Interview with Dawn Mercer Golf School
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Robert Blumenthal
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Dawn Mercer is the Director of Instruction at the Innisbrook Golf & Spa Resort near Tampa, FL. In the following interview, Dawn explains her “keep it simple” theory of golf instruction that we would all do well to follow. She informs us that male chauvinism is alive and well … how golf can help a woman move up in the business world … and why some female students might feel more comfortable with a female instructor.
I highly recommend attending one of Dawn’s golf schools at beautiful Innisbrook. You’ll have four golf courses from which to choose, including the Copperhead Course, the venue for the PGA Tour’s Transitions Championship.
Dawn Mercer
GolfConversations: I came down here to meet David Windsor tomorrow. He’s a PGA pro who teaches disabled people how to golf. But it occurred to me that Innisbrook is nearby and I thought it would be neat to talk to you as well. Thank you for agreeing to meet with me on such short notice.
Dawn Mercer: Next time you’re gonna give me more warning and we’ll go play golf. We’ve got four courses here so you gotta stay at least four days.
(laughter)
GC: From your mouth to God’s ears. That reminds me of a few months ago when Sea Pines was nice enough to host me. I was the last player to go off that day at Harbour Town. When I got to the 17th hole, I caught up with a foursome that was on the green. They waved me up. That’s the worst thing in golf for a lousy player … to have everybody watching you try to hit the green on a par 3. They’re all watching you…
(laughter)
DM: We create our own pressure.
(laughter)
GC: Especially that shot – it’s not the easiest shot. But somehow the golf gods were looking down on me in a favorable manner – and I hit a great shot.
DM: What was the yardage?
GC: It was like 175. You know, wind coming left to right off Calibogue Sound, quartering and helping and hurting and I got stuck on my downswing and I had to flip my hands…
(laughter)
… and I hit this great shot. So I drive up with the left foot dangling outside the cart. I get up to the green, I’m twirling the club, and the whole deal…
(laughter)
“Thanks guys, I’ll be out of your way in just a second…”
(laughter)
I’m fixing ball marks all over the place, tamping down spike marks, the whole show.
(laughter)
Anyway, enough about me. How did you get involved with golf? Were you one of those little girls who took it up and you were fabulous immediately?
DM: My father got me started. Age of 12.
GC: Where was this?
DM: Local. I’m the last of six kids. There was quite a big span from one child to the other. It was kind of like two families. So my dad got my sister and me into golf and tennis. He was an addict; he started at the age of 30 and was self-taught. He got to a +2 handicap.
GC: Wow. You have good genes.
(laughter)
DM: Yeah. He made his own clubs; he was very addicted.
GC: Made his own clubs???
DM: Yeah.
GC: You mean he’d buy components and assemble them?
DM: Yes. He’d put our names on the clubs and he’d come home and say, “I hit you well today.” I said, “Don’t tell too many people that.”
(laughter)
I liked golf more than tennis. I went to Innisbrook’s first junior camp when I was 13. Mike Souchak was the Director of Golf at the time, Jay Overton was the host professional.
GC: Mike Souchak the famous amateur?
DM: Yes. And pro.
GC: He was the big muscular guy? He went to Duke?
DM: Yes. His son Chris worked here as well. The problem in high school was that golf is a lonely sport for kids … especially girls. All my girlfriends were going to the beach and looking at guys and I’m hanging with Dad for 4 ½ hours a day playing golf.
Since my father was so serious, I played for fun. I was on the high school girls’ team the first year. After the first year, they didn’t have many girls that went out for the team so I had to play on the guys’ team. I had to play the same tees and I couldn’t hit the same yardage distance as the guys. So after that I was done.
GC: “Done,” meaning you gave up?
DM: I was just playing for fun. I wasn’t trying to make the golf team. It was just boring.
GC: Were you a very competitive person?
DM: Yes. But I didn’t bleed it. Things and sports in general, I’m very competitive. But I just never had the interest to beat everybody and play everybody and win all the time because none of my friends played. I think if there were more girls who had played, it would have been different. But the guys just beat me up and it wasn’t worth it.
