions are
slightly different to Aldric's, but you know, it's a similar
type of pattern to the way that they kind of
see the game and the way that they play the game.
The club face is very much delayed the pivot and

(08:46):
the body is doing an awful lot of the work.
There's an awful lot of kind of like natural de
lofting and then lofting going on through the exit. So
you know, I think there's a lot of things that
he's doing, and I think somewhat similar to DJ where
he's doing something at high speed with a fairly stable
club face, which is kind of like really exciting because
if you put those two matchups together, you see him

(09:07):
driving it really straight under pressure, and if guys that
got drive it really straight under pressure. And we do
our job helping to educate and train them with the
finer details of distance, spin control, and then they can
do the rest of the stuff because they're really good golfers.
Then they've become kind of hard to live with.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
The other thing that I noticed in that video that
doctor Greg Rose posted when Aldrich went out to TPI
is that separation between upper body and lower body. You
know where the upper body on the backswing, you know,
the separation between the upper body and the lower body
is kind of average on the PJ tours right around
you know, forty five percent. I mean he gets almost sixty,

(09:44):
so he gets that kind of really really good load.
But the thing that I love about is golf swing
for a big log here when Bryson was trying to
gain distance and was doing all his long drive stuff.
I mean, Bryson talked a lot about trying to move
the golf club faster and trying to move, you know,
move the tool faster. Aldrich's golf swing for a guy

(10:05):
that hits it as far as he does, he's got
really really nice, nice rhythm. And he's one of those
guys JP that we're starting to see. He's not six
foot four, six foot five, you know, like Noah kent R.
Noah hits it a long way because he's six foot
five inches tall. Now, Aldric is not a big, big, tall,

(10:27):
tall giant. He's a very kind of stocky, strong guy.
So he swings the golf club at obviously a massive,
massive speed, very much like Rory. His balance looks pretty good,
it doesn't look like there's a massive amount of overswing. So,
in your opinion, where do you think the speed for

(10:51):
him comes from.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
I've spent a lot of time with his father, who
is an excellent rugby player downe in South Africa, and
he was a like a like a center to a winger.
So's he's fast like these So these boys are genetically
he's fast, he's he's very very strong. I don't know
that you would ever refer to him as a small guy.
I understand he's not six foot five, but he's probably
around about that six foot, big, big stocky lower body

(11:17):
on him. Then, so you've got the sort of the
genetics and of course, like I kind of know what
they feed them down in South Africa, but they might
have some sort of special special stew that they feed
them at some point, because there's a lot of these
guys that look the same. So then you know, like
we've talked about through our TPI background, he comes out
of you know, out of there and starts to then go, okay,
I'm going to do some wrestling. He's playing some rugby,

(11:38):
he's playing some tennis.

Speaker 1 (11:40):
So an athletes background.

Speaker 2 (11:42):
Yeah, great genetics, very athletic, very powerful. If you see him,
he's very sinewy. He's kind of lied his his hands
and his wrists are nicely formed. He's got a lot
of flexibilities and you know, he's okay, and I agree
with you kind of like Rory, he's he's at that
stage in a life at twenty where he's extremely powerful.

(12:03):
Obviously he hasn't quite muscled up yet, so he's very
very mobile with that really really stable base. So to
your point about you know, being able to utilize the
ground and being able to get a really good stretch
between your lower body and your upper body in the
back swinging into the change of direction, I think he
exhibits a lot of things that just allow him to
transfer a lot of force to the golf club. And

(12:23):
you know, I think for you know, for this generation
of golfers, when you combine that with really really good
club fitting, you start to get really really good advice
on how to take care of your body and all
of those things that were probably lacking when we were
growing up playing. Then you're in a position where they're
kind of maximizing what they're doing.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
Is there anything that he does that the people listening
could say, Okay, let me try and implement that into
my game, because obviously, ball speeds in the mid one nineties,
there are very few people on the planet Earth that
can do that in golf tournaments. Certainly there's almost nobody
doing that right now, that is at the speed he's

(13:07):
got that's winning tournaments, right, I mean at an elite,
elite level. So is there anything that he does that
the average golfer who's just trying to break one hundred
and ninety eighty seventy for the first time. Anything that
he does that the listeners could take and try and
apply to their own game.

Speaker 2 (13:27):
So, you know, I think that's a really good question,
and it's probably a difficult question to answer because you know,
you've got this guy who's who's so elite and so
kind of out there, and as his coach currently, one
of the things that I'm trying to do is kind
of understand what his feels are and understand what he's
feeling whenever he's hitting golf shots. And I think those
for those people out there, he definitely feels and sees

(13:48):
the game in a slightly different way. For example, you know,
he went in the middle part of the season talking
about wanting to feel like he was hitting draws more,
and for me, that was always be a swing that
was slightly more from the inside, where you're kind of
squaring it with your face. And I was kind of thinking,
that's probably not the way I'd want you to go about,
you know, continuing to look at your technique through the
foreseeable future. And then I realized that he feels everything

(14:11):
through the club face, so he feels he feels a
draw being a little bit more of a release of
the club face. And I think for people, you know,
heading golf shots on ranges and things like that, it's
certainly exploring some feels that would help you to make
the golf ball go further. Of course, with an Aldric's case,
his hands are well to the right of the handle
for a long hitter, he's got plenty of shaft lean

(14:32):
he's squaring the golf club with his pivot an awful lot.
But learning what some of those feels might be and
how to like generate force under some of your own
conditions I think can be sometimes quite useful, and certainly
from a perspective of looking at a strong, gripped, strong
faced player who squares it with the face, you can
make some little short swings where you can really learn

(14:53):
to let your body kind of square the club face.
And for most players struggling a little bit with getting
too handsy and releasing the club a little bit, that
might give you a little bit more pressure in the bowl.

