January 25, 2025 • 63 mins
Kick off the 2025 season with us on the Flag Hunters Golf Podcast as we bring you an engaging conversation with Nick Chertock, the mastermind behind Open Forum Golf. This pioneering platform has evolved from a lively Facebook group into a dynamic event at the PGA show, creating a nexus for golf pros, sports scientists, and tech innovators. Nick shares the Open Forum's core philosophy: fostering debate and discussion to drive golf's evolution. Discover how this vibrant community is pushing the boundaries of golf knowledge and technology, ensuring the game remains at the cutting edge.
Join us as we tackle the intricacies of golf coaching, where understanding each player's unique needs and dedication level is paramount. With insights from respected figures like Chris Como and Randy Smith, we highlight the delicate balance between technical expertise and personal guidance. Whether you're a busy executive needing quick fixes or a dedicated amateur striving for improvement, our discussion underscores the importance of a tailored approach that aligns with your golfing goals. Our conversation also touches on the practicalities of instruction and how coaches can offer meaningful support in today's fast-paced world.
Explore the burgeoning world of online golf instruction and the hurdles it presents in maintaining instructor-student relationships. As free content floods platforms like YouTube and Instagram, we question the impact on the perceived value of paid lessons. Reflecting on the wisdom of legendary coaches like John Jacobs and Jim Hardy, we consider the limits of focusing solely on ball flight without addressing movement and coordination. From lowering handicaps to selecting the right golf coach and understanding the pivotal role of lead side stability in your swing, this episode is packed with valuable insights for golfers eager to elevate their game.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Happy 2025, everyone.
This is the first one of theyear.
My name is Jesse Perryman fromthe Flag Hunters Golf Podcast.
I decided to take a little timeoff.
I needed a break fromeverything, and so I can get
back into 2025 just full steamahead.
Both Justin and I have somegreat guests coming on this year
(00:26):
.
You're not going to want tomiss it.
This is simple, next levelinformation that you may not get
immediately, but over time.
It is our intention to plantseeds of greatness within
yourselves and that you can comeand understand how to grow
(00:49):
yourself and how to grow withinthe game and how to make your
game better through all of thegenres that we're going to touch
during the course of the next12 months and beyond, and
getting you to a place where youcan get real comfortable with
your game.
And it's an honor and aprivilege for both Justin and
(01:12):
myself to help bring you thisgolf-affirming information
that's going to help you enjoythe game and just add more
fulfillment when you get outthere and tee it up.
So, without further ado, ourfirst guest of the year.
His name is Nick Shurtok.
Notably, Nick is a Bay Area guy.
California created a spacecalled Open Forum.
(01:34):
The name of the website iscalled openforumgolfcom and it
is a platform where you can signup and watch one-on-one
coaching interviews.
Coaches debate certain thingsfrom every pillar of golf
(01:55):
improvement, primarily in thegolf swing and with technology,
and really diving into some ofthese things that'll make you
get better, make you hit theball better, make you hit the
ball further.
It's full-fledged right now.
As of this recording, this isstarting the week of the PGA.
If you go on toOpenForumGolfcom all one word
(02:22):
you can sign up and you can hearand witness what's going on
down there and then have theseone-on-one interviews with some
of the great coaches in theworld.
And you've got to become amember to have access to this,
but it's very reasonable and Ihighly encourage you to do it.
Check it out.
There's coaches on there thatare going to help you maybe
(02:47):
clear up some ambiguity, thingsthat are foggy in your mind that
you don't quite know.
You might hear something from aparticular coach and it might
resonate with you and help youto click something in your game
Period.
So, openforumgolfcom, Nick.
Thanks for coming on, pal.
Both Justin and I thank you,and I hope everybody is having a
(03:09):
good week and everyone's off toa fantastic 2025 start and the
next couple of weeks we're goingto be going into mindset.
We're going to analyze what itreally takes to get your engine
going from the inside out.
What it really takes to getyour engine going from the
inside out and, if you thinkdeeply about it, with the advent
(03:29):
of all of the technology andeverything, which is a very
important piece of the pie.
Let's not forget that this is aholistic game as well.
Openforumgolfcom Cheerseverybody and have a great week.
Hello, Welcome to 2025, folks,this is the first one of the
(04:02):
year for the Flag Hunters GolfPodcast.
On behalf of Justin and myself,we thank you for tuning in.
It's going to be a great andexciting year.
We're going to kick off the uhoff the year with a fellow uh
northern california and his nameis nick shurtok, along with
justin tang.
Once again, thanks for comingon and and boys, happy new year.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Happy new year, guys Right on Happy to be here.
Hey, nick, jesse, good to speakto you First time 2025.
Hey, nick, very quickly I justwant to say that we're starting
off the year on the right footby having you as our first guest
.
Tell us a bit about what OpenForum is all about.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Tell us a bit about what Open Forum is all about.
Yeah, so Open Forum it camefrom a Facebook group of golf
teachers that I had set up inabout 2011.
And so after a couple of yearsof this group really growing,
(05:08):
there was a lot of stronginteraction, a lot of friction.
I would kind of seek out topicswhere people had disagreement
and try to get all of theinstructors I possibly could
find to be in the group, and soone of our members named Mike
Michaelides, who was one of theco-founders of the event.
He said we should really dosomething together in person at
the PGA show, and at the timeI'd never been to the PGA show.
At the PGA show, and at thetime I'd never been to the PGA
show.
And so the first open forum wasmy first trip to Orlando for
(05:29):
the show, and it was kind ofchaotic.
We really didn't have muchstructure, but thanks to the uh,
the Facebook forum gave me theability to invite hundreds of
hundreds of pros and and therewere probably 200 people crammed
into a bar for the first one.
It's evolved over the years.
It's now in our 11th year.
(05:49):
It's essentially a symposiumand a kind of a networking event
for the nerdiest golf pros andthe sports scientists that come
out, all the technologycompanies that I can get to
sponsor.
Traditionally Trackman's beenout there sponsoring Ping Swing,
(06:11):
catalyst, smart2move.
This year 4D Golf is going tojoin us, probably Hack Motion
Still talking to a lot ofsponsors, but there's it's just
an annual tradition now and wetry to just maintain the spirit
of a debating societyessentially, where most seminars
(06:34):
are not really trying to finddisagreement.
But I would say that I do seekit out, where we can have smart
people kind of iron outdifferences of opinion.
And you know you try to avoidwhere everyone's just agreeing
with each other, patting eachother on the back.
You also don't want peoplebeing really over the line, but
(06:56):
that that just rarely happens inan in-person event so you don't
have to worry about it.
So my goal is always just tokeep it from being boring and
always be on the cutting edge ofnew topics, new technologies.
A lot of times unveil there atthe open forum, so that's kind
of what it's all about hey,speaking of bar fights,
(07:16):
something very interestinghappened last year.
Let's talk about it, man, thatwas the hot topic yeah, the hot
topic last year and it stillcontinues to be shallow yeah,
it's all about, you know, josephmayo, all the the stuff he's
been putting out on instagramfor the last, say, two years
(07:37):
maybe, uh, 18 months, uh, aboutan approach to teaching that
high-spinning wedge thatlaunches around 30 degrees, and
Joe's very much in favor of anangle of attack of maybe 8, 10,
12, even 15 on a shot like that.
(07:58):
And then there's kind of beenanother school of thought you
could say a more shallow andhitting, you know, hitting
behind it being being okay onanother, the other side of
things, if you will.
I mean, I don't want tooversimplify it as though it's
like this complete dichotomythere's a lot of opposite,
(08:20):
opposite ends of the spectrumyeah, like, do you want to
prioritize ball first contactand still hitting a low, high
spinning shot, or are you, um,are you trying to prioritize not
getting really steep into theground and therefore the the
(08:41):
shallower?
Like, the idea is, which one'ssafer?
Which one would someone lean to?
Who cannot afford to chunk aball?
And so there continues to bedisagreement there.
But last year I think, we triedto set that debate up on a
panel.
It went okay.
And then there was definitely amoment between Brian Manzella
(09:02):
and Joe where I don't know therewas definitely a moment between
brian manzella and joe where Idon't know there was it wasn't
that much being discussed, uh,of substance in that particular
moment.
But that's an example of theguy.
The guys have a history, youknow there's, there's been many
disagreements on many topicsover the years between certain
people, and so we're not reallythere to like immediately shut
(09:27):
it down.
So I I basically have alaissez-faire approach to
managing it and nothing reallygot out of hand.
And we've got chris como therewith the microphone, you know,
providing kind of theintellectual yeah, intellect
he's able to, he knows all thesides, like he kind of knows
what everyone where they'recoming from.
(09:47):
And then we have mike.
Michael is for the actualphysical security in case
anything would ever happen,because he's a very large man
yes, I, I always defer tomichael when it comes to club
hit speed production.
Yeah, so he was a long drivecompetitor back in the day he
was on Big Break 2 or 3.
(10:09):
I know one of those early BigBreak shows.
He was a college golf coach andnow golf-wise.
I think he mainly does charitylike exhibition stuff.
So if you have a charitytournament you want a guy to
just get out there and pump it400 yards, hit a drive for
somebody.
He can still definitely bringit with.
(10:30):
I don't know, probably around130 miles an hour maybe a little
faster.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Very nice.
So, going back to going back todebates between golf
professionals, I think the mainissue that causes all these
conflicts is some what I callrelativism, what you say works
relative to a guy and how theyinterpret the information.
And don't, don't forget, in uh,open forum nine, randy smith
(11:00):
dispensed these words of wisdom.
He said it's the guy in frontof you that's the most important
thing.
It's not about my approach, howsmart I am as a professional.
The guy in front, if he can doit, that's the way for him.
I thought that was so wise I wasblown away.
I was watching it yesterday.
(11:22):
I watched that segment, iconsegment, iconic teachers maybe
three times, oh yeah, and.
And it felt to me like thisthis is a guy that's produced
the world number one, scottyscheffler, the most dominant
golfer in 2024, and yet he, hesaid we are teaching the person
(11:45):
in front of you.
It almost feels like to be agreat coach.
You've got to go full circle,you've got to go into the weeds,
all the technicalities of thegolf swing, 3d data, ground
force, data, and then you comeback to the person in front of
you us in in front of you, Iwould say it's a, it's like you,
(12:10):
the.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
The advice he's given is probably what someone would
say who's just getting into golfinstruction.
Oh, of course, of course youteach the person in front of you
, but it would be very easy forthem pretty quickly to see a
scotty scheffler with that kindof footwork and maybe he doesn't
fit their image of the kind ofpivot they want to teach.
Or the perfect swing, yeah, orthis modern very like push your
(12:34):
butt way back and get supershallow, like scotty is not an
example of that at all, uh, butyeah.
So I think for you inparticular, since you're a golf
instructor, you know that overtime people in their teaching
can fall in love with theirpreferences and so, uh,
(12:56):
eventually I think the wisdomcomes and, yeah, full circle.
You're back to like, what doesthis person need?
And they don't need to.
To hear me be really smart likethat as a student, there's
probably very few students whowould say, like justin's a good
pro because he he throws a lotof vocabulary out at me and he
shows me, like, all thedifferent things that he knows.
(13:16):
Uh, I think most people willgather that you know what you're
doing based on what they canget you to do as a golfer.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
So that's how they're going to judge you anyway yeah,
but I think at the same timealso the scorecard.
The scorecard matters and theball flight matters.
Right, like some guys, as aninstructor, you don't want to be
telling them about groundreaction forces.
You're going to mess them.
You're going to say, hey, look,you know what.
You're going to mess them up.
You're going to say, hey, look,you know what You're going to
play tomorrow.
When you address the ball, justhood, the club face, so you can
(13:50):
hit the little draw instead ofthe big slice.
