One of the most famous tee shots you will ever play in golf!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
The thrill of playing the Old Course at St. Andrews cannot be described in words!
It is a spiritual experience that reaches down into the depths of your soul and finds that place of contentment you’ve always wanted! I have played St. Andrews Old Course several times, but none so special as playing with my eldest son in 2014!
My son and I in front of the R&A Building on the first tee at the Old Course, St Andrews!
To stand on the first tee in front of the Clubhouse and headquarters to the R&A is amazing. One of the most famous tee shots in golf is not the opening tee shot, which is fairly benign, but the tee shot, on 17 over the former railroad sheds (rebuilt to replicate the original in the mid-’80s) is intimidating and exciting all at the same moment!
Certainly an intimidating tee shot! Hitting over the corner of the Old Course Hotel.
Fortunately for me, I hit my best drive of the day here and went on to make my par!
If you would like to experience hitting this tee shot over the corner of the railway sheds and the Old Course Hotel, come and join me on a trip of a lifetime in 2017 to Scotland. Go here for more details!
6 Reasons Why Jordan Spieth Will Not Win the British Open!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
I think that the decision to play in the John Deer Classic instead of the Scottish Open at Gullane, Scotland was a HUGE mistake in Jordan’s judgment.
Yes, I know it was the site of his first Tour victory, but he was on a course to change history, and you just cannot let sentiment get in the way. There is always next year for John Deere! Here are my 6 reasons why Jordan will not win the British Open next week.
1. Preparation.
Playing links golf is totally different from playing golf in America, and to learn all the nuances of playing that type of golf takes time.
2. Time difference.
Golfers need at least two or three days (if not more) to get used to the time change experienced by your bodys time cycle.
There is a 6 Hour time difference between Western Illinois at St. Andrew Scotland.
3. Weather.
Scotland is close to the North Sea and the weather is a lot cooler. You need to get used to playing all bundled up for the week.
Rear view of golfer next to golf bag in rain holding umbrella
4. Greens.
The greens are a lot slower than in the courses played on the PGA Tour. It will take more than a couple of days to get used to that.
5. Food.
It takes time and experience to find the right restaurants for the food you like. The last thing you want is an upset stomach while you play!
A Scottish breakfast!
6. Practice rounds.
I have heard that Jordan has been practicing in a simulator to get the feel of playing St. Andrews. He needs to be at St. Andrews on Monday, fresh and ready to go in order to get as many practice rounds in as possible. He has already admitted that he is a little rusty playing in the John Deere because he did touch a club for a week. I think his struggles at the John Deere could affect his confidence going into the Open Championship.
I really hope I am wrong on this and I will still be pulling for Jordan come Thursday as I would like to see the Grand Slam completed once in my lifetime.
What is your take on Jordan Spieth not going over a week early to get acclimatized? Do you think it is not important, and once he gets over there, he will be ready to take on the world? Or do you think he will struggle? Let me know by posting your comments below!
Improve Your Backswing By NOT Thinking About Your Wrists!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
Do you start the backswing with a wrist cock, or do you take the club back in one piece?
Well, some players do, and some players don’t, so it depends on your instructor’s philosophy. Johnny Miller and Hubert Green both started their backswing with a quick wrist set, Jack Nicklaus started back with a very little wrist set at the start. My philosophy is simple, use the big muscles to generate power and eliminate the small muscles in the golf swing to improve accuracy.
Here I describe why I teach a “no wrist cock” backswing and how to master it! There is actually a wrist cock; you just do not do it consciously. The “secret is in the grip pressure.”
Charge By The Hour For Golf – I’d like to see this happen!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
I am so tired of hearing some players say, “I’ll take all the time I want to golf. I’ve paid the full price, and I don’t wish to hurry.”
We each are entitled to enjoy the game at a pace that is not overly slow…. slow meaning a round that takes over 4 hours, 30 minutes, and sometimes up to 5 and 6 (ouch!) hours. I once played Pasatiempo in California. It took us 6 hours to play. I will never go back!
While some players are not ready to hit their shot, they play from tee boxes that are too long for them, they spend over 5 minutes looking for lost balls, and they take several practice swings…. the rest of us wait. And wait some more. Muscles start to cool down, limbs stiffen up, and patience grows thin.
This is the type of golfer you don’t want to have on the course!
Most of us like a moderately paced round where each player is always ready to hit his/her shot, and we aren’t meandering as a group to the other player’s balls.
We enjoy forward movement but still have time for a little friendly conversation. Upon approaching the green, we are already reading the line of our putts, and we putt without making others wait as we walk around the green, plumb bob, etc.
You know you are playing too slow when you reach a new hole, and the group of golfers ahead are leaving the green or are nowhere to be seen. If you won’t speed up and you won’t let the group behind you through, I would like to see a penalty fee assessed.
