February 15, 2024 • 49 mins
Embark on an enlightening exploration of the greens with Michael Dutro, joined by the esteemed Salima Musani, former pro golfer and the current head coach of Team Canada's women's team. In a narrative woven with personal trials and victories, Salima opens up about her transformative journey from a competitive player to a coach with a mission. Her tale is not just about golf swings and tournament wins; it's a story that goes beyond the fairways, delving into the heart of resilience and the art of nurturing future champions.
As we tee off into the technological revolution within golf, we debate the pros and cons of data's dominance in shaping athletes. I share firsthand insights from the PGA show, reflecting on how modern tools are sculpting the game and whether they're restricting the creative spark that is essential to the sport. Together with Salima, we ponder the balance of embracing tech to refine skills while preserving the raw, intuitive essence that makes each golfer unique. Listen in for a candid discussion on the delicate dance between embracing innovation and maintaining the authentic spirit of the sport.
Rounding out our discussion, we take a mental approach to the game, considering the strategies that separate the casual player from the seasoned pro. Salima and I navigate through the psychological landscapes of golf, from the quiet focus needed to outmaneuver challenges to the discipline young minds acquire from this age-old game. Whether you're a golfer seeking a competitive edge or simply a fan of the game, join us as we connect the dots between mental agility, strategic thinking, and the pursuit of excellence both on the course and in life.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hello and welcome to another episode of the measured
golf podcast, where I, michaelDutro, sit down and talk all
things golf with some amazingguests.
And today we are very fortunatebecause not only has this
person had amazing success beinga coach, but also amazing
success as a player as well,including winning not only at
the junior level, but also atthe college level and
(00:28):
professional level.
So this person, without a doubt, is no stranger to doing
amazing things with a golf clubin her hand, and she has done an
amazing job helping a lot ofyoung golfers out there as well
with being the head coach forthe Team Canada women's team.
So, without further ado, we'vegot Salima Musani from Team
(00:49):
Canada today and we're veryfortunate.
Salima, would you like to sayhello?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Yeah, no problem, thanks.
Thanks for having me, michael,and yeah, excited to see where
this conversation goes.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Yeah, I think it's going to be fun.
I mean, I was kind ofintroduced to you through some
of the players that you workwith at Michigan and some of the
influence that you have fromTeam Canada's perspective, and
I've really kind of been blownaway since I got to know you.
I think it's really cool whatyou do and I think your story is
incredible.
I mean, it's never easy toachieve and it's even harder
(01:24):
when you have other obstacles inyour way, and I mean you've
just kind of really had thiscool career to where you've had
success at just about everylevel.
That's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, I mean, it's part of the journey.
I feel very, very fortunatethat golf entered my life and
the places it's taken meObviously never would have
thought this is where I'd end up, but it all makes sense at the
end of the day.
Yeah, as a player, as a juniorgolfer, the dream was obviously
the LPGA and I got a littletaste of that through my playing
(01:55):
career.
And now, you know,circumstances have brought me
into the coaching world and,yeah, I haven't really looked
back.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Have you got to the point yet where you're ready to
say whether you enjoyed being aplayer or a coach more, or are
you still kind of figuring thatout?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, there's moments , I mean, I definitely miss
playing.
There's definitely momentswhere I wish I could still be
playing and be out there withdoing what these girls are doing
.
But I know my health kind ofholds me back from that and I
have tried.
I did quit coaching the firsttime when I was in Stanford to
go play again and I had toswallow that big pill and really
(02:34):
get the.
I was like that's fine, it'slike you really just can't do
this anymore.
But I tried.
I gave it everything I had andI fought through the highs and
the lows and I brought all thatwealth of experience and all the
things I went through into whatI'm doing today.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
It's really tough, though, right, I mean, I think
what you're talking aboutdoesn't get talked about enough
with athletes and it's like youknow, we all have the dreams of
winning majors and like makingmillions of dollars and all of
that.
But at the end of the day, veryfew of us do that and most of
us unfortunately kind of have toretire before we're ready, if
you will, because we can't keepthe skill level up or the output
(03:14):
level where we need it to be tocompete.
And it's really tough, I think,I mean especially if that
athlete doesn't know what thenext thing is going to be for
them.
So I'm kind of curious did, atthe end of that second stint of
your playing career where youkind of knew like you were done
for good this time, maybe didyou kind of think about going
into coaching slightlydifferently than you had before
(03:34):
and like, hey, now I'm actuallygoing to like devote my time to
being a coach, or was therereally no thought to that and
you just kind of changed roles?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I actually, once I stopped playing I didn't
go directly to coaching.
I actually went down a coupleother avenues.
I went and did some businessdevelopment at a startup, I
became a financial advisor, Iworked in the hotel business, I
did a few really random thingsand I was just teaching on the
(04:04):
side because people knew I was agolfer and I obviously had been
coaching at Stanford.
So I was just teaching in theevenings for fun, and then it's
all.
I got back into it by the way.
Yeah, I was just doing it forfun, to satisfy a few people
basically, and I quicklyrealized that, like this is
(04:24):
where my passion is.
I mean, I've invested so muchof my life into like getting
myself better.
I know what it takes, I knowthe steps and, yeah, just the
balance kind of just shifted.
The lessons were here and thefinancial advising work was
heavier and then it just slowlytipped and I was having way more
fun being at the driving rangeand I was getting a lot more
(04:45):
referrals.
I didn't have to do those coldcalls, I didn't have to chase
people to like sign thedocuments and make a deal.
Yeah, it was kind of a in thatway.
It was a slow but quicktransition.
I did that other stuff for acouple of years before I just
gave it up fully.
But yeah, it's been so.
(05:05):
To answer your question, Ididn't really think about it, it
just kind of happened.
But I have, in the process I'vedefinitely grown a lot.
I've learned a lot more.
When I first started teaching,I was very like teaching kind of
just my own ways and what Iwhen I knew and thought.
Since then I've learned a lot.
I watch everything, you pick upbits here and there you learn
(05:26):
from different people and kindof create your own style.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
How much of you the weird question maybe, but like
how much do you think you'vegrown personally, as you've kind
of grown as a coach, and what Imean by that is I'll use myself
as an example I kind of had mythoughts about myself and
everything as a young man andthen, as I became more competent
at coaching and learned morethings, like that growth mindset
(05:52):
kind of bled into my personallife too and like I really was
able to find myself and find myhappiness through coaching, kind
of like you're describing.
I'm wondering if you didn'tkind of have a similar
experience that way.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, I think definitely the growth mindset is
I mean, never mind as a coach,but as an athlete, as a human
having a growth mindset isabsolutely necessary.
But yeah, I think that I'vedefinitely in my personal life,
I am always learning, I'm alwaystrying, I'm trying.
(06:25):
I was growing.
I do a lot of volunteer workwith my community and, yeah,
definitely having a growthmindset, I have to work with a
lot of different people.
You have to come up with lotsof ideas, strategies, put on
events.
But yeah, it's definitelysomething that I kind of
incorporate in my whole life andit's important to have that,
(06:49):
just as a human trying to getbetter.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Yeah, I mean, and that's what you know, I just got
back from the PGA show a coupleof weeks ago and you know you
know me, selima you're probablytalking to one of the biggest
golf geek nerd guys out thereand I love data and I love all
the tech and I use it nonstop.
But at the same time it's like Ikind of feel like that growth
mindset is almost gettingstripped out of the game a
(07:14):
little bit, because so manypeople are trying to force so
many young players into theseboxes and like hey, you got to
produce this data set to be agood golfer and we know that.
You know, at the highest oflevels there's so much variance
and there isn't truly one waythat they all go about doing it.
So I'm just kind of curious,like you know, what do you see
(07:36):
looking at it?
Because you kind of get to lookat it from a lot larger
viewpoint than most.
You know, working with TeamCanada.
But like, where do you kind ofsee like golf development going
right now, selima?
Like you, do you think it'smoving in a positive direction?
Do you think we're actuallyhaving a positive impact or do
you think we're using thetechnology in a way to where
maybe we're not helping as muchas we could be.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
That's a really good question.
I think if we just look at golfin general and golf growth and
development, it has changed aton, even from the time when I
was a junior right If we go back30 years, you know we didn't
have Trackman, we didn't haveBushnells, we didn't have, we
had to trust the sprinkler headson the ground.
We had to look at our ballflight, we had to make the
(08:20):
adjustments and figure out whatto do, not based on club path
and attack angles and faceangles and spin rates and all
that good stuff.
You know low points, but we hadto figure it out on our own.
And so I think a lot of thelearning is lost with the
Trackman and I think for us ascoaches, it's our duty to, you
know, continue to make ourplayers learn, the ones who are
(08:44):
becoming successful to be honest, I like to call them, like, the
expert learners and then youknow, the key ingredient to
being an expert learner is againcoming back to the original
question is growth mindset, Imean being flexible enough and
knowing, and so I think some ofthe onus.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Oh, you're right.
I mean you got to have somefailure mixed in there.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Yeah, I mean our men's national coach told me
this quote while back, DerekIngram, and he said success
leaves clues, and I mean you canuse that at all different
levels, right?
Success by winning a tournament, success in hitting the shot
you want, Success in carryingout a habit?
I mean there's ways in which weget these things done.
(09:29):
Everybody has their own way,and I mean sometimes for some
players the box approach mightbe the way and it might get them
, you know, to the level that isthe highest for them.
But I think that there's a.
There's definitely some onus onus coaches to challenge our
players and to let them fail,like you're saying.
Let them fail, let them learnthe hard way, let them challenge
(09:51):
them, make them frustrated.
But you definitely have tothink outside the box a little
bit, because if the girls arenot learning and you're just
telling them what to do, you'regoing to hit a plateau at some
point where they become toodependent or they don't have a
way to make those fixes on theirown.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
What I see a lot of.
I see a lot of dependency onthe tech to tell them what went
wrong, and I think, maybestealing a little bit from what
you just said, I think thereason for that perhaps is
because, to your point, theydon't have to dig it out of the
dirt, so like they get thatinstantaneous feedback oh okay,
(10:34):
this is how I do it.
And because they didn't have tofigure that out on their own
and go through that process oflearning, they don't really
they're not nearly as welladjusted for when it goes a
little awry, maybe.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Yeah, and I mean look the track man and the data.
It makes practice more efficient, like let's be honest, right,
Like I don't have to go andspend an hour hitting balls to
figure something out and fiveswings I mean, you don't need to
really hit more than five ballsto know what the pattern is,
and especially for an eliteplayer.
So I think that efficiency isdefinitely improved and I think
(11:08):
that's why you're seeing moreand more good golfers, because
they're just learning quicker.
I mean, they're getting better,faster because of technology,
agreed, but yeah, I think whenit comes to high level, elite
performance, you need to be ableto make adjustments.
I mean, on the PGA Tour, lpgaTour, the players that are
winning are the ones that makethe best adjustments the
(11:29):
quickest, and you have to.
