An opportunity calls

Over the past few weeks I have been reading the Vision 54 books by Pia Nilsson and Lynn Marriott and have been thoroughly enjoying learning through their experiences. Recently, I contacted Pia and began talking with her about my quest and after a few emails she suggested that I come to their 3 day school from April 19-21 in Scottsdale.

Pia knows that I don’t have much of a budget for these types of experiences and has extended a generous discount on the school, but the cost of the three day program, transportation, lodging, etc would be a pricey excursion in the middle of Spring, or any time for that matter. In the past, though, readers of this blog have told me that if there is a specific monetary need to post about it and perhaps it could get covered (or at least a portion) in exchange for writing about the experience.

Instead of just letting this opportunity slip by due to lacking funds I figured I would at least mention it on the site. The total cost would be about $2,200. I don’t expect anyone to shoulder that expense, but if someone happens to want to provide this I would appreciate it beyond words. I’m not asking for individual small donations right now, rather one person who wants to sponsor the entire trip. It’s an all or nothing type deal and I would feel bad if a lot of small sums came in that weren’t quite enough to make it to the big game.

Golf is by no means a cheap sport and once you get into the thick of working with the top coaches in the world those expenses can skyrocket. I am actively pursuing sponsorship leads to make these types of endeavors possible in the future. For now, I will most likely need to pass on this trip, but getting the invite is a step in the right direction.

For more about Pia and Lynn, please check out: http://www.vision54.com/vision54/pages/about/

The reason that I want to attend is to avoid getting overly mental with my game. As anyone who has ever played golf even remotely seriously knows, it’s very easy to get heady out on the course when things turn south. Since day one I have been reading through golf mental books from Rotella’s Golf is not a Game of Perfect to Parent’s Zen golf and everything in between. I have learned a ton through these texts, but knowing my personality I know that I learn better with the hands on approach.

After reading Lynn and Pia’s books I want to know more about their processes and think that by attending this 3 day school I could fast track the mental side of the game. I don’t want to leave it up to trail and error as there isn’t time for that. If there is a way to improve I want to take advantage of it.

There will be a few opportunities like this along the way and some will come with open doors, some with a invoices. It’s a long shot, but I thought it better to ask than to just let it slip by even though I don’t necessarily feel good about asking as there are, of course, more worthy charities in this world. That said, golf is a wonderful game and if by my attending this school I can share their ideas with the masses perhaps we can all benefit from the experience.

The school will be about $1,800, flight would come in around $300. I can probably find a place to crash for free and a rental car for a few days would be about $100. If it was possible to raise about 70 percent of the total then this would be possible. Thank you all for reading and continuing to follow. I don’t expect someone shoulder this cost, but would love to attend if it is possible.

On a related note, my coach has asked me to take the driver out of my bag until we have our next lesson this coming Thursday. It’s gone from bad to unbelievable over the past few weeks. I hit it solid, but am launching the ball hard left, right, left, right. Just playing military golf out there.. I’ve talked a lot about gear and about the driver over the past few months and know that a huge part of it is my swing, but the funny thing is that I can hit it pretty decent on the range. So, the obvious conclusion is that I am getting mental on the tee box. It could be grip pressure or tempo or swing plane, etc. Regardless of whether it’s a tournament or practice round, I’m not moving the ball in the right direction now with that stick so I am going to keep it off the course until Thursday. Adrian, my coach, doesn’t want me to develop a fear of using the big stick so wants me to work on other aspects until we have a chance to see what’s going on. I agree and will be playing without it for a few days.

It’s these types of things that I would like to avoid as much as possible and I think that Lynn and Pia could dramatically help when it comes to learning how to play the game beyond swing mechanics.

9 Responses to "An opportunity calls"

Jason says:

March 30, 2013 at 7:46 am

You should do a kickstarter campaign
Aussie josh says:

March 30, 2013 at 1:49 pm

Hi Dan,

I am constantly inspired by your progress and initiative. However if the 3 day course is you believe essential to your future and achieving your goals, then you could surely break the $2500 into more manageable pieces, being what you actually need for the journey. That way, people can offer part of the overall package without being bound (such as you not wanting to do a small donation drive if it doesnt come through).