And sometimes that's all theyneed.
I mean, if you're a CEO of aFortune 500 company, you don't
have time to practice.
That's all you need.
Man, you don't need a golfimprovement plan.
Speaker 3 (14:08):
Sure he could pay for it, but he's got no time for it
.
Yeah, that's another.
Another spin on the like.
Work with the person in frontof you, yeah, could also mean
find out, like, what's theirtrue level of dedication.
Like this, this ceo guy whoworks 80 hours a week and then
he says, oh, I want a completeoverhaul of my game.
You know that he's never goingto stick to any kind of practice
(14:32):
routines.
So then the band-aid approachesare realistically gonna have to
be used in many cases wheresomeone either outright says I
won't, or you know that they saythey will, but you know that
they won't.
So you've got to like craftwhat you tell them based on that
.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
You know Jim Hardy and John Jacobs would not agree
with the term band-aid approach.
Sometimes the band-aid stays onfor life.
Man, if you can fix it, that'sit, man.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
Yeah, it depends on the person and what they're
trying to change.
I'll say, yeah, maybe it gets abad rap.
I know that for some peoplethey'll come out and say I want
the quickest fix and it's aquick idea and I just want to
hold on to that idea.
And maybe for some people it'slike for me.
I was at the rain, I was hittingballs today, just hitting it
really badly just off the heel,inside of the heel on some
(15:32):
fairway woods, and then I justkind of zeroed in on this little
thought in my backswing thatthat sometimes I have.
That relates to this moraddrill of basically trying to
almost like not swing my leftarm across my chest at all.
Like, try in the back swing,try to swing my left arm, my
lead arm, toward the target.
I'm not really going to do that.
(15:53):
But man, that little tiny thing.
You might call that a bandaidif someone just said that to me,
but every single shot for therest of the session was so much
different.
So, like a little thing that'llget your sequence improved.
It's beyond the level ofconsciously even understanding
what you change and a littletiny thought could do it.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Indeed, and back to Open Forum.
How many editions are we inthis?
Speaker 3 (16:22):
is Open Forum 11.
And so it's our actual our 13thyear.
We missed two years because ofcovid, but essentially, um, it
was 12 years ago that we did itthe first time, and so we're
back at the hyatt regency, whichis the big fancy hotel in
(16:43):
Orlando that most people go to.
Have you been to the PGA showbefore?
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Unfortunately no.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
I know you're a world away.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
I'm a world away man, but I'm with you guys in spirit
, as you always know, of course.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, and I'll announce it close to the event.
But we're going to stream itagain for free just because we
want to.
We want just more people to seeit and know about it.
But your listeners will hearthat, but it's not something
I've shared.
Uh, I'll usually like last yearwas the first year we did it I
(17:18):
think something like three orfour thousand people watched the
stream, wow so it'd be nice ifwe can get that that number up
to like ten thousand this yearsure, how do we, how do our
listeners, get hold of the link?
so openforumgolfcom uh, justlike the way it sounds is the
three words.
(17:39):
That's our home page, uh,someone, if they went to the
home page they'd be able to buythe videos that have been
produced of past events at thetop of the homepage.
There's a big banner there toregister for the live event
that's coming up on the 21st.
So we always have it after demoday.
(18:00):
For anyone who hasn't been tothe pga show, they have a demo
day tuesday at the uh orangecounty uh golf center.
I forget the name of it, butit's a giant, giant range.
Probably seen it on the golfchannel and the magazines um.
And then we, uh we always setup our event to be right after
(18:21):
that and and the night beforethe actual trade show starts.
So we're we're in the greatlocation to be at the hyatt.
We've had it at another hotelclose by called the rosen plaza
quite a few times, but we'regoing back to the hyatt this
year and we've got some prettygood stuff in store.
(18:42):
I usually am pretty I'm fairlylate to tell people the lineup,
just because I never want tohave to bump somebody, to have
to announce someone's going tobe there and then, because we
overbook, have to have to pushthem off.
So let's just say the themethis year is going to strongly
relate to the 30th anniversaryof the X factor article and just
(19:07):
.
McLean Right and all about whatdrives the pivot and
understanding that relationshipbetween you know, the pelvis,
how it's rotating in the trunk,uh, and and just so many topics
that will come about from that.
We try to have a general themefor the night but there's going
(19:30):
to be probably fivepresentations and at least two
panels, possibly a third paneldiscussion, one panel discussion
this year we are going to talkabout the business of golf
instruction discussion.
This year we are going to talkabout the business of golf
instruction, uh, just kind ofhow it's evolving, with pros
starting to, you know, branchout into other areas.
(19:52):
Uh, you know, a lot of pros are, whether they be involved in
indoor facilities or having umcontracts with training aid
companies, or some people havetheir own training aids and then
the whole online instructionway that's evolving and you know
(20:13):
there's a lot of kind ofopinions about.
I personally I think onlineinstruction so far has been a
bust.
Uh, I think it has potentialbut for the most part people are
taking like a single lessonfrom someone, getting a
voiceover video, and then theyeither jump to someone else
(20:36):
because it's very tempting to dothat, or they just get the one
lesson and that's it.
So they don't really developmuch of a relationship, which
has always been like thecornerstone of coaching.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
My take is this right , A lot of online instructors.
They cannibalize themselves.
I get it that a lot of theancillary YouTube videos,
Instagram videos, are forpromotion, but it gets to the
point where I'm getting all thisinformation.
Do I really need to take anonline lesson?
(21:13):
That costs $200 per session.
But I can figure this thing outand that's generally the
feedback that I get from a lotof friends in the US and the UK.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I do think people are giving away the store um their
Instagram channels, especiallyif they use video that they've
already made to teach someone.
Cause, imagine, if you watchsomeone's channel, uh, watch 20
of their videos immediatelyYou're like this is my guy.
I love the way he teaches.
He's teaching someone who's gotthe same problem I have, and
(21:48):
then you go get the lesson andthey actually send you the same
video that you just watched oninstagram exactly, and that's
the uh business model that mostgolf pros use, right scale.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
And I see a lot of videos being recycled.
So could be videos from 2010.
And I've seen that right,because I recognize the model of
the drivers that's being usedin the video.
And then they try to marketthis as oh, this is a new
program.
I think that's a bitdisingenuous, but at the same
(22:20):
time, I get it Like it's verytime consuming to take proper
videos.
Yeah, I get it Like it's verytime-consuming to take proper
videos.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Yeah, I'm a real stickler.
I feel like a lot this hasgotten better, but in the
beginning the audio quality wasjust horrible on a lot of these
videos.
And then eventually, becausepeople are now able to use
iPhone, I think it's easier todeal with microphone issues now
than it used to be.
(22:48):
But also like, as you mentioned, old stuff, uh, maybe out of
date or you can tell the pro islike 50 pounds heavier now than
in the video.
Uh, but yeah, less hair.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Less hair, of course yeah, less hair and in where you
want it now than in thebeginning.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
Less hair, less hair, of course, yeah, less hair in
where you want it, more hairwhere you don't want it.
It's tempting in golfinstruction, especially the info
product side of things, yeah,it starts to resemble like the
fat loss industry, which is alot about.
(23:26):
Are you going to sell hype andfalse, exaggerated claims of
what you can do for someone, oryou're going to be honest?
And if you're going to behonest, it's going to be harder
to make money because it'seasier to lie to people.
And with golf they just say youknow, just like the club makers
with all their claims ofinstant, uh, yardage increases.
(23:49):
But in yeah, in a golf pro,sell on a pdf, there's always
some claim of strokes.
You're going to improve.
And I'll say, if I ever have alike a golf coaching platform
and I might myself will never bea coach, but my whole thing
would be not making anyguarantees at all no, no claims,
no promises.
(24:09):
Uh, in fact, you probably won'tget better.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
That's what I'd tell the only thing that's guaranteed
to reduce strokes in your golfgame is called an eraser the
eraser that's it, yeah, and it's.
It's's funny that you bring allthese things up right.
So my view is this right,there's only so many ways you
can discuss about the golf grip,so many ways you can talk about
(24:35):
ground reaction forces Beforeyou go like shucks.
I need to talk about this in adifferent way and you can't find
anything.
So let's recycle it.
A three-year cycle hopefullywe've got new people coming into
the game.
Hopefully people who saw itthree years ago don't remember
it.
I think the golf instructionworld needs ozempic.
(24:58):
But what is the ozempic of thegolf instruction world?
I really don't know, man, and Ifind myself coming back to old
school teaching well, not reallyold school, but guys who, who
really understood how to changegolf string motor movement
pattern in a very simple way.
(25:18):
I'm talking about guys likejohn jacob, jim hardy and those
guys yeah those guys knew whatthey were doing.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Maybe they didn't have the, the uh lingo that
we're using today, but they gotresults like that yeah, I I my
problem I have with the, andthose are two different guys, so
I'm not going to say they'rethe same, because, john jacobs
uh, are you talking about theenglish one or the?
Speaker 2 (25:48):
there's an american, john jacobs too no, no, the, the
english john jacobs was thementor of mr plain truth, jim
hardy okay I didn't know.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Hardy worked with uh jacob oh yeah okay, so so
essentially my, my and I'm notgoing to say criticism, because
I'm in no place to becriticizing a legendary golf pro
, but I'll say my questions thatI would have about someone who
teaches off ball flight.
I do believe that in many casesthere's a lot to look at with
(26:25):
someone in terms of eithercoordination issues they have or
or movement limitations thatthey're just unaware of, and so
if everything's off ball flight,I feel like you're never going
to talk posture or, uh, you knowthe way someone needs to feel
(26:45):
in terms of their side bendingand their forward bending and
their extension.
All the body motion stuffbasically does not get addressed
at all if you are strictly areally old school ball flight
coaching, but I'm not going tosay it's not great.
I mean, I think it can workwonders for a ton of people,
(27:08):
especially good players.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Maybe I should clarify so they will adapt
things like what you mentionedgrip, address, stance, posture
and see how it affects ballflight.
But what I'm saying is they'renot going to put the cart before
the horse.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, I am not someone who thinks it's a good
idea to bring someone into golfand say, okay, I'm gonna make
you master all of thesefundamentals away from the ball
first, like I guess that's hownick faldo learned the game.
He said I think he had to spendweeks just getting the posture
and grip right before he wasallowed to ever hit a ball.
(27:49):
I'd be more the opposite, Iwould say like to my kids if I
bring them out there, I justwant to get them feeling the
club head swing.
Make a couple swing, don't paytoo much attention to the way
they grip it, or if they're likealigning parallel.
You know railroad tracks, it'slike in general I want them to
(28:12):
kind of know where they'retrying to to send the ball.
But it's more like get a feelof making that club head move in
a relaxed way, uh, where you'renot spazzing out trying to hit
the ball.
Uh, my, my overall likephilosophy of what's wrong with
instruction why everyone let'ssay statistically golfers don't
(28:35):
improve like if you had to justbet.
If someone's trying to improve,you had to just bet on whether
they will or not.
You'll probably win the bet thatthey won't and I feel like it's
mainly because, like, when youfirst start you can't really hit
the ball at all and then in thevery first couple times you
start to figure out how to getthe club on the ball.
(28:57):
You probably did some form of ascooping action, some some
variant of a very steepdownswing as far as, like the
shaft angle coming down and thenlike a handle draggy.
But there's a way to just getthe club on the ball, at first
to be able to shoot like 110instead of not even be able to
(29:21):
play, and I feel like everyonelike makes that adjustment and
then they often just get stuckin that pattern and they get a
little better at it, but they'rejust kind of perfecting a
mediocre pattern.