GC: And they weren’t particularly welcoming to you?
DM: No. They weren’t great…
GC: They were real jerks
(laughter)
They were the usual; that hasn’t changed!
(laughter)
DM: So I went through a timeframe where I just played for fun. I went to Tampa College and did computer programming and accounting. Bartended for a while and got tired of that.
It was my mother’s idea to teach golf. When I started to learn the game, I always went to golf schools and took clinics and lessons. So I always learned correctly. So as time went on, if I went out and played with my parents or their friends, I would tell them what to do. And it worked because I knew the proper foundations and fundamentals from the get-go.
GC: How old were you when your mom had the idea for you to teach golf?
DM: 20, 21.
GC: You weren’t interested in anything else at that time?
DM: I liked math but I didn’t like sitting still for eight hours at a desk.
GC: I don’t like sitting in a golf cart for five hours but that’s another story.
(laughter)
DM: Jay Overton came into the place where I was bartending. He was the one who worked here when I was 13 at the Innisbrook junior camp.
GC: Is he related to Jeff Overton on the PGA Tour?
DM: No relation. So we get to talking and he mentioned something about working at Innisbrook. I said I’d be interested. He said he’d hire me, start me in the golf shop, get me in the PGA or LPGA program.
I enrolled in the PGA first. After the first year, the lead female instructor that worked the golf schools left. They offered me a position for which I didn’t have any experience, you know, teaching full time.
Lew Smither was our Director of Instruction at the time. He said, “You don’t need experience; I’ll tell you what to do and you do it. You just kind of be a coach.”
GC: This sounds just like the Peggy Kirk Bell story at Pine Needles.
DM: Yeah, similar.
GC: You had learned all the fundamentals as a kid so you actually knew what to say.
DM: Yes. I got into the LPGA program as well. Their teaching/coaching division.
GC: I never understood the difference between the PGA program and the LPGA certification.
DM: The LPGA does mainly the teaching division. I had to take a teaching test which I didn’t have to do in the PGA. But because I was already in the PGA, they recognized those credentials and I just had to take a simple test and I got my membership.
I don’t know how they are now, because I got out of it. The LPGA, at that time, you could only take a seminar that had a minimum of eight hours of credits. So it was a full day taken away from work; most cases, you had travel expenses as well. But the PGA was different: maybe this one-hour interview we’re doing could be used towards credit, depending upon what the subject matter was.
GC: I wouldn’t take lessons from any PGA pro that got credits for talking to me!
(laughter)
DM: So when you’re in both the PGA and the LPGA, the LPGA will not recognize credits outside their organization. It is very time-consuming to participate in both and pay for all the expenses to maintain your certification credits.
Now I understand them wanting to get dollars for the LPGA program, but they’re going to get all their dollars from their LPGA-only participants. There aren’t many pros that are PGA and LPGA members.
For example, I offered to them to do a cracker barrel session …
GC: A “cracker barrel” session?
DM: Yeah, they called them “cracker barrel” sessions in the PGA in South Florida. It would be 6 to 8 o’clock…
GC: So you don’t meet at the Cracker Barrel?
(laughter)
DM: No!
GC: What kind of session is it at the Cracker Barrel? All the fried chicken you can eat?
(laughter)
What the hell is a cracker barrel session?
DM: A training session where people can interact with different speakers. I set up a session with a tournament director, a rules person, a financial guy … so if you went from 6 to 8 o’clock at night, you still got 2 hours of credits and you didn’t have to take off from work, and get a hotel, etc.
GC: I see.
DM: The LPGA was very nice to me as far as promoting golf for females. But at the end of the day, they were a lot smaller and didn’t offer as much as the PGA. Now it’s changed, from what I understand.
GC: Dawn, if it was up to me, today’s interview would get you 3 credits.
(laughter)
Good towards … whatever you’d like!
(laughter)
DM: If I have to go to therapy after this, I get more credits, right?