Speaker 1 (15:02):
Yeah, I mean, and I think he does what we
try and get a lot of amateurs to do, right
where they are very very active with the hands and
the golf club. And I liked what you've said there.
And he's got the club face very similar to what
we do with you know, DJ, what I did with
Brooks for over a decade, they played from a shut position.

(15:23):
You know, I think that's one of the ways JP
the game has changed a lot, because it's kind of
the complete one hundred and eighty degree opposite of what
my dad did back in the day with Tiger. Tiger
had the golf club in a very very shut position.
They weakened his grip, they tried to get the face
more neutral. But I think equipment technology, the way that

(15:45):
we can measure what a player's body's doing. Now, you know,
that was the thing that I said to Brooks when
I first saw him. He was trying, you know, back
in twenty twelve, he was trying to weaken his grip,
he was trying to hit draws. He was trying to
get the face a little little bit more neutral at the top,
maybe borderline, a little bit more open. And having watched

(16:06):
you know what my dad did with DJ to say, listen,
if you've got high speed and you've got a lot
of rotation, you square the face up with the body,
and I think so many golfers have so much of
the hand action. But I do like what you said there,
he's got the club face and a pretty good strong position.
And then I think that's a great way for everyone

(16:27):
listening to work on that. Make a nine to three
backsen you know, waist tie back and waist tied through,
but feel like you're going to square the club face
with the lower body and the upper body, not so
much of the hands and the arms.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
Yeah. I mean then when I start thinking about those
kind of matches through the impact area, you know, if
the club face is strong on the clubs in line
with your hands coming into the ball to your delivery,
you're sort of let's say you're nine o'clock position. Then
at least you've got an incentive to use your body
through the impact area. You've got an incentive to go
ahead turned through the ball, Whereas if the face, for example,

(17:03):
is open and behind you, then you're in a situation
where you've got no real incentive to rotate, because if
you rotated, the ball would start off right and high
and weak. So your incentive really is to slow your
body down and to kind of use your hands more
through impact, so you know, even even as a drill
for you know, a lot of players having that club
face a little bit more strong and on the line

(17:23):
of your hands and being able to learn to use
your body to really square it, I think can improve
your pivot, improve your impact conditions, and that would bleed
in when you do those nice little training swings. I
always think that's a great way for it to bleed
into your full swing.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
Talk to me about this equipment, Jad, what do we
do in lost wise with the driver? What's his wedge
set up look like? First of all, loft on the driver,
where is he loftwise? What type of shaft is he using?

Speaker 2 (17:48):
You're putting me on the spot. He went to he
went back to the UK and worked with Liam before
he went to South Africa. Came back and he's definitely
playing with the spinning your but all the Probi one
X ball from a wedge set up, I think we're
at I think we're at sixty to fifty six fifty
two forty six. The driver, I think they they loft

(18:13):
it up a little bit and shortened a little bit.
I'm not going to I'm not going to guess the
chap that I knew we had a I think we
had a Ventus seven X and there have been there
have been a few changes. I think, you know, we
we've got to give these these guys, these club fitters,
their due. I mean again, they're trying to help understand
this genius that they're working with, and they're having to

(18:33):
navigate a lot of different things that they probably haven't
seen before either. So we are sacrificing a little bit
more spin on the ball, a little bit more spin
on the driver. Probably brought the overall distance of the
driver package, if you like, back in a little bit,
and we're trying to get that done at the relevance
of making the wedge stuff a little bit easier, making
the gappings a little bit easier. So we're I think

(18:56):
to be to be honest with you. Since I really
started with Alder around about a year ago, it's been
a little bit of a work in progress, like figuring
out like what's working under pressure, what's not, what's going
too far? You know. And as he's learning his craft
and he's finding his own footprints, certainly relative to Detroit,
they're getting a lot closer to the finished article.

Speaker 1 (19:15):
Give me an idea of his wedge distances and let's
just go from lob wedge up to five iron, So
what is kind of stock lob wedge distance for him,
and then just go up through sand wedge all the
way up. What do you think I mean yardage wise?

