Charley Hoffman & His TPI Team: Leveraging Past Success for Future Triumphs

Charley Hoffman’s runner-up finish at the WM Phoenix Open in 2024 was not only a product of elite play on the course, but a data-driven approach off the course.

Charley came to TPI several weeks before the WMPO with his coach, Mark Blackburn, and trainer, Kayleigh Franklin, hoping that, as a team, we could help diagnose why his swing wasn’t performing to his expectations.

Through our TPI screen, 3D analysis or force and pressure data, we were able to identify how limited lower body rotation (related to a past back injury) was drastically affecting his club delivery, ball flight tendencies and, most of all, grip.

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Chapters:

0:00 – Introduction: Charley Hoffman’s Visit to TPI
0:08 – Analyzing Hoffman’s Career and TPI’s Role
0:30 – Identifying the Iron Play Challenge
0:56 – Technical Breakdown: Loft and Grip Adjustments
1:08 – The Impact of Injuries on Swing Patterns
1:49 – Drill Insights: Left-Hand-Only Swing Technique
2:27 – Understanding Swing Dynamics and Adjustments
3:02 – Data Analysis: Comparing Past and Present Swings
3:30 – Body Mechanics and Swing Adjustments
4:02 – Exploring Grip Changes Over Time
4:37 – The Significance of Grip Strength and Orientation
5:13 – Implementing a Stronger Grip: Technique Tips
5:43 – Connection Between Grip and Body Rotation
6:23 – On-Range Application: Testing New Grip Strength
6:41 – Real-Time Feedback and Swing Correction
7:08 – Integrating New Insights into Practice
7:39 – Charley’s Lightbulb Moment: Recapturing the Feel
8:13 – The Power of Data: Shaping Hoffman’s Swing Adjustments
8:39 – The Value of Historical Swing Data
8:53 – The Importance of Regular Screening and Progress Tracking
9:00 – Closing Thoughts: Monitoring and Adjusting Your Swing

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So today we got Charlie Hoffman coming into TPI he’s a PGA Tour veteran with over 30 million in career earnings nine professional wins four on the PGA tour he’s actually one of the players we see the most here at TPI and we think it’s one of the reasons he’s been able to

Stay competitive into his late 40s he’s coming with Mark Blackburn gol dig number one coach in the United States and Mark was telling me that they’re struggling a little bit with his irons we got some contact problems and L a distance and we’re going to try and

Figure out what’s going on his running complaint is that he hits his driver further than his irons I hit my driver further than my irons too no relative relative to his feet but he delivers quite a lot of dynamic Loft so like the sharlan portion is interesting so for

Him I’ve like look your speed isn’t your problem is you’re delivering as soon as I did this I had to strengthen that mhm where I think I’ve always come into s like that all of a sudden I’m like to get that club face where I need to be

Strong so it’s I actually have more to do with this left hand than I’ve ever thought because I took the right hand out of it because this is this is conserved face doing normal stuff so about 3 years ago Charlie started to develop some lower back pain

Which is very common with players that have been playing for as many years as Charlie one of the things about injuries is it changes the way you swing in other words motor patterns are developed around physical limitations when you create these limitations sometimes you can’t swing the same way you used to

Swing so you start to make changes whether conscious or subconscious they can creep into your golf swing I personally think when his back goes and he extends he has to do that to hit the ball anyway so it’s like six of one half a dozen of the

Other the problem is is if they get in there too long they become permanent and creates some real detriment to your golf game can you hit with your left hand only can I hit my left hand only can you just um probably not but yeah that’s perfect I feel this

Muscle going the foot Joy logo down do a little bigger swing with your body but that same feel with your yeah yes that’s what I want what you have to do is you have to close your eyes and go what am I feeling right cuz

Then you got to take all the stuff off and go can I keep the feel I’m a gentle flower my feelings are hurt the problem is when he started doing his hands the body was crazy got go crazy if the body’s good and it’s all

Over there he should be able to hit shot the more you turn the more the face opens so it’s hard to hit it left so the more you can release and it won’t go left that’s correct at least it helps me understand what you guys want to measure so now now

I understand I’m warm by the I’m ready when you are when you hear double plate ready you can s double plate ready so we get into 3D Bay and we start collecting data first thing we’re going to do is we’re going to go back and compare him today to where he was before

So you went from four degrees extended to square that’s a big change one of the advantages of seeing Charlie over the years is we have his data when he was playing at his best so the big difference from back in the day way more Lane 5.1 and then so he leans the shaft

Farther forward and then if you look over here there was negative thrust he’s still positive thrust right upper body’s more left than it was before the iron so we start looking at his body and we’re noticing that the body is not rot like it used to be it’s kind of early