(laughter)
GC: Oh, absolutely! You have your therapist call my therapist and they can both bill each other.
(laughter)
I’m sorry I interrupted you. So they offered you the job here at Innisbrook…
DM: For teaching.
GC: You did a little work in the shop first?
DM: Right. I worked the first year in the shop and if we had a school that needed more instructors, I’d work the golf school.
GC: How was it when you first started teaching? Were you comfortable with it?
DM: No. Because when I started here I was 21 or so. And anybody that I had for a student who was from my father’s era, I got a lot of, “Look, lady, I’ve been playing the game longer than you’ve been alive. Whatta ya gonna tell me?”
Anytime I would get that confrontation, I would clam up and I wouldn’t speak. So Lew Smither would say, “Look, we’ve got five people here. If three of them don’t want to listen, go talk to the two that will listen. They’re all paying the same amount of money, it’s their choice. Don’t clam up and not teach the last two because the other three made you uncomfortable.”
GC: That was good advice.
DM: As time went on and I was more comfortable and confident and experienced, it didn’t bother me anymore.
GC: But that’s got to be a scary thing when you’re 21 and some guy who’s been shanking it for 30 years…
(laughter)
“Yeah, honey, I know the grip. Why can’t I hit it further?”
(laughter)
DM: They don’t want to listen. One time I had a gentleman who was in his early 70s; he used to be a single-digit handicap but over time became a 15-handicap. He wasn’t very happy.
GC: I feel his pain.
(laughter)
DM: So he and his wife are in the golf school. He had an attitude with from the get-go. He said, “I don’t have a problem with you being a professional, I have a problem with you being a female.”
GC: No!
DM: I started to laugh and I said, “Would you like me to take my bra off?”
(laughter)
What am I going to say: “Sorry, I was born this way?”
(laughter)
The next day, we start in the bunker. He’s right behind me as I’m showing the students how to hit bunker shots. And he says, “I thought you’re supposed to make ‘em?”
So I rake another ball over and I jarred it! And I looked at him real seriously and said, “Is that what you mean?”
(laughter)
His wife said, “Good for you” and he left me alone. So I’ve had some moments. Last September, it was 23 years since I’ve been at Innisbrook. You walk in the door and you look around and you know why. The place is beautiful, I meet people from all around the world.
GC: 23 years at the same golf resort? You must have some collection of towels!
(laughter)
DM: It’s great. I have a lot of repeat students. A lot that I’ve created great friendships with. Some friends have a place in Manhattan, a place out in the Hamptons, and a place in West Palm.
GC: Those are my kind of friends. Don’t lose my phone number!
(laughter)
My parents live in West Palm.
DM: My friends are in Frenchman’s Reserve. They’re near the Bear Club.
GC: My parents are near Toojay’s Deli in Lake Worth.
(laughter)
So tell me, do you have a philosophy of the golf swing?
DM: Fundamentals and balance. I’m into the fitness element even though I can’t get students to see that. When I went to the Titleist Performance Institute, it was very interesting to have them show you that with tight hip flexors, the ability for someone to turn back and maintain their original posture cannot happen.
When you’re first teaching, it’s typical to never shut up. I always tell people, you know you have an inexperienced instructor when they never shut up and they’re all over the place.
GC: I’ve noticed that.
DM: As you get more experience, you learn that simplicity is the best. And you also learn that if the foundation isn’t correct, there’s going to be a breakdown in the backswing and then, consequently, a breakdown in the forward swing.
It really stems from the beginning. It’s two moves: one-two. Your putter and your driver are two of the same. One just goes back longer than the other.
Keeping it simple in terms of other sports is helpful. Like swinging a baseball bat or a tennis racket.
I took violin lessons with my great niece about four years ago. I say, “I took violin lessons” — it lasted two whole months.
GC: That’s a hard instrument to learn.
DM: I did it for her so we could spend time together. But I learned a valuable lesson. At the third lesson, the teacher was saying, “The back of your hand’s not flat, you’re not drawing the bow…” He barked out four things at me in two seconds.