Speaker 2 (19:32):
I would I would say he's probably in around about
one twenty with his lob wedge one thirty five. With
a fifty six, I'm sure he can fifty two, could
get up to your probably talking about fifteen to eighteen
yard increments, you know, depending on the slight variants and lofts,
and there's always an outlier club in the bag. But
you know, pitching wedge one fifty five nine iron, I've

(19:54):
seen him in that sort of one seventy one seventy
two region eight iron. Of course, the up in around
about the one ninety with an eight iron, seven iron,
he can shift it just over the two hundred and
two five six iron, And we saw him at a
six iron on Sunday, albeit from the rough from two
forty six somewhere. So one of the things that you
know that again going back to one of our first

(20:16):
sessions at Sea Island, you know, I went into some
work that you know that. Really I both learned and
then and honed with Bleue Eustauzer, which was like, let's
let's take your full stock swing, and let's make sure
we create one more swing beneath that swing, which Levi
calls his one din shot, which in his case, he
grips maybe half an inch three quarter of an inch

(20:37):
down the handle of the club, stands in a little
bit closer to the golf ball, narrows his stance, changes
his foot arrangement a little bit to take a little
bit of the athleticism out of his legs, and he
plays like what I would probably refer to would be
like a like say an ear high to ear high
kind of arms swing or hand swing. Three quarter is yeah,
three quarter is so that that kind of one doing shot.

(20:58):
You know something, you know you would remember watching Tiger
do a lot when he's controlling spin and things like that.
And you know when again, when when a guy like Goldwig,
is that all of a sudden, you know, rather than
the eight iron being stuck in there at like one
eighty five, you know, all of a sudden he's got
a one seventy two or a one eighty five with
his eight iron and he's maybe got a one fifty
four and a one seventy with a nine iron, so

(21:20):
he can now start to hit the ball at different flagsticks,
control the spin a little bit better, and that's, you know,
it's certainly something I was very proud of him, you know,
watching him do that. Albeit you know, in the playoff
with adrenaline and things, he's going a little harder at things,
and you know, we both know that's probably the right
the right answer to you know, to that question. But

(21:40):
you know, for him learning that, you know, you've got
to have a couple of different swings and golf to
be able to produce different outcomes, and taking some of
that speed away has been a has been a big
part of it.

Speaker 1 (21:50):
I like the way you described that I've never heard
of describe that. It's almost like, you know, you're flying
the plane at full speed at a certain altitude, but
you've also got to be able to get the plane
to fly maybe just a little bit under the top
altitude or the top speed. And the way that you
describe Louis saying, it's it's one down from what my
full swing is jp trajectory wise, what's the trajectory like

(22:15):
with the long stuff, what's the trajectory like with the
shorter stuff. Where do you want the trajectory to be
throughout the bag?

Speaker 2 (22:23):
Well, I think one of the cool things, you know,
for me, one of the things that I noticed with
some of these high speed guys that really makes me
kind of prick my ears up. And you know, you
your family have always told me that, you know, you've
got to start to really understand when you have somebody
who's really really good. You know, you hopefully get to
a point where you know it. But his ability to
change trajectory is quite impressive. You know, he'll he'll stand

(22:46):
in there with a driver and he'll hit a flat
one that might peak at seventy feet seventy five feet,
and then you had a high one that might peak
at one hundred and forty feet. So being able to
do that, I think is a real skill in itself,
and that would again lend me to the idea that
he's going to be somebody who can control his distance.
If he's got great hands, that he can control his trajectory.
He can probably control his distance. But you know, he'll

(23:09):
he'll shift it up there when he wants to. He'll
he'll shift it up there and put it up in
the sky. But you've got to remember this lad also
won the British Amateur Championship, or the Amateur Championship as
I prefer to call it, and I've got into a
situation where he was, you know, he was able to
control trajectory really at a at a fairly young age.
So I'm not saying that I would I would know
exactly what I would want from his trajectory. I think

(23:30):
that with the speed that he has, he's always going
to be someone who's going to be able to take
it up into the sky. But of course with a
little bit more spin on the ball recently, he's going
to find maybe a little bit more of that. And
I'm kind of looking forward to to seeing him next
week at the Renaiscellance Club in Scotland, just to see
how he plays links golf and what is kind of
natural adaptation processes with that, because with so many of

(23:53):
these great players, I remember watching you over the years
going to the Open Championship and you'd have a you'd
have a bunch of guys there and I'd stand behind
watching you and all of a sudden, I see, you know,
Jimmy Walker or Gary Woodland or one of the guys.
I think that doesn't look like their normal flight, and
they're brilliant at just making it okay. This week, it's
going to come down a little bit, and it's almost
like they're predisposed into doing that, and I think that's

(24:15):
one of the signs of a great player.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
Obviously, there are a lot of people that are kind
of anti distance at the moment, right, I mean, say,
the golf courses are becoming obsolete and we are seeing
more and more, you know, technology equipment. I mean, guys,
you know, these young kids are learning to hit it
as hard and fast as they can. So there is

(24:38):
a lot of I think there's a lot of noise
in certain segments of kind of the traditionalist. Hey, everybody
hits the golf ball too far. Now, the drivers go
too far, the balls go too far. But speed at
the level that Aldric has had, Yeah, it's a skill,
but it's also I think, Mike counter to everybody saying, hey, listen,
there's too much speed, the golf balls go too far,

(24:59):
the drives go too far. Distance, you know, we've got
to scale and we got to roll everything back. I
think learning how to play with a lot of speed
is a skill because listen, you're in the same boat
that I am. Every kid we teach now that plays
college golf is kind of rarely do you see a
kid that's a freshman or a sophomore in college or