And so, like I'm jealous of mykids who they can't play golf
really, but when I watch themputt, like they actually have a
(29:42):
more fluid way that they movethe putter than I do, because I,
you know, I learned, you knowtoo much yeah, I, I try to
control it and they like reallylet it swing.
so the athleticism kind of getstaken out when you first realize
I cannot hit this fat and I'vegot to kind of find a way to be
(30:07):
still.
And it's usually not in a wayyou would want to teach somebody
and I think that's why almosteveryone's super steep as well,
with an open face.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
I got to chime in here.
So, coming from a player'sperspective in regards to
teaching, you know we're talkingabout beginning.
You know how, how do you teacha beginner.
Most of the people that listento this podcast are really,
really good players, like we'retalking about two and less, all
(30:47):
the way up to the PGA Tourplayer, the Champ Tour player,
the LPGA Tour player, along withother professional athletes
that understand instruction at ahigh level.
So, when it comes to teachingsomebody who may want to get
from, let's say I'll tell you inmy experience, boys, one of the
hardest jumps is like an eightor a nine getting down to a
(31:12):
scratch.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
Yeah, that's a hard jump right there.
Those are different worlds.
That's like going through tworanges of skill.
I would say you know?
Speaker 1 (31:23):
surprisingly, I've gotten a lot of emails.
I don't know if you have,Justin, but I've gotten a lot of
emails from guys in thathandicap genre, in that category
, let's say, seven to 10.
And they email me and they sayJesse, I love your podcast, I
love what you and Justin talkabout.
Can you help me get what arethe necessary steps to get down
(31:43):
to a scratch?
To get down to a scratch?
And then I think that's where aninstructor and it's not 100% on
an instructor at all I thinkthat the student, the player,
has to be very clear with whatthey want out of their golf game
.
If they're coming from thatperspective, if they're a
beginner and they just want togo have a good time, join a
(32:06):
country club and break 100 everyonce in a while on the weekends
, that's a differentconversation.
But when it comes to peoplethat truly want to get better,
let's just say let's stick withthat genre right now, let's go
from a 10 to a 7, and they wantto get down to a scratch.
What do you guys think thatconversation should be like?
Everything we've talked aboutup to this point, what would
(32:31):
that conversation look like?
Speaker 2 (32:33):
I think it's three things.
Well, you've got to understandthat the guys sorry, let me
start it would have to go backto the guys approach shots.
I find that that is where a lotof guys waste strokes.
So when it comes to approachshots, where does the ball start
?
I would always say eithereither three degrees either side
(33:05):
of of the target and your rangeof of uh carry distances are
you off by 15 plus minus?
So you really got to know howfar you actually carry your ball
on average.
And being smart about clubselection.
(33:26):
So if you're 160 from the flagand you choose an eight iron
because you nuked it once and itwent 160 and then you try to
hit it, then it doesn't makesense.
And where's the flag?
So if the flag's center, Ialways tell guys hey look, just
pick a club that's going to giveyou.
If you hit a great shot, you'rejust slightly over the flag.
(33:49):
But if you miss hit it, heylook, you're going to be pin
high.
And if you really chunk it, well, you're still front of the
green.
And if it's playing to a backpin, then you want to do the
opposite.
Right, you pick the club that,if you flush, it's going to get
(34:10):
you pin high and then again, ifyou miss hit it, you're in the
middle of the green or, worse,front of the green.
So you've got somethingplayable.
And if you're playing to afront pin, you want to pick a
club that, if you flush, sendsyou to the back of the green and
then generally you're not goingto hit it, flush all the time
(34:31):
at a 7-8 handicap.
Generally you're going to be inthe middle of the green.
So I think that's the mostimportant thing from what I've
observed over 20 years ofteaching.
So, approach strategy, Approachstrategy that's where I feel
that a lot of people missstrokes.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
I think that the stats bear that out.
I think that's kind of beenconfirmed and from both Mark
Brody's work and you remember,richie.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
Richie, our good friend.
The danger zone, the danger zone, and I think, right, if you
take that thinking a little bitdeeper, then it's how well do
you drive the ball?
So if you hit the ball long andstraight, then the approach
clubs you use will be muchshorter, making it easier to hit
(35:21):
the green.
I think this guy Richie I can'tremember his name this guy
Richie, I can't remember hisname he was a top I want to say
golf official and he did a study.
He did a study that said thebest predictor of a golfer's
(35:41):
handicap would be greens inregulation.
Sure, you got guys like StanArtley hit one green per nine
and shoot like what I don't know32.
But that's rare.
But generally a guy that hasvery high number of greens in
regulation would have a lowscore.
So for golfers out there whowant to get to scratch, you've
(36:05):
got to target something like 12to 13 greens in regulation.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Yeah, I think Scott Fawcett decade.
I think he's spoken on thistopic quite a bit and I think he
would agree there's such avalue in being on the putting
surface that just looking atgreens if you're going to take
one of the old school stats, inbeing on the putting surface,
that just looking at greens ifyou're going to take one of the
(36:32):
old school stats, probably wouldgive you the best indicator of
your scoring potential.
Yeah, and it's better to have a50-foot putt on the green in
most cases than to be like 30yards away with a horrible.
Scott would probably disagreewith that.
But the the that he said youwouldn't aim to protect against
(36:52):
that.
But to have a straight downhill20 yard chip shot out of rough
is not what you want over.
You'd rather have a super longputt.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
Yeah, generally, if you're, if you're not, if you
don't have the touch of ablacksmith, you're going to
score better over 10 shots, butit's ironic you're.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
You're saying the first two places.
You basically look, someonesays they want to get from high
single to scratch, and I'm notdisagreeing with you at all.
In fact, I would say the samething is you're looking at
approach strategy andessentially driving like having
(37:35):
enough speed to be able to drivethe ball long enough to give
yourself an approach that givesyou a good chance.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
Reasonable.
Speaker 3 (37:46):
None of that isting and chipping which maybe if you
had a 30 handicapper and theysaid, how do I get to a 15?
Speaker 1 (37:53):
You'd say, well, I don't even have to watch you.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Your short game is probably terrible, so let's work
on that.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Yeah, you're right, you hit the nail on the head.
It's a relative approach, sowhat I would say to a 30
handicapper, it's going to bedifferent to what I say to an
eight handicapper.
It's part of the interviewprocess, right?
Speaker 3 (38:13):
Right, and there's different eight handicappers,
because you might have an eightwho really gets a lot out of
their game, like they're smart,and so then you might have an
eight who, if they had a brain,they'd be like a four or a five.
So just helping them onapproach strategy could make a
(38:33):
huge difference, and that's thelow-hanging fruit is that they
go at every pin, or they reallydon't even know exactly how far
they carry it.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
Yeah, so there are two kinds of scratch golfers
golfers, scratch golfers who areball strikers and scratch
golfers who are short gamevisits.
It really depends.
Scramblers, I think.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
I think ideally, you want, you want a, a nice blend
of both yeah, and then you Ithink you would look if you had
a group of 108 handicappers, youprobably start putting him into
some groups, be like okay, yeah, there's, you know, people who
obviously the guy can't can'thit a bunker shot or a high
(39:25):
pitch shot at all, so you've gotpeople where that part of the
game is the weakness.
Then you get some people whoare just overall, they need more
speed and that's going to helpthem with driving distance and
then not have to swing theirdriver hard and get it even
farther than they do now andthat's going to help their
approach game oh, yeah, exactlyuh.
So like you'd probably get likea group let's speed you up and
(39:48):
then a group of like short gameis.
The issue is probably peopleare just terrible at putting.
You'd end up with littleavatars, uh, but I don't think
out of 100 there's a hundreddifferent types of levels of
game.
I think you could.
You could end up having I don'tknow, maybe four or five like
(40:09):
prototype, eight handicaps andand you would have a different
approach to help each one,because if they're like 19 and
and really fast and have nophysical problems, you don't
have to like get them to do hipmobility work so that they can
just pivot properly like you goright into something.
(40:32):
That's probably more strategy.
I think the people have themental game as what's holding
them back.
They tend to have the most, notnot always, but there's more
correlation where they'rephysically gifted so they can do
anything.
Like you see him on range, yousee this guy can hit any shot
and so like those people, as acoach I think you've got to
(40:54):
handle so much differently thanthe person who's mentally
completely fine, like doesn'treally break down, but they've
got all kinds of like technicalswing things to work on.
Like those people are inopposite sides and a lot of
instruction is lot ofinstruction is like all
technical swing stuff.
So if you're a good player, alot of that would just make you
(41:16):
worse, and so if you want to, ifyou're listening to it, you're
like I don't want to hear allthis.
I don't even want to see myswing on video because it might,
I might not, like something inthere and they're probably
perfectionist there and they'reprobably perfectionist so like
it's.
It's that whole interviewprocess is critical and, knowing
your student if you're a proand I I come at this not as
(41:38):
someone who's ever taught butwho's talked to a couple
thousand teachers about whatthey do, and the older they get
the seems, the more they putinto really upfront
understanding what is really thelow-hanging fruit for this
person.
And then what's the domino Icould knock over?
(41:58):
And it'll knock over otherstuff, and I don't even have to
tell them that I did that.
They don't know.
That was my plan.
Speaker 2 (42:05):
So what you're saying , nick, is that it's a holistic
approach, it's not aone-size-fits-all solution.
Absolutely not, and that'sexactly what this podcast is all
about.
Speaker 3 (42:20):
Yeah, I mean, I think I like your philosophy.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yeah, you're going to do a real disservice to the
student as a teacher if youthrow them in the same in the
same methodology.
That'd be, that would be.
That'd be bad.
That would be bad, especiallyif the methodology is is being
taught to somebody.
(42:42):
I love what you said, nick,about you know, checking one's
mobility.
If you're trying to getsomebody to make a huge shoulder
turn and they're 60 years ofage and they've been at a desk
for 40 years or 35 years orwhatever, it's going to be hard
for them to do that.
So I really like thisconversation.
Boys, this is good stuff here.
(43:03):
Hopefully the folks that haveemailed me, hopefully this
answers some of your questionstoo, you know, and I do think
that.
So let me get this answers someof your questions too, and I do
think that.
So let me ask you guys aquestion.
What if there is, let's say,the let's throw this in there
this hypothetical question yougot a 45-year-old male who is a
(43:25):
professional, has an office job.
Just say, for example, he's anattorney and he's at a desk,
he's got some athleticism, he'san eight, nine handicap, he's a
member at a private club, he'sgot a couple kids, wife, uh, and
, and he it's.
It's really part of his life'spassion to get down to a scratch
(43:46):
um.
What do you guys think thatperson like what kind of
questions can he ask when he'sinterviewing coaches?
Like what if you're?
If you're, what kind ofquestions would you like?
Speaker 3 (44:00):
that's a great question.
Yeah, I mean what?
Speaker 1 (44:02):
what questions?
Speaker 3 (44:03):
would you go ahead when it comes to and this this
often is a question from parentswho say I need to hire a golf
coach, but I myself game thatwell.
So what do I ask to determineif someone's good at coaching?
And you know, a lot of it doescome down to old fashioned
(44:26):
social proof.
It's like who have you taught?
Have you uh tell like at a timethat you brought, what has been
your approach and have you hadsuccess in doing that, without
(44:47):
actually tell me about yourtrack record in helping someone
like me?
And I find that there arecharacteristics of golfers.
You know, I mean, justin,they're probably drawn to your
material because you do have alot of technical stuff, so let's
(45:08):
say, the engineering type, ormaybe a lot of people in in
medicine or in finance who are,if the player likes that, I
think they got.
A coach pays attention to thatkind of stuff, like collecting
(45:28):
stats or analyzing their game toreally figure out where are
they weakest, and so I would beasking how, how does the coach
look at stats and and determineif we're on track?
Am I getting better?
Because score, I don't.
