To clarify, I was not necessarily advocating he return to his old swing, though there’s nothing wrong with that either. (not that there’s anything wrong with that)
I meant return to the guy who could dominate…what ever that means. And maybe he hasn’t left that guy behind.
I agree with what you are saying…it’s impossible to go back. “You can’t stand in the same river twice.”
The golf Tiger played was spectacular. The incessant media coverage, fawning, and free hall passes were hard to take. If it looks like people were waiting for him to fail, I think that’s why. But that is life.
He’d beat you pre-Butch swing
He’d beat you with his Butch swing
He’d beat you with his Haney swing
Likely, he’ll beat you with his Foley swing
and so on…
I´d take my chances right now - cant get any worse so lets go for it!!!
But seriously - yes, golfers are tinkering at their swing all the time trying to improve - but one much more important thing - they adept - to the equipment they have available, to playing conditions, to body restraints. When you reach 20 (or maybe even younger) - there is only one way, and that is downhill - some people manage walk down a shallow path, others fall off the cliff. You have to take these things into consideration and change your swing accordingly to stay competitve. Thats why everytime i hear this argument, he should go back to his 2000 swing, i´m scratching my head - i´m sure he would love to - but he cant!
I dont play golf long enough to have been through swing consolidations due to bodily restraints - but Lag or Bradley - you couldnt swing like when you where in your early 20s - could you?
I think I could have…IF…I had persevered and kept that swing.
Sure we tend to get older and maybe not move as well but golf is about a different set of muscles and such working in tandem.
If I had of said NO to instructors and kept my ‘own swing’ then I am convinced I could have still swung the same even at 44.
But at least with my ABS work I feel somewhat back to my old feelings…even though I hesitate to say it won’t look the same because of the trash that still needs to be taken out
I wouldn’t want to go back to swinging like I did when I was in my early 20’s. My swing is much better now than it was then.
I hit the ball as well if not better now with zero practice… compared to an inferior swing that required 200 balls a day to keep it working somewhat properly.
I can only imagine how refined I could get if I had more time to grind balls and all that stuff.
I’m quite happy to not hit a ball or play for two weeks and on a good day, maybe hit 15 or 16 greens and shoot 68. I would never have been able to do that in the past.
Two,
Taking modesty and all that stuff out of it, do you reckon your longest drive would’ve been longer than Norman’s longest? I’ve been wondering about in looking at how your arms functioned on the way through and into the followthrough. My guess is that you probably could’ve gotten a few freaky long ones past him…?
The first time I played with Shark it was both of us using persimmon…I outdrove him more often than not…the reporters asked me about it after the round and I replied
“He’s just a wimp!!!”…with my tongue planted well and truly in my cheek
What’s your take on that premise? and what you mention you have been looking at
Funny! Apparently it’s pretty hard to whisper on the internet…
My thinking is this: You both have very similar actions by and large- the key stuff that we all talk about. But I reckon Norman had his arms engaged for a lot longer through and beyond the strike. I would say that he felt tension, maybe conscious tension in them all the way through, as if he was still holding the club and moving it. Whereas with you, you held the pressure on the strike, but there was a softening and a flinging of the arms off your body past impact, which would explain the height you had through there with your arms/hands. Norman’s recoil, in my mind, speaks to that engagement of the arms. Your follow through was ‘softer’ in a way, in that your arms folded more into your followthrough. I feel like that enabled more pure speed through there, though at the same time, his longer engagement may speak to his overall driving consistency. Btw, that’s not in relation to you specifically, because I don’t know your overall driving numbers, though most of the early footage I’ve seen would suggest that you were pretty solid off the tee in terms of consistency. Ironically, you started hitting it offline when you started to tone it down- though you’ve discussed that already.
Can you relate to any of that at all?
Lag will confirm or deny this…but according to wisdom Norman was a hitter (which accounts for what you mention about having his arms engaged longer)… I am believing I used more of a switting motion through (where I was pinned but the post impact acceleration threw my arms out extended and not as engaged as Norman’s)
I only say switter because I know I didn’t use a real defined swinger’s release with a distinct roll and extension when I was younger and I wasn’t quite a full turn left hitter either…so I am parking myself in the middle zone and classifying it as me being a switter… Verging on swinging with the long clubs and verging on hitting with the short clubs
(Capt C…that’s a switter…not a switch hitter )
Sure,
Hitting and swinging represent opposite intentions post impact. The key is to work into one or the other because there are too many incompatible concepts in the middle. Most players swit to some degree. I have swung and I have hit. When I was a pure CF swinger, I would struggle when I started hitting. Likewise as a hitter now, I tend to struggle when things start loosening up too much or moving toward swinging.
In Bradley’s case, he tended to hit the short irons, and swing the longer clubs. This is not uncommon. Swinging works fine as long as you have great tempo, which Bradley always has had. It’s very hard to teach, and I believe that some people will just simply never get it. It’s like being a great vocalist. Some people are just tone deaf. Hitting can be learned if you do the work. It just requires dedication and a lot of muscular conditioning. All things considered, I believe it to be the superior method because of the basic geometric alignments and also the concept of holding shaft flex to and beyond impact. It just removes the requirement for extensive timing issues to be working properly day in and day out.
Norman’s rigid arms allowed him to feel a very tangible sensation day in and day out, even with his very extensive traveling schedule. His swing was based upon fantastic cohesive body tension from his feet right through his hands. With the entire motion feeling like a firm rock from start to finish, it was easier for him to repeat than most other players who where playing a bit more of the guessing game.