(25:22):
a senior in college that doesn't have high one seventies,
low one eighties right ball speed. Everybody at a competitive
level knows that that's kind of where you need to be.
But I think one of the tasks and I'm going
through that right now with Noah Kent, is Noah Kent's
one of the longest hitters in the game, and he
got smoked by Bernhard Langer at the Masters. Right Bernhard

(25:45):
hit hybrid on Thursday into nine of the ten part
fours at Agusta National. Noah's out driving him by one
hundred and Noahs shooting the phone book and Bernhard Langer's
smoking him. I mean, he's just crushing him. So the
skill to play at high speeds, that is kind of

(26:06):
a skill that a lot of players need to learn,
how because having the driver and having distance is a
weapon is only a weapon and can help you if
you can keep the golf ball on the planet.

Speaker 2 (26:20):
Well, I think you're right, and I think, you know,
currently we are probably approaching a time where we're probably
seeing a leveling out in the overall speed of players,
because to your point, you know, we've seen the beginnings
of a generation of you know, one eighty to one
ninety guys, many of whom are falling because they can't
control the golf ball. Now, we could potentially look at

(26:42):
ourselves and say, you know, should we be training these
players two different swings for golf right from the get go?
Should we be training a driver swing and should we
be training a distance control based iron swing. I mean,
I wouldn't be at all surprised if that happened in
the future, but there's no happening.

Speaker 1 (26:59):
I mean, I think for a lot of players that
you work with, you know, a ton of guys on tour,
I think we are seeing that right now. I think
we are seeing guys, you know, watching a clip on
Max for Stafford and they were talking about Max in
the early days as a Formula one driver. He was
very fast, he was very very aggressive, right, and he

(27:21):
made a lot of mistakes growing up, and he's now
you know, it's controlled aggression, it's controlled speed. And I
think we are seeing that at the top level. Now,
even the guys that are super super high speed are
all like, Okay, where's your fairway finder? Where's the drivers
swing to? Where you've got a one shot lead, and

(27:44):
it doesn't matter how far you hit, It doesn't matter
if you overpower the eighteenth hole with a one shot lead.
The only thing that matters is you got to get
the damn ball in the fairway so that you don't
put yourself behind the eight ball. Where do you think?
I mean, because I've talked to Gregan Dave's at TPI
about this, they're kind of they think anything kind of
over ninety two, ninety three, one ninety two or ninety

(28:07):
three ball speed becomes difficult to manage.

Speaker 2 (28:10):
Yeah, I mean, certainly difficult from an equipment perspective. You know,
there's there's two arguments there that I would have. Number
one would be and this would be from you know,
from from experience and from failures that I've had as
a player. If you start to overwork on one aspect
of your game, other aspects of your game are going
to be disrupted. You know, I'm really really proud of

(28:32):
the work that I've done with Brian Harman he's a
much much better iron player in twenty three to twenty
five than he ever was at any other part of
his career. But he said to me, I think some
of the stuff we've done with the irons has kind
of led into the driver, and my driver's dipped a
little bit. I'm not hitting as many drivers on the range.
I'm hitting more irons, I'm compressing the ball a little

(28:53):
bit more, I'm flighting, I'm fading the golf ball more
than I used to. So I think, you know, those
players who are coming out who have put such an
mp is into the great work that you know Sacho's
done and the track man guys have done on maintaining speed,
upping your speed, using the stack, using the track man,
using all this stuff, well, then at the bequest of
something else, something else has probably given up in that regard.

(29:14):
So I think, you know, we possibly have this smaller
generation of players who really haven't had the time or
taken the time because they know how important speed is.
But then to your to your second point, I think
the very very best players who are sometimes also the
longer ones Jack's, the Arnies, the Roryes, they not only
have the capacity to generate a lot of speed, but

(29:35):
they've also got the capacity to control the golf club.
And I hope that that that I'm writing saying that
that Aldric's going to be in that camp of a
of a subset of players who are not only able
to control the golf club and control distance, but also
generate an awful lot of force to your point when
that's necessary. And you always remember an old Peter McAvoy

(29:56):
story playing with Jack the Open years and years ago,
and he had a I can't remember. They're playing troun
or somewhere, so you know, t shots into the wind,
and he's level with Jack, level with Jack, level with Jack.
Fourth holes A part five, and Jack's fifty yards outside
him because Jack was able when he needed to do it,
he would just generate that force. So I think we're
definitely at a little bit of a tipping point where

(30:16):
we're seeing some changes, and I think you're absolutely right.
I think we're going to get to a point where, Okay,
if you've if you're a college player and you're already
generating one the eighty, well let's see what you can
do with the seven iron from one seventy five and
from one seventy nine and can you hit it one
eighty four and start to see that as a bit
of an art, which you know, in golf's cool in
that way, you know, rather than it being an enforced

(30:39):
old thuddy duddy roll back. It'll be all we need
spin to control our distance. We want to be able
to hit different shots from the fairway, and maybe there'll
be a natural kind of rolling back as opposed to
some enforced, you know, dogmatic type of rollback.