I don't think score alwaystells you, especially in the
(45:49):
short term, whether you'remaking good changes, because I
get a lot of heat for this, butI think a lot of times you start
hitting your irons better, youwill start hitting more long,
and out here in California, ifyou're long on most courses it's
bad news.
(46:10):
I mean you're going to I wouldrather be 10 yards short than 10
yards long on almost every holethat I play out here so you
could, by collecting moreinformation.
I think if someone's reallyserious about it, it comes down
(46:30):
to really knowing, like, whathappened on each shot when, as
opposed to just is my handicapgoing up or down, and being able
to look at things like stroke.
I think is if the golfer is intothat kind of thing, you know
they they might come from itwith no interest at all and they
really hate technicalinformation and they need to be
(46:52):
matched up with a coach, in myopinion, who's more similar to
them.
You wouldn't put Bubba Watson,probably with Sean Ford.
I think you've got to have abit of a personality match and
understand how much informationis too much for this person and
(47:14):
if you're the golfer, you don'tlike that level of detail.
You probably shouldn't begetting a coach who has all
kinds of certifications and isreally into all the tools that
they've invested in.
You know there's um you.
You must see that just in termsof like the spectrum of
different type of pros I think Ithink I'm a parent myself of
(47:37):
two girls.
Speaker 2 (47:38):
If I were to get them to take long-term coaching, for
whatever activity, I thinkfirst the most important thing
for me is what's the characterof the teacher?
I, I don't need my girls goingto take lessons from an a-hole,
because think about this, right,do you want this person to
(47:59):
raise your kid?
Because essentially that's whatthey're doing for you,
especially talking aboutlong-term coaching.
So that's a.
For me, that's the mostimportant thing, and then after
that we can worry about thetechnicalities of it.
This is where I defer a littlebit uh from you, nick.
I think it's.
The onus is on parents to doresearch on their own.
(48:21):
They can't just like outsourcethe whole process to coaches and
say, hey, look, it's yours, you, you need to know a little bit
of what you're getting yourselfinto.
I think a lot of parentsdiscover that a little bit too
late.
Now I'm not saying that, hey,you're going to be a golf swing
expert, but I think you need tobe reasonably updated on what's
(48:42):
going on, and it's not difficultto find out information.
It's kind of the same thing,right, when you go ask an
investment professionalfinancial advisor should I buy
nvidia like that's a loadedquestion, man you need you.
You need to, you need to do yourown research first before you
go ask or discuss that issue andit I feel if you're trying to
(49:06):
groom your kid to be a decentgolfer, that's the basic thing
you need to do.
I think if you're trying togroom your kid to be a decent
golfer, that's the basic thingyou need to do.
I think if you, if a parentgoes, speak to a few golf
coaches, send emails, golfcoaches generally will respond,
generally, if it's, if you'renot going too deep in the weeds.
(49:27):
If a parent goes and sends like10 golf coaches on Instagram,
youtube, hey, what should I lookfor in a good coach?
Maybe this is the topic foranother podcast interview.
I think generally they willcome back with a few pointers
and that's where you start.
Speaker 3 (49:47):
Yeah, when you say the information's out there.
There's no doubt.
I think that's.
The problem, though, is there'sso much information and it's
very hard for people to filterit and know, and sometimes
absorbing more info is nothelpful, but it actually just
makes you unable to make adecision.
(50:08):
Or, in the case of peopleabsorbing swing information for
themselves, at a certain pointyou feel like I don't even know
what to do now.
I just watched two hours ofYouTube videos.
Speaker 2 (50:25):
Let me distill that a little bit.
Sure, there's a lot ofinformation.
You've got broad buckets liketechnology, you've got the
mental game, and then you've gotthe full swing technique.
And then I think the key thingthat most golf coaches are
deficient in is the art ofcommunication.
And that's the first thing thatparents have to ask, assuming
(50:47):
that this guy knows about golfswing technique, has social
proof.
And then it's about how do youcommunicate with kids of various
ages.
And you can see right, as anadult, when you speak to a golf
coach, if he can't explain hisphilosophy in a paragraph, he
probably doesn't really have asystem of organizing information
(51:12):
.
But if I say, hey, nick, whatdo you do for a living?
One, two sentences, in anutshell, your elevator pitch.
It shows me that you havethought about these things.
I'm an investment professional.
I would recommend you invest inNvidia because of one, two,
three.
(51:32):
If your financial circumstancesare X, y, z, I think that's a
good start.
Speaker 3 (51:41):
Yeah, it's a tough one.
Cause the prices, and is itovervalued, then that's the next
oh yeah.
And it's like well, no oneknows, Correct.
Speaker 2 (51:52):
So I think it's asking the right questions to
begin this web of questions,right?
And I think, well, for theparents out there, the key thing
is this, right?
Maybe to ask the instructor isthis right, do you have a
short-term, what's yourlong-term strategy and what's
the short-term tactic to get tothat long-term strategy?
(52:16):
And I think you want to hearthe coach say hey, I've got a
five-year, seven-year, 10-yearplan for your kid, because he's
five now and in a couple years,10 years time, he's going to be
at the peak of puberty.
His anatomical proportions aregoing to change.
So the swing is not going to befixed in stone, but at the same
(52:38):
time we're going to work onshort game, we're going to work
on this and that ball striking,because all these things are
critical to getting the ball inthe hole and the lowest number
of strokes.
So it's again, again, holistic.
It can't be simplified.
It can be made simple, but itcannot be simplified.
And that's the thing with mostissues in life how do I get rich
(53:00):
in the stock market?
It's not a one-size-fits-allanswer.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
Yeah, I mean, if you caught me on a different day and
you said, how do you interviewa coach, I might just say, look,
it's just an art form.
I don't even there's no good setof questions.
You just start talking to themand hope to gain an
understanding of do they checkall those boxes?
Do they seem to have goodcharacter from the conversation,
(53:29):
seem to have good characterfrom from the conversation, and
do I believe that they would,that they have ideas that are
organized, but I would say veryfew golf pros have put much
thought into like exactly theirmessaging.
Uh, now that many of them havewebsites and so that might have
been the first time that theyhad to put into words what they
(53:53):
believe or how they teach, and alot of times it's just
extremely vague information onthere that you couldn't really
distinguish them from anybodyelse.
World where most pros wouldrather just get a chance to talk
(54:13):
to the parent and, uh, justkind of let it flow naturally
and hope that they, they kind ofhit it off and have some
rapport.
That's really the what the pro,the pros who can build rapport
quickly, do well in the businessexactly.
Speaker 2 (54:26):
So goes back to what randy smith again guy in front
of you.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
Yeah, building rapport.
I think a key in sales.
It's like don't make the falseassumption about a person
without really hearing that likereally listen to them, because
if you don't, you might tellthem something that you think
that they would find importantbut they actually don't.
And so you're like kind ofbarking up the wrong tree with
them, or you're you're coachingscotty scheffler in a first
(55:00):
lesson and his parents aresitting there and you're trying
to tell him like that his feetshould not move at all, and and
you're, um, you're automaticallyshowing that you're kind of
like have a method, I think.
I think a lot of parents arewary of cookie cutter method
instruction at this point we'recoming up on the hour mark nick.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
What are some?
Who are some of the marqueenames that have presented at
Open Forum?
Speaker 3 (55:35):
Well, I would say, going back to the first real
event that we had was the secondOpen Forum, because we had
speakers.
So we were heavy biomechanicsfor that one, biomechanics for
that one.
So we had Dr Rob Neal, dr MikeDuffy, dr Phil Cheatham and
(56:03):
Sasho McKenzie went last.
So that was kind of our firsttime where we had a program and
then we had these two panels.
They were way too big.
I think I had 11 guys on thefirst panel and I have actually,
because I found that videorecently, I think I have them in
front of me.
It was tyler farrell, fredericktuxon, scott cowks, rob holding
(56:33):
, brady riggs, andrew rice,sasha was up there, uh, ea,
tishler, that was one panel atopen forum too.
Then we we had one at openforum six.
I think you've seen thosevideos yeah we had brandon
chamblee.
Speaker 2 (56:51):
Ledbetter was on there oh, that was good man,
that one was excellent grantweight.
Speaker 3 (56:57):
Brad faxon uh butch, uh, butch harman, the third, it
was on that one.
So you know we we've had a lotof the biomechanics present
where they weren't really thatwell known.
Like dr kwan, presented at openforum three just about 10 years
ago uh, this was right whenchris was starting work with
(57:19):
tiger woods and like a lot wasseeming to be developing to kind
of elevate instruction and Ifelt like it was a pivotal time
there and a lot of people hadnever seen Kwan present.
And then now, years later,there's a lot have have gone and
(57:39):
studied and done advanced stuffwith Kwan and in golf
biomechanics We've had ScottLynn from swing catalyst.
So so to me like a big name,maybe a different version than a
typical person, because a lotof people to them like when I'm
(58:00):
at the PGA show I don't payattention to the tour pros, I
walk right by them and I'll goshake hands with a teacher that
I like or a PhD.
So I'm not really I don'treally think in terms of like
the famous guys.
It's more like the people whoare really deep into golf swing
(58:23):
instruction and science in a waythat's probably excessive for
almost everybody else, like Iwould not want anyone to learn
at the level of detail that Ihave, and I wouldn't even say
it's helped me in my own gamevery much.
In fact it's probably hurtingme, to be honest, it's, but it's
more for the information.
It's just, it never ends Like.
(58:45):
I wake up every day and I justkind of obsessed over golf, golf
instruction and especially thefull swing well, you're meant to
be an evangelist for the gamethat's right, I think I.
I I'm an evangelist over theidea of improvement and I'm a
(59:06):
realist of I know how hard itactually is, so I have
tremendous respect for golfteachers who have the patience
to spend like an entire daytrying to make people better,
which I can never have thepatience to do.
You guys have to develop acoaching method that can be
(59:30):
sustained over many, many years,and so that's for your own
mental health you have to figurethat out.
Speaker 2 (59:35):
My method changes all the time depending on who's in
front of me.
Man, yeah, but I always deferto getting the guy's confidence.
If he's slicing the hell out ofthe ball, I'm going to make him
hook it, get the buy-in andthen say, hey guy, we've got the
(59:57):
ball flight sorted out.
But in the midterm, these arewhat you've got to work on
Mobility, for example, changethat shitty grip.
Maybe you've got to changeequipment shaft's too heavy, too
light, too flexible, whateverthe case may be.
So last question for for me,nick what's the biggest lesson
(01:00:18):
you've taken away from all thistime in open forum?
What's the one big lesson thatyou've taken away?
Speaker 3 (01:00:29):
and put me on the spot.
Um, if I had to think of it interms of and I hate to get in
the weeds on a question likethat, but it would probably be
just understanding in a golfswing, like how important it is
for the, the lead side of thebody to be able to create some
(01:00:49):
stability for the person to beable to push off of and swing
around, um, and so a lot of thatis just coming from that lead
foot and the way it interactswith the ground and how you use
that with the rest of your body.
Uh, I'm still kind of trying tofigure out how to do that as a
(01:01:12):
player, but I found, likelearning, that it makes a lot of
the other stuff that you see interms of motion makes sense
when you see the ultimate goalof, like why people are like
spiking that vertical groundreaction force vector with that
lead foot early in the downswing, what it does, what it allows
(01:01:37):
you to do.
Probably not your typicalanswer, but that's my answer.
Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
No, that's true.
I think a lot of golfers areweak on the lead side, given
that it's their non-don,generally not.
They're not not their dominantside.
So it makes a lot of sense.
And high level golfers, overthe years I've noticed that
their lead side tends to bebigger, more developed than the
trail side so big lesson thereyeah, I consider it gives you
(01:02:11):
permission to rotate hard.
Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
If you don't have that pressure on the lead side,
you can't really rotate.