GC: Too much information.
DM: Yes. The first day I was trying to be so perfect holding the bow in the correct position that I almost broke it in my hand. My arm and shoulder were killing me.
That’s what my golf students do. They’re trying to do something perfect by applying tension and pressure. And that makes it that much more difficult to do it correctly. When you can get them to let go, when you can get them to let it fly and not analyze it or be so deliberate about it, it’s amazing the performance that comes out of them when they’re not trying.
GC: Did you ever read that book, “Extraordinary Golf” by Fred Shoemaker?
DM: I’ve seen it.
GC: He tells his students to swing and let the club fly down the range.
DM: If you could throw the club, that would be ideal. Remember that movie, it was called “Little Mo,” it was about tennis? They had the girl throwing rackets – same thing.
One of the things I find interesting in teaching … your typical “Type A” person … a lot of times, a majority of my students are from New York. They’re wired. They’re tight, they’re fast. Let’s say they’re hitting balls and they’re getting faster and tired and thinking way too much. I’ll ask them something stupid: “Where’d you get that jacket?” You get them talking about something non-golf related; it’s amazing how they’ll hit five balls in a row great. It’s a distraction.
It’s almost like a chess match for me to figure out where can I go to get the performance out of you without you realizing it.
GC: Is that based upon the fact that most beginners are so tense?
DM: It’s very intimidating.
GC: It’s intimidating and your mind tells you, rationally, to propel this little ball all the way out there, you have to exert force.
DM: Right.
GC: So why wouldn’t you want to swing real hard to propel the ball? I always thought that if I was going to attempt to teach golf to a beginner … well, first of all, Dawn, I would get LPGA certified.
(laughter)
Ok, that’s the first thing I would do. I’m not a big-shot like you. I don’t have a problem going to hotels and traveling.
(laughter)
DM: You might have to shave off your beard!
(laughter)
GC: Yes. But now the LPGA has got that new transgender policy.
(laughter)
DM: Well, now you’re in!
GC: Now I’m in.
(laughter)
But that estrogen issue aside … in that first lesson to a beginner: if you could explain this is how the ball travels in golf. It looks like you should scoop the ball to make it fly but it’s not. Maybe some relaxation exercises, similar to what you were just talking about. I think that would have been more helpful than “Here’s how you hold the club, here’s how you stand.”
DM: Right, not become so deliberate. I have people swing with one hand … toss a ball to me, things like that. But because the golf ball is just sitting there, it’s saying, “Ok, buddy what are you gonna do to hit me?”
“Well, I watch Golf Channel, Tiger Woods does this, this magazine says do this, my friend tells me to do that.” Everything locks up, everything’s more arms, nothing’s going through and towards the target.
I use the analogy a lot: if our primary objective was to hit a bulls eye in darts … and there’s four of us going to play darts. And you look at the bulls eye, and your friend looks at the dart board … another friend looks at the wall … and I’m thinking about how many fingers are holding on to the dart, how far my arm is going to go back, and so forth.
If we relate that back to golf, when you were hitting on the 17th at Harbour Town and all those guys are watching you … are you looking at where you want the ball to go? Are you looking at the whole green? Are you thinking about your elbow going back? The farther we get away from the bulls eye, the farther the ball gets away from the bulls eye.
And that’s why when we just let it go … we’re always looking to analyze, we never look to react. And when you get people to just go with the flow: look and see and go, look and see and go … not think of how but where.
That’s when you start to see the performance. That’s the challenge: to get people to trust it, have confidence in it … to trust to let it go. They feel like they have to control it.
GC: We have an information society and we think that if you want to learn something, you read a book, watch a video, listen to an expert. If Ben Hogan says swing the club like this, then that must be the way to do it. But Hogan’s swing was fashioned to fight a hook and his method didn’t apply to 95% of golfers. And yet everyone says Ben Hogan’s book is the golf instruction of all time.