Golf is not a game of perfect.
We all know that.
You're not going to go outthere and hit all every shot
exactly how you wanted to, andso being able to, you know,
create shots, being able to makethose adjustments, those are
all things you have to dooutside of the technical.
You know, machine.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
That's what I think it gets lost in the sauce coach.
And what I mean by that is likeI had Kevin Rhodes on who's the
men's coach at Harvard and wewere talking about his players
and we were kind of talkingabout how, like because they're
people that are at Harvard likethere's certain things you don't
have to tell them.
Like you don't have to tell akid that goes to Harvard to
(12:12):
study Like they, that alreadycomes with the territory right.
So like he doesn't have tonecessarily, even though grades
are very, very important atHarvard, he doesn't necessarily
have to tell those kids how tomake those grades because that
already goes.
Like that's just one of thosecore competencies that you have
to have to be there and at yourlevel, I would imagine and I
certainly don't want to putwords in your mouth, but when
(12:34):
you're looking at players andevaluating, like I can't imagine
that you're like leaning overto see the track man.
I can't imagine that you'rewanting to see the force plate
graphs, Like you're out therewatching them play, and I think
that that's really what'sgetting lost right now is
there's a million kids out therethat can go out and shoot.
A million shoot even par.
(12:54):
I see it all the time If youlook at AJGA fields, there's
always like a ton of kids rightaround par but then they don't
really learn how to take thatnext step per se right To where
they start breaking par prettyregularly.
So I'm just kind of curiouslike where is the disconnect and
where are?
Where are we as coaches needingto elevate our games to where
(13:14):
we can change this narrativewith junior golfers, to where
it's not about having perfectdata?
That's great, Like we need tosee some good stuff there, but
we also need to learn how to goout and play and be creative and
be responsive and being able tolike emotionally regulate on a
golf course, Like I think thatskills kind of overlooked a lot.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Yeah, I mean, sending your players out to play is key
, whether it's just in practiceor playing competition,
especially at the junior level.
It's definitely, definitelyimportant.
And you know the work thatwe've done with Ian Highfield
and Zach Parker with the game,like training and like pushing
the girls and challenging them,putting them through things that
(13:54):
are frustrating, things, thatare hard, things that they don't
want to do or that they're likeyou know this is too much or
you know it's that's part of it.
Right, forcing them to havethese emotions and forcing them
to feel these things is part ofthe growth.
It's part of the plan notmaking them want to do it, but
this stuff is all important,it's all like it's necessary for
(14:20):
growth, it's necessary forlearning and that's where the
transference comes, because whenthey're on the golf course and
they're playing for theirNational Amateur Championship or
they're playing at the US Open,they're going to have feelings
and they're going to havesensations that they haven't
practiced.
But if they have an idea of howto handle these and manage
these, then you know they're onestep ahead of the next person.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
So, like you know, kind of like we were talking
about earlier, salima, you knowso many kids I think especially
in my space, to where I'mindoors you know they kind of
know what they want thesenumbers to be and when they,
when they create those numbersright, because we're in a
simulated environment andthey're calm they get the result
that they're expecting.
But then they go out onto thegolf course, right, and they
(15:05):
more or less feel like, hey, Idid everything I was supposed to
do and then the shot didn'twork out and it's like, okay,
well, there's more to playinggolf than just hitting a golf
ball, right.
So you know, what is it that wecan do to try to simulate
better transference of skillsand better training that leads
to better tournament results?
Getting them onto the golfcourse, I mean, how do we go
(15:27):
about doing this, do you think?
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, this is a great thing.
This is what affects thetransference and being able to
meet the moment, so to speak.
Right, that's what we're doingis training our players to meet
the moment.
We don't know when thatmoment's going to come, what
it's going to be, but we canhelp to prepare them for those
moments, and a lot of that'sgoing to come through creating
(15:52):
the spacing effect, creatingcontext, the psychological
pressures.
These are all things that ifyou don't have the context Ian
Highfield once gave the exampleof you're training for a
triathlon you're not going topractice swimming in a bathtub.
That's not the context, right?
So through giving them thesegame-like training simulation
(16:14):
situations, they're able to feelwe can set it up where they're
competing against each other,you can set it up with a time
limit and have a goal.
But it helps them to just getoff the driving range flat, lie
same condition over and over,and it forces them to move
around.
It forces them to createspacing.
(16:35):
So hitting 14 drivers on thedriving range in a row is not
transferable, because we don'tever do that, we don't ever get
a chance to hit the 14 shots.
So their principle of learningis all about losing a feeling
and recalling it.
So, as you're doing, let's sayyou have a player, you want them
to do a combine on Trackman,instead of just doing the
(16:55):
combine and hitting 10, 12, 15iron shots, spread it out, set
the Trackman up, have them hit adriver through a gate that you
create.
Come to the combine, hit theapproach shot, go hit a chip or
go hit a putt.
Come back, hit the drive, gohit your second shot on the
combine.
So now, when you get your finalcombine results, it's a little
(17:17):
more realistic of what theywould do in a tournament versus.
Okay, I've now hit 15 iron shotsin a row.
I have a feeling I'm just goingto keep recreating this over
and over with my four iron, myeight iron, my wedge.
It's forcing them to lose itand come back and recall it,
which, as we know, is what theyhave to do on the golf course.
So for us that's been a gamechanger, just introducing this
(17:41):
into their practice.
Some of them love it, some ofthem hate it.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
I'm.
You know, I'm fortunate enoughto be a Trackman master and I
own several Trackman units andI've always been dead set
against the combine.
I don't like it, and the reasonI don't like it is because it
puts the target score out there.
That's not achievable and Idon't like doing something to
where the failure rates 100% ofthe time.
So for me, like we've createdcombines but we create a free to
(18:05):
individual player based off howfar they hit it, which, in our
opinion, is way moretransferable than just, you know
, having kids do a test thatthey can't.
You know, for some of my kidsto hit a shot 180 yards, you
know they're hitting a freakinghybrid.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
Yeah, yeah, or a free one.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Or they're a driver and it's kind of wild.
So at the end of the day, Ilike what you're saying there
and the thing I'm the mostcurious about is you said
something really cool there,which was meet the moment, and I
think that that's a really areally big thought.
But I think it's a thought thatreally doesn't get enough
daylight with.
(18:40):
Training athletes right ispreparing them for what's going
to happen.
And we don't know what's goingto happen.
We don't know the experienceand the emotions that they're
going to have.
But if we give them ways oflearning how to manage these
things, then they can meet thatmoment and adjust to that moment
.
So I'm kind of curious from aplaying perspective.
You've played on some prettydarn big stages and you've won a
(19:02):
lot.
I mean, were you prepared forevery single moment out there,
selima, or did a few things?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
sneak up?
Absolutely not, absolutely not.
I mean I could tell a story ofyou know, my win on the Epson
tour back in the day.
It was the major.
I definitely was not ready forit.
I lost my breakfast on thedriving range.
You know, I actually did mycaddy like dragged the pyramid
(19:32):
of balls and like just coveredit up and was like, okay, let's
keep going.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, it's, you know that's what happened right right
before you threw up Selima,like what was going through your
head.
I'm curious.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Like I was.
I was feeling I don't rememberexactly.
I was remember us feeling likeunsettled, Like normally for me.
I'm nervous.
I show up at the golf course.
As soon as I hit a putt or hita shot, I'm settled.
I'm like back in my element.
I'm like, okay, I know how todo this.
All the thoughts and dreams oflike I'm never going to, I'm not
going to know how to hit a golfball when I get out there, you
know, like all these things usedto cross my mind.
I remember very, very clearlyand then, as soon as I'd hit a
(20:08):
ball on the range, I'm like, ohyeah, I know exactly what I'm
doing.
Like what, what was I freakingout about?
But that morning in particular,it was the fourth round.
It was a, the only four roundtournament.
It was the major on the back.
Then it was the futures tour,but on the Epson.
And, yeah, I remember going totee up the first ball, Like I'd
been scraping irons and warmingup.
(20:28):
And then I went to tee up athree wood and I, like you know,
bent over to tee it up and boomlike that was it.
But I mean, I felt much betterafter and I just kind of moved
on.
But I wasn't like I wasn'tpsychologically ready to meet
that moment, like I didn't havea sports performance person, I
didn't have anybody helping me.
(20:49):
My coach at the time, seanFoley, had actually left a
voicemail at the pro shopbasically saying like you've
worked your whole life, you'renot going to lose your skills
overnight.
You still have everythingyou've ever had, like go do your
thing.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
And that was kind of the I'm like Sean.
I mean, that sounds pretty muchspot on like Sean.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Yeah, that was the validation that we need.
I need it Right.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
I know what I'm doing during the round.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Just another day.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Did you think about that message from Sean?
Speaker 2 (21:22):
I don't remember specifically, but I'm sure I did
.
I remember having one swingthought out.
I still remember that swingthought I had that day and I,
yeah, I just kind of went outthere and did my thing and
trusted, and you know, you kindof I don't even remember telling
myself like, oh, you're, you'vebeen preparing for this whole
moment your whole life, but itjust kind of happens.
(21:42):
It just kind of happened andbut now, now we have all the
parameters right, like we know,we can kind of set them up, we
can recreate them, we can helpthe girls to to find these ways
of excelling.
But like I remember seeing NickDunlap's interview a couple of
weeks ago when he won, and Ithink he said like I couldn't
(22:03):
feel my feet, I couldn't feel myhands, I couldn't feel my face,
like how you can't prepare forthat.
You just, you just cannotprepare for that and all you can
do is have routines and havestrategies you know to to get
back All you had out there.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Slema, was you right?
Like I mean, you found a way.
Like, yeah, you're right, youdidn't have any of those things,
but yet you still somehow founda way, and it's.
It's not because you weren'tprepared.
You didn't know exactly whatyou were going to have
experienced, but at the sametime, like you had all these
other experiences to draw off ofright, and that's what kind of
prepared you to get you throughthat.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah, and I mean back , the way we prepped back then
and the way we're preparing nowis different, but it was a way
of preparation, right.
It was getting yourself readyand getting yourself.
You know we used to do thehere's the putt to win the US
Open, and you know we still dothings like that.
But we can, we can create moreenergy around it.
But back then that's what wedid.
(22:59):
Right, you play a chip withyour, your dad or your friends
and it's like okay, this is forthis.
Or you know the old school,let's play for lunch.
Something that means somethingto you is really important.
If you're, if you put that onthe line and it means something
to you, you're going toexperience things inside of you
that you wouldn't if you werejust.
You know playing for braggingrights.
(23:19):
So you know, whatever that isfor each player, whatever that,
whatever we can do to kind ofextrapolate that and have them
feel that and again, it's a it'sa good balance and mix of like
frustrating the heck out of them, making really hard depending
on the time of the year, thetime of the week relative to a
(23:39):
tournament, and then also, youknow, making it easy and
achievable at times where youknow it's.