Speaker 2 (01:02:19):
And it's hard to hit solid shots off of your trail.
Foot, trail side Can be done,but very, very rare.
Speaker 3 (01:02:32):
Yeah, and a lot of times it looks like a moment
where their left foot iscompletely off the ground and
then maybe, maybe they finishheavily on the trails.
So the assumption is, oh,they're, they're like a trail
side player, but they were sohard on their lead side it
launched them into the air onthat side, and so it gives a lot
(01:02:54):
of people the wrong impression,like that there's golfers out
there not using their trail sideall that much, which I don't
think there's any player who,unless you have no front leg at
all, you're gonna gonna postinto that and use that as the
basis of the whole swing.
Speaker 2 (01:03:12):
Indeed.
Where can our listeners findout more about Open Forum?
Openforumgolfcom.
Happy 2025, everyone.
This is the first one of theyear.
My name is Jesse Perryman fromthe Flag Hunters Golf Podcast.
I decided to take a little timeoff.
I needed a break fromeverything, and so I can get
back into 2025 just full steamahead.
Both Justin and I have somegreat guests coming on this year
(00:26):
.
You're not going to want tomiss it.
This is simple, next levelinformation that you may not get
immediately, but over time.
It is our intention to plantseeds of greatness within
yourselves and that you can comeand understand how to grow
(00:49):
yourself and how to grow withinthe game and how to make your
game better through all of thegenres that we're going to touch
during the course of the next12 months and beyond, and
getting you to a place where youcan get real comfortable with
your game.
And it's an honor and aprivilege for both Justin and
(01:12):
myself to help bring you thisgolf-affirming information
that's going to help you enjoythe game and just add more
fulfillment when you get outthere and tee it up.
So, without further ado, ourfirst guest of the year.
His name is Nick Shurtok.
Notably, Nick is a Bay Area guy.
California created a spacecalled Open Forum.
(01:34):
The name of the website iscalled openforumgolfcom and it
is a platform where you can signup and watch one-on-one
coaching interviews.
Coaches debate certain thingsfrom every pillar of golf
(01:55):
improvement, primarily in thegolf swing and with technology,
and really diving into some ofthese things that'll make you
get better, make you hit theball better, make you hit the
ball further.
It's full-fledged right now.
As of this recording, this isstarting the week of the PGA.
If you go on toOpenForumGolfcom all one word
(02:22):
you can sign up and you can hearand witness what's going on
down there and then have theseone-on-one interviews with some
of the great coaches in theworld.
And you've got to become amember to have access to this,
but it's very reasonable and Ihighly encourage you to do it.
Check it out.
There's coaches on there thatare going to help you maybe
(02:47):
clear up some ambiguity, thingsthat are foggy in your mind that
you don't quite know.
You might hear something from aparticular coach and it might
resonate with you and help youto click something in your game
Period.
So, openforumgolfcom, Nick.
Thanks for coming on, pal.
Both Justin and I thank you,and I hope everybody is having a
(03:09):
good week and everyone's off toa fantastic 2025 start and the
next couple of weeks we're goingto be going into mindset.
We're going to analyze what itreally takes to get your engine
going from the inside out.
What it really takes to getyour engine going from the
inside out and, if you thinkdeeply about it, with the advent
(03:29):
of all of the technology andeverything, which is a very
important piece of the pie.
Let's not forget that this is aholistic game as well.
Openforumgolfcom Cheerseverybody and have a great week.
Hello, Welcome to 2025, folks,this is the first one of the
(04:02):
year for the Flag Hunters GolfPodcast.
On behalf of Justin and myself,we thank you for tuning in.
It's going to be a great andexciting year.
We're going to kick off the uhoff the year with a fellow uh
northern california and his nameis nick shurtok, along with
justin tang.
Once again, thanks for comingon and and boys, happy new year.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Happy new year, guys Right on Happy to be here.
Hey, nick, jesse, good to speakto you First time 2025.
Hey, nick, very quickly I justwant to say that we're starting
off the year on the right footby having you as our first guest
.
Tell us a bit about what OpenForum is all about.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Tell us a bit about what Open Forum is all about.
Yeah, so Open Forum it camefrom a Facebook group of golf
teachers that I had set up inabout 2011.
And so after a couple of yearsof this group really growing,
(05:08):
there was a lot of stronginteraction, a lot of friction.
I would kind of seek out topicswhere people had disagreement
and try to get all of theinstructors I possibly could
find to be in the group, and soone of our members named Mike
Michaelides, who was one of theco-founders of the event.
He said we should really dosomething together in person at
the PGA show, and at the timeI'd never been to the PGA show.
At the PGA show, and at thetime I'd never been to the PGA
show.
And so the first open forum wasmy first trip to Orlando for
(05:29):
the show, and it was kind ofchaotic.
We really didn't have muchstructure, but thanks to the uh,
the Facebook forum gave me theability to invite hundreds of
hundreds of pros and and therewere probably 200 people crammed
into a bar for the first one.
It's evolved over the years.
It's now in our 11th year.
(05:49):
It's essentially a symposiumand a kind of a networking event
for the nerdiest golf pros andthe sports scientists that come
out, all the technologycompanies that I can get to
sponsor.
Traditionally Trackman's beenout there sponsoring Ping Swing,
(06:11):
catalyst, smart2move.
This year 4D Golf is going tojoin us, probably Hack Motion
Still talking to a lot ofsponsors, but there's it's just
an annual tradition now and wetry to just maintain the spirit
of a debating societyessentially, where most seminars
(06:34):
are not really trying to finddisagreement.
But I would say that I do seekit out, where we can have smart
people kind of iron outdifferences of opinion.
And you know you try to avoidwhere everyone's just agreeing
with each other, patting eachother on the back.
You also don't want peoplebeing really over the line, but
(06:56):
that that just rarely happens inan in-person event so you don't
have to worry about it.
So my goal is always just tokeep it from being boring and
always be on the cutting edge ofnew topics, new technologies.
A lot of times unveil there atthe open forum, so that's kind
of what it's all about hey,speaking of bar fights,
(07:16):
something very interestinghappened last year.
Let's talk about it, man, thatwas the hot topic yeah, the hot
topic last year and it stillcontinues to be shallow yeah,
it's all about, you know, josephmayo, all the the stuff he's
been putting out on instagramfor the last, say, two years
(07:37):
maybe, uh, 18 months, uh, aboutan approach to teaching that
high-spinning wedge thatlaunches around 30 degrees, and
Joe's very much in favor of anangle of attack of maybe 8, 10,
12, even 15 on a shot like that.
(07:58):
And then there's kind of beenanother school of thought you
could say a more shallow andhitting, you know, hitting
behind it being being okay onanother, the other side of
things, if you will.
I mean, I don't want tooversimplify it as though it's
like this complete dichotomythere's a lot of opposite,
(08:20):
opposite ends of the spectrumyeah, like, do you want to
prioritize ball first contactand still hitting a low, high
spinning shot, or are you, um,are you trying to prioritize not
getting really steep into theground and therefore the the
(08:41):
shallower?
Like, the idea is, which one'ssafer?
Which one would someone lean to?
Who cannot afford to chunk aball?
And so there continues to bedisagreement there.
But last year I think, we triedto set that debate up on a
panel.
It went okay.
And then there was definitely amoment between Brian Manzella
(09:02):
and Joe where I don't know therewas definitely a moment between
brian manzella and joe where Idon't know there was it wasn't
that much being discussed, uh,of substance in that particular
moment.
But that's an example of theguy.
The guys have a history, youknow there's, there's been many
disagreements on many topicsover the years between certain
people, and so we're not reallythere to like immediately shut
(09:27):
it down.
So I I basically have alaissez-faire approach to
managing it and nothing reallygot out of hand.
And we've got chris como therewith the microphone, you know,
providing kind of theintellectual yeah, intellect
he's able to, he knows all thesides, like he kind of knows
what everyone where they'recoming from.
(09:47):
And then we have mike.
Michael is for the actualphysical security in case
anything would ever happen,because he's a very large man
yes, I, I always defer tomichael when it comes to club
hit speed production.
Yeah, so he was a long drivecompetitor back in the day he
was on Big Break 2 or 3.
(10:09):
I know one of those early BigBreak shows.
He was a college golf coach andnow golf-wise.
I think he mainly does charitylike exhibition stuff.
So if you have a charitytournament you want a guy to
just get out there and pump it400 yards, hit a drive for
somebody.
He can still definitely bringit with.
(10:30):
I don't know, probably around130 miles an hour maybe a little
faster.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Very nice.
So, going back to going back todebates between golf
professionals, I think the mainissue that causes all these
conflicts is some what I callrelativism, what you say works
relative to a guy and how theyinterpret the information.
And don't, don't forget, in uh,open forum nine, randy smith
(11:00):
dispensed these words of wisdom.
He said it's the guy in frontof you that's the most important
thing.
It's not about my approach, howsmart I am as a professional.
The guy in front, if he can doit, that's the way for him.
I thought that was so wise I wasblown away.
I was watching it yesterday.
(11:22):
I watched that segment, iconsegment, iconic teachers maybe
three times, oh yeah, and.
And it felt to me like thisthis is a guy that's produced
the world number one, scottyscheffler, the most dominant
golfer in 2024, and yet he, hesaid we are teaching the person
(11:45):
in front of you.
It almost feels like to be agreat coach.
You've got to go full circle,you've got to go into the weeds,
all the technicalities of thegolf swing, 3d data, ground
force, data, and then you comeback to the person in front of
you us in in front of you, Iwould say it's a, it's like you,
(12:10):
the.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
The advice he's given is probably what someone would
say who's just getting into golfinstruction.
Oh, of course, of course youteach the person in front of you
, but it would be very easy forthem pretty quickly to see a
scotty scheffler with that kindof footwork and maybe he doesn't
fit their image of the kind ofpivot they want to teach.
Or the perfect swing, yeah, orthis modern very like push your
(12:34):
butt way back and get supershallow, like scotty is not an
example of that at all, uh, butyeah.
So I think for you inparticular, since you're a golf
instructor, you know that overtime people in their teaching
can fall in love with theirpreferences and so, uh,
(12:56):
eventually I think the wisdomcomes and, yeah, full circle.
You're back to like, what doesthis person need?
And they don't need to.
To hear me be really smart likethat as a student, there's
probably very few students whowould say, like justin's a good
pro because he he throws a lotof vocabulary out at me and he
shows me, like, all thedifferent things that he knows.
(13:16):
Uh, I think most people willgather that you know what you're
doing based on what they canget you to do as a golfer.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
So that's how they're going to judge you anyway yeah,
but I think at the same timealso the scorecard.
The scorecard matters and theball flight matters.
Right, like some guys, as aninstructor, you don't want to be
telling them about groundreaction forces.
You're going to mess them.
You're going to say, hey, look,you know what.
You're going to mess them up.
You're going to say, hey, look,you know what You're going to
play tomorrow.
When you address the ball, justhood, the club face, so you can
(13:50):
hit the little draw instead ofthe big slice.
And sometimes that's all theyneed.
I mean, if you're a CEO of aFortune 500 company, you don't
have time to practice.
That's all you need.
Man, you don't need a golfimprovement plan.
Speaker 3 (14:08):
Sure he could pay for it, but he's got no time for it
.
Yeah, that's another.
Another spin on the like.
Work with the person in frontof you, yeah, could also mean
find out, like, what's theirtrue level of dedication.
Like this, this ceo guy whoworks 80 hours a week and then
he says, oh, I want a completeoverhaul of my game.
You know that he's never goingto stick to any kind of practice
(14:32):
routines.
So then the band-aid approachesare realistically gonna have to
be used in many cases wheresomeone either outright says I
won't, or you know that they saythey will, but you know that
they won't.
