The last time I thought about skipping an event was the Iceberg Open at Rose City this April, but that wasn’t from bad play, rather it was because my back felt tweaked.  It was a two-man best ball so I didn’t want to let my partner, or myself, down and decided to play through the lower back pain.  It wasn’t the prettiest site and I had to make some huge changes in my swing to not have sharp pains, but made it through the 36-hole event and had a lot of fun despite the personal conditions.

But, that came with a price and the next day I knew that I should have probably skipped the second round, or at the very least the back 9.  It has been about six weeks since than and I have not been able to make a full swing, and for the first four weeks wasn’t even able to carry a bag or make a chip without pain.  The good news is the time away has been fruitful in that I am excited about getting back out there and have actually been dreaming about playing golf lately.  Also, I am starting to feel much better and think that I can return to practice relatively soon.

Today was supposed to be the first day of my favorite Portland area tournament.  It is a thee day event called the Royal Oaks Invitational Tournament (ROIT) and as the name suggests entries are by invitation only, which leads to a lot of the best golfers from the area participating.  You have to write a letter to the board listing your “golf resume” and based on that you are either let in or put on the waiting list for the years to come.  Last year was my first time playing in the event and it was a blast.  That is easily one of my favorite courses in the area and when they get the greens rolling fast it is a tough test.

I have been looking forward to this weekend for months and had many goals for the three days.  So, I had been laying low in order to maximize the healing process and six weeks after making my last full swing I finally went out and slowly approached hitting a ball.  I started with little chips and some putts then went out to 1/4 swings and worked up to 1/2 and then 3/4 swings.  I was feeling decent and my body was plenty warmed up, so I made a couple of full swings.  Immediately I could feel the same twinge of sharp pain in the lower right side of my back and shut it down for the day.  It wasn’t nearly as bad as it had been leading up to the Iceberg, but it was the same spot.

I woke up this morning and could feel it when getting out of bed and doing random regular morning things like brushing teeth and putting on shoes.  I felt like I had reverted two weeks from just two full swings.  I got ready and my tee time wasn’t until 12:30 so I decided to go out to the back yard and make a few easy swings with an 8-iron and no ball.  Again a little pain, but I still wanted to play in the event.  I had to make a tough decision.

Around 11:15 this morning I realized that it was much more important to fully recover than to try and play as I knew that I would most likely have to WD on the first few holes even if I did give it a shot and with the adrenalin of the event I would probably end up overdoing the first few swings and reverting back to the beginning of my recovery process.  So, regretfully, I called in and withdrew from the event.

It was the most prudent decision, albeit one I did not want to have to make.  Still, give it some more time and fully heal before going out and doing more harm than good.  The good news is I felt fine chipping and putting so this week I can at least get back out and get the short game back in order. Kind of like starting back over from the beginning, I will start close to the hole and work my way back, doing just what the body tells me is okay to do.

Over and out.  Hopefully next post will concern actual golf endeavors and not just injury updates.  I suppose it’s all part of the same story, though.

Inspiration abounds and sometimes there’s so much to go around it almost hurts.  Other times it’s hard to find your way through a day.  Lately, I’ve been finding so much beauty in life that I get to the course full of excitement and confidence.  I can’t wait to get there and can’t wait to tee it up after my practice session ends.  I know my skills and game are better than ever and each first tee I hit I’m ready to go after it and make some good shots, shoot a nice and low score.

The problem, though, is that my on-course confidence is at an epic low.  I’m testing some new drivers, trying to change my iron swing, the new wedges I’m not 100 percent sure how to hit short approach shots with due to the different bounces and my putting is good but I don’t seem to start the ball on the line I want each time.  Outside of that, all is gold.

I know the change is going to come and life happens in cycles, but that doesn’t necessarily make it better while you are in the middle of the old “take a step back before moving forward.”  Everything I am doing is for the long-term greater good and I know that progress is happening, just have to stick to my guns.

I’ve been testing out some new drivers and here are the FlightScope numbers from the most recent one:

There are some things I really like about these numbers, like the club path and face to path, but the dynamic loft is now too low on average which added to lower spin is causing a lot ball flight.

This driver has a 43″ Accra stiff shaft in it.  I tested out one right before the holidays with an x-flex shaft and I only played 9 holes with it.  It felt crazy strange and I hadn’t a clue why I literally could not hit the ball more than 170 yards.  The night before I went to see Jari at Birdie Finnish golf to have him switch out the shafts I picked it up and did a light flex test in my hands, honestly not bending the shaft much at all, but then this happened:

It was one of the craziest things I have seen in golf.  There were maybe 20 swings on the shaft and it just exploded in my hands.  I didn’t put much pressure on it, so it must have had just a randomly weak spot.  No offense to Accra, of course, as they make great shafts, I just happened to have found one with a defect.  They will swap it out with Jari, for sure.  But, I do know that the structure of this particular shaft probably led to how it performed on the course.