Upon checking in at the Pro Shop, everyone should be informed that the expected length of time for 18 holes is 4 hours and 15 minutes maximum.
Your receipt should include a policy of assessing 10% of the original green fees for every 15 minutes (or part thereof) you finish over that time! In other words, charge by the hour. You are paying for 4.5 hours on the course. If you dally longer, you have to pay more! The first group to lag behind pays the penalty as long as the next groups play in a timely fashion.
There are plaques near the first holes of most courses in Scotland and Ireland that say, “Expected pace of play to be 3 hours 50 minutes. Please respect your fellow players.
I do not think golfers need to ‘hurry’ to play just over 4 hours. But, it will get them thinking about being prepared and being ready to play when it’s their shot, and overall, they should enjoy the game more.
Stop Complaining and believe you are the best says Gary Player.
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
I played on the South African Sunshine Tour from 1969 to 1979 and had the good fortune to play a few practice rounds with the great Gary Player.
I learned a lot of life lessons from Gary. But the one that has stuck in my head all these years came to the fore this week. I heard all the mumblings and grumblings about the greens at Chambers Bay. Sergio Garcia and Henrik Stenson did not have kind words for the Robert Trent Jones Jr design.
Gary Player has been an inspiration to me and many others with his honesty, integrity, and positive attitude!
I was playing a practice round before the SA Masters at Kensington GC with Gary Player. And the greens were extremely bumpy. I complained to Gary, but instead of getting sympathy, Gary said, “Mel, I am the best putter in the world on bumpy greens. So much so that I think I have a huge advantage this week and believe I can win this tournament.” He went on to win by 7 shots!
The following week, we played the SA Open Championship at Mowbray Golf Club in Cape Town, and the greens were beautiful and really fast.
I thought, “Gary will have a hard time this week as these greens are not the bumpy greens of the week prior.” When I saw Gary in the clubhouse before the first round, I said, “Gary, what do you think of these smooth slick greens?” Do you know what he said? “Mel, I am the best putter in the world on fast, smooth greens. I think I have an advantage over everyone else in the field this week!” He went on to win by 5!
It was an epiphany moment for me! As long as you believe you are the best in ANY situation, you will immediately have an advantage over everyone else! If it is raining, say “I love playing in the rain” If it is sweltering, say “I love playing in the heat!” and if it is freezing cold, say “I love playing in the cold!” Remember, you cannot change the situation. You can only change your attitude towards the situation! I think the winner of the US Open at Chambers Bay will have to have that attitude!
Sergio Still a Crybaby, and Mickelson Still Not a Crybaby!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
On the 10th hole at Chambers Bay in the opening round of the U.S. Open, Phil Mickelson faced a 35-foot birdie putt.
He sent his putt up the hill but got the pace wrong and ended up 3-putting for bogey. Mickelson’s reaction? “That was a pin that I had not spent time on, and I didn’t know how high up the ridge I needed to go… that’s my own fault for having not known that and practiced that putt to that pin.”
Phil Mickelson is always the gentleman. T! akes the high road and never complains.
Sergio Garcia took to Twitter 3 times to complain about the greens. “… These greens are as bad as they look on TV.” “I think a championship of the caliber of US Open golf deserves better quality green surfaces than we have this week, but maybe I’m wrong.” And a third tweet features Garcia indicating that everyone thinks similarly, but he’s the only one with the guts to say it.
Sergio Garcia, on the other hand, is always complaining about something. His nickname “Crybaby” is well suited.
Sergio never gets the big picture. All players face the same conditions, and the U.S. Open would always present challenging tasks for the world’s highest level players.
Cannot take a good divot with your irons – This is easy peasy!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
When you take a strip of earth up as your club strikes the ball – a good divot – it’s a good indication that you made a good swing.
Like all things golf, the key to success is in the details, in this case: your sternum. Watch Mel Sole identify the common problem with this type of shot and describe how you can improve this important aspect of your game.
3 things you must do out of bunkers with hard sand!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
Most golfers are not members of fancy country clubs that have nice, fluffy sand.
Instead, they play public golf courses that intentionally have hard bunkers with very little sand because it keeps the maintenance costs down. Here are 3 things you must do to make your bunker shots more successful!
The man they called Mister – An interview with Ben Hogan in 1987!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
Along with Gary Player, Ben Hogan was my childhood idol.
I learned my golf through Ben Hogan’s book “The 5 Modern Fundamentals.” I read that book so many times I could almost recite it in its entirety! Both Hogan and Player were two of the hardest workers in the game, and this interview done by GOLF Magazine in 1987, gives some interesting insights and dispels one myth about the man they called Mr. Hogan.