So you've got to like craftwhat you tell them based on that
.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
You know Jim Hardy and John Jacobs would not agree
with the term band-aid approach.
Sometimes the band-aid stays onfor life.
Man, if you can fix it, that'sit, man.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
Yeah, it depends on the person and what they're
trying to change.
I'll say, yeah, maybe it gets abad rap.
I know that for some peoplethey'll come out and say I want
the quickest fix and it's aquick idea and I just want to
hold on to that idea.
And maybe for some people it'slike for me.
I was at the rain, I was hittingballs today, just hitting it
really badly just off the heel,inside of the heel on some
(15:32):
fairway woods, and then I justkind of zeroed in on this little
thought in my backswing thatthat sometimes I have.
That relates to this moraddrill of basically trying to
almost like not swing my leftarm across my chest at all.
Like, try in the back swing,try to swing my left arm, my
lead arm, toward the target.
I'm not really going to do that.
(15:53):
But man, that little tiny thing.
You might call that a bandaidif someone just said that to me,
but every single shot for therest of the session was so much
different.
So, like a little thing that'llget your sequence improved.
It's beyond the level ofconsciously even understanding
what you change and a littletiny thought could do it.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Indeed, and back to Open Forum.
How many editions are we inthis?
Speaker 3 (16:22):
is Open Forum 11.
And so it's our actual our 13thyear.
We missed two years because ofcovid, but essentially, um, it
was 12 years ago that we did itthe first time, and so we're
back at the hyatt regency, whichis the big fancy hotel in
(16:43):
Orlando that most people go to.
Have you been to the PGA showbefore?
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Unfortunately no.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
I know you're a world away.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
I'm a world away man, but I'm with you guys in spirit
, as you always know, of course.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, and I'll announce it close to the event.
But we're going to stream itagain for free just because we
want to.
We want just more people to seeit and know about it.
But your listeners will hearthat, but it's not something
I've shared.
Uh, I'll usually like last yearwas the first year we did it I
(17:18):
think something like three orfour thousand people watched the
stream, wow so it'd be nice ifwe can get that that number up
to like ten thousand this yearsure, how do we, how do our
listeners, get hold of the link?
so openforumgolfcom uh, justlike the way it sounds is the
three words.
(17:39):
That's our home page, uh,someone, if they went to the
home page they'd be able to buythe videos that have been
produced of past events at thetop of the homepage.
There's a big banner there toregister for the live event
that's coming up on the 21st.
So we always have it after demoday.
(18:00):
For anyone who hasn't been tothe pga show, they have a demo
day tuesday at the uh orangecounty uh golf center.
I forget the name of it, butit's a giant, giant range.
Probably seen it on the golfchannel and the magazines um.
And then we, uh we always setup our event to be right after
(18:21):
that and and the night beforethe actual trade show starts.
So we're we're in the greatlocation to be at the hyatt.
We've had it at another hotelclose by called the rosen plaza
quite a few times, but we'regoing back to the hyatt this
year and we've got some prettygood stuff in store.
(18:42):
I usually am pretty I'm fairlylate to tell people the lineup,
just because I never want tohave to bump somebody, to have
to announce someone's going tobe there and then, because we
overbook, have to have to pushthem off.
So let's just say the themethis year is going to strongly
relate to the 30th anniversaryof the X factor article and just
(19:07):
.
McLean Right and all about whatdrives the pivot and
understanding that relationshipbetween you know, the pelvis,
how it's rotating in the trunk,uh, and and just so many topics
that will come about from that.
We try to have a general themefor the night but there's going
(19:30):
to be probably fivepresentations and at least two
panels, possibly a third paneldiscussion, one panel discussion
this year we are going to talkabout the business of golf
instruction discussion.
This year we are going to talkabout the business of golf
instruction, uh, just kind ofhow it's evolving, with pros
starting to, you know, branchout into other areas.
(19:52):
Uh, you know, a lot of pros are, whether they be involved in
indoor facilities or having umcontracts with training aid
companies, or some people havetheir own training aids and then
the whole online instructionway that's evolving and you know
(20:13):
there's a lot of kind ofopinions about.
I personally I think onlineinstruction so far has been a
bust.
Uh, I think it has potentialbut for the most part people are
taking like a single lessonfrom someone, getting a
voiceover video, and then theyeither jump to someone else
(20:36):
because it's very tempting to dothat, or they just get the one
lesson and that's it.
So they don't really developmuch of a relationship, which
has always been like thecornerstone of coaching.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
My take is this right , A lot of online instructors.
They cannibalize themselves.
I get it that a lot of theancillary YouTube videos,
Instagram videos, are forpromotion, but it gets to the
point where I'm getting all thisinformation.
Do I really need to take anonline lesson?
(21:13):
That costs $200 per session.
But I can figure this thing outand that's generally the
feedback that I get from a lotof friends in the US and the UK.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I do think people are giving away the store um their
Instagram channels, especiallyif they use video that they've
already made to teach someone.
Cause, imagine, if you watchsomeone's channel, uh, watch 20
of their videos immediatelyYou're like this is my guy.
I love the way he teaches.
He's teaching someone who's gotthe same problem I have, and
(21:48):
then you go get the lesson andthey actually send you the same
video that you just watched oninstagram exactly, and that's
the uh business model that mostgolf pros use, right scale.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
And I see a lot of videos being recycled.
So could be videos from 2010.
And I've seen that right,because I recognize the model of
the drivers that's being usedin the video.
And then they try to marketthis as oh, this is a new
program.
I think that's a bitdisingenuous, but at the same
(22:20):
time, I get it Like it's verytime consuming to take proper
videos.
Yeah, I get it Like it's verytime-consuming to take proper
videos.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Yeah, I'm a real stickler.
I feel like a lot this hasgotten better, but in the
beginning the audio quality wasjust horrible on a lot of these
videos.
And then eventually, becausepeople are now able to use
iPhone, I think it's easier todeal with microphone issues now
than it used to be.
(22:48):
But also like, as you mentioned, old stuff, uh, maybe out of
date or you can tell the pro islike 50 pounds heavier now than
in the video.
Uh, but yeah, less hair.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Less hair, of course yeah, less hair and in where you
want it now than in thebeginning.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
Less hair, less hair, of course, yeah, less hair in
where you want it, more hairwhere you don't want it.
It's tempting in golfinstruction, especially the info
product side of things, yeah,it starts to resemble like the
fat loss industry, which is alot about.
(23:26):
Are you going to sell hype andfalse, exaggerated claims of
what you can do for someone, oryou're going to be honest?
And if you're going to behonest, it's going to be harder
to make money because it'seasier to lie to people.
And with golf they just say youknow, just like the club makers
with all their claims ofinstant, uh, yardage increases.
(23:49):
But in yeah, in a golf pro,sell on a pdf, there's always
some claim of strokes.
You're going to improve.
And I'll say, if I ever have alike a golf coaching platform
and I might myself will never bea coach, but my whole thing
would be not making anyguarantees at all no, no claims,
no promises.
(24:09):
Uh, in fact, you probably won'tget better.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
That's what I'd tell the only thing that's guaranteed
to reduce strokes in your golfgame is called an eraser the
eraser that's it, yeah, and it's.
It's's funny that you bring allthese things up right.
So my view is this right,there's only so many ways you
can discuss about the golf grip,so many ways you can talk about
(24:35):
ground reaction forces Beforeyou go like shucks.
I need to talk about this in adifferent way and you can't find
anything.
So let's recycle it.
A three-year cycle hopefullywe've got new people coming into
the game.
Hopefully people who saw itthree years ago don't remember
it.
I think the golf instructionworld needs ozempic.
(24:58):
But what is the ozempic of thegolf instruction world?
I really don't know, man, and Ifind myself coming back to old
school teaching well, not reallyold school, but guys who, who
really understood how to changegolf string motor movement
pattern in a very simple way.
(25:18):
I'm talking about guys likejohn jacob, jim hardy and those
guys yeah those guys knew whatthey were doing.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Maybe they didn't have the, the uh lingo that
we're using today, but they gotresults like that yeah, I I my
problem I have with the, andthose are two different guys, so
I'm not going to say they'rethe same, because, john jacobs
uh, are you talking about theenglish one or the?
Speaker 2 (25:48):
there's an american, john jacobs too no, no, the, the
english john jacobs was thementor of mr plain truth, jim
hardy okay I didn't know.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Hardy worked with uh jacob oh yeah okay, so so
essentially my, my and I'm notgoing to say criticism, because
I'm in no place to becriticizing a legendary golf pro
, but I'll say my questions thatI would have about someone who
teaches off ball flight.
I do believe that in many casesthere's a lot to look at with
(26:25):
someone in terms of eithercoordination issues they have or
or movement limitations thatthey're just unaware of, and so
if everything's off ball flight,I feel like you're never going
to talk posture or, uh, you knowthe way someone needs to feel
(26:45):
in terms of their side bendingand their forward bending and
their extension.
All the body motion stuffbasically does not get addressed
at all if you are strictly areally old school ball flight
coaching, but I'm not going tosay it's not great.
I mean, I think it can workwonders for a ton of people,
(27:08):
especially good players.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Maybe I should clarify so they will adapt
things like what you mentionedgrip, address, stance, posture
and see how it affects ballflight.
But what I'm saying is they'renot going to put the cart before
the horse.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, I am not someone who thinks it's a good
idea to bring someone into golfand say, okay, I'm gonna make
you master all of thesefundamentals away from the ball
first, like I guess that's hownick faldo learned the game.
He said I think he had to spendweeks just getting the posture
and grip right before he wasallowed to ever hit a ball.
(27:49):
I'd be more the opposite, Iwould say like to my kids if I
bring them out there, I justwant to get them feeling the
club head swing.
Make a couple swing, don't paytoo much attention to the way
they grip it, or if they're likealigning parallel.
You know railroad tracks, it'slike in general I want them to
(28:12):
kind of know where they'retrying to to send the ball.
But it's more like get a feelof making that club head move in
a relaxed way, uh, where you'renot spazzing out trying to hit
the ball.
Uh, my, my overall likephilosophy of what's wrong with
instruction why everyone let'ssay statistically golfers don't
(28:35):
improve like if you had to justbet.
If someone's trying to improve,you had to just bet on whether
they will or not.
You'll probably win the bet thatthey won't and I feel like it's
mainly because, like, when youfirst start you can't really hit
the ball at all and then in thevery first couple times you
start to figure out how to getthe club on the ball.
(28:57):
You probably did some form of ascooping action, some some
variant of a very steepdownswing as far as, like the
shaft angle coming down and thenlike a handle draggy.
But there's a way to just getthe club on the ball, at first
to be able to shoot like 110instead of not even be able to
(29:21):
play, and I feel like everyonelike makes that adjustment and
then they often just get stuckin that pattern and they get a
little better at it, but they'rejust kind of perfecting a
mediocre pattern.
And so, like I'm jealous of mykids who they can't play golf
really, but when I watch themputt, like they actually have a
(29:42):
more fluid way that they movethe putter than I do, because I,
you know, I learned, you knowtoo much yeah, I, I try to
control it and they like reallylet it swing.
so the athleticism kind of getstaken out when you first realize
I cannot hit this fat and I'vegot to kind of find a way to be
(30:07):
still.
And it's usually not in a wayyou would want to teach somebody
and I think that's why almosteveryone's super steep as well,
with an open face.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
I got to chime in here.
So, coming from a player'sperspective in regards to
teaching, you know we're talkingabout beginning.
You know how, how do you teacha beginner.
Most of the people that listento this podcast are really,
really good players, like we'retalking about two and less, all
(30:47):
the way up to the PGA Tourplayer, the Champ Tour player,
the LPGA Tour player, along withother professional athletes
that understand instruction at ahigh level.