Surely as a group your supporters have resources – whether it is a bed to sleep on and food to eat, taking accommodation and food out of the equation, or organising the cheapest flights possible (anyone out there work for an airline?).
Bubba says:

March 30, 2013 at 4:46 pm

I was wondering why you no longer make the videos of your weekly adventures. You don’t have to even edit them just simple little clips. If you need help piecing clips together I could edit them if you were to send them to me.
Richard Chen says:

March 31, 2013 at 8:16 am

In my opinion the four key books to hitting consistently long and straight are Nicklaus’s “Golf My Way”, Hogan’s “5 Fundamentals”, Nelson’s “Shape Your Swing the Modern Way”, Woods “How I Play Golf,” and my book “Gold Slow Motion Picture Swing Secret of Effortless Long Shots.”

I think the key element of the Nicklaus book is about developing the mental ability of visualization. The book describes visualizing the flight path of the ball before setting up, and visualizing a point a few feet in front of the ball to line up with during setup.

It is said that the great baseball batters can see the bat in the process of hitting the baseball. In golf, the clubhead is moving too fast for anybody to actually see the clubhead in the process of hitting the ball. However, it is possible to develop a sort of mental virtual visualization of the orientation of the clubhead as it hits the ball. It is also possible to more easily develop the mental visualization ability to “see” the positions of the body during the swing, as the body parts are moving relatively slower than the clubhead.

A photographer should have a lot of mental ability of visualization, that can be put to great use in golf. The ability to visualize the clubhead path, clubface angle, and loft of the clubface during the swing can be highly advantageous, as Nicklaus said in his video about the object of the swing is to move the clubhead.

For example, the clubface angle, and the clubface loft can be mentally visualized during the release fairly easily, as these clubface angle, and the clubface loft change relatively slowly during the release. The clubface angle changes from ninety degrees open to square during the final release to impact, while the clubface loft changes from somewhat higher than normal to normal (or slightly below normal) during the final release. I forgot whether Nicklaus describes mentally monitoring and visualizing the squaring and closing of the clubface during the final release in the “Golf My Way” book, but he may had described it in another article.

In addition, the clubhead can be visualized and imagined to fly down the fairway after impact towards some targeting point down the fairway, which is described in Baron’s and my books, which will be discussed later here.

The positions of the body can be visualized and monitored during the swing relatively easier than visualizing the various aspects of the clubhead, as the body is moving slower than the clubhead; however, there are a lot more body part aspects to visualized and monitor. If the swing is perfectly grooved in automatically hitting long and straight, there is no need to monitor the body. If there are certain problems, a few specific body parts can be singled out for monitoring and visualization.

Hogan’s book describes a fairly flat swing, and promotes waggling, that are not generally adopted today, but the book does go into a lot of details of the swing. Hogan swung from the opposite side as a left-hander swinging right-handed clubs. The book may be viewed as a guide for swinging from the opposite side.

Nelson is considered to be very consistent and accurate, as the holder of the consecutive wins record. In these regard, his book demands some attention. His book also discusses the visualization of swing and of throwing the clubhead down along the target line to the target after impact.

My book tries to make it simple to hit long shots by using simplified “applied physics” and engineering principles. Simplified “Transform” methods are used in engineering and applied physics like the Fourier and LaPlace transforms to simplify calculations. In my book, instead of worrying about ball distance, getting ball distance is transformed into getting clubhead distance, which is a lot shorter than getting ball distance.

For example, instead of trying to hit the ball to 300 yards, the transform is to swing the clubhead to 100 yards. In general, the ball goes three times the distance of the clubhead “distance.” (The clubhead distance can be imagined and visualized as the distance the clubhead would go down the fairway along the target line, if the clubhead was to detached from the shaft at the bottom of the swing arc.) If the clubhead is swung to 70 yards, the ball will go 3 times further to 210 yards. If the clubhead is swung to 80 yards, the ball will go 3 times further to 240 yards. If the clubhead is swung to 90 yards, the ball will go 3 times further to 270 yards. According to the 3 times formula, if the clubhead is swung between 70 to 100 yards, the ball will go from 210 to 300 yards for the driver.