Ben Hogan on the tee during the 1965 “Shell’s Wonderful World of Golf Match” against Sam Snead. Hogan hit every fairway and every green.
This interview originally appeared in the September 1987 issue of Golf Magazine.
The man they called Mister – An interview with Ben Hogan in 1987!
GOLF Magazine:
Next year we’ll be celebrating the 100th anniversary of golf in America. You’ve been around for 75 of those years. What’s your first golf-related memory?
BEN HOGAN:
I guess it goes back to about 1920. I was nine years old and selling newspapers in Forth Worth to make some money when one of my friends told me I could earn more by caddieing. The word was you could make 65 cents just by packing a bag around 18 holes. So one day I walked the seven miles from my home to Glen Garden Country Club to see what it was all about. The established caddies at Glen Garden ran sort of a kangaroo court. For a new caddie to break in, he had to win a fist-fight with one of the older, bigger caddies. So they threw me against one of those fellas and I got the better of him. It was through the caddie experience that I got the golf bug.
GOLF:
You were a natural left-hander who took up the game right-handed, weren’t you?
HOGAN:
No, that’s one of those things that’s always been written, but it’s an absolute myth. The truth is, the first golf club I owned was an old left-handed, wooden-shafted, rib-faced mashie that a fellow gave me, and that’s the club I was weaned on. During the mornings we caddies would bang the ball up and down the practice field until the members arrived and it was time to go to work. So I did all that formative practice left-handed. But I’m a natural right-hander.
GOLF:
So many top golfers say they’ve learned the game by studying your swing. From whom did you learn?
HOGAN:
I used to caddie for a fellow named Ed Stewart. He was 21 or 22. He wasn’t the best tipper at Glen Garden, but he was the best player. I’d wait around to caddie for him even though some days he didn’t have the money to pay me. I got more than money from him—I learned the elements of the game and started to mimic him. But he was only the first in a long line of people. Throughout my career, I watched the best players and tried to emulate them.
GOLF:
You were on the Tour for a decade before you started to blossom. Do you still think that’s still possible on today’s Tour, with 150 players going at it and more young talent coming out of college every year?
HOGAN:
I think so, yes. There’s no set time or schedule for developing one’s skills as a professional golfer, and it certainly doesn’t come overnight. It’s a muscle-memory exercise that comes over time.
GOLF:
You’re saying it’s possible for a player to be on the Tour for 10 years before breaking through for, say, two dozen victories in the next decade?
The man they called Mister – An interview with Ben Hogan in 1987!
HOGAN:
Absolutely, if that player is willing to work hard. Otherwise, he’s likely to be out there frustrating himself for another 25 years.
GOLF:
What was it that drove you so hard?
HOGAN:
Three things. One, I didn’t want to be a burden to my mother. Two, I needed to put food on the table. Three, I needed a place to sleep.
GOLF:
Once you and your family were eating well and sleeping comfortably, then what drove you?
HOGAN:
Pride. Determination. I saw an opportunity. And when you see an opportunity, you practice and work, at least from sunup to sundown.
GOLF:
In your own words, you “dug it out of the ground.”
HOGAN:
That’s right.
GOLF:
Did you compete against yourself, against the golf course or against the rest of the field?
HOGAN:
All three. First I went after the golf course. Generally, I figured that if I could beat the course I could stay ahead of the competition. Ultimately, however, I guess I played against my own standards. It was a constant struggle of one kind or another—but always a pleasant one.
GOLF:
Your fight to play top-quality golf wasn’t as onerous as it’s often made out to be?
HOGAN:
You hear stories about me beating my brains out practicing, but the truth is, I was enjoying myself. I couldn’t wait to get up in the morning so I could hit balls. I’d be at the practice tee at the crack of dawn, hit balls for a few hours, then take a break and get right back to it. And I still thoroughly enjoy it. When I’m hitting the ball where I want, hard and crisply—when anyone is—it’s a joy that very few people experience.
The man they called Mister – An interview with Ben Hogan in 1987!
What is the relationship between your grip and the clubface!
Golf Chats is a website to encourage discussions on various subjects relating to the game of golf. I am Mel Sole, Director of Instruction of the Mel Sole Golf School and SAPGA Master Professional. I invite you to enter into a discussion on this or any article on the golfchats.com website. The input is for the entire subscriber base to learn something new each time! Please post your comments below. Keep it clean and tasteful. We are here to learn from one another!
There is a definite relationship between your grip and the clubface.
If you start with a strong grip and your left wrist is “cupped” (for right-handed golfers), then the wrist must be cupped at the top. If your wrist is flat at address, your wrist needs to be flat at the top of your swing. Getting these two positions wrong will lead to hooking or slicing. Check this out and get rid of those offline shots!