Excellent segment devoted to Twomasters today, complete with audio commentary, on Ralph’s Gotham blog. The very end shows a 3i hit very tight on 72nd hole of the 1993 Australian Masters… to get into a playoff, which he won.
Just got done listening to this, and it was some kind great. Thanks for sharing all those thoughts and experiences, Two, it’s pretty damn cool. As Ralph pointed out, you’re more a humble guy to say the least…
It left me with lots more questions, but one stuck out… Norman’s ‘shoulder’ injury… details, please Sounds like there might be a good story in there somewhere…
Cheers…
So what’s up with the Aussies and the long putters? Scott didn’t look like missing once he stepped on the green today. Peter Senior, Bradley Hughes, Brett Ogle, Roger Davis? Any thoughts or is it just coincidence?
The funny thing about me using the long putter is…I actually used it it 1993 for about 10 tournaments!!! That’s IT…I used it in Australia in one event in 1994 (Masters defence) and last year for one event as i was putting terrible and hoped I could find just a hint of magic with it.
So I have used a long putter for 2(two) events in the past 18 years and only 12 events in my entire life- Yet the commentators in Aust always seem to lump me as a long putter user. Never used it is the USA or Europe. Used it
Now Senior has used it for 23-24 years…that’s a different story. Scotty has just started using it about 6-8 weeks ago…he looked very confident with it and putter great- he was a good putter the regular way also but lost his nerve a little.
I stopped using it in mid 1993 because I truly believed it was not a golf stroke and was going to be banned some time soon–so I had better persevere with a regular putter and learn a way to hole more putts and not do it by using a long putter—yet here we are 18 years later and they have not banned the long putter at all.
The incredible thing about these rule makers is this-- Brett Ogle really lost his nerve chipping around the green-- He used a long putter-- so he made up a long chipper where he could attach it to his body up his arm more for his chipping-- I am pretty sure they banned that??? Why the distinction that one is fine and one isn’t?
A lot of Aussies have used them- Peter Lonard for ever (15 years with only a few months of short putter here or there)…Nick O’Hern (12 years or more)…a bunch of young guys also use it. I think it has to do with the normally hard fast slick greens in Australia. You hinge the putter to the chest- you hardly use the right hand or fingers… more or else dangling them on the grip and just let the weight of the putter do the work.
Should be 100% TOTALLY ILLEGAL…I am amazed they can allow it- and have waited so long to ban it, it can’t be done now.
Man, I forgot about O’Hern and Lonard, that’s funny. O’Hern is some player. He looks like he does nothing yet he’s always up there. I’ve got so much admiration for those kinds of players- I wish could figure out how they do it.
I hadn’t realized you had such a short time with the long putter, I suppose winning with it was a big part of you getting labeled with it. I do agree it shouldn’t be allowed, it’s just not golf. Though I do appreciate the careers I’ve gotten to see because of it, so what are you gonna do. Peter Senior, and most of Sam Torrance’s career wouldn’t even be on the map without it. It’s funny how it works…
It was funny watching the practice rounds at The Masters last week. Especially being outside the ropes. Some of the comments from people are absurd…I don’t know how you guys put up up with hearing such off the wall things from people when walking around watching… But that’s another topic
What is really amazing is how the gallery get all turned on about the drive…they don’t care where it goes as long as it goes far.
I don’t go to watch golf from behind the ropes but who could resist going to Augusta?.
The last time I went and watched live golf was with Lag at The Presidents Cup in San Fran in 2009 and it was the same mentality there…“WOW…that’s gone miles…How Far Is That?.. it has got to have gone 330 yards”!!! “He crushed it…killed it”
Little consideration for the shape of the shot or where it ended up as the guy would be chipping out under cypress limbs for his next shot.
The 17th at Augusta guys just bombed away over Eisenhower Tree even with the tee 40 yards back from when I played it in 1998…Now that tee shot would be an entirely different story with a persimmon or a small headed 300CC driver in your hand. You would have to start it right and draw it around the tree to find the fairway. Golf has certainly changed and that right there, just for one example, is living proof of how shot making has exited the scene for smash and grab golf.
thinking back at that Prez Cup with Lag…Funny story when we were watching Mike Weir tee off in practice one day…that’s Lag’s story and he can tell it…but you certainly had to be there…it was priceless and timed to perfection
The action in your early swing sequence looks quite a bit like what David Lee was advocating ten or fifteen (more?) years ago. Did you ever consider any of that gravity golf stuff?
Bradley and I walked up to a tee to watch the guys tee off, and in the group was Mike Weir and I told told Bradley “Oh, there’s Weir, I wonder if he is still snap hooking drives like he did back when we played the Canadian Tour together” and a couple of people around us gave me a weird (Weir) look. So he gets up, and sure enough, absolutely hits a hard snap hook off the tee into the right trees (being left handed). “Well, some things never change”
It’s hard for me to fathom that a guy playing on the President’s Cup team and who has won The Masters would have a shot like that in his bag. We watched him on a few holes and I don’t remember him hitting a fairway, and there was another snap hook he hit when we saw him again. I don’t think the S & T stuff he is working on is doing him much good either.
Mike always had a really sharp short game and putter… but never came across as a great striker. Obviously he has his excellent ball striking weeks or he would not have had the success he has had.
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