So, when it comes to teachingsomebody who may want to get
from, let's say I'll tell you inmy experience, boys, one of the
hardest jumps is like an eightor a nine getting down to a
(31:12):
scratch.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
Yeah, that's a hard jump right there.
Those are different worlds.
That's like going through tworanges of skill.
I would say you know?
Speaker 1 (31:23):
surprisingly, I've gotten a lot of emails.
I don't know if you have,Justin, but I've gotten a lot of
emails from guys in thathandicap genre, in that category
, let's say, seven to 10.
And they email me and they sayJesse, I love your podcast, I
love what you and Justin talkabout.
Can you help me get what arethe necessary steps to get down
(31:43):
to a scratch?
To get down to a scratch?
And then I think that's where aninstructor and it's not 100% on
an instructor at all I thinkthat the student, the player,
has to be very clear with whatthey want out of their golf game
.
If they're coming from thatperspective, if they're a
beginner and they just want togo have a good time, join a
(32:06):
country club and break 100 everyonce in a while on the weekends
, that's a differentconversation.
But when it comes to peoplethat truly want to get better,
let's just say let's stick withthat genre right now, let's go
from a 10 to a 7, and they wantto get down to a scratch.
What do you guys think thatconversation should be like?
Everything we've talked aboutup to this point, what would
(32:31):
that conversation look like?
Speaker 2 (32:33):
I think it's three things.
Well, you've got to understandthat the guys sorry, let me
start it would have to go backto the guys approach shots.
I find that that is where a lotof guys waste strokes.
So when it comes to approachshots, where does the ball start
?
I would always say eithereither three degrees either side
(33:05):
of of the target and your rangeof of uh carry distances are
you off by 15 plus minus?
So you really got to know howfar you actually carry your ball
on average.
And being smart about clubselection.
(33:26):
So if you're 160 from the flagand you choose an eight iron
because you nuked it once and itwent 160 and then you try to
hit it, then it doesn't makesense.
And where's the flag?
So if the flag's center, Ialways tell guys hey look, just
pick a club that's going to giveyou.
If you hit a great shot, you'rejust slightly over the flag.
(33:49):
But if you miss hit it, heylook, you're going to be pin
high.
And if you really chunk it, well, you're still front of the
green.
And if it's playing to a backpin, then you want to do the
opposite.
Right, you pick the club that,if you flush, it's going to get
(34:10):
you pin high and then again, ifyou miss hit it, you're in the
middle of the green or, worse,front of the green.
So you've got somethingplayable.
And if you're playing to afront pin, you want to pick a
club that, if you flush, sendsyou to the back of the green and
then generally you're not goingto hit it, flush all the time
(34:31):
at a 7-8 handicap.
Generally you're going to be inthe middle of the green.
So I think that's the mostimportant thing from what I've
observed over 20 years ofteaching.
So, approach strategy, Approachstrategy that's where I feel
that a lot of people missstrokes.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
I think that the stats bear that out.
I think that's kind of beenconfirmed and from both Mark
Brody's work and you remember,richie.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
Richie, our good friend.
The danger zone, the danger zone, and I think, right, if you
take that thinking a little bitdeeper, then it's how well do
you drive the ball?
So if you hit the ball long andstraight, then the approach
clubs you use will be muchshorter, making it easier to hit
(35:21):
the green.
I think this guy Richie I can'tremember his name this guy
Richie, I can't remember hisname he was a top I want to say
golf official and he did a study.
He did a study that said thebest predictor of a golfer's
(35:41):
handicap would be greens inregulation.
Sure, you got guys like StanArtley hit one green per nine
and shoot like what I don't know32.
But that's rare.
But generally a guy that hasvery high number of greens in
regulation would have a lowscore.
So for golfers out there whowant to get to scratch, you've
(36:05):
got to target something like 12to 13 greens in regulation.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Yeah, I think Scott Fawcett decade.
I think he's spoken on thistopic quite a bit and I think he
would agree there's such avalue in being on the putting
surface that just looking atgreens if you're going to take
one of the old school stats, inbeing on the putting surface,
that just looking at greens ifyou're going to take one of the
(36:32):
old school stats, probably wouldgive you the best indicator of
your scoring potential.
Yeah, and it's better to have a50-foot putt on the green in
most cases than to be like 30yards away with a horrible.
Scott would probably disagreewith that.
But the the that he said youwouldn't aim to protect against
(36:52):
that.
But to have a straight downhill20 yard chip shot out of rough
is not what you want over.
You'd rather have a super longputt.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
Yeah, generally, if you're, if you're not, if you
don't have the touch of ablacksmith, you're going to
score better over 10 shots, butit's ironic you're.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
You're saying the first two places.
You basically look, someonesays they want to get from high
single to scratch, and I'm notdisagreeing with you at all.
In fact, I would say the samething is you're looking at
approach strategy andessentially driving like having
(37:35):
enough speed to be able to drivethe ball long enough to give
yourself an approach that givesyou a good chance.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
Reasonable.
Speaker 3 (37:46):
None of that isting and chipping which maybe if you
had a 30 handicapper and theysaid, how do I get to a 15?
Speaker 1 (37:53):
You'd say, well, I don't even have to watch you.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Your short game is probably terrible, so let's work
on that.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Yeah, you're right, you hit the nail on the head.
It's a relative approach, sowhat I would say to a 30
handicapper, it's going to bedifferent to what I say to an
eight handicapper.
It's part of the interviewprocess, right?
Speaker 3 (38:13):
Right, and there's different eight handicappers,
because you might have an eightwho really gets a lot out of
their game, like they're smart,and so then you might have an
eight who, if they had a brain,they'd be like a four or a five.
So just helping them onapproach strategy could make a
(38:33):
huge difference, and that's thelow-hanging fruit is that they
go at every pin, or they reallydon't even know exactly how far
they carry it.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
Yeah, so there are two kinds of scratch golfers
golfers, scratch golfers who areball strikers and scratch
golfers who are short gamevisits.
It really depends.
Scramblers, I think.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
I think ideally, you want, you want a, a nice blend
of both yeah, and then you Ithink you would look if you had
a group of 108 handicappers, youprobably start putting him into
some groups, be like okay, yeah, there's, you know, people who
obviously the guy can't can'thit a bunker shot or a high
(39:25):
pitch shot at all, so you've gotpeople where that part of the
game is the weakness.
Then you get some people whoare just overall, they need more
speed and that's going to helpthem with driving distance and
then not have to swing theirdriver hard and get it even
farther than they do now andthat's going to help their
approach game oh, yeah, exactlyuh.
So like you'd probably get likea group let's speed you up and
(39:48):
then a group of like short gameis.
The issue is probably peopleare just terrible at putting.
You'd end up with littleavatars, uh, but I don't think
out of 100 there's a hundreddifferent types of levels of
game.
I think you could.
You could end up having I don'tknow, maybe four or five like
(40:09):
prototype, eight handicaps andand you would have a different
approach to help each one,because if they're like 19 and
and really fast and have nophysical problems, you don't
have to like get them to do hipmobility work so that they can
just pivot properly like you goright into something.
(40:32):
That's probably more strategy.
I think the people have themental game as what's holding
them back.
They tend to have the most, notnot always, but there's more
correlation where they'rephysically gifted so they can do
anything.
Like you see him on range, yousee this guy can hit any shot
and so like those people, as acoach I think you've got to
(40:54):
handle so much differently thanthe person who's mentally
completely fine, like doesn'treally break down, but they've
got all kinds of like technicalswing things to work on.
Like those people are inopposite sides and a lot of
instruction is lot ofinstruction is like all
technical swing stuff.
So if you're a good player, alot of that would just make you
(41:16):
worse, and so if you want to, ifyou're listening to it, you're
like I don't want to hear allthis.
I don't even want to see myswing on video because it might,
I might not, like something inthere and they're probably
perfectionist there and they'reprobably perfectionist so like
it's.
It's that whole interviewprocess is critical and, knowing
your student if you're a proand I I come at this not as
(41:38):
someone who's ever taught butwho's talked to a couple
thousand teachers about whatthey do, and the older they get
the seems, the more they putinto really upfront
understanding what is really thelow-hanging fruit for this
person.
And then what's the domino Icould knock over?
(41:58):
And it'll knock over otherstuff, and I don't even have to
tell them that I did that.
They don't know.
That was my plan.
Speaker 2 (42:05):
So what you're saying , nick, is that it's a holistic
approach, it's not aone-size-fits-all solution.
Absolutely not, and that'sexactly what this podcast is all
about.
Speaker 3 (42:20):
Yeah, I mean, I think I like your philosophy.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yeah, you're going to do a real disservice to the
student as a teacher if youthrow them in the same in the
same methodology.
That'd be, that would be.
That'd be bad.
That would be bad, especiallyif the methodology is is being
taught to somebody.
(42:42):
I love what you said, nick,about you know, checking one's
mobility.
If you're trying to getsomebody to make a huge shoulder
turn and they're 60 years ofage and they've been at a desk
for 40 years or 35 years orwhatever, it's going to be hard
for them to do that.
So I really like thisconversation.
Boys, this is good stuff here.
(43:03):
Hopefully the folks that haveemailed me, hopefully this
answers some of your questionstoo, you know, and I do think
that.
So let me get this answers someof your questions too, and I do
think that.
So let me ask you guys aquestion.
What if there is, let's say,the let's throw this in there
this hypothetical question yougot a 45-year-old male who is a
(43:25):
professional, has an office job.
Just say, for example, he's anattorney and he's at a desk,
he's got some athleticism, he'san eight, nine handicap, he's a
member at a private club, he'sgot a couple kids, wife, uh, and
, and he it's.
It's really part of his life'spassion to get down to a scratch
(43:46):
um.
What do you guys think thatperson like what kind of
questions can he ask when he'sinterviewing coaches?
Like what if you're?
If you're, what kind ofquestions would you like?
Speaker 3 (44:00):
that's a great question.
Yeah, I mean what?
Speaker 1 (44:02):
what questions?
Speaker 3 (44:03):
would you go ahead when it comes to and this this
often is a question from parentswho say I need to hire a golf
coach, but I myself game thatwell.
So what do I ask to determineif someone's good at coaching?
And you know, a lot of it doescome down to old fashioned
(44:26):
social proof.
It's like who have you taught?
Have you uh tell like at a timethat you brought, what has been
your approach and have you hadsuccess in doing that, without
(44:47):
actually tell me about yourtrack record in helping someone
like me?
And I find that there arecharacteristics of golfers.
You know, I mean, justin,they're probably drawn to your
material because you do have alot of technical stuff, so let's
(45:08):
say, the engineering type, ormaybe a lot of people in in
medicine or in finance who are,if the player likes that, I
think they got.
A coach pays attention to thatkind of stuff, like collecting
(45:28):
stats or analyzing their game toreally figure out where are
they weakest, and so I would beasking how, how does the coach
look at stats and and determineif we're on track?
Am I getting better?
Because score, I don't.
I don't think score alwaystells you, especially in the
(45:49):
short term, whether you'remaking good changes, because I
get a lot of heat for this, butI think a lot of times you start
hitting your irons better, youwill start hitting more long,
and out here in California, ifyou're long on most courses it's
bad news.
(46:10):
I mean you're going to I wouldrather be 10 yards short than 10
yards long on almost every holethat I play out here so you
could, by collecting moreinformation.
I think if someone's reallyserious about it, it comes down
(46:30):
to really knowing, like, whathappened on each shot when, as
opposed to just is my handicapgoing up or down, and being able
to look at things like stroke.
I think is if the golfer is intothat kind of thing, you know
they they might come from itwith no interest at all and they
really hate technicalinformation and they need to be
(46:52):
matched up with a coach, in myopinion, who's more similar to
them.
You wouldn't put Bubba Watson,probably with Sean Ford.
