Growing up in the suburb of Washington DC, I was lucky enough to live in a neighborhood that had a bunch of kids and we played sports all year long. Fall was football, winter was basketball and spring/summer was baseball, repeat. One summer day when I was 13, during an impromptu batting practice, an errant pitch knocked out four of top teeth completely. After surgery and a quite unattractive set of braces, I finished the baseball season, made the all-star and all seemed normal. When the next baseball season came around I could not stay in the batter’s box to hit. The coach cut me from the team. You can’t hit, you can’t play. Ouch!
A friend of mine asked me if I wanted to caddy and make some money at a local country club in Bethesda Maryland. I did not know what a caddy was since I have never stepped foot on a golf course but the idea of making some money was a winner. We went to caddy camp and started caddying. At that time, I didn’t think much of golf since I had played team sports all my athletic life, which is the source of my ultra-competitive spirit and golf was an individual game.
To my surprise, the members I caddied for were fun, easy going, trashing talking athletes that were also ultra-competitive. The same comradery from playing team sports was also in golf and I had a great time caddying. I watched with full attention to the swings of the best players and I mimicked their game. Golf to me was similar to baseball. It had a ball, stick and the goal was to hit it as hard and far as possible. What is not to like? I was hooked after I broke 40 that summer.
I made the high school golf team the next year. Our team won the Maryland state championship in 1984 and placed 2nd in 1985. That summer, I was a semi-finalist in three different Washington DC area junior tournaments and I felt like I could play at the college level. I went on to play for the local Junior College (Montgomery College) where I qualified for two National Junior College Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NJCAA) tournaments. Division I golf didn’t work out for me at University of Maryland after walking onto the team.
Why? My swing did not hold up. I can honestly tell you that I never felt I could get to the next level in golf because my “swing” always fell apart at some point during a round. I was missing something that the better players knew but they were sharing the secret.
If there is such a thing as a PhD in Golf, I think I would have three degrees by now. Toski and Flick, Jim Ballard, Golf My Way, Square to Square are just a few curriculums I have studied but none of them delivered the goods. Then I meet AJ Bonar from The Truth about Golf TV fame. I flew out to San Diego to have a private lesson and my golf life changed. It took just a short amount of time under his watchful eyes to instantly improve my ball striking, chipping and putting. We played a round the next day and I shot 69, which should have been better. It also solidified how important face-to-face golf instruction is for anyone’s game. You just have to find the right instructor.
I became a plus 2 later that year and qualified as an amateur to play in two consecutive Maryland Opens – a profession event. My swing held up! It made me think that if I knew this method when I was younger, I could have had an even better golf career and maybe won some titles. There is my competitive spirit again. I think there is a song about that somewhere.
So what does this all mean for you, I would like teach you the same methods and techniques I learned 22 years after I started to play the game. You are never to old to learn what really works in golf and you are not too young to learn how to use the club properly. I am honored and excited to carry this legacy to this generation of golfers and those to come.
Let’s get your Game in Gear!