We lousy golfers go from one swing theory to another … from one Golf Digest article to the next … in the same issue you can read conflicting theories!
DM: Oh, yeah. Sure. They’ve got to keep writing to keep printing. The question is, #1: are you reading it correctly? #2: Feel vs. reality. You think you’re turning and you’re not. So you add a couple of those into the loop and you become a jack of all trades and a master of absolutely nothing.
That’s one thing nice about the teaching philosophy here. It’s very simplistic – you can relate to baseball and tennis and other things. Instead of: “It has to be this and this and this … and all these degrees and angles that the average person can’t do.”
GC: When you’re teaching someone, do you ever hold the butt of the golf club against a student’s head?
DM: I’ve done it. I don’t like using the terms “head still” or “centered” because it works, in my opinion, more on the spine … and the head sits off of the spine. So if the head sits still, the spine goes forward.
GC: The head travels a little bit with the spine?
DM: Right. So I use more of the analogy of maintaining the distance to the ball, not “head still.”
GC: When I would look at the pictures in Golf Digest of David Leadbetter holding the shaft against a student’s head … I always said to myself, “Anybody who tries to hold a golf club next to my head, I’m gonna kill him!”
(laughter)
DM: I will say it’s nerve-wracking for people because of their eyes. I can tell they flinch a little bit because their eyes are right there.
GC: What is the average age/handicap of the person you teach?
DM: I’ll teach anybody. The bulk of our lady membership is probably mid-to-high 20s. I don’t have a ton of juniors; I love to work with the ones that want to learn or beat their dad or play on a college team.
GC: I’d love to do that!
(laughter)
DM: I don’t like the ones that Mommy and Daddy don’t want either. I have a handful of those. It really ranges. I’ll get raw beginners. One of my best ones this year … I had a lawyer come down from Canada. He’s a 1-handicap. And lot of people would go, “Why would a 1-handicap bother?” But he could be a +2. I don’t care what level anybody is at anything, you can always be better.
He came down here on the recommendation of friends of his that come here all the time. They worked with our Director of Instruction, Lew Smither, who was here for 25 years. Lew and I worked side by side. We’d do pretty much the same stuff.
So the gentleman books the golf school and then he finds out Lew is no longer there and I’m the Director of Instruction. He did great. He’s a hockey player; hockey players are great hands players, a lot of cut in their short game shots.
So we made some adjustments, got a little better path with his driver. He goes home; a few months later, a couple from his area books a school with me. I was talking to the husband at a social function and he said to me, “Please don’t take this the wrong way, but my friend … an attorney, male, 1-handicap, going to see a female instructor. We all said to him, ‘You’re crazy!’ You have no idea what it did for you when he came back and he told everyone, ‘She’s the best. You go down and see her.’”
GC: That happened recently?
DM: Yes.
GC: So you’re still having to deal with the male chauvinism nonsense?
DM: Not as much. This guy…
GC: Listen, sweetheart, I’m running this interview.
(laughter)
Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. Go ahead.
(laughter)
DM: The other thing, you get out of it what you put into it. Mike Bender, who you probably know.
GC: I know of him.
DM: When he gives a lesson to the Korean girls — the tour players — he’ll ask them to do a drill. And they’ll do it for eight hours until they’re told to stop. I can’t get some students to make two practice swings.
GC: Well, the Korean girls are very driven.
DM: Yes, but my point is that students get very frustrated that they can’t buy the success: “Hey, I just paid for a lesson – now let me hit the ball 20 yards further.”
So the discipline for individuals – or their ability to apply it – is different for everybody.
I tell people, “We all went to school, we all had the same teacher, we got the same sales pitch; someone got an ‘A’, someone got a ‘B.’” Some people learn faster and apply things easier. That’s always the variable you’re going to deal with.
GC: And then there are some people who just don’t have the athletic ability to do this.
DM: Right. Right.
GC: That’s what’s so maddening about golf. You can hit one or two good shots in a round and it gives you the hope that with a little practice, a little instruction, you could do it consistently.