We're getting ready right topeak and we want them to feel
confident, we want them to besuccessful, we want the goals to
be achievable and all that kindof stuff.
So you can, you can vary thechallenges depending on the time
of year and, yeah, we just hopethat when they, when they reach
(24:01):
that moment, they're able toperform.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
That's.
I mean that's awesome, it's notsurprising.
I mean there's so much goodstuff that you're putting out
there.
And I hope my big goal for thisis that some parents of some
junior players kind of hear thisand kind of hear what we're
trying to say, which is there'snothing wrong with going out
there and playing a bunch ofgolf and failing a whole lot and
not winning tournaments,because you've got to do those
(24:27):
things before you can wintournaments.
There's really, in my opinion,no shortcut to it.
I've been very fortunate andworked with some children who
won a lot of things at an earlyage and they didn't continue to
win.
And sometimes it works that wayand sometimes young people that
don't win early on win later on.
But I think the important thingthat you've talked a lot about
(24:49):
is like kind of understandingwho that player is,
understanding what theirmotivators are.
You know everybody and I knowyou know this, but everybody's
completely different.
Not everybody can go out thereand be completely stoic and
perform very well, right?
Not everybody has that Tigergene.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
So I mean high performance.
High performers are unique.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
That's the way it is my favorite thing I always hear.
I forget who said it.
I want to say it was BrettMcCabe, but I don't think it was
Brett.
But somebody said that everyperson on the PGA tour that
plays golf is at least twoclicks off standard deviation in
some way.
And I believe that because I'veworked with just enough of them
now that they all are veryeccentric in their own way.
(25:31):
But I think that you kind ofhave to become very eccentric in
a certain way to kind ofunderstand yourself enough to
perform at the level that thesemen and women do.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah, I mean I think there's just on our national
team.
I mean you have all differentpersonalities, you have all
different styles of learning,you have all different ball
striking types.
You have, you know, the bombers, you have the shorter hitters.
They're all successful.
I mean there's no, there's noone recipe as to what's going to
(26:02):
make somebody.
You know, have that secretsauce and, like you said, it
doesn't.
Really there's no set recipeLike if you have this ball speed
and you have this, this, this,you're going to be successful.
The intangible stuff is thestuff it's hard for us to teach.
We can help to bring it out,but I can't, I definitely can't
(26:23):
teach self motivation.
I can't teach their own valuesystems right, Like that stuff
is all built into who they arealready.
So it's, you know, harnessingthose things and trying to
figure out what are, what arethe pieces that are going to
move them to the next level.
Everybody has their own style,Everybody has their own comfort
(26:44):
levels.
Pushing boundaries sometimescan be dangerous, but we have to
just figure that out as we goalong.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
That.
I mean, I think that's true,right, but the figuring it out
part you said a great quoteearlier, right, success leaves
clues.
You know it's.
It's not on this linear lineand it's not on this upward
graph either.
It's somewhere in between that.
And I think that if you, if youperiodize with your players and
you actually put things on acalendar and then you actually
(27:16):
start tracking things, like youcan actually begin to understand
kind of where that player is,because you know, as you know,
you know one week's a greattournament, we hope the next
week's a great tournament, butsometimes it's a bad tournament.
And like, how do wedifferentiate those two things?
Like how do we actually takeaway learning from the bad
performance?
Do we just like try to protect,you know, their confidence at
(27:37):
all costs and say, hey, let'snot pay attention to that, or do
we kind of try to get out alittle bit ahead of that and
kind of dig into the data andtry to differentiate?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
Yeah, you know, one of the biggest skills that's
also lost these days is thatskill of reflection, journaling,
reflection, stats.
It's so key like stats are onething, but the journal and the
reflection on their part, thedebriefing after around, you
know being able to be a littlemore objective than subjective.
(28:08):
You know if you walk off 18 andyou just three putt, you might
think you're the world's worstputter, when actually it's, you
know, could be your approachplay that day that left you with
all the 50 footers that thatpushed you.
So you know taking the time andeffectively debriefing around,
effectively journaling, spendingtime.
(28:32):
You know whether it's a greatday or a tough day.
What were your emotions?
How did you handle them?
Would you have made somedifferent decisions?
You know there's so manydifferent ways.
You can go kind of down thoseoctopus tentacles to answer
those questions, but reallydigging deep, because a lot of
players will debrief and justsay, yeah, I had a good day.
(28:54):
It was, you know, I hit theball.
Well, I'm going to go work onmy putting.
It's like, okay, that's greatYou're reflecting, but like dig
deeper.
Like how deep can you dig?
So pushing the girls to reallylike, reflect and think about
what's what's going to actuallymake them better.
And, like you said, like takingthe good rounds and really
really like analyzing the heckout of those ones and the rough
(29:19):
ones.
Yeah, you have to set some ofit aside, but there's always
learnings.
Like, if you can't takesomething away from every
experience, it's kind of lost inthe matter, right?
So, and I'm a big believer thatlike process, process, process,
like what we do every day inand out, that's where you get
your confidence.
You know shooting saying, oh,if I shoot like under par, I'm
(29:41):
going to be confident again.
Well, that's just not going tohappen.
Um, you got to.
You got to actually dosomething to get there.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
So, uh, the process is super main tape, I mean.
I call them with the kids,because the thing that drives me
nuts and it happens all thetime and I know you know this
went real well.
You get a, you get a youngperson out there, or even just a
person playing golf in general,and they get to where they're
having a really great round.
There's six, seven, eight holesinto this thing.
There may be a couple under par, maybe they've never done that
(30:11):
before, but like, they get tothat point and then all of a
sudden, like the entirenarrative flips in their head
and they end up shooting like 76, 77, right.
And it's like when you teachpeople that everything they do
is a process and then you getthem to actually practice those
processes and understand them,then you kind of realize in that
moment, when you're seven,eight holes into it and you're a
(30:33):
few under par, hey, myprocesses have led me to this
position.
It's my processes that I'mdoing right now that are
creating all the good results.
This is great.
I just have to keep doing myprocesses and I'm going to be
fine.
And now all of a sudden, likeyou're positive instead of being
fearful of oh my God, I'm goingto lose this at any moment.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Cause you don't start thinking of outcome.
Right, that's the problem.
They start.
Oh God, I'm four under, fiveunder now.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
What now Right but?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
yeah, I mean that's.
That's a whole nother side ofit, right, learning how to
separate and not think ofoutcome and again be so, so
entrenched in what you're doingthat whatever happens at the end
of it is just the result.
That's a whole nother skill set.
Yeah, it's hard, it's hard, ithappens to the best of us, I
(31:21):
mean, even if you're Tiger Woodsor whomever, like it doesn't
matter, Like it's going to, thethought's going to creep into
your head.
Um, and then how?
What you do with that, whetheryou put up the shield of armor
or you welcome it, like you knoweverybody, everybody's going to
manage that differently, butyou have to have a plan for both
right.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Like you have to be willing to go either way with it
, because some days maybe theone option isn't available to
put up the armor and not thinkabout it.
And I strongly disagree withthe idea that, like people you
know can't think about theirscore.
Well, they told me that foryears and then every time I
would think about my score Iwould feel shame and like that
didn't help either.
So, like you know, it's likeyou're going to think about it
(32:03):
probably.
What do you do about it whenyou think about the score is the
score.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
I mean a strategy that I use, and I've done this
for a long time.
What I'm not watching myplayers when we're just
practicing, I just use numbers.
So there's no.
The word par, birdie, bogeynever comes out of my mouth.
I've done this for so long thatit's just the way it is.
So if I'm watching a girl playI was just in Florida watching
(32:28):
one of my players and she makesa birdie on a par three I just
be like great to nice, to.
Sometimes you make excuse me,sometimes you make a good six.
I mean, sometimes I made abunch of them.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I mean, they're just numbers.
As soon as you attach a word tothem, there's negative
connotations, there's negativeemotions, there's judgment.
A number is a number.
You add numbers up, they'rejust numbers.
So that's something that I'vealways done.
I don't even know that myplayers maybe realize it or
notice it, but it's just the wayI've always been and I think
(33:10):
it's important.
I think that's one step in,like detaching from.
The result is it's a number and, like I said, you might hit an
OB on a T and make a five on apar four.
It's a great five.
It's a great five.
You don't have to worry aboutthe OB, you just made a great
five, move on.
So there's a lot of differentways to think about it and I
(33:34):
don't know.
It's just strategies, right,mike?
At the end of the day it'shaving strategies, trying them,
practicing them, see what works,what's the stick?
Yeah, what helps you to kind ofquiet the noise in your head in
those moments that you canperform.
But you got to have strategies.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Yeah, and I mean I think that the thing that kind
of frustrates me is I think somany golfers can hit one out of
a thousand right, like they canhit a shot that kind of looks
good and kind of feels good andall that stuff.
And they assume with the typesof players that you deal with
that it comes so easily to themand that's why they shoot these
(34:15):
crazy scores, but it's like it'sreally really difficult and
they make it look really reallyeasy.
And the reason that it appearsto be easy is because they
practice these skills and thesesystems so much that, to your
point, it just kind of becomesprocesses that they learn how to
do.
So I think that that's reallythe thing that people lose sight
(34:37):
of sometimes is the fact thatyou know to make it look easy.
There's a lot of work that goesinto it.
Golf is not an easy game.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
You're going to lose in golf more than you're ever
going to win, and you have toknow, behind every person that
wins that week, there are a lotof learnings that happened
before that.
There's a lot of failures,however you want to call it,
there's a lot of detractors,there's a lot of backward steps,
there's a lot of upward steps.
I mean, we know how this isLike behind every win, there's a
(35:10):
wealth of experience and, asI'm saying, like their ability
to reflect and learn from allthese.
That's the quicker you're goingto get these successful results
.
If you're not journaling andyou're not learning or
reflecting and you're just goingweek to week, it's going to be
a longer span, most likely.
If we were to, you know, testcase a bunch of people to where
(35:32):
they have success, versus thosethat are actually taking the
time to dive in and see what'sgoing on and actually work in a
way that's productive andefficient.
So I think that's like to me,that's kind of the secret.
Part of all this success istaking the time to look at it
and to understand what's goingon, to then, you know,
(35:54):
strategize what you do, movingforward.
But it's kind of a lost.
It's a lost art, because wehave all this tech and we have
all this other fun stuff thatthey'd rather be doing.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
I always tell them like the notes thing, like my
players take a lot of notesafter lessons, which I think is
good, but I always tell them I'mlike you know that's really
worthless if you never read itagain.
You know what I mean.
Like, if you're a point, likewe need to be reflective, we
need to be looking back.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
Yeah, and it's no good for me to write them for my
player either.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
You know, I never write my notes.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I'm like no, I want you to write the notes and then.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
I'll go in, I'll go word preferably, and play it
back to me.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Because what you feel what you feel when I give you
something is not what I'mfeeling.