Speaker 1 (30:59):
As a coach, JPD, you managed the technical stuff that
you're trying to do with Alders because you know, like
you said, he's very much an outlier, right, so the
way that you're going to work with him is somewhat
going to be kind of hymn specific based off of
the toolbox that he has that he presents, because if

(31:19):
you look at his career, he had chances to win Porland.
You mentioned net Bank in twenty twenty four, fifty four
whole lead seventy five in the final round Mexico. This year,
fifty four whole lead seventy one in the final round,
lost in a playoff. I think he was leading, if
I remember correctly, he was leading at Tory Pines earlier
this year, didn't get it done. On Sunday, fifty four

(31:42):
whole lead at Rocket our fifty two shot lead and
then sixty nine and gets into a play. So how
are you balancing the technical work that you're trying to
do with him from a very very unique and kind
of unicornish like game because there aren't a lot of
people in the world playing competitive golf that that can

(32:02):
do what he does, and the balance of the learning
aspect of the playing of the game.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
To be honest with you, and I know this is
I don't want this to sound like a Farman family
sucker up session, but you know, I really, I really
lean into the learnings that I've had from from your
dad and his brothers and from you, And you know,
I'll really never forget whenever Brian was leading the Open
in the United State together, and uh, we're I can't

(32:29):
remember that little village anyway near Liverpool. And you know
what I.

Speaker 1 (32:34):
Told you, the one I gave you grief that was
too far away from the golf course when you book.

Speaker 2 (32:39):
Me, right, And I remember saying to you the night
you know he shot that unbelievable third round, I think anyway,
and he but he was leading the Open Championship and
I said to you, look, Brian's just text me. He said,
you know what am I going to do tomorrow between
six o'clock when I wake up and three o'clock when
I'm when I'm going to tee off. And I'm thinking
I should tell him to go for a walk in
the And you said, tell him to embrace it. Tell

(33:02):
him every Open champion who's won this tournament has had
to go through this time, and tell him to embrace it.
Watch some stuff on television. Remind him that Louis Eustausen
has done this, and Darren Clark has done this, guys
that are brands of ours. Remind him that Jack Nicholas
has gone through this, that Tiger Woods had to had
to figure out what to do. Tell him it's an
integral part of winning this championship. And I think that

(33:25):
from my side. Then with Aldrick this Saturday, when we talked,
I just, you know, I thought of what you know
you might say and what your dad would say, and
it's like this lad's twenty years old, he's really raw,
he's really good at golf. He's not going to win
this golf tournament. In Detroit by course managing and being
a mercurial Bernhard Langer style player. So I just I said,
all you need to go out to more and be

(33:46):
really aggressive and try and win the golf tournament. And
he said, he said through six holes. Something interesting in
his interview. He said, you know, he went out there
kind of looking a little bit at a leaderboard, thinking
he would protect it a little bit, and when he
made a couple of mistakes, he just decided to get
aggressive and put the pedal down and he drove it
in such a way down those last eight or ten
holes that he was in a situation where he was

(34:08):
either going to win or get in a playoff. So,
you know, I would love to have had the opportunity
to do that when I was a player, and I didn't.
And I've tried to learn from you, learn from your dad,
learn from Davis Love, speak to loui Ustaz and speak
to Darren Clark, speak to people who've really been in
those situations. And then you've got to then think to yourself, well,
what's it like to be Aldrich Pottgeiter. He's twenty years old.

(34:30):
He's from South Africa. He's in the United States. He's
in a big cauldron. He's already had a couple of
these opportunities. You know, what does he need to hear?
Like you and I always talk about it, it's learning
to be a chameleon and make sure that they're getting
what they need to get, not maybe what you think
would be your first thingstinct to tell them.

Speaker 1 (34:47):
I think what you told him was genius. And you
know a great example of that. I don't know if
you saw, but Padrick Harrington won the US Open, and
he said in his interview, They're standing in the middle
of the eighteenth hole, and I think they had a
one shot lead, and I think his caddy wrote a
flood flood. He said to him, Hey, don't hit this

(35:07):
shot like you've got a one shot lead. Hit this
shot like your one shot back. Go into this with
the mindset of Okay, I'm not going to protect I've
got a one shot lead, or anything like that. It
would have been very easy for you to say to Aldrich,
listen man, try and be somebody you're not. Try and
be a tactician. Try, and you know, like you said,

(35:29):
try and dissect the golf course like a Luke Donald
or a Birdhard Lang or somebody like that that doesn't
have the skill set you had, whereas you just said, hey,
just go out and be you. And I think that
is something that everybody has kind of their own kind

(35:51):
of signature, their own kind of DNA. And I think
a lot of golfers across the board, from JP the
handicapped golfer to the competitive golfer, it's almost like everybody's
trying to be somebody else, right, They're trying to do
what they hear or see other people do. And you
know this because you've been around as many great players

(36:14):
as I have. The great ones are just themselves. The
great ones just do what they do and they ride
the hell out.

Speaker 2 (36:25):
Of what they do.