You can’t hit a fastball against a major league pitcher. You can’t play basketball against Kobe Bryant. But every once in a while, in golf, you can hit a semi-professional shot.
DM: Yeah. Sure. It’s self-rewarding and self-defeating. And I get a lot of people who are very successful financially and they’re used to winning at everything. And it’s infuriating for someone at that level to whiff at a drive or top a drive that goes 30 yards.
GC: I’ve never had that problem because I’ve been losing at everything my entire life.
(laughter)
So when I got into golf I said, “Wow, I’m used to this. No problem here. This is my game.”
(laughter)
DM: But that’s the difference between golf and lot of other sports. It is very self-rewarding and self-defeating. When you think you’ve got, you just lost it. If you lost it, it comes right back again. It’s maddening.
GC: As a golf professional, explain to me: how is that Tiger Woods had a swing with Butch Harmon that won 8 majors … then he goes to Hank Haney, changes his swing and wins 5 majors. Doesn’t like that swing anymore so now he’s with a new guy and he’s changing his swing again.
It’s not just Tiger, but why do they do this? It would seem to me that I would go back to that swing with which you won 8 majors. I don’t understand and I don’t think the average golfer understands why a pro would change a swing that was so successful.
DM: Tiger could win majors with any instructor, obviously. A couple of things … if the errant shot tends to go here, they’re going to do something to make sure that error doesn’t happen. So that’s where some of them make their changes, to correct an error.
There was talk about his leg and how he straightens his left leg and that’s why he needed the knee surgery. He spun his hips out so quickly … Butch Harmon asked him to speed up his arm swing. That’s why a lot of times it looks like he’s swinging out of his shoes compared to the other players.
One of our tennis members here is a good tennis player. He comes to a golf clinic; he’s swinging over the top all day long. I asked him to hit the ball with some tennis top spin; he applies it immediately. A month later I work with him, he’s worse than ever going over the top. I thought it was strange because he had made the adjustment very quickly.
So I asked him what he was working on. He said, “Tiger Woods works on speeding up his arm swing at impact.”
(laughter)
GC: And Senator, you’re no Tiger Woods!
(laughter)
DM: And I said, “What’s the breakdown in Tiger’s golf swing?” He said, “I have no idea.” I said, “He spins his hips out.” So instead of Butch Harmon asking him to slow down his hips, he wanted him to speed up the arms.
Now here’s my guy, he’s over the top with no lower body rotation … and now he’s going faster than ever over the top. That’s where if I want to listen to everything and read everything … we all don’t have the same disease. How do you take the same medicine?
Probably someone like a Haney tries to work with being more on plane. The new guy, I’m not sure what his philosophy is. Tiger has always been above everyone physically. But I thought his edge was always mental. And that’s where you saw the breakdown a little bit with everything going on in his life.
You take someone like him who can fine-tune and do anything. And he’s so savvy as it is, he can make his own adjustments. I have some friends at a Hank Haney facility; they said Hank said the best day in his life was when Tiger called him… and the best day of his life was when he ended it. He worked like 180 days… everyone thinks the pay is that great. Where the pay is great is the tie-in… everyone goes to you because of Tiger.
But you can imagine…180 days. I pick up the phone and I say, “Robert, I want you here now.” You drop whatever you’re doing and you go.
GC: And Tiger will pick up your bus fare. I mentioned that to Bob Toski a few months ago. “If Tiger called you and asked you to come out on tour with him and coach him, what would you say?” Mr. Toski said, “I don’t do house calls.”
(laughter)
DM: When Tiger was interviewed a long time ago by Dan Rather or Mike Wallace, he was asked, “Why are you working on your swing, you’re number one?” Tiger said, “You can always get better.” A lot of people have done that.
GC: And go in the other direction.
DM: Yes, when you get up to here, you’ve got a better chance of falling off the cliff than going higher up the mountain.
GC: Which is why I stay where I am…
(laughter)
…I don’t want that feeling of being up at the top and having to back down. I couldn’t live with myself.