At any rate, I now have the Stiff flex version and am liking it, but it’s not quite perfect yet.  I can tell that something is a bit off with either the length, the head, the weight or something.  But, it’s getting closer to the date where I find a driver that really fits me.  Right now I am hitting way more fairways with the 43″ shaft and making center contact more often.  But, I am not getting it up in the air high enough, especially for winter time when the ball plugs as soon as it hits grass and a better trajectory can increase your drives by 15-20 yards.

It’s a work in progress, but at least it’s finally progressing.

I am also still adjusting to my new wedges, which is proving to take longer than I had imagined as short wedge game has always been a strength of mine, but now I am finding myself chunking one or two shots a round and then blading a couple.  It does not lead to confidence or scoring.  The question I have is how long do you try something out before you make a decision if it belongs in the bag or not?  Last year I stuck with a driver that I never “found” for months and then realized that it just didn’t fit my game.  In retrospect I wish that I would have switched it out earlier, but I kept thinking something would click.  I don’t want to replicate that experience, but I also want to do my due diligence with any potential new piece of gear.  What does everyone else do?

I’m going to give the new wedges another week and then if I have not found confidence in them will switch out to the old ones for a week to see if it’s the arrow or the operator.

The shoot was quick, too.  I basically just taught the TV host how to hit a golf ball as he had zero experience in the sport (a la Dan 2010) and then told a quick summary of my story to date while we played a couple holes of the St Jörgen Golf Club.  I love when these things go well as my journalism background likes to get things correct the first time and be efficient.

Afterwords I had 48 hours to explore and reflect on the trip as well as the past few weeks.

Walking around Gothenburg I was reminded how important it is to have an extremely strong sense of self belief in your vision.  I’m not exactly sure why that thought came to mind while exploring the 17th century neighborhood of Haga Nygata, but I suppose when exposed to the countless options of this world it can be easy to have a wandering mind. It’s important to have a bit of that old fashioned tunnel vision to keep the train moving along.

For me it is also important to step back and appreciate everything that my work has accomplished both on and off the course to date.  Never would I have imagined that I would get flown to both Australia and Europe in a single year to make an appearance.  It’s important for me to relish these experiences as there are a lot of things that have been foregone over the past 4 years in order to get to where I currently am.  Short term (or even longer term) sacrifices lead to the long term payout.  This is true with just about everything in life, not just one man’s chosen path or his golf game.

So relish I did and I had a great time during the trip.  In a way it felt like an end-of-the-summer vacation and seeing as I only golfed a few times and didn’t get much practice in it might as well have been my annual time off.  When I returned I felt refreshed and ready to get back at it, too.  It took about an hour to warm up the body as 15 hours on a plane does no wonders for your golf game, but once I get the swing back on line I hit some good shots, including birdying my first hole back in the states, which is a great sign of things to come.  Of the 9 holes I played I birdied 3 of them and felt good rolling the ball.

Now that I am back and refreshed I am ready to make the next push of the Plan.  The first step is to meet with Michael Neff again and get my clubs better fit for my current swing.  He texted me while away and said he had it figured out and would tell me in person when we were on a range.  We shall meet early this week and I am excited to hear what he has “discovered.”  I have no clue, but trust that he knows what he is doing and will set the sticks accordingly.

The next step is to decide which clubs to play with that new configuration.  I have been hitting my Titleist set for 20 months and still like them, but have a call with Titleist and two other club manufacturers in the near future (i.e. this week).  I have been offered similar deals to what a typical club pro might get (14 clubs, hats, gloves and balls) from three manufactures right now and need to decide whether it makes any sense to try out something new or to stick with what I have.  It’s a good problem to have.

On a side note, here is a story from a Swiss newspaper about my time over there:

The link:  http://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/sport/weitere/Spielt-er-2018-gegen-Tiger-Woods/story/22975901

As you can see, I’m decked out in my Titleist, Vokey and FJ gear.  Like the world’s cheapest billboard.  I truly appreciate the gear that I have gotten to date and think I have repaid everyone who has sent it in media and social media outreach.  Seems to be a fair trade in my opinion.