Ernest Jones wrote Swing the Clubhead. Nicklaus says about moving the clubhead. Nelson wrote about feeling “as if the clubhead is being thrown toward the hole.” I wrote the precise formula of swinging, and releasing the clubhead to one-third the distance of the target down the target-line for the driver. In terms of clubhead distance, 70 to 100 yards are the distances of interest. Most golfers of average build can swing the clubhead to 80 yards for 240 yard drives. With better efficiency in technique (like swinging with the arms closer to the body during the downswing to lessen rotational inertia) an extra 10 yards can be picked up in clubhead distance to 90 yards to give 270 yard drives. Another 10 yards of clubhead distance will provide the opening to 300 yard drives. The key here is to swing the clubhead down the fairway along the target line from the ball to the target, and with modest clubhead distances from 70 to 90 yards of clubhead distances. Together with proper visualization and control of clubface angle, long and straight shots should not be difficult.

Woods book provides a great number of photographs, including many slow motion photo sequences. Woods is representative of the build of tall modern pro golfers of over six feet. In the old days, the great golfers are mostly under six feet.
Robert Johansson says:

March 31, 2013 at 10:15 am

Your trackman stats show inconsistency all over for every shot.
slow down tempo to 50% or less and once the chain works better and your striking is more consistent move up a notch until the swing breaks down again. Your likely doing what many does that the distance sacrifice the accuracy and you need to find the optimum balance between those two. even if it means loosing 30 yards. Once it works, you be gaining more distance as your likely also have a grip tension issue (Hit impulse) along that tempo.
90% or more of the golfers I see have both going on.

Its a 20min fix in person.

3 range sessions while loosing up that grip and tempo will fix any driver issue you have.
Cant stay stressed with such grip pressure.

Modern swing mechanics is what causes all those swing issues.
Richard Chen says:

March 31, 2013 at 12:12 pm

The development of visualization can be clarified by comparing to learning to drive a car. Most raw beginners makes over steering, and under steering go around curves. They even do these over and under steering adjustments on a straight road. They have not yet developed any visualization ability to correlate and to “see” how the car will response in direction for any given amount of steering adjustment. As a result, they over steer, and the car lurch too much in one direction, and they over steer in the other direction to counteract the lurching, the car lurches too much in the other direction. The beginning drivers drive the cars wobbling and lurching left and right even a on straight road. This is comparable to hitting golf shots left and right with over corrections like over counter steering.

Even experience drivers still can over steer, and over correct when they lack the ability to visualize in special situations like driving on very icy roads, that they have not encountered before.

The lack of visualization of how the car responses can be very frightening as the car lurches left and right on dry road, and fishtails on icy road. Golf too can be frightening as the shots lurch left and right unpredictably.

Over time, the beginning drivers develop a visualization sense to know how the car will turn and adjust in direction for any given amount of steering, and the car will start to be driven smoothly around curves, and without wobbling down straight roads, and even under control in icy situations.

Similarly, the development of a sense of visualization can help straighten out golf shots.

Cars with soft suspensions, and looseness in steering ball joints can cause difficulties in directional control, which will need more effort and attention to steer the car. Steering joints can be fixed, but soft suspensions cannot be easily changed, so that such cars will be harder to steer. In a similar manner, some golf swings are looser and less compact than others, and more efforts are needed to control direction.

In these modern times, car computers are used to compensate for many looseness like steering on icy roads by using anti-skip brakes. The car computers sense data in real time to form a “picture” of the conditions to response to. This is a sort of visualization by the car computers in real time to adjust to the road situations. Similarly, the brain is the computer golfers have to use to monitor and visualize the swing.
William Evan says:

March 31, 2013 at 4:12 pm

Have you read the reviews of your book?
Brian Kuehn says:

April 1, 2013 at 10:32 am

I think the $2,500 would be better spent on one-on-one instruction from your current professional. It seems to me that you may be chasing after too much advice from too many sources.
Marco says:

April 5, 2013 at 7:02 am

I don’t how much an hour with a coach cost in the U.S.A., but I agree with Brian. 25 (100$/h) hours with a coach seem to be a better investment compared with that 3 day course.

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