Speaker 1 (36:26):
And I think everybody listening thinks that all of these
guys that they watch on TV, you know, on tour,
have all the shots that have total command all of
the time, and a lot of them get to points
and stages in their game, but in their rounds and
in their years to where they just say, listen, I'm
just gonna do what I do here. And for you

(36:49):
to say that to Aldric, hey don't take the handbreak
golf b Max, for Staffing to go, hey, I'm starting
second on the grid, I am going to not try
and sit back and kind of see what happens in
the first quarter. I am going to go for the
lead and then take my chances one.

Speaker 2 (37:07):
Percent and I, you know, further to that, and I
think for those I mean, this is something I remember
I'll never forget. In Dubai, we were our little short
game area at the back there and I was watching
Rory chips and shots and we're talking about golf and things,
and I said, did you ever like mimic someone else?
And he kind of looked at me as if I
had two heads, And I said, because you know, when
I was growing up, Nick Follow was the best player

(37:28):
in the world, and I tried to make my golf
swing look like his, and I wore those dopey looking
Pringle sweaters, and you know, I pretty much mimicked and
wanted to be like Nick Follow. And Rory went, no,
I never, no, I never mimicked anyone. He said, but
if I saw somebody hitting a shot, like a really
cool shot, I would say, I want to have that.
I want to be able to hit that shot. And
I thought it was like, to your point, it was

(37:49):
almost like that perfect little way of recognizing, like a
what a coach's mentality might be like and what a
real golfer's mentality might be like. And Rory went on
to say, you know, whenever I saw that Iron Clark
hit a real wind cheeter driver, like a real flat
low driver, he said, I don't I'm not going to
hit that shot like Darren, but I want my ball
to do that whenever I hit it. So he would

(38:11):
figure out how he was going to do that under
his term. So the individuality to have the confidence in
yourself to keep being you and at the same time
having the adaptability and the desire to be able to
be a more complete player, I think that's something that
the best seemed to seem to exhibit well.

Speaker 1 (38:30):
And also I think what I'm always trying to say
to players JP is be the best version of yourself.
Don't try and be the best version of what you
think Roy McElroy does or what you think Scotti Scheffler does,
because that's a track that I think a lot of
people that I see that art on tour that are

(38:52):
trying to play and don't kind of have that holy grail,
the holy grail for competitive golfers that are trying to
play professionally is to have full status on a tour somewhere,
whether that's Asia, whether that's DP, whether that's Lived, whether
that's Canada, corn Fairy wherever. Full status is the holy grail,

(39:14):
right And if if you can be the best version
of yourself, then I think you don't get caught into
that trap of trying to do things that you're not
good at doing.

Speaker 2 (39:26):
Yeah, and I think I think further to that, you
know you you helped me with this, and I think
it's throwing arms and legs in my mind. And I'm
teaching the likes of Harris and Patent and guys like
I think every player has somewhat of a successful DNA
like of you know when when even when I played well,
I had some sort of DNA. This is when he
plays well. He tends to do this when when Harris

(39:47):
English plays well, he controls the ball off the tee,
he's got an offensive iron game, he's a good course manager,
and he's excellent putter. When Brian Harmon plays well, he's
extremely efficient off the tea. He's an improving eye, he's
got an unbelievable short game. He's a brilliant putter, so learning,
I think with those young players and even guys at
home with your own game, like knowing these are the

(40:08):
four or five tenants that I know that I can
do quite well, don't let them fluctu eight too much.
To your point, you don't have to be brilliant at everything,
but you've got to not be terrible at anything, and
you've got to be really good at a couple of things,
and then with those weapons you can start to score.

Speaker 1 (40:23):
Yeah, I think that's the balance, right. The balance is
even for you know, someone that's you know, I look
at golf in non tour golf. I look at golf,
and what we do is we're trying to help people
break one hundred ninety eighty and break part for the
first time. That's basically the bulk of the work that

(40:45):
you and I do, and every golf instructor does. We
just don't sit on ranges all day, every day and
work three hundred and sixty five days a year with
tour players. You know, we have regular golfers that come
to us, and so I do think that's a really
good point in that even if you're trying to break
ninety for the first time, there will be relative to

(41:08):
your talent level as a player. There will be some
things that you're good at, you're not going to be
good at at them, like Scotty Scheffler or Rory McElroy
or John Robb not that level. But there will be
some things. There will be some clubs, there will be
some shots that you feel comfortable hitting, and then there

(41:28):
will be some that make you feel uncomfortable, and it's
finding what those things are about your game and then
basically just saying, hey, I'm just gonna ride what might
and I'm going to I think so many golfers, as
I said earlier JPI, they're trying to be somebody else.
They're trying to be somebody they're not, and as a result,

(41:52):
you know, they're always taking the boat out and they're
getting themselves in the situations that they're not really good at.
In sale right, no, Wow, the wind's really up today
and the seas are really really hot. There are going
to be people that are like, dude, give me those
conditions all day. I'm good at that. But I think
a lot of golfers you know that are just trying
to break, you know, just barrier numbers for the first

(42:15):
time they're not really focusing on themselves, just trying to
do things that other people do, and they're trying to
do things that they're not good at doing.