(laughter)
Listening to you, it sounds as if you enjoy your work.
DM: Love it.
GC: “Love it.” That’s great. I’d say 95% of the people in the world hate what they do and it’s always nice to hear that someone loves their work.
DM: I’m fortunate. I’m taking a group to southern Ireland in August. This past September, I’d won a trip to the northern part of Ireland. Last year, we were in the middle part. I went to New Zealand and played golf with some of the lady members here. Went to Portugal with some of the members. Went to Whistling Straits in May.
GC: You didn’t stand in any bunkers, did you?
DM: I, uh, I didn’t…
GC: You didn’t know where you were standing, did you?
(laughter)
DM: But like anybody, I work long hours, holidays, and weekends … but at the end of the day, if I weigh what I do and how much fun it is, sometimes it’s hard to call it work.
GC: That’s great. I was watching some of your videos on YouTube.
(laughter)
DM: Oh, God – those ones!
(laughter)
DM: You don’t like them?
DM: I told Matt, next time I’ll try to smile a little bit and not look straight in the sun.
GC: Tell me, what is that little phrase you use at the end?
DM: “Always invest in the best equipment: being yourself.”
GC: Would you like to expand upon that?
DM: People think nothing of spending $500 for a driver that they don’t use 18 times in a round of golf. And if they knew what they were doing, they could pretty much hit any driver. I think people put a lot of time and energy in paying for stuff instead of investing in themselves. Investing in themselves, like the fitness thing. I can’t stay I’m a 100% a health nut, but I’ve gravitated more to being healthy. I see the benefits of feeling like a million bucks and zipping around all day.
I think a lot of life is choice and I always make the statement, “Change what you don’t like or change your attitude of what you can’t change.” So I use the “invest in yourself” phrase … whether it’s through better health and stretching … or better attitude … instead of just buying another driver or pay another instructor without bothering to listen or practice.
GC: Do you use any teaching aids that you recommend?
DM: One of the things I was really impressed with and it’s a new one out: Pro Balance. Guys in the U.K. made it. You can almost do the same thing with a pool noodle. You stand on it and you try to get your feet flush as best you can. You hit balls with it; it really stabilizes your lower body and works the power from the bottom to the top.
There’s a teaching aid called The Hip Blaster. It’s a contraption that has elastic bands that attach to the hips. I have it on order; they’re sending me two of them. It really increases your hip speed.
GC: Let’s say a woman wants to take up golf. Would she be better off seeing a female instructor?
DM: I think so and I’ll give you a reason why.
GC: Keep it clean.
(laughter)
DM: One of the ladies I give lessons to … she’s been taking instruction from a local male pro here for years. When she swings back, she would be way off plane. So he worked with her to keep the shaft in line with her arms on plane … which I agree with. She has a very large chest and…
GC: What did I say about keeping it clean?
(laughter)
DM: …which makes your arms shorter and she’s short-waisted, which inhibits the freedom of her arms as they relate to her body. I don’t know if A) he doesn’t identify with a woman’s anatomy as it relates to the golf swing or B) Would not feel comfortable speaking to a woman about how her chest might be impacting her swing.
That’s an area that I will say is different. The other thing is – I’m not always touchy/handsy, but if I’m trying to get someone to turn and I’m not getting it, I’ll move her shoulders back … or I’ll turn their hips. Especially a lady that’s larger, she would feel uncomfortable with a male instructor turning her. But at the end of the day – male vs. female – there’s no difference in expertise or knowledge. The comments I hear from a lot of my male clients is that the approach is softer and simpler. It’s not this kind of in-your-face and “do this” approach.
GC: That makes sense.
DM: I used to find that your businesswoman who was a better golfer wanted to take lessons from a man. So you had that flip side also. But at the end of the day, golf should not have gender. There should not be a lady’s club and a men’s club because there are short guys that need the softer flex, shorter club … and there are tall women that need a longer club. I have men’s clubs – my driver’s a stiff shaft, I have two wraps on the grips because I have big palms.