Perhaps it’s time to start adjusting the tone and approach of the blog in order to expand the reach and truly inspire instead of just telling my own story.  The original idea of telling my story seems to be getting stale and I think the more useful information would be to tell the story of what research and findings people across the globe are currently discovering that can help us all improve.  I have met a number of these people and think that focussing more on their work, albeit through my training eyes, is a better approach for both myself and every potential blog reader out there.  It is time to seriously step back and scrutinize the path this blog has travelled down and figure out where it needs to go for my own sanity and the readers’ sake.  I’m not saying that my training or practice will be different, just that I will focus more of this site on human performance in general while entangling it with one person’s expeditions.

At any rate, this wasn’t supposed to be a blog about shifting directions; rather my aim was to talk about the Europe trip and about what comes next, although I suppose the jet lagged mind wanders when wide awake at 4am and what I worry about during those middle-night times is often how to continue funding this expedition.  Mountaineers and explorers have similar issues, although once they finally raise funds and set off their concerns shift from funding to survival.  I suppose I have a leg up in that respect as it is very unlikely that getting lost or an avalanche will be my demise.   Everything has it’s plusses and minuses.

Perhaps that is the point.  You can travel the world and see all of the amazing people doing their amazing work stuffs and fantasize about what their lives may be like but at the end of the day you have to trust your heart compass is pointing you in the right direction.  Without that faith all is quickly lost.

There are countless ways to get from here to there, just pick one and stick to it.  That, in a nutshell, is talent.

And now I shall force upon you a photo slideshow of my 11 days in Europe.  You knew it was coming and like the good relatives you are you will do me a kind and take a look.  Perhaps pretend you just found this in a thrift store laptop 100 years from now and are trying to create a novel around it about the lives of those involved.  Or feel free to skip it.

In a couple more hours the sun will come up, at which point practice is in the equation.  For now I will continue the mental process of organizing my goals for the rest of 2014 and then begin to think about the year to come.

There are a few things going on right now.  Practice wise, I have still been improving my chipping, putting, pitching and general short game as well as getting my full swing on a better plane for increased consistency and power.  Here is a short video of my swing a couple weeks ago and then from yesterday.  I have done some voice over for the details of what I was trying to improve:

Sorry about the quality of the second clip, it had to be hand-held and was taken during dusk, which is coming at 7pm these days.  The vernal equinox is right around the corner, meaning it’s time to start thinking about winter plans.

Before I get too carried away about early 2015 there are a few things to chat about.

I’ve been in a swing-focus mindset for a bit of time here and haven’t paid too much attention to how the game is breaking down on the course.  I have some more work to do before I really get into serious score mode, but it shouldn’t be too long now and I am starting to really hit the ball well once again.  So, give it another week and then I plan on getting my recorders out and capturing some updated stats for the site.  A lot of people have been emailing me about updating that page and it’s time that some new numbers are put up.  Soon.

There is a three-day tournament in October that I am beginning to gear up for.  It’s the Puget Sound Scratch Championship which takes place October 17-19 at three different courses:  The Home Course, Chambers Bay and Gold Mountain.  It should be a great tourney and I can’t wait to play in it.

Before that I am heading to San Diego next week for a 3 day Vision54 course.  I love working with those ladies and am very excited to have a chance to see them again; this time for 3 days.  I fly down there next Thursday and the course is just outside of San Diego at the Grand Del Mar.  While down there I am going up to Carlsbad for a meeting on Monday with a potential sponsor.  Unfortunately I cannot mention who it is quite yet, but I am hoping to amp up the game and the site in 2015 and with the help of a sponsor that will be possible.  It’s still been just a one man show to date, which is great and all, but there are a handful of things that I would do different if a budget existed.

In a similar vein to the Carlsbad funds quest, I have been working on acquiring funds for a TV pilot.  I have a great idea of a show that’s underlying story arc is my journey, but would be appealing to a wider-than-golf audience through themes of skill acquisition, talent versus practice, human performance and the ways and means of achievement.  The best part is that outside of being entertaining it would also allow me access to the mini-tournaments and coaches that I would like to be exposed to for experience and wisdom along the way.  It’s a win-win that will be funded, just not sure how quite yet.

That’s a bit about what’s been going on.  I should write more about all of this soon.  For the time being I have been spending the evening hours brainstorming and putting together presentations.  Just searching and waiting to find the right partners.

Also, please don’t forget to download and read the entire blog from start until breaking par just a few months ago.  It’s a great way to catch up on all of the action and the highs and lows that come with dropping everything to pursue a completely new direction in life. Download it on Amazon here:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00MTC0NJA/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00MTC0NJA&linkCode=as2&tag=thdapl05-20&linkId=NQ72WF55IIVE2AQ2

Thank you!