Speaker 2 (42:26):
I would say that that would reflect also the fact
that a lot of golfers aren't really doing things that
are simply designed to make them score better. They're doing
things that they think might be cooler or faster or bigger,
look better. For example, you remember I told David Hyle
for a couple of years in Dubai, and David's a

(42:46):
fantastic guy, Ryder Cup player, you know, beat Tiger in China,
the HSBC Great Career, one that PGA chompmanship are the
Wentworth Event. And one of the things David was brilliant
that was a brilliant and a brilliant long putter. And
quite a lot of the times with David was like
get me on the green or anywhere around the green

(43:07):
where I can put it, and I'm either going to
make a burdier apart. And David's biggest strength was his
lag putting, and his overall putting game was so strong
that he was able then to just design his course
management around that. And I remember saying to him one
of the times we sat down and you know, I
want I said to him, you, Dave, I think i'd
love to see you be a little more aggressive from
one seventy five to two hundred. And he said, JP,

(43:28):
I can give you ten years of evidence as to
why I'm not aggressive from one seventy five to two hundred,
because you know, I think he was a better iron
player than he gave himself credit for a very self
demeaning sort of guy. But you know he just said, look,
get me on the green, get me on the green,
and I'll play. So you take someone like that, And
if we interviewed fifteen tour players in David's kind of realm,

(43:49):
his his age, well, what would you know, David Hall,
As they would say, somebody who get the most out
of his game, someone who scored really well, didn't matter
how he hit it. He always tended to make the copy,
tended to get the most out of his game. And
I think to your point, you know, most guys, most
of us who don't play as much and don't think
about it, clearly we're not getting the most out of

(44:10):
the game. So the guy who's not breaking ninety could
be starting to think that way. Just thinking a little
bit better could probably get the most out of his game.

Speaker 1 (44:20):
Lastly, JP, specifically with Aldric, with all that speed and
all that power, how do you manage the playing offense
when he needs to play offense? I think, I mean,
I just think that's there aren't a lot of people.
I think JPN. I think you've you know, it's a
testament to how much you've learned. You know, specifically in
the over you know, almost fifteen years of you and

(44:42):
I have known each other. I think what you told
him there would have been a lot of people and
coaches JP, where okay, fifty four holy two shot lead,
trying to win your first tournament, all that speed, all
that power, rocket mortgage. Is not a desert golf course.
There's trees, it's not wide open. You know, it's the
Midwest in summer, the roughest, thick. There are a lot

(45:04):
of people that would have said, hey, get the ball
and play off the tee. Don't necessarily try and overpower
the golf course. You know, maybe hit three woods, don't
hit driver, Maybe hit some irons off the tee. I
thought it was great, which so no, no, stay aggressive. But
for someone that has that type of speed, how do

(45:25):
you balance the Okay, play offense, but also that shit
doesn't work at Oakham, right, So there are going to
be situations for Aldric where he is going to have
to say, Okay, maybe I need to play a little
bit more defense. So as the coach balancing who he

(45:47):
is is the player. I mean, that's I used to
say the same thing to DJ and Brooks all the
time standing on the putting green right before they went
out to win the five Majors. Brooks swung the two
majors DJ one, I told them the exact same thing
that you you said, old stay aggressive with the driver today,
don't try in three quarters, don't be reckless, don't be stupid. No,
but stay aggressive because that's your strength. But balancing that

(46:13):
to where situationally, okay, you have to learn how to
play offense here, but you need to learn how to
play defense here.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
And I think that twenty years old when we look
at you know, Tiger went in golf tournaments when he
was twenty, and Rory went in golf tournaments when he's twenty,
And to your boys who maybe a little bit a
little bit more into their careers at that point, you know,
these twenty year olds, they haven't learned. Some of the
finer don't know. They don't know what they don't know,

(46:44):
so you can't expect them to know what they don't know.
And you know, then we've got to make a point
of when there's a coachable moment that you might call it.
Maybe it could be next week in Renaissance, where it's
you know, this whole plays four point one seven and
you know there's a lot of trouble up there a
driver and if the pins over here, it's probably going
to be you miss it down there and you're in
a really bad spot. Like then then you're you're creating

(47:07):
like a coachable moment where he's beginning to then assimilate.
All right, that situation is a bit smelly. I need
to be very careful with that. But at twenty years old,
with where he's out at the moment, he's going to
win and have more success. I believe taking fields apart
and going away from fields as opposed to you know,
let's hit eighteen greens and have thirty six pots type

(47:28):
of you know, the old Nick Foulow type of golf.
So I think just at this stage understanding that we
you know, we want to create those coachable moments and
help him recognize the course management and strategy is going
to be an even more important thing is he gets
to Oakmont and he you know, he gets more regularly
to Augusta and places like that. But I like what
you said, you don't know what you don't know, so

(47:49):
you can't expect him to know it.

Speaker 1 (47:50):
How good can he be? Uh? With the toolbox he's got, Like,
I mean, I just you know, you've been doing some
work with still Lampreck. I mean I watched James Hart
hit the golf balls. These guys are hitting the golf
balls distances that I mean tour players could only dream of, Right,
But we just don't seem on mass, massive, massive amounts

(48:17):
of speed and power and distance off the tee one
hund translate into winning golf tournaments. No, right, that that
is another skill. So twenty years old you've got I
mean I was looking at some of the names of
people that have won PJ Tour events at his age.
I mean that list is pretty short, and I mean

(48:39):
this kid, I think has a massively long runway. So
where and how big do you think that runway is?