I don't feel anything whenyou're hitting the ball.
So you got to write down foryou what it means and what it
feels like and what's goingthrough your head in competition
.
What's I'm not in your head toknow.
I can see, you know you looklike you're walking faster and
you look like you're you knowquicker in your routine, but I
(36:50):
don't know what's happeninginside.
So that's on you to like.
Sit down and think about.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, no, I couldn't agree more.
I mean, it's definitelysomething that I feel like.
You know it's weird because I'veworked with people and I have
them on a program and you knowI'm seeing them regularly and
I'm doing the practice, planningform and things like that, and
it's funny because I feel likeso much of the time that I
(37:17):
devote to them is in theplanning stage of things because
they just golfers don't thinkthat way.
Right, like a lot of peopletreat golf the same way they
treat Monopoly, right, like youget it out every now and then
you go out there and you throwsome dice and things happen and
what do you know?
There's winners and losers, butthere is a strategy that you
could apply to Monopoly and youcould learn how to play the game
(37:37):
.
You know more to your advantageand you could like, if you
wanted to devote your time, youcould.
And that's the same thing withgolf.
And I just think that so manypeople, unfortunately, instead
of, to your point, digging inand figuring out what they need
to do, moving forward, they tendto rely on data points and
numbers which don't actuallyequate to playing better golf.
(37:58):
Correct, correct, call me crazy.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
It's well.
It's the difference between youknow teaching on a driving
range and like coaching Right.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
So, I just think we need more of a blend, right?
I think obviously it almostsounds like I've been negative
tech this whole time, but I'mvery pro tech, just like I'm
very pro coaching and I'm verypro being on the golf course.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
There's a lot of validation, there's a lot of
benefit to the tech, look likewe talked about.
If you have somebody who'skinematic sequence is totally
off and you just keep sendingthem out to play, I mean, you're
not really, you're not going to.
Yeah, it's not going to help.
There's certain things that youneed the tech and you need the
time to solidify.
But as you, you know we'retalking as you're kind of
(38:43):
cranking up these levels ofperformance.
The focus has to change and thefocus will change.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
I just think that the focus needs to be on the low
hanging fruit, right, and it'salways easier to clip that
before the crazy complex andtechnical and like I just look
at so many young people goinginto college golf and it's like,
okay, you know golf wise, theyhave the skill.
But then you look at the otherpieces, right, and you start
wondering like where some ofthose skills are.
(39:11):
And it's not hard, skills likelearning how to breathe a little
better, to regulate, to do someof these things, like it's just
a practice of a skill.
It's not hard to learn, it'sjust word me, I'll take the
blame.
Us coaches, you know,unfortunately sometimes are just
a little bit of a problem andunfortunately sometimes they're
just a little too lost in launchmonitors and things like that
(39:31):
to kind of notice the humanstanding in front of us.
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Yeah, I know, Mindfulness training is an
integral part of what we do withthe girls.
You know whether they're doingit or not?
is on them.
But it's such an important partbecause they're all super
talented.
Let's be honest, like none ofthem need overhauls, none of
them need, you know, major swingfixes.
They can all play at the end ofthe day, you know where are
(39:55):
they in their head, where arethey in their confidence, where
are they in their belief ofthemselves and all that, and
where are they in the in theirapproach to managing all the
things that are going to thrownat them that day, the surprises,
right.
Like there's always somethingthat's going to show up all of a
sudden.
You go and you're hitting like ahook and you're a fader.
Like you got to manage that,you got to be able to manage
(40:18):
that, and that's all stuff thatyou're trained through.
Situational, like you said,playing and playing in
tournaments nothing can replacethat.
There's no pill to say here's20 rounds of tournament golf and
now, boom, you have that likewisdom inside of you.
You got to just do it right.
Practice is the art of doing,and so the art of going out and
(40:41):
playing, the art of competingthis is all different forms of
practice.
Like you mentioned, I thinkit's less sexy to practice your
mindfulness.
They'll go out and practicebunker shots from wet sand, soft
sand, uphill lies, downhilllies, but who's actually going
and sitting and meditating for30 minutes?
Speaker 1 (40:59):
and training.
I mean their mind.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Their mind is what's hitting the golf shots.
That's the part we have to getthem to understand, like my hand
is not doing what it's doingbecause my hand wants to do that
.
It's doing it because my mindis, my brain is telling it what
to do.
So I think really hammeringthat and trying to get them to
understand like the actualeffect of what your brain is
(41:23):
doing on a daily basis istalking about young people, man.
I mean, they're so distracted,mike, like they got like iPads
and phones and TVs and smartthis and smart that, and they're
so distracted.
They're so distracted and sothey'd rather be doing.
I'm gonna get you to sit.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
So bad, like I, honestly I'm so glad that I grew
up without a cell phone, like Ireally am.
Yeah, because like they're justhyper conditioned to see
everything at full scroll speedand that's just like how the
world existed, them right, andthat full on scroll mode and
it's like, man, if we could justslow this down a little bit,
like how much better would youdo, how much better would your
(42:06):
decision making become, just bygetting you to like look at a
post every now and then insteadof just full scroll.
Like just slow it down a hair.
Speaker 2 (42:14):
Yeah, yeah, our minds are so busy and so distracted
that we like this.
Dr Izzy Justice said that we'reall.
We would all be diagnosed aslike schizophrenics back in the
1950s.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
Yeah, that's great, because of all the activity in
our brains on a regular basisand we keep training it right,
like we just addicted to thephones and we just keep doing it
Our mind is constantlywandering.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
So, yeah, getting them to focus for 10 seconds.
That's all you need is 10seconds of focus, clear mind,
execute your shot, then you cango do whatever you're doing.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I mean, honestly think about whatever you want,
if you made me really sit downand think about, like, some of
the positive effects of golf onyoung people, I would say it's
the fact that it is like the onething maybe where they're.
Actually.
You pretty much have to beoutside if you're playing at
least competitive golf, right,so like they're outside and they
don't have a screen in front ofthem and they have to interact
(43:08):
with their environment andsocially.
Yeah people like I think thatdoes so much for a young mind
that they don't normally get,because normally when they
communicate in a group it's likethrough their phone.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
Yeah so I think it's rather playing video games with
you know, 10 people on the otherside of the world.
Yeah, I mean, it's great thatwe're so connected.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
I sound like such a good off my lawn guy and like
such a such a homer but at thesame time, like you know, I feel
like as as good as thetechnology gets and as good as
we get at making our liveseasier.
You know, a lot of our joy anda lot of our happiness and a lot
of our self-belief comes frommoments when none of that stuff
was present and we were just outdoing things and being creative
(43:51):
.
And that's what I always try tochallenge my kids with is like
never get painted into a corneron the golf course.
You know, always leave yourselfout, stay creative.
You know, yeah, it's stupid totry to punch it through that
hole in the trees, but know thathole in the trees is there in
case you don't like this shotand you all of a sudden decide
you like that one.
But just stay open to what canbe done instead of being forced
(44:14):
into a position.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah, and the more, the more your mind is quiet, the
more options you'll see.
That's scientific, like ifyou're in a bad space and you've
hit a bunch of bad shots.
You're going to see one option,but if you're clear minded,
you'll see all sorts options.
Speaker 1 (44:31):
Well, you've seen this and I'm so glad you said
that because I really want tobring this up to you how many
times have you been standingnext to a parent of a player and
they hit it in the water leftof the hole and the parents like
, oh my god, how did they notsee that?
Right, they like kind of freakout that like the player hit in
the water when obviously likethe one place you can't hit it's
(44:52):
in the water, and like theymake that comment to me and I'm
like they literally couldn't seethe water and the parents are
like what are you talking about?
It's right there.
And I'm like, well, when weover stimulate, our peripheral
vision shrinks and literallythat child is so overstimulated
that they're looking through ahole that's just big enough to
see that flag and they literallydon't see the water.
(45:14):
And you're exactly right, likekind of what we've been talking
about throughout this is, Ithink, is is trying to be aware
of the decisions that we have tomake on the golf course and
unfortunately, I think a lot ofour players are out there and
they can only see a flag at atime and that's why the
decision-making is so poor.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
Yeah, I mean we can.
We can sit and break this downfor for days really.
But yeah, you have players likethat.
Go for a par five, let's say,and then you know they're not
actually looking at, oh, where'sthe place I can leave it, where
70% of the time I'll be able toget it up and down right.
And then next you know you hitit, they hit it, they go for it
too, which is what you wantedthem to do.
And then they short sidethemselves in a place where,
(45:55):
like, are you going to make fivenow?
And did you?
Did they actually think aboutit?
Is the question right?
Like, yeah, we're going to havemishits and you're going to
have this, that the other, likethat's golf, right, but did you
actually?
What was your intent?
Um, you know, that's the stuffI get at the end of the round,
kind of.
If I'm there watching.
You get to ask, like, what wereyou actually trying to do?
(46:17):
That's the first question.
It's not a.
Why would you leave your ballthere?
You know, like, what was yourintention?
Look like, I said you're gonna,you're not gonna hit everything
perfect, but you got to setyourself up for the percentages
and, um, understanding that andsetting them up and helping them
to understand.
That is, you know, that's myjob, your job, um all the other
(46:39):
coaches is to help them.
You know, like you said, theyhave very they're they're flag
hunting.
They just see the flag.
That's what they want.
It's our job to you know,whether it's the decade system
or dispersions or however youwant to address it, but helping
them to understand, on certainflags, certain wins, certain
conditions.
You know they got to lookelsewhere.
(46:59):
You have to look elsewhere andmake your focus something
different than the pin, um, tohave your high, highest success
rates and, um, that that justcomes from getting to know your
player, learning, um, spendingtime, uh, and investing right.
So, um, I have the, I have theprivilege of being able to do
that, getting to spend so muchtime and and watching these
(47:22):
girls.
But at the end of the day, it'sstill a challenge, right, they
have their personal coaches,they have their college coaches,
they have their parents, um,but it's still.
It's still fun.
It's still fun to to be part ofthis process and be part of
these girls's journeys, um, andhelp them get to that next level
.
Uh, it's definitely a privilege.
So awesome.
Speaker 1 (47:43):
I mean, I can tell you know how much honor you feel
in the role that you're in, um,and I think that that's great
and I definitely think that thegirls are super helpful for you.
But I also think that the girlsare super fortunate to have
such great leadership in you,and I'm really happy that Team
Canada has put you in the roleyou're in, because I think
you're great at it.
(48:04):
So, um, my hat's off to you andwhat you're doing, and I really
appreciate you taking the timebecause I know that you are
under the weather, but, uh, onceagain, it's been a real
privilege to have you on.
Uh, I really hope that a lot ofpeople have listened to this
and take away that you know,even at the highest of levels,
(48:25):
you know as as X's and O's asyou may think it would be, it
really is about the overallhuman quality and development of
that person.