I was going to make it a pdf download and ask people to contribute what they thought it was worth, but I thought if I put the book up on Amazon’s website it would be better formatted for all types of digital readers.  If this doesn’t work after a couple of months I may put a link to the pdf up as well, but for the time being please think about supporting The Dan Plan by purchasing the book here:

Amazon Unites States:  http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00MTC0NJA

Amazon UK:  http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00MTC0NJA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

Amazon Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B00MTC0NJA

Amazon Germany: http://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00MTC0NJA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

Amazon Japan: http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00MTC0NJA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

And most any other country, email me if you want a specific link or search for “The Dan Plan”.

I wish to apologize in advance as a few external links did not translate to this format.  One of the most blaring absences are videos.  On a few occasions I talk about watching a video and it’s just a blank on the page.  Outside of that the content is whole.  I edited out about one third of the posts but there is still quite a bit of content, too much in a lot of ways.  Down the road at some point I will have a professional editor (or a well versed friend, or myself when the amount of time in a day magically doubles) take a gander at the content and polish it up.  For now, this is the story, more or less, word for word from the beginning.  I hope you enjoy and get some value out of the content.

For every book purchased from Amazon almost $5 goes to The Dan Plan.  Thank you for reading and please help spread the word to anyone potentially interested in seeing what it takes to make such a drastic change in one’s life.

Cheers!

It was 6am and I couldn’t check into my hotel until noon so I went on a walk down to the Harbor Bridge.  It’s winter here, but I was wearing a short sleeve shirt and was pretty comfortable out, about as warm as a nice Portland Spring day.  The first stop was to do the tourist thing and see the sights:

Really amazing city and walking around reminded me of the time I lived here back in 2000.  It seems like ages ago, but the smells and sights and sounds flooded the memory banks.

The rest of the day was about staying awake until the night came in order to stave off jet lag. Sydney is 17 hours ahead of Portland so my circadian rhythm had been thrown a few extra loops.  I made it until dark and then was surprisingly wide awake after fighting sleep all day so popped an over the counter sleep aid and hit the hay.

The next morning I was picked up early by a news crew to go have a round at St. Michael’s Golf Course on the coast.  It was a beautiful morning and amazing to see the Pacific ocean as we played the round.  We even saw some whales passing by far off in the distance. Quite incredible landscape.

The setting reminded me a bit of Bandon Dunes back in Oregon, although the course was different.  Before coming people kept telling me that the tracks here were more “European” in style than the American courses.  I had no image of what the could mean, but once I started walking around I slowly got the picture.  American courses tend to be overly kempt, especially in the rough.  Here the fairways and greens are quite nicely groomed, but once you get in the rough, bushes or bunkers the area is let to grow more naturally.  I think I prefer this way of doing things as it allows for more realistic conditions while also utilizing less resources.  Different and interesting.

After the round I went to the SBS Studios to film Insight, which is the reason for my voyage south.  SBS Insight is a discussion based news program that tackles different subjects every week by opening up a topic to a panel of people as well as the audience.  This was my view:

The show that I was on was titled “Born or Made” and was centered on the idea of talent versus hard work and how far it is possible to go in life as well as whether talent is necessary to reach the peak of different fields.  We filmed for two hours and it was a very interesting debate that is scheduled to air July 22 on SBS. Please do check it out.  Scientists, coaches, athletes, chess prodigies, Dan, ballerinas and a number of other fascinating people spoke up.  If you can’t view SBS then it will be possible to watch the piece online shortly after the air date, stay tuned for the details.

The next couple of days were about meeting new people and playing some incredible courses.  I was lucky enough to tee it at Castle Hill, Monash Country Club and Bonnie Doon.  All great tracks with unique features.  One thing I found particularly interesting was that the area around the greens here are a completely different type of grass and very tight.  So far I have not played an Australian course with thick rough, but this is penalizing in a different way in that the grass likes to grab your club.  I think my wedges are great in the Pacific Northwest, but too much bounce when trying to finesse shots down under.  Lots of tight lies hit to rock hard greens build on a completely different substrate.  It’s a learning experience to play these rounds and figure out what type of shots are needed for these different conditions.

Here is an example of how the fairway bunkers and rough between fairways is let go natural.  this is a shot from Bonnie Doon:

And one of me just missing an eagle putt on the 9th hole (thrown in as it was my only eagle putt of the trip so far):

Under the gun and being filmed.  Bush in the background that eats golf balls immediately:

Rugby player Steve Menzies and me after our round.  Good thing I’m not going for Rugby in my 10,000 hours as I’m about a foot too short:

And Aussie Golfer hitting a shot. Not the best photo, but you can see what I mean about letting the rough go as well as how tight the grass was around the greens.  You can actually putt from about 10 yards off the green and it seemed like a lot of people did that:

I would love to thank all of the golf courses that I have been on so far as well as my new friends Damien Kelly, Steve Menzies, Aussie Golfer, and all of the fine people running SBS.