Speaker 2 (48:47):
From what the history would suggest relative to his pedigree
and again learning from your fun you know, let's look
at the pedigree of the player, amateur champion one at
stage volley by however many shots against you know, all
his counterparts of all over the world. You know, you
really think his pedigree is very very fine. I think
that certainly his ability to learn, combine that with the

(49:10):
power and his his ability to generate very consistent power.
I mean, that's one of the things that has really
impressed me club when I watched him with the drivers,
like one ninety three, one ninety three, one ninety two,
one ninety three, like that is his cruising speed and
combining that with you know, with learning distance control. I mean,
I think the ceiling is very very high for the

(49:30):
lad And I'm you know, and I'm enjoying him. I'm
enjoying his family. They've been great support, his caddie rants
has been great thus far. I'm working really hard to
get him into some sort of physical regimen, which you know,
he was in when he was in Australia. He's had
less of a chance to be able to get that
implemented since he was in America. So yeah, there are

(49:51):
a lot of little fine parts of the professional enterprise
he needs to get better at, but the world's the
world's big for him.

Speaker 1 (49:58):
Back to the port for the Open Championship Port Rush,
back to your homeland Northern Ireland. As someone that comes from,
I mean you've played that. How many times you played
Port Rush?

Speaker 2 (50:11):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (50:11):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (50:11):
I meant too many to think about. I mean it's
different now either seventeenth used to have this massive, great,
big bunker on the right hand side and eighteen can
back up with the club high. So the golf course
of readings difference. I've only played the modern reading two
or three times, but the majority of the golf course
I couldn't tell you how many times I played it.

Speaker 1 (50:28):
What does it mean to go back to I mean
very rarely for someone like you or are they going to
hold a major championship not far from you know where
you grew up, the rich, rich history of golf, not
only in Ireland but Northern Ireland, and you know Darren
having won, Rory having won, and then you know the
Irish guys and chane.

Speaker 2 (50:46):
O and and Padre.

Speaker 1 (50:50):
It's got to be special to be going back to
Port Rush. You effectually call it port magic as well.
I mean when we went there for the last time
when shanea won. There were a lot of play that
said to me, can we just have this here every
single year? Because I think the setup with everybody going
down not only the golf course. The golf course is great,
the views are great, but then at night everybody goes

(51:11):
down into the ports and hangs out and stuff. I mean,
it's it's a fantastic week.

Speaker 2 (51:17):
It's an amazing week. It's a fabulous place. I mean,
I'm really lucky my brother and I lives there. For
those the golfers who don't know, Port Rush is also
tremendous surfing around there. He's not a golfer, he's a surfer,
so goes up there and surf side of Port Rush
and portstairk Castle Rock up up to Bali Liffing. You
know it is. It is very special. I walked down
the hill to watch darantee off the last time and

(51:38):
I just couldn't. But I mean, I walked down that
hill at five point thirty and there were thousands of
people on the first tee at at six twenty four
whatever time Clark he was was leading off the tournament,
and of course he hits it done the right semi
knocks on the green holes of putt for a birdie
as only Darren, as only Darren would. But no, it's
it's going to be a very very special week. I've
got so many friends and family. You and I got

(51:59):
to a lot of very special people living in the area.
I know you're staying with one of them, and we'll
you know, we'll enjoy it and hopefully the weather will
be okay we have it's unbelievable weather at home, or
so I'm told, but at a party it's breaking a
little bit. So fingers crossed for a great week.

Speaker 1 (52:15):
Well, I'll look forward to seeing you and we will
all be blowing up our boy Matt mccalpine's phone, because
he is the gatekeeper to all the bars and the
food in the port. So proud of you, mate, I mean,
just you know, I say this every time I talk
to you, but you know, to look at where your
career is gone, and the trusts that players are putting

(52:36):
in you, and and the results that you've had with
the stable of guys you've worked with. I think you're
one of the best in the world at what you do.
And you know, I'm proud to call you a friend
and I think you like a brother and I love you.
So we will see you in the port. And you said,
you said, I've got to drink Guinness this trip.

Speaker 2 (52:54):
I'll get you a little half pint. You you could,
you could even make a half pint look good.

Speaker 1 (52:59):
Great to talk to you and drats and all the success.

Speaker 2 (53:01):
Thanks.

Speaker 1 (53:02):
So that was justin Parsons And like I said, you
know I'm biased, but I think JP's one of the
best golf instructors on the planet. I think the record
that he's got Brian Harmon as a major champion and
the work that he's doing puts him in a in
a very very small group of people. And listen, I
think I agree with him. The sky's the limit for Aldrich.
I mean, this kid moves it. He plays the game

(53:25):
the way the game is being played at the moment,
and I think they are going to be a very
very cool partnership to see. Can't thank everyone enough for listening, Rate, review,
subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Tell of which podcast
we will see you next week.