Over time, they kind of putthem in position later on down
the road.
So I would strongly adviseparents listening to this.
If you have a junior golfer wholoves the game of golf but
isn't winning every tournamentthey play in, that child isn't
failing.
(48:45):
That child is learning andthere's a very good chance that
they'll eventually learn enoughthrough loving it that they're
able to compete at a very highlevel.
So, um, I hope that that's themessage it gets taken away.
I really appreciate Salimajoining us, and if you've
enjoyed this conversation,please make sure to subscribe,
and we'll make sure to keephaving great guests on for you
to always tune into.
(49:06):
So thanks again and until nexttime, keep grinding.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the measured
golf podcast, where I, michaelDutro, sit down and talk all
things golf with some amazingguests.
And today we are very fortunatebecause not only has this
person had amazing success beinga coach, but also amazing
success as a player as well,including winning not only at
the junior level, but also atthe college level and
(00:28):
professional level.
So this person, without a doubt, is no stranger to doing
amazing things with a golf clubin her hand, and she has done an
amazing job helping a lot ofyoung golfers out there as well
with being the head coach forthe Team Canada women's team.
So, without further ado, we'vegot Salima Musani from Team
(00:49):
Canada today and we're veryfortunate.
Salima, would you like to sayhello?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Yeah, no problem, thanks.
Thanks for having me, michael,and yeah, excited to see where
this conversation goes.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Yeah, I think it's going to be fun.
I mean, I was kind ofintroduced to you through some
of the players that you workwith at Michigan and some of the
influence that you have fromTeam Canada's perspective, and
I've really kind of been blownaway since I got to know you.
I think it's really cool whatyou do and I think your story is
incredible.
I mean, it's never easy toachieve and it's even harder
(01:24):
when you have other obstacles inyour way, and I mean you've
just kind of really had thiscool career to where you've had
success at just about everylevel.
That's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, I mean, it's part of the journey.
I feel very, very fortunatethat golf entered my life and
the places it's taken meObviously never would have
thought this is where I'd end up, but it all makes sense at the
end of the day.
Yeah, as a player, as a juniorgolfer, the dream was obviously
the LPGA and I got a littletaste of that through my playing
(01:55):
career.
And now, you know,circumstances have brought me
into the coaching world and,yeah, I haven't really looked
back.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Have you got to the point yet where you're ready to
say whether you enjoyed being aplayer or a coach more, or are
you still kind of figuring thatout?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, there's moments , I mean, I definitely miss
playing.
There's definitely momentswhere I wish I could still be
playing and be out there withdoing what these girls are doing
.
But I know my health kind ofholds me back from that and I
have tried.
I did quit coaching the firsttime when I was in Stanford to
go play again and I had toswallow that big pill and really
(02:34):
get the.
I was like that's fine, it'slike you really just can't do
this anymore.
But I tried.
I gave it everything I had andI fought through the highs and
the lows and I brought all thatwealth of experience and all the
things I went through into whatI'm doing today.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
It's really tough, though, right, I mean, I think
what you're talking aboutdoesn't get talked about enough
with athletes and it's like youknow, we all have the dreams of
winning majors and like makingmillions of dollars and all of
that.
But at the end of the day, veryfew of us do that and most of
us unfortunately kind of have toretire before we're ready, if
you will, because we can't keepthe skill level up or the output
(03:14):
level where we need it to be tocompete.
And it's really tough, I think,I mean especially if that
athlete doesn't know what thenext thing is going to be for
them.
So I'm kind of curious did, atthe end of that second stint of
your playing career where youkind of knew like you were done
for good this time, maybe didyou kind of think about going
into coaching slightlydifferently than you had before
(03:34):
and like, hey, now I'm actuallygoing to like devote my time to
being a coach, or was therereally no thought to that and
you just kind of changed roles?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I actually, once I stopped playing I didn't
go directly to coaching.
I actually went down a coupleother avenues.
I went and did some businessdevelopment at a startup, I
became a financial advisor, Iworked in the hotel business, I
did a few really random thingsand I was just teaching on the
(04:04):
side because people knew I was agolfer and I obviously had been
coaching at Stanford.
So I was just teaching in theevenings for fun, and then it's
all.
I got back into it by the way.
Yeah, I was just doing it forfun, to satisfy a few people
basically, and I quicklyrealized that, like this is
(04:24):
where my passion is.
I mean, I've invested so muchof my life into like getting
myself better.
I know what it takes, I knowthe steps and, yeah, just the
balance kind of just shifted.
The lessons were here and thefinancial advising work was
heavier and then it just slowlytipped and I was having way more
fun being at the driving rangeand I was getting a lot more
(04:45):
referrals.
I didn't have to do those coldcalls, I didn't have to chase
people to like sign thedocuments and make a deal.
Yeah, it was kind of a in thatway.
It was a slow but quicktransition.
I did that other stuff for acouple of years before I just
gave it up fully.
But yeah, it's been so.
(05:05):
To answer your question, Ididn't really think about it, it
just kind of happened.
But I have, in the process I'vedefinitely grown a lot.
I've learned a lot more.
When I first started teaching,I was very like teaching kind of
just my own ways and what Iwhen I knew and thought.
Since then I've learned a lot.
I watch everything, you pick upbits here and there you learn
(05:26):
from different people and kindof create your own style.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
How much of you the weird question maybe, but like
how much do you think you'vegrown personally, as you've kind
of grown as a coach, and what Imean by that is I'll use myself
as an example I kind of had mythoughts about myself and
everything as a young man andthen, as I became more competent
at coaching and learned morethings, like that growth mindset
(05:52):
kind of bled into my personallife too and like I really was
able to find myself and find myhappiness through coaching, kind
of like you're describing.
I'm wondering if you didn'tkind of have a similar
experience that way.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, I think definitely the growth mindset is
I mean, never mind as a coach,but as an athlete, as a human
having a growth mindset isabsolutely necessary.
But yeah, I think that I'vedefinitely in my personal life,
I am always learning, I'm alwaystrying, I'm trying.
(06:25):
I was growing.
I do a lot of volunteer workwith my community and, yeah,
definitely having a growthmindset, I have to work with a
lot of different people.
You have to come up with lotsof ideas, strategies, put on
events.
But yeah, it's definitelysomething that I kind of
incorporate in my whole life andit's important to have that,
(06:49):
just as a human trying to getbetter.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Yeah, I mean, and that's what you know, I just got
back from the PGA show a coupleof weeks ago and you know you
know me, selima you're probablytalking to one of the biggest
golf geek nerd guys out thereand I love data and I love all
the tech and I use it nonstop.
But at the same time it's like Ikind of feel like that growth
mindset is almost gettingstripped out of the game a
(07:14):
little bit, because so manypeople are trying to force so
many young players into theseboxes and like hey, you got to
produce this data set to be agood golfer and we know that.
You know, at the highest oflevels there's so much variance
and there isn't truly one waythat they all go about doing it.
So I'm just kind of curious,like you know, what do you see
(07:36):
looking at it?
Because you kind of get to lookat it from a lot larger
viewpoint than most.
You know, working with TeamCanada.
But like, where do you kind ofsee like golf development going
right now, selima?
Like you, do you think it'smoving in a positive direction?
Do you think we're actuallyhaving a positive impact or do
you think we're using thetechnology in a way to where
maybe we're not helping as muchas we could be.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
That's a really good question.
I think if we just look at golfin general and golf growth and
development, it has changed aton, even from the time when I
was a junior right If we go back30 years, you know we didn't
have Trackman, we didn't haveBushnells, we didn't have, we
had to trust the sprinkler headson the ground.
We had to look at our ballflight, we had to make the
(08:20):
adjustments and figure out whatto do, not based on club path
and attack angles and faceangles and spin rates and all
that good stuff.
You know low points, but we hadto figure it out on our own.
And so I think a lot of thelearning is lost with the
Trackman and I think for us ascoaches, it's our duty to, you
know, continue to make ourplayers learn, the ones who are
(08:44):
becoming successful to be honest, I like to call them, like, the
expert learners and then youknow, the key ingredient to
being an expert learner is againcoming back to the original
question is growth mindset, Imean being flexible enough and
knowing, and so I think some ofthe onus.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Oh, you're right.
I mean you got to have somefailure mixed in there.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Yeah, I mean our men's national coach told me
this quote while back, DerekIngram, and he said success
leaves clues, and I mean you canuse that at all different
levels, right?
Success by winning a tournament, success in hitting the shot
you want, Success in carryingout a habit?
I mean there's ways in which weget these things done.
(09:29):
Everybody has their own way,and I mean sometimes for some
players the box approach mightbe the way and it might get them
, you know, to the level that isthe highest for them.
But I think that there's a.
There's definitely some onus onus coaches to challenge our
players and to let them fail,like you're saying.
Let them fail, let them learnthe hard way, let them challenge
(09:51):
them, make them frustrated.
But you definitely have tothink outside the box a little
bit, because if the girls arenot learning and you're just
telling them what to do, you'regoing to hit a plateau at some
point where they become toodependent or they don't have a
way to make those fixes on theirown.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
What I see a lot of.
I see a lot of dependency onthe tech to tell them what went
wrong, and I think, maybestealing a little bit from what
you just said, I think thereason for that perhaps is
because, to your point, theydon't have to dig it out of the
dirt, so like they get thatinstantaneous feedback oh okay,
(10:34):
this is how I do it.
And because they didn't have tofigure that out on their own
and go through that process oflearning, they don't really
they're not nearly as welladjusted for when it goes a
little awry, maybe.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Yeah, and I mean look the track man and the data.
It makes practice more efficient, like let's be honest, right,
Like I don't have to go andspend an hour hitting balls to
figure something out and fiveswings I mean, you don't need to
really hit more than five ballsto know what the pattern is,
and especially for an eliteplayer.
So I think that efficiency isdefinitely improved and I think
(11:08):
that's why you're seeing moreand more good golfers, because
they're just learning quicker.
I mean, they're getting better,faster because of technology,
agreed, but yeah, I think whenit comes to high level, elite
performance, you need to be ableto make adjustments.
I mean, on the PGA Tour, lpgaTour, the players that are
winning are the ones that makethe best adjustments the
(11:29):
quickest, and you have to.
Golf is not a game of perfect.
We all know that.
You're not going to go outthere and hit all every shot
exactly how you wanted to, andso being able to, you know,
create shots, being able to makethose adjustments, those are
all things you have to dooutside of the technical.
You know, machine.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
That's what I think it gets lost in the sauce coach.
And what I mean by that is likeI had Kevin Rhodes on who's the
men's coach at Harvard and wewere talking about his players
and we were kind of talkingabout how, like because they're
people that are at Harvard likethere's certain things you don't
have to tell them.
Like you don't have to tell akid that goes to Harvard to
(12:12):
study Like they, that alreadycomes with the territory right.