I think you've got to have abit of a personality match and
understand how much informationis too much for this person and
(47:14):
if you're the golfer, you don'tlike that level of detail.
You probably shouldn't begetting a coach who has all
kinds of certifications and isreally into all the tools that
they've invested in.
You know there's um you.
You must see that just in termsof like the spectrum of
different type of pros I think Ithink I'm a parent myself of
(47:37):
two girls.
Speaker 2 (47:38):
If I were to get them to take long-term coaching, for
whatever activity, I thinkfirst the most important thing
for me is what's the characterof the teacher?
I, I don't need my girls goingto take lessons from an a-hole,
because think about this, right,do you want this person to
(47:59):
raise your kid?
Because essentially that's whatthey're doing for you,
especially talking aboutlong-term coaching.
So that's a.
For me, that's the mostimportant thing, and then after
that we can worry about thetechnicalities of it.
This is where I defer a littlebit uh from you, nick.
I think it's.
The onus is on parents to doresearch on their own.
(48:21):
They can't just like outsourcethe whole process to coaches and
say, hey, look, it's yours, you, you need to know a little bit
of what you're getting yourselfinto.
I think a lot of parentsdiscover that a little bit too
late.
Now I'm not saying that, hey,you're going to be a golf swing
expert, but I think you need tobe reasonably updated on what's
(48:42):
going on, and it's not difficultto find out information.
It's kind of the same thing,right, when you go ask an
investment professionalfinancial advisor should I buy
nvidia like that's a loadedquestion, man you need you.
You need to, you need to do yourown research first before you
go ask or discuss that issue andit I feel if you're trying to
(49:06):
groom your kid to be a decentgolfer, that's the basic thing
you need to do.
I think if you're trying togroom your kid to be a decent
golfer, that's the basic thingyou need to do.
I think if you, if a parentgoes, speak to a few golf
coaches, send emails, golfcoaches generally will respond,
generally, if it's, if you'renot going too deep in the weeds.
(49:27):
If a parent goes and sends like10 golf coaches on Instagram,
youtube, hey, what should I lookfor in a good coach?
Maybe this is the topic foranother podcast interview.
I think generally they willcome back with a few pointers
and that's where you start.
Speaker 3 (49:47):
Yeah, when you say the information's out there.
There's no doubt.
I think that's.
The problem, though, is there'sso much information and it's
very hard for people to filterit and know, and sometimes
absorbing more info is nothelpful, but it actually just
makes you unable to make adecision.
(50:08):
Or, in the case of peopleabsorbing swing information for
themselves, at a certain pointyou feel like I don't even know
what to do now.
I just watched two hours ofYouTube videos.
Speaker 2 (50:25):
Let me distill that a little bit.
Sure, there's a lot ofinformation.
You've got broad buckets liketechnology, you've got the
mental game, and then you've gotthe full swing technique.
And then I think the key thingthat most golf coaches are
deficient in is the art ofcommunication.
And that's the first thing thatparents have to ask, assuming
(50:47):
that this guy knows about golfswing technique, has social
proof.
And then it's about how do youcommunicate with kids of various
ages.
And you can see right, as anadult, when you speak to a golf
coach, if he can't explain hisphilosophy in a paragraph, he
probably doesn't really have asystem of organizing information
(51:12):
.
But if I say, hey, nick, whatdo you do for a living?
One, two sentences, in anutshell, your elevator pitch.
It shows me that you havethought about these things.
I'm an investment professional.
I would recommend you invest inNvidia because of one, two,
three.
(51:32):
If your financial circumstancesare X, y, z, I think that's a
good start.
Speaker 3 (51:41):
Yeah, it's a tough one.
Cause the prices, and is itovervalued, then that's the next
oh yeah.
And it's like well, no oneknows, Correct.
Speaker 2 (51:52):
So I think it's asking the right questions to
begin this web of questions,right?
And I think, well, for theparents out there, the key thing
is this, right?
Maybe to ask the instructor isthis right, do you have a
short-term, what's yourlong-term strategy and what's
the short-term tactic to get tothat long-term strategy?
(52:16):
And I think you want to hearthe coach say hey, I've got a
five-year, seven-year, 10-yearplan for your kid, because he's
five now and in a couple years,10 years time, he's going to be
at the peak of puberty.
His anatomical proportions aregoing to change.
So the swing is not going to befixed in stone, but at the same
(52:38):
time we're going to work onshort game, we're going to work
on this and that ball striking,because all these things are
critical to getting the ball inthe hole and the lowest number
of strokes.
So it's again, again, holistic.
It can't be simplified.
It can be made simple, but itcannot be simplified.
And that's the thing with mostissues in life how do I get rich
(53:00):
in the stock market?
It's not a one-size-fits-allanswer.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
Yeah, I mean, if you caught me on a different day and
you said, how do you interviewa coach, I might just say, look,
it's just an art form.
I don't even there's no good setof questions.
You just start talking to themand hope to gain an
understanding of do they checkall those boxes?
Do they seem to have goodcharacter from the conversation,
(53:29):
seem to have good characterfrom from the conversation, and
do I believe that they would,that they have ideas that are
organized, but I would say veryfew golf pros have put much
thought into like exactly theirmessaging.
Uh, now that many of them havewebsites and so that might have
been the first time that theyhad to put into words what they
(53:53):
believe or how they teach, and alot of times it's just
extremely vague information onthere that you couldn't really
distinguish them from anybodyelse.
World where most pros wouldrather just get a chance to talk
(54:13):
to the parent and, uh, justkind of let it flow naturally
and hope that they, they kind ofhit it off and have some
rapport.
That's really the what the pro,the pros who can build rapport
quickly, do well in the businessexactly.
Speaker 2 (54:26):
So goes back to what randy smith again guy in front
of you.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
Yeah, building rapport.
I think a key in sales.
It's like don't make the falseassumption about a person
without really hearing that likereally listen to them, because
if you don't, you might tellthem something that you think
that they would find importantbut they actually don't.
And so you're like kind ofbarking up the wrong tree with
them, or you're you're coachingscotty scheffler in a first
(55:00):
lesson and his parents aresitting there and you're trying
to tell him like that his feetshould not move at all, and and
you're, um, you're automaticallyshowing that you're kind of
like have a method, I think.
I think a lot of parents arewary of cookie cutter method
instruction at this point we'recoming up on the hour mark nick.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
What are some?
Who are some of the marqueenames that have presented at
Open Forum?
Speaker 3 (55:35):
Well, I would say, going back to the first real
event that we had was the secondOpen Forum, because we had
speakers.
So we were heavy biomechanicsfor that one, biomechanics for
that one.
So we had Dr Rob Neal, dr MikeDuffy, dr Phil Cheatham and
(56:03):
Sasho McKenzie went last.
So that was kind of our firsttime where we had a program and
then we had these two panels.
They were way too big.
I think I had 11 guys on thefirst panel and I have actually,
because I found that videorecently, I think I have them in
front of me.
It was tyler farrell, fredericktuxon, scott cowks, rob holding
(56:33):
, brady riggs, andrew rice,sasha was up there, uh, ea,
tishler, that was one panel atopen forum too.
Then we we had one at openforum six.
I think you've seen thosevideos yeah we had brandon
chamblee.
Speaker 2 (56:51):
Ledbetter was on there oh, that was good man,
that one was excellent grantweight.
Speaker 3 (56:57):
Brad faxon uh butch, uh, butch harman, the third, it
was on that one.
So you know we we've had a lotof the biomechanics present
where they weren't really thatwell known.
Like dr kwan, presented at openforum three just about 10 years
ago uh, this was right whenchris was starting work with
(57:19):
tiger woods and like a lot wasseeming to be developing to kind
of elevate instruction and Ifelt like it was a pivotal time
there and a lot of people hadnever seen Kwan present.
And then now, years later,there's a lot have have gone and
(57:39):
studied and done advanced stuffwith Kwan and in golf
biomechanics We've had ScottLynn from swing catalyst.
So so to me like a big name,maybe a different version than a
typical person, because a lotof people to them like when I'm
(58:00):
at the PGA show I don't payattention to the tour pros, I
walk right by them and I'll goshake hands with a teacher that
I like or a PhD.
So I'm not really I don'treally think in terms of like
the famous guys.
It's more like the people whoare really deep into golf swing
(58:23):
instruction and science in a waythat's probably excessive for
almost everybody else, like Iwould not want anyone to learn
at the level of detail that Ihave, and I wouldn't even say
it's helped me in my own gamevery much.
In fact it's probably hurtingme, to be honest, it's, but it's
more for the information.
It's just, it never ends Like.
(58:45):
I wake up every day and I justkind of obsessed over golf, golf
instruction and especially thefull swing well, you're meant to
be an evangelist for the gamethat's right, I think I.
I I'm an evangelist over theidea of improvement and I'm a
(59:06):
realist of I know how hard itactually is, so I have
tremendous respect for golfteachers who have the patience
to spend like an entire daytrying to make people better,
which I can never have thepatience to do.
You guys have to develop acoaching method that can be
(59:30):
sustained over many, many years,and so that's for your own
mental health you have to figurethat out.
Speaker 2 (59:35):
My method changes all the time depending on who's in
front of me.
Man, yeah, but I always deferto getting the guy's confidence.
If he's slicing the hell out ofthe ball, I'm going to make him
hook it, get the buy-in andthen say, hey guy, we've got the
(59:57):
ball flight sorted out.
But in the midterm, these arewhat you've got to work on
Mobility, for example, changethat shitty grip.
Maybe you've got to changeequipment shaft's too heavy, too
light, too flexible, whateverthe case may be.
So last question for for me,nick what's the biggest lesson
(01:00:18):
you've taken away from all thistime in open forum?
What's the one big lesson thatyou've taken away?
Speaker 3 (01:00:29):
and put me on the spot.
Um, if I had to think of it interms of and I hate to get in
the weeds on a question likethat, but it would probably be
just understanding in a golfswing, like how important it is
for the, the lead side of thebody to be able to create some
(01:00:49):
stability for the person to beable to push off of and swing
around, um, and so a lot of thatis just coming from that lead
foot and the way it interactswith the ground and how you use
that with the rest of your body.
Uh, I'm still kind of trying tofigure out how to do that as a
(01:01:12):
player, but I found, likelearning, that it makes a lot of
the other stuff that you see interms of motion makes sense
when you see the ultimate goalof, like why people are like
spiking that vertical groundreaction force vector with that
lead foot early in the downswing, what it does, what it allows
(01:01:37):
you to do.
Probably not your typicalanswer, but that's my answer.
Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
No, that's true.
I think a lot of golfers areweak on the lead side, given
that it's their non-don,generally not.
They're not not their dominantside.
So it makes a lot of sense.
And high level golfers, overthe years I've noticed that
their lead side tends to bebigger, more developed than the
trail side so big lesson thereyeah, I consider it gives you
(01:02:11):
permission to rotate hard.
Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
If you don't have that pressure on the lead side,
you can't really rotate.
Speaker 2 (01:02:19):
And it's hard to hit solid shots off of your trail.
Foot, trail side Can be done,but very, very rare.
Speaker 3 (01:02:32):
Yeah, and a lot of times it looks like a moment
where their left foot iscompletely off the ground and
then maybe, maybe they finishheavily on the trails.
So the assumption is, oh,they're, they're like a trail
side player, but they were sohard on their lead side it
launched them into the air onthat side, and so it gives a lot
(01:02:54):
of people the wrong impression,like that there's golfers out
there not using their trail sideall that much, which I don't
think there's any player who,unless you have no front leg at
all, you're gonna gonna postinto that and use that as the
basis of the whole swing.
Speaker 2 (01:03:12):
Indeed.
Where can our listeners findout more about Open Forum?
Openforumgolfcom.
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