Tomorrow I am going into town to check out Pure Performance Golf Labs.  They “Pure” club shafts and do a ton of interesting fitting stuff that I have been curious about.

I’m loving Australia so far!  Will post more in depth about both the fitting and Australian golf soon.  First I need to catch up on a bit of sleep.  One more day in Sydney and then I will be flying to the Gold Coast for a week of practice and more new courses.

The last time I felt like I do today was during the Men’s Journal interview back in summer 2011.  I literally lost my voice half way through the day and had to resort to writing notes so that the journalist, Gavin, could get his questions answered.  In retrospect, It was a comical scene and we have managed to stay friends since that story.

Today is a good day to try and figure out the best ideas moving forward.  I have the entire afternoon to write, read and ponder on progress both past and future.  It’s a quiet day and a reflective one.

The first thoughts that came to mind when thinking about ways to continue to improve was chipping and putting, especially the latter.  Lately I have not felt my putting stroke and I have not been putting up to the standards I have set for myself.  Some of that is due to the fact that I have been working on the full swing for so long that a bit of the other aspects have suffered, and part of it is just a cyclical confidence issue.  When you are rolling it hot you don’t think about it and tend to drop a lot of putts.  Once you start missing you think about it more and get overly nit-picky about the stroke and focus too much on mechanics instead of just finding your line.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a bad roller of the rock nor am I in a putting funk, just have been missing a couple of putts per round that I think I should make and haven’t really been dropping anything outside of about 5 feet.  Some of this might be due to the fact that the greens on a lot of courses have been punched and sanded and some because my alignment is out of whack.  When I saw Bruce on Wednesday he noticed that my shoulders had gotten closed to my intended line so there is some concrete setup issues to unkink.  Outside of that, I must remember to continue to improve the basics even if my main focus has transitioned to a different part of the game.  In order to succeed all things must be improving, not just what you are focussing on that week.

It is important to have specific goals and you can’t always work on everything, but don’t allow yourself to lapse on anything in particular.  I’ve always had a goal of being one of the best putters in the game and there have been times when my putting was rock solid, but over the past few weeks my stats have gone south in that arena.  Now is a good opportunity to pick it back up and drop those birdies.

Yesterday I played in a 4 man tourney at Riverside.  When I woke up I didn’t want to play as I was feeling crappy, but I had signed up as part of a team and wasn’t going to cancel at the last minute.  With a head full of cough medicine and a belly full of what Riverside calls meatloaf we all went out and teed it up starting on a lightly rainy 17th hole.  As a team we played great, Eric had 4 birds, Mick 2, Tom 1 and me 1 and we pretty much ham and egged the entire day to shoot a good score on the 2 ball best ball (they take the best two balls for each hole out of the four of us).  There were only one or two holes where 2 of us didn’t get par or better and despite all shooting 78-84 we were second gross and first net for the event.  It was really just a fun round as the competition was as light as the Spring drizzle, but I was proud of the team for sticking to it and finishing strong.

Personally, I shot 78 with a couple of missed short putts and some chips that led to two-putts which were easily avoidable.  The short game woes may just have easily been from the swimming head as from lack of consistent chipping and putting drills over the past month.  It’s hard to say, but after each round I am upset with myself for not taking better advantage of some good opportunities. In particular, I never like leaving birdie chips/putts short of the hole and need to improve that.  At least give it a shot to drop.  And, I seriously need to focus on making 6-12 foot putts as I have had numerous birdie putts from that distance lately and far too few make the bottom of the cup.  It has been a long time since I had more than 2 birdies consistently in any single round and even though I have limited the number of bogeys or worse per round I am not scoring as well as I could be due to those situations.

Luckily there is a very easy solution to this:  work and work harder.  I need to rediscover my putting routines and spend more time on the greens, especially as my swing is starting to shape up better.

On a side note, the trip to NYC was postponed for 2-3 weeks.  We will be heading over there soon, but couldn’t do it this week due to some unforeseen conflicts.

Also, I have been testing the Game Golf tool lately and have a few rounds in there to share on the site.  But, I’m not exactly sure how to do that yet.  Will discuss with their tech people and post something soon.

Back to resting.  I want to get out tomorrow and work on putting and chipping so need this body in better shape than today.  One day down for rest is okay, anything more is unacceptable.