So like he doesn't have tonecessarily, even though grades
are very, very important atHarvard, he doesn't necessarily
have to tell those kids how tomake those grades because that
already goes.
Like that's just one of thosecore competencies that you have
to have to be there and at yourlevel, I would imagine and I
certainly don't want to putwords in your mouth, but when
(12:34):
you're looking at players andevaluating, like I can't imagine
that you're like leaning overto see the track man.
I can't imagine that you'rewanting to see the force plate
graphs, Like you're out therewatching them play, and I think
that that's really what'sgetting lost right now is
there's a million kids out therethat can go out and shoot.
A million shoot even par.
(12:54):
I see it all the time If youlook at AJGA fields, there's
always like a ton of kids rightaround par but then they don't
really learn how to take thatnext step per se right To where
they start breaking par prettyregularly.
So I'm just kind of curiouslike where is the disconnect and
where are?
Where are we as coaches needingto elevate our games to where
(13:14):
we can change this narrativewith junior golfers, to where
it's not about having perfectdata?
That's great, Like we need tosee some good stuff there, but
we also need to learn how to goout and play and be creative and
be responsive and being able tolike emotionally regulate on a
golf course, Like I think thatskills kind of overlooked a lot.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Yeah, I mean, sending your players out to play is key
, whether it's just in practiceor playing competition,
especially at the junior level.
It's definitely, definitelyimportant.
And you know the work thatwe've done with Ian Highfield
and Zach Parker with the game,like training and like pushing
the girls and challenging them,putting them through things that
(13:54):
are frustrating, things, thatare hard, things that they don't
want to do or that they're likeyou know this is too much or
you know it's that's part of it.
Right, forcing them to havethese emotions and forcing them
to feel these things is part ofthe growth.
It's part of the plan notmaking them want to do it, but
this stuff is all important,it's all like it's necessary for
(14:20):
growth, it's necessary forlearning and that's where the
transference comes, because whenthey're on the golf course and
they're playing for theirNational Amateur Championship or
they're playing at the US Open,they're going to have feelings
and they're going to havesensations that they haven't
practiced.
But if they have an idea of howto handle these and manage
these, then you know they're onestep ahead of the next person.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
So, like you know, kind of like we were talking
about earlier, salima, you knowso many kids I think especially
in my space, to where I'mindoors you know they kind of
know what they want thesenumbers to be and when they,
when they create those numbersright, because we're in a
simulated environment andthey're calm they get the result
that they're expecting.
But then they go out onto thegolf course, right, and they
(15:05):
more or less feel like, hey, Idid everything I was supposed to
do and then the shot didn'twork out and it's like, okay,
well, there's more to playinggolf than just hitting a golf
ball, right.
So you know, what is it that wecan do to try to simulate
better transference of skillsand better training that leads
to better tournament results?
Getting them onto the golfcourse, I mean, how do we go
(15:27):
about doing this, do you think?
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, this is a great thing.
This is what affects thetransference and being able to
meet the moment, so to speak.
Right, that's what we're doingis training our players to meet
the moment.
We don't know when thatmoment's going to come, what
it's going to be, but we canhelp to prepare them for those
moments, and a lot of that'sgoing to come through creating
(15:52):
the spacing effect, creatingcontext, the psychological
pressures.
These are all things that ifyou don't have the context Ian
Highfield once gave the exampleof you're training for a
triathlon you're not going topractice swimming in a bathtub.
That's not the context, right?
So through giving them thesegame-like training simulation
(16:14):
situations, they're able to feelwe can set it up where they're
competing against each other,you can set it up with a time
limit and have a goal.
But it helps them to just getoff the driving range flat, lie
same condition over and over,and it forces them to move
around.
It forces them to createspacing.
(16:35):
So hitting 14 drivers on thedriving range in a row is not
transferable, because we don'tever do that, we don't ever get
a chance to hit the 14 shots.
So their principle of learningis all about losing a feeling
and recalling it.
So, as you're doing, let's sayyou have a player, you want them
to do a combine on Trackman,instead of just doing the
(16:55):
combine and hitting 10, 12, 15iron shots, spread it out, set
the Trackman up, have them hit adriver through a gate that you
create.
Come to the combine, hit theapproach shot, go hit a chip or
go hit a putt.
Come back, hit the drive, gohit your second shot on the
combine.
So now, when you get your finalcombine results, it's a little
(17:17):
more realistic of what theywould do in a tournament versus.
Okay, I've now hit 15 iron shotsin a row.
I have a feeling I'm just goingto keep recreating this over
and over with my four iron, myeight iron, my wedge.
It's forcing them to lose itand come back and recall it,
which, as we know, is what theyhave to do on the golf course.
So for us that's been a gamechanger, just introducing this
(17:41):
into their practice.
Some of them love it, some ofthem hate it.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
I'm.
You know, I'm fortunate enoughto be a Trackman master and I
own several Trackman units andI've always been dead set
against the combine.
I don't like it, and the reasonI don't like it is because it
puts the target score out there.
That's not achievable and Idon't like doing something to
where the failure rates 100% ofthe time.
So for me, like we've createdcombines but we create a free to
(18:05):
individual player based off howfar they hit it, which, in our
opinion, is way moretransferable than just, you know
, having kids do a test thatthey can't.
You know, for some of my kidsto hit a shot 180 yards, you
know they're hitting a freakinghybrid.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
Yeah, yeah, or a free one.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Or they're a driver and it's kind of wild.
So at the end of the day, Ilike what you're saying there
and the thing I'm the mostcurious about is you said
something really cool there,which was meet the moment, and I
think that that's a really areally big thought.
But I think it's a thought thatreally doesn't get enough
daylight with.
(18:40):
Training athletes right ispreparing them for what's going
to happen.
And we don't know what's goingto happen.
We don't know the experienceand the emotions that they're
going to have.
But if we give them ways oflearning how to manage these
things, then they can meet thatmoment and adjust to that moment
.
So I'm kind of curious from aplaying perspective.
You've played on some prettydarn big stages and you've won a
(19:02):
lot.
I mean, were you prepared forevery single moment out there,
selima, or did a few things?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
sneak up?
Absolutely not, absolutely not.
I mean I could tell a story ofyou know, my win on the Epson
tour back in the day.
It was the major.
I definitely was not ready forit.
I lost my breakfast on thedriving range.
You know, I actually did mycaddy like dragged the pyramid
(19:32):
of balls and like just coveredit up and was like, okay, let's
keep going.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, it's, you know that's what happened right right
before you threw up Selima,like what was going through your
head.
I'm curious.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Like I was.
I was feeling I don't rememberexactly.
I was remember us feeling likeunsettled, Like normally for me.
I'm nervous.
I show up at the golf course.
As soon as I hit a putt or hita shot, I'm settled.
I'm like back in my element.
I'm like, okay, I know how todo this.
All the thoughts and dreams oflike I'm never going to, I'm not
going to know how to hit a golfball when I get out there, you
know, like all these things usedto cross my mind.
I remember very, very clearlyand then, as soon as I'd hit a
(20:08):
ball on the range, I'm like, ohyeah, I know exactly what I'm
doing.
Like what, what was I freakingout about?
But that morning in particular,it was the fourth round.
It was a, the only four roundtournament.
It was the major on the back.
Then it was the futures tour,but on the Epson.
And, yeah, I remember going totee up the first ball, Like I'd
been scraping irons and warmingup.
(20:28):
And then I went to tee up athree wood and I, like you know,
bent over to tee it up and boomlike that was it.
But I mean, I felt much betterafter and I just kind of moved
on.
But I wasn't like I wasn'tpsychologically ready to meet
that moment, like I didn't havea sports performance person, I
didn't have anybody helping me.
(20:49):
My coach at the time, seanFoley, had actually left a
voicemail at the pro shopbasically saying like you've
worked your whole life, you'renot going to lose your skills
overnight.
You still have everythingyou've ever had, like go do your
thing.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
And that was kind of the I'm like Sean.
I mean, that sounds pretty muchspot on like Sean.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Yeah, that was the validation that we need.
I need it Right.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
I know what I'm doing during the round.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Just another day.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Did you think about that message from Sean?
Speaker 2 (21:22):
I don't remember specifically, but I'm sure I did
.
I remember having one swingthought out.
I still remember that swingthought I had that day and I,
yeah, I just kind of went outthere and did my thing and
trusted, and you know, you kindof I don't even remember telling
myself like, oh, you're, you'vebeen preparing for this whole
moment your whole life, but itjust kind of happens.
(21:42):
It just kind of happened andbut now, now we have all the
parameters right, like we know,we can kind of set them up, we
can recreate them, we can helpthe girls to to find these ways
of excelling.
But like I remember seeing NickDunlap's interview a couple of
weeks ago when he won, and Ithink he said like I couldn't
(22:03):
feel my feet, I couldn't feel myhands, I couldn't feel my face,
like how you can't prepare forthat.
You just, you just cannotprepare for that and all you can
do is have routines and havestrategies you know to to get
back All you had out there.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Slema, was you right?
Like I mean, you found a way.
Like, yeah, you're right, youdidn't have any of those things,
but yet you still somehow founda way, and it's.
It's not because you weren'tprepared.
You didn't know exactly whatyou were going to have
experienced, but at the sametime, like you had all these
other experiences to draw off ofright, and that's what kind of
prepared you to get you throughthat.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah, and I mean back , the way we prepped back then
and the way we're preparing nowis different, but it was a way
of preparation, right.
It was getting yourself readyand getting yourself.
You know we used to do thehere's the putt to win the US
Open, and you know we still dothings like that.
But we can, we can create moreenergy around it.
But back then that's what wedid.
(22:59):
Right, you play a chip withyour, your dad or your friends
and it's like okay, this is forthis.
Or you know the old school,let's play for lunch.
Something that means somethingto you is really important.
If you're, if you put that onthe line and it means something
to you, you're going toexperience things inside of you
that you wouldn't if you werejust.
You know playing for braggingrights.
(23:19):
So you know, whatever that isfor each player, whatever that,
whatever we can do to kind ofextrapolate that and have them
feel that and again, it's a it'sa good balance and mix of like
frustrating the heck out of them, making really hard depending
on the time of the year, thetime of the week relative to a
(23:39):
tournament, and then also, youknow, making it easy and
achievable at times where youknow it's.
We're getting ready right topeak and we want them to feel
confident, we want them to besuccessful, we want the goals to
be achievable and all that kindof stuff.
So you can, you can vary thechallenges depending on the time
of year and, yeah, we just hopethat when they, when they reach
(24:01):
that moment, they're able toperform.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
That's.
I mean that's awesome, it's notsurprising.
I mean there's so much goodstuff that you're putting out
there.
And I hope my big goal for thisis that some parents of some
junior players kind of hear thisand kind of hear what we're
trying to say, which is there'snothing wrong with going out
there and playing a bunch ofgolf and failing a whole lot and
not winning tournaments,because you've got to do those
(24:27):
things before you can wintournaments.