The ladies’ tees vs. the mens’ tees – it should be forward, middle, and back. A lot of our senior men members play from the forward tees now. If you can pull gender out of the equation, I think it helps in a lot of elements: instruction, equipment, playing the course, etc.
GC: I think women have been intimidated by men for too long on the golf course. I love it when you see a foursome of men watching women about to tee off and they’re rolling their eyes…
DM: “Oh, God!”
(laughter)
GC: Yes. Meanwhile, they’re 25 handicappers!
(laughter)
DM: I like it when they give a lesson to someone on the range. They can’t hit the ball for dirt and they’re telling someone else how to do it.
GC: And it’s always a pretty girl they want to help: “Honey, wait a minute, you’re doing it all wrong.”
(laughter)
And in the good old days, the man would come around them and hold the club with them…
(laughter)
DM: There’s a pro in Michigan who uses the term “Pick up the laundry basket” to get people to turn. I said to him, “When you do these schools with men, do you tell your male clients that?” He said, “No, I tell them to pick up the laundry basket and hand it to their wife.”
(laughter)
GC: I’m offended by that.
(laughter)
DM: Golf brings such a large world into a small area. I was in New Zealand and a guy said to me, “Do you know Lew Smither?” I said, “Know him? I work with him every day.” I was in Austria … the lady behind us had an Innisbrook sweatshirt on – she had taken lessons here two years prior.
There are a lot of ladies that would come to the golf school here – especially from New York – that were bond traders and stock brokers. All the men were leaving the office to go play in golf tournaments and they had to stay in the office because they didn’t play golf.
So they said, “Forget it, we’ll go play golf, too.” One of the gals I worked with in the school – she’s 28 or so – she worked for a financial company. When the boss came in, everyone would clam up, no one would speak. They had a golf tournament, she gets paired with him, and she plays a good game of golf. So they hit it off, it’s a totally different atmosphere. Afterwards, they go to the bar. She likes cigars, he smokes cigars.
The next day, the boss walks in and she says, “Hi, Bob.” And everyone is shocked because she was talking to him on a first-name basis. She said two or three months down the road, she moved up the ladder. She said, “Don’t get me wrong. Golf and the cigars opened the door of conversation. The reason why I moved up the ladder is because I could have a conversation with him. I gave him a bunch of ideas in ways to better his business … where before no one spoke to him or helped him.”
GC: I would like to see women take the place of some of these loudmouth assholes who are swilling beer, smoking cigars, putting with one arm and talking on the cell phone with the other. I think women are more respectful of the game.
DM: I’ve got a question for you: why do you think it’s not typical for 8, 12, or 16 women to go on a golf vacation for four days?
GC: Is there an answer?
DM: I don’t know. That’s one of the things we always ask ourselves. We get tons of male golf groups and we’d like to see lady groups, too. From my own perspective, women aren’t easy to travel with. I get 4 guys, they’ll throw a hundred bucks into the pot and pay for the bill; I get 4 ladies, they’ve got their calculators out.
GC: Ay-yi-yi … I hate that.
DM: So that’s part of it – they’re not as easy to get along with. I don’t know if they get the same satisfaction out of dumping $1,000 on a weekend that’s just golf vs. going shopping in New York.
GC: Oh, I know why groups of women don’t go on golf trips.
DM: Why?
GC: Because after the round, women don’t go to titty bars.
(laughter)
DM: Could you please keep this clean?
(laughter)
GC: Touché. Dawn, thank you very much for your time.
DM: It was a pleasure. I’d like you to come back and play some golf. You’ve gotta play the courses.
GC: It’s a dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it!
(laughter)
The Copperhead course here is routinely rated as one of the favorites among the PGA Tour players.
DM: I think it was two years ago, it was rated the third-hardest that they play.
GC: Just what I need: another hard course to beat me up.
Bruce Baird is the founder and CEO of The Nationwide Golf Schools. Join us at www.weteachgolf.com