There's really, in my opinion,no shortcut to it.
I've been very fortunate andworked with some children who
won a lot of things at an earlyage and they didn't continue to
win.
And sometimes it works that wayand sometimes young people that
don't win early on win later on.
But I think the important thingthat you've talked a lot about
(24:49):
is like kind of understandingwho that player is,
understanding what theirmotivators are.
You know everybody and I knowyou know this, but everybody's
completely different.
Not everybody can go out thereand be completely stoic and
perform very well, right?
Not everybody has that Tigergene.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
So I mean high performance.
High performers are unique.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
That's the way it is my favorite thing I always hear.
I forget who said it.
I want to say it was BrettMcCabe, but I don't think it was
Brett.
But somebody said that everyperson on the PGA tour that
plays golf is at least twoclicks off standard deviation in
some way.
And I believe that because I'veworked with just enough of them
now that they all are veryeccentric in their own way.
(25:31):
But I think that you kind ofhave to become very eccentric in
a certain way to kind ofunderstand yourself enough to
perform at the level that thesemen and women do.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah, I mean I think there's just on our national
team.
I mean you have all differentpersonalities, you have all
different styles of learning,you have all different ball
striking types.
You have, you know, the bombers, you have the shorter hitters.
They're all successful.
I mean there's no, there's noone recipe as to what's going to
(26:02):
make somebody.
You know, have that secretsauce and, like you said, it
doesn't.
Really there's no set recipeLike if you have this ball speed
and you have this, this, this,you're going to be successful.
The intangible stuff is thestuff it's hard for us to teach.
We can help to bring it out,but I can't, I definitely can't
(26:23):
teach self motivation.
I can't teach their own valuesystems right, Like that stuff
is all built into who they arealready.
So it's, you know, harnessingthose things and trying to
figure out what are, what arethe pieces that are going to
move them to the next level.
Everybody has their own style,Everybody has their own comfort
(26:44):
levels.
Pushing boundaries sometimescan be dangerous, but we have to
just figure that out as we goalong.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
That.
I mean, I think that's true,right, but the figuring it out
part you said a great quoteearlier, right, success leaves
clues.
You know it's.
It's not on this linear lineand it's not on this upward
graph either.
It's somewhere in between that.
And I think that if you, if youperiodize with your players and
you actually put things on acalendar and then you actually
(27:16):
start tracking things, like youcan actually begin to understand
kind of where that player is,because you know, as you know,
you know one week's a greattournament, we hope the next
week's a great tournament, butsometimes it's a bad tournament.
And like, how do wedifferentiate those two things?
Like how do we actually takeaway learning from the bad
performance?
Do we just like try to protect,you know, their confidence at
(27:37):
all costs and say, hey, let'snot pay attention to that, or do
we kind of try to get out alittle bit ahead of that and
kind of dig into the data andtry to differentiate?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
Yeah, you know, one of the biggest skills that's
also lost these days is thatskill of reflection, journaling,
reflection, stats.
It's so key like stats are onething, but the journal and the
reflection on their part, thedebriefing after around, you
know being able to be a littlemore objective than subjective.
(28:08):
You know if you walk off 18 andyou just three putt, you might
think you're the world's worstputter, when actually it's, you
know, could be your approachplay that day that left you with
all the 50 footers that thatpushed you.
So you know taking the time andeffectively debriefing around,
effectively journaling, spendingtime.
(28:32):
You know whether it's a greatday or a tough day.
What were your emotions?
How did you handle them?
Would you have made somedifferent decisions?
You know there's so manydifferent ways.
You can go kind of down thoseoctopus tentacles to answer
those questions, but reallydigging deep, because a lot of
players will debrief and justsay, yeah, I had a good day.
(28:54):
It was, you know, I hit theball.
Well, I'm going to go work onmy putting.
It's like, okay, that's greatYou're reflecting, but like dig
deeper.
Like how deep can you dig?
So pushing the girls to reallylike, reflect and think about
what's what's going to actuallymake them better.
And, like you said, like takingthe good rounds and really
really like analyzing the heckout of those ones and the rough
(29:19):
ones.
Yeah, you have to set some ofit aside, but there's always
learnings.
Like, if you can't takesomething away from every
experience, it's kind of lost inthe matter, right?
So, and I'm a big believer thatlike process, process, process,
like what we do every day inand out, that's where you get
your confidence.
You know shooting saying, oh,if I shoot like under par, I'm
(29:41):
going to be confident again.
Well, that's just not going tohappen.
Um, you got to.
You got to actually dosomething to get there.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
So, uh, the process is super main tape, I mean.
I call them with the kids,because the thing that drives me
nuts and it happens all thetime and I know you know this
went real well.
You get a, you get a youngperson out there, or even just a
person playing golf in general,and they get to where they're
having a really great round.
There's six, seven, eight holesinto this thing.
There may be a couple under par, maybe they've never done that
(30:11):
before, but like, they get tothat point and then all of a
sudden, like the entirenarrative flips in their head
and they end up shooting like 76, 77, right.
And it's like when you teachpeople that everything they do
is a process and then you getthem to actually practice those
processes and understand them,then you kind of realize in that
moment, when you're seven,eight holes into it and you're a
(30:33):
few under par, hey, myprocesses have led me to this
position.
It's my processes that I'mdoing right now that are
creating all the good results.
This is great.
I just have to keep doing myprocesses and I'm going to be
fine.
And now all of a sudden, likeyou're positive instead of being
fearful of oh my God, I'm goingto lose this at any moment.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Cause you don't start thinking of outcome.
Right, that's the problem.
They start.
Oh God, I'm four under, fiveunder now.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
What now Right but?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
yeah, I mean that's.
That's a whole nother side ofit, right, learning how to
separate and not think ofoutcome and again be so, so
entrenched in what you're doingthat whatever happens at the end
of it is just the result.
That's a whole nother skill set.
Yeah, it's hard, it's hard, ithappens to the best of us, I
(31:21):
mean, even if you're Tiger Woodsor whomever, like it doesn't
matter, Like it's going to, thethought's going to creep into
your head.
Um, and then how?
What you do with that, whetheryou put up the shield of armor
or you welcome it, like you knoweverybody, everybody's going to
manage that differently, butyou have to have a plan for both
right.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Like you have to be willing to go either way with it
, because some days maybe theone option isn't available to
put up the armor and not thinkabout it.
And I strongly disagree withthe idea that, like people you
know can't think about theirscore.
Well, they told me that foryears and then every time I
would think about my score Iwould feel shame and like that
didn't help either.
So, like you know, it's likeyou're going to think about it
(32:03):
probably.
What do you do about it whenyou think about the score is the
score.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
I mean a strategy that I use, and I've done this
for a long time.
What I'm not watching myplayers when we're just
practicing, I just use numbers.
So there's no.
The word par, birdie, bogeynever comes out of my mouth.
I've done this for so long thatit's just the way it is.
So if I'm watching a girl playI was just in Florida watching
(32:28):
one of my players and she makesa birdie on a par three I just
be like great to nice, to.
Sometimes you make excuse me,sometimes you make a good six.
I mean, sometimes I made abunch of them.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I mean, they're just numbers.
As soon as you attach a word tothem, there's negative
connotations, there's negativeemotions, there's judgment.
A number is a number.
You add numbers up, they'rejust numbers.
So that's something that I'vealways done.
I don't even know that myplayers maybe realize it or
notice it, but it's just the wayI've always been and I think
(33:10):
it's important.
I think that's one step in,like detaching from.
The result is it's a number and, like I said, you might hit an
OB on a T and make a five on apar four.
It's a great five.
It's a great five.
You don't have to worry aboutthe OB, you just made a great
five, move on.
So there's a lot of differentways to think about it and I
(33:34):
don't know.
It's just strategies, right,mike?
At the end of the day it'shaving strategies, trying them,
practicing them, see what works,what's the stick?
Yeah, what helps you to kind ofquiet the noise in your head in
those moments that you canperform.
But you got to have strategies.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Yeah, and I mean I think that the thing that kind
of frustrates me is I think somany golfers can hit one out of
a thousand right, like they canhit a shot that kind of looks
good and kind of feels good andall that stuff.
And they assume with the typesof players that you deal with
that it comes so easily to themand that's why they shoot these
(34:15):
crazy scores, but it's like it'sreally really difficult and
they make it look really reallyeasy.
And the reason that it appearsto be easy is because they
practice these skills and thesesystems so much that, to your
point, it just kind of becomesprocesses that they learn how to
do.
So I think that that's reallythe thing that people lose sight
(34:37):
of sometimes is the fact thatyou know to make it look easy.
There's a lot of work that goesinto it.
Golf is not an easy game.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
You're going to lose in golf more than you're ever
going to win, and you have toknow, behind every person that
wins that week, there are a lotof learnings that happened
before that.
There's a lot of failures,however you want to call it,
there's a lot of detractors,there's a lot of backward steps,
there's a lot of upward steps.
I mean, we know how this isLike behind every win, there's a
(35:10):
wealth of experience and, asI'm saying, like their ability
to reflect and learn from allthese.
That's the quicker you're goingto get these successful results
.
If you're not journaling andyou're not learning or
reflecting and you're just goingweek to week, it's going to be
a longer span, most likely.
If we were to, you know, testcase a bunch of people to where
(35:32):
they have success, versus thosethat are actually taking the
time to dive in and see what'sgoing on and actually work in a
way that's productive andefficient.
So I think that's like to me,that's kind of the secret.
Part of all this success istaking the time to look at it
and to understand what's goingon, to then, you know,
(35:54):
strategize what you do, movingforward.
But it's kind of a lost.
It's a lost art, because wehave all this tech and we have
all this other fun stuff thatthey'd rather be doing.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
I always tell them like the notes thing, like my
players take a lot of notesafter lessons, which I think is
good, but I always tell them I'mlike you know that's really
worthless if you never read itagain.
You know what I mean.
Like, if you're a point, likewe need to be reflective, we
need to be looking back.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
Yeah, and it's no good for me to write them for my
player either.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
You know, I never write my notes.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I'm like no, I want you to write the notes and then.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
I'll go in, I'll go word preferably, and play it
back to me.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Because what you feel what you feel when I give you
something is not what I'mfeeling.
I don't feel anything whenyou're hitting the ball.
So you got to write down foryou what it means and what it
feels like and what's goingthrough your head in competition
.
What's I'm not in your head toknow.
I can see, you know you looklike you're walking faster and
you look like you're you knowquicker in your routine, but I
(36:50):
don't know what's happeninginside.
So that's on you to like.
Sit down and think about.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, no, I couldn't agree more.
I mean, it's definitelysomething that I feel like.
You know it's weird because I'veworked with people and I have
them on a program and you knowI'm seeing them regularly and
I'm doing the practice, planningform and things like that, and
it's funny because I feel likeso much of the time that I
(37:17):
devote to them is in theplanning stage of things because
they just golfers don't thinkthat way.
Right, like a lot of peopletreat golf the same way they
treat Monopoly, right, like youget it out every now and then
you go out there and you throwsome dice and things happen and
what do you know?
There's winners and losers, butthere is a strategy that you
could apply to Monopoly and youcould learn how to play the game
(37:37):
.
You know more to your advantageand you could like, if you
wanted to devote your time, youcould.
And that's the same thing withgolf.
And I just think that so manypeople, unfortunately, instead
of, to your point, digging inand figuring out what they need
to do, moving forward, they tendto rely on data points and
numbers which don't actuallyequate to playing better golf.
(37:58):
Correct, correct, call me crazy.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
It's well.
It's the difference between youknow teaching on a driving
range and like coaching Right.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
So, I just think we need more of a blend, right?
I think obviously it almostsounds like I've been negative
tech this whole time, but I'mvery pro tech, just like I'm
very pro coaching and I'm verypro being on the golf course.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
There's a lot of validation, there's a lot of
benefit to the tech, look likewe talked about.
If you have somebody who'skinematic sequence is totally
off and you just keep sendingthem out to play, I mean, you're
not really, you're not going to.
Yeah, it's not going to help.
There's certain things that youneed the tech and you need the
time to solidify.
But as you, you know we'retalking as you're kind of
(38:43):
cranking up these levels ofperformance.
The focus has to change and thefocus will change.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
I just think that the focus needs to be on the low
hanging fruit, right, and it'salways easier to clip that
before the crazy complex andtechnical and like I just look
at so many young people goinginto college golf and it's like,
okay, you know golf wise, theyhave the skill.
But then you look at the otherpieces, right, and you start
wondering like where some ofthose skills are.
(39:11):
And it's not hard, skills likelearning how to breathe a little
better, to regulate, to do someof these things, like it's just
a practice of a skill.
It's not hard to learn, it'sjust word me, I'll take the
blame.
Us coaches, you know,unfortunately sometimes are just
a little bit of a problem andunfortunately sometimes they're
just a little too lost in launchmonitors and things like that
(39:31):
to kind of notice the humanstanding in front of us.
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Yeah, I know, Mindfulness training is an
integral part of what we do withthe girls.
You know whether they're doingit or not?
is on them.
But it's such an important partbecause they're all super
talented.
Let's be honest, like none ofthem need overhauls, none of
them need, you know, major swingfixes.
They can all play at the end ofthe day, you know where are
(39:55):
they in their head, where arethey in their confidence, where
are they in their belief ofthemselves and all that, and
where are they in the in theirapproach to managing all the
things that are going to thrownat them that day, the surprises,
right.
Like there's always somethingthat's going to show up all of a
sudden.
You go and you're hitting like ahook and you're a fader.
Like you got to manage that,you got to be able to manage
(40:18):
that, and that's all stuff thatyou're trained through.
Situational, like you said,playing and playing in
tournaments nothing can replacethat.
There's no pill to say here's20 rounds of tournament golf and
now, boom, you have that likewisdom inside of you.
You got to just do it right.
Practice is the art of doing,and so the art of going out and
(40:41):
playing, the art of competingthis is all different forms of
practice.
Like you mentioned, I thinkit's less sexy to practice your
mindfulness.
They'll go out and practicebunker shots from wet sand, soft
sand, uphill lies, downhilllies, but who's actually going
and sitting and meditating for30 minutes?
Speaker 1 (40:59):
and training.
I mean their mind.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Their mind is what's hitting the golf shots.
That's the part we have to getthem to understand, like my hand
is not doing what it's doingbecause my hand wants to do that
.
It's doing it because my mindis, my brain is telling it what
to do.
So I think really hammeringthat and trying to get them to
understand like the actualeffect of what your brain is
(41:23):
doing on a daily basis istalking about young people, man.
I mean, they're so distracted,mike, like they got like iPads
and phones and TVs and smartthis and smart that, and they're
so distracted.
They're so distracted and sothey'd rather be doing.
I'm gonna get you to sit.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
So bad, like I, honestly I'm so glad that I grew
up without a cell phone, like Ireally am.
Yeah, because like they're justhyper conditioned to see
everything at full scroll speedand that's just like how the
world existed, them right, andthat full on scroll mode and
it's like, man, if we could justslow this down a little bit,
like how much better would youdo, how much better would your
(42:06):
decision making become, just bygetting you to like look at a
post every now and then insteadof just full scroll.
Like just slow it down a hair.
Speaker 2 (42:14):
Yeah, yeah, our minds are so busy and so distracted
that we like this.
Dr Izzy Justice said that we'reall.
We would all be diagnosed aslike schizophrenics back in the
1950s.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
Yeah, that's great, because of all the activity in
our brains on a regular basisand we keep training it right,
like we just addicted to thephones and we just keep doing it
Our mind is constantlywandering.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
So, yeah, getting them to focus for 10 seconds.
That's all you need is 10seconds of focus, clear mind,
execute your shot, then you cango do whatever you're doing.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I mean, honestly think about whatever you want,
if you made me really sit downand think about, like, some of
the positive effects of golf onyoung people, I would say it's
the fact that it is like the onething maybe where they're.
Actually.
You pretty much have to beoutside if you're playing at
least competitive golf, right,so like they're outside and they
don't have a screen in front ofthem and they have to interact
(43:08):
with their environment andsocially.
Yeah people like I think thatdoes so much for a young mind
that they don't normally get,because normally when they
communicate in a group it's likethrough their phone.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
Yeah so I think it's rather playing video games with
you know, 10 people on the otherside of the world.
Yeah, I mean, it's great thatwe're so connected.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
I sound like such a good off my lawn guy and like
such a such a homer but at thesame time, like you know, I feel
like as as good as thetechnology gets and as good as
we get at making our liveseasier.
You know, a lot of our joy anda lot of our happiness and a lot
of our self-belief comes frommoments when none of that stuff
was present and we were just outdoing things and being creative
(43:51):
.
And that's what I always try tochallenge my kids with is like
never get painted into a corneron the golf course.
You know, always leave yourselfout, stay creative.
You know, yeah, it's stupid totry to punch it through that
hole in the trees, but know thathole in the trees is there in
case you don't like this shotand you all of a sudden decide
you like that one.
But just stay open to what canbe done instead of being forced
(44:14):
into a position.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah, and the more, the more your mind is quiet, the
more options you'll see.
That's scientific, like ifyou're in a bad space and you've
hit a bunch of bad shots.
You're going to see one option,but if you're clear minded,
you'll see all sorts options.
Speaker 1 (44:31):
Well, you've seen this and I'm so glad you said
that because I really want tobring this up to you how many
times have you been standingnext to a parent of a player and
they hit it in the water leftof the hole and the parents like
, oh my god, how did they notsee that?
Right, they like kind of freakout that like the player hit in
the water when obviously likethe one place you can't hit it's
(44:52):
in the water, and like theymake that comment to me and I'm
like they literally couldn't seethe water and the parents are
like what are you talking about?
It's right there.
And I'm like, well, when weover stimulate, our peripheral
vision shrinks and literallythat child is so overstimulated
that they're looking through ahole that's just big enough to
see that flag and they literallydon't see the water.
(45:14):
And you're exactly right, likekind of what we've been talking
about throughout this is, Ithink, is is trying to be aware
of the decisions that we have tomake on the golf course and
unfortunately, I think a lot ofour players are out there and
they can only see a flag at atime and that's why the
decision-making is so poor.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
Yeah, I mean we can.
We can sit and break this downfor for days really.
But yeah, you have players likethat.
Go for a par five, let's say,and then you know they're not
actually looking at, oh, where'sthe place I can leave it, where
70% of the time I'll be able toget it up and down right.
And then next you know you hitit, they hit it, they go for it
too, which is what you wantedthem to do.
And then they short sidethemselves in a place where,
(45:55):
like, are you going to make fivenow?
And did you?
Did they actually think aboutit?
Is the question right?
Like, yeah, we're going to havemishits and you're going to
have this, that the other, likethat's golf, right, but did you
actually?
What was your intent?
Um, you know, that's the stuffI get at the end of the round,
kind of.
If I'm there watching.
You get to ask, like, what wereyou actually trying to do?
(46:17):
That's the first question.
It's not a.
Why would you leave your ballthere?
You know, like, what was yourintention?
Look like, I said you're gonna,you're not gonna hit everything
perfect, but you got to setyourself up for the percentages
and, um, understanding that andsetting them up and helping them
to understand.
That is, you know, that's myjob, your job, um all the other
(46:39):
coaches is to help them.
You know, like you said, theyhave very they're they're flag
hunting.
They just see the flag.
That's what they want.
It's our job to you know,whether it's the decade system
or dispersions or however youwant to address it, but helping
them to understand, on certainflags, certain wins, certain
conditions.
You know they got to lookelsewhere.
(46:59):
You have to look elsewhere andmake your focus something
different than the pin, um, tohave your high, highest success
rates and, um, that that justcomes from getting to know your
player, learning, um, spendingtime, uh, and investing right.
So, um, I have the, I have theprivilege of being able to do
that, getting to spend so muchtime and and watching these
(47:22):
girls.
But at the end of the day, it'sstill a challenge, right, they
have their personal coaches,they have their college coaches,
they have their parents, um,but it's still.
It's still fun.
It's still fun to to be part ofthis process and be part of
these girls's journeys, um, andhelp them get to that next level
.
Uh, it's definitely a privilege.
So awesome.
Speaker 1 (47:43):
I mean, I can tell you know how much honor you feel
in the role that you're in, um,and I think that that's great
and I definitely think that thegirls are super helpful for you.
But I also think that the girlsare super fortunate to have
such great leadership in you,and I'm really happy that Team
Canada has put you in the roleyou're in, because I think
you're great at it.
(48:04):
So, um, my hat's off to you andwhat you're doing, and I really
appreciate you taking the timebecause I know that you are
under the weather, but, uh, onceagain, it's been a real
privilege to have you on.
Uh, I really hope that a lot ofpeople have listened to this
and take away that you know,even at the highest of levels,
(48:25):
you know as as X's and O's asyou may think it would be, it
really is about the overallhuman quality and development of
that person.
Over time, they kind of putthem in position later on down
the road.
So I would strongly adviseparents listening to this.
If you have a junior golfer wholoves the game of golf but
isn't winning every tournamentthey play in, that child isn't
failing.
(48:45):
That child is learning andthere's a very good chance that
they'll eventually learn enoughthrough loving it that they're
able to compete at a very highlevel.
So, um, I hope that that's themessage it gets taken away.
I really appreciate Salimajoining us, and if you've
enjoyed this conversation,please make sure to subscribe,
and we'll make sure to keephaving great guests on for you
to always tune into.
(49:06):
So thanks again and until nexttime, keep grinding.
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