Extending moving a little bit towards the ball and that’s one of those weaknesses where if Charlie starts doing that he has to make modifications in the way he releases the golf club if you went to this and you actually focused on this and you were like overdosing that

And then tried to make it go straight I guarantee you’ll go back to that motion covering it like this I need to cover it double plate ready that was 14 degrees cuted hit do me a favor do just just 3D don’t worry about the force plate hit

One where you’re where you’re doing the hand feeling so when you start comparing old data to new data lots of discoveries can happen and sometimes it’s really obvious sometimes it’s not so obvious body’s better with now the hand’s not doing is there a way to check his left

Hand grip correlation to now as to where it was years ago 3D show us that cuz if your left hand grip’s gotten weaker over time which would happen if you’re thrusting that could affect this but as you get more thrusty your grip’s going to get weaker because you don’t want to

Hit it as far left so Mark had this great idea to go look at the grip and see what it was doing before and right away I could see that there was a massive difference not a little a massive difference in the position of his lead hand and

Gregory the same no definitely not the same it’s 20° week now yeah there there your own maybe 23 and golf the more you rotate your left hand for a right-handed player your lead hand the more you rotate it clockwise that it’s called a strong grip

I looked at like three of the swings we did today and they were all in the 20s the lowest I saw in the past was 42 it was way stronger much more in line with the body movement the stronger your grip is the easier it is for you to close the

Club face to get less Loft and compressed just hold on one that’s too strong make a grip that’s too strong strong grip like two Knuckles show me two Knuckles at a dress let’s get this here and then let’s grip it cuz that’s going to get him more

Side Bend at a dress anyway that he had before you just cut it in half you understand why that’s would weaken right it’s never crossed my mind but it makes sense and one of the things you’ll see is with players who are not rotating their body because their body’s not

Rotating it’s hard for them to close the club face so what they’ll do is they’ll go weaker because the stronger your grip is the faster the club face will close and the ball will hook so to prevent the left a lot of times what they’ll do is subconsciously make their grip weaker

And that’s exactly what Charlie’s done I like the flights of what you were doing over there like I said I’d like to just see that with a little stronger grip see what happens so we go back out on the Range to work on what we just learned

That you want them more yep okay and real quickly we saw that feel and real can be very different do this correctly what did you see what he just did you went this way uh-uh no that’s what he was doing in the 3D Bay right there cannot do that

Okay hold this strong no no no no no this is good you see there’s a lot of fear of the ball going left from what was happening before when your body stops rotating due to a back injury you can’t release the club properly you can’t Flex the wrist compress the golf

Ball so because that fear of the ball going left there’s this instinct inside your body that says keep the face open and he starts to extend his wrist but now that his body’s working properly we’ve got to remind him that hey you can release the club like you used to hold

It strong okay so I want you to understand that with that grip this still needs to happen as you come through you can still do that and you’re going to say well it’s going to go left so now watch what you would do you would

Start rotating yes so I need that I need that feel so when I go left I start doing that yeah that’s EXA that’s exactly what I do yes when I go down left yeah so you need to go left and feel that and you’ll go oh man that and

That’s why I want that’s why I want to feel that way correct and it’s kind of like that light bulb moment that goes off for Charlie you can see it in his eyes he’s like I remember what that feels like I used to do that he just

Forgot that he wasn’t doing that this was an epitome of TPI and why is so useful yeah like there that’s the low hook we went back to old data to see what I was doing different and how we can improve we saw that my grip was 20°

Weaker via injury back injury used to rotate the body fantastically seeing the golf shot the pelvis used to move back now moves forward toward the ball we strengthen the grip and now the body starts reacting to the hand to the stronger face and starts rotate faster through the golf

Ball you’ve got the release looking the right way but if we didn’t have this data from literally 20 years ago we would still maybe be searching on what to do cuz you didn’t know your grip was weaker had no clue like I said i’ probably not been a person maybe

Podrick’s maybe close to me on number of no you’re definitely you’re definitely the leader in the clubhouse there’s a reason why we captured data when I was playing good too and that was always Greg’s key is we want to capture swings when you’re playing good and your body

Feels good for days like this for days like this so it is instrumental and I would say a comeback or getting back to where I should be so this session with Charlie is a perfect example of why we always preach the importance of screening your players and charting their progress making the connection

With a player swing in their body is so critically important for being able to guide a player throughout their career not everybody has access to force plates in 3D and this type of Technology but you don’t need fancy technology to be able to track your progress there going

To be occasional bad shot in your golf game right you’re going to have one ball that goes up high one ball that goes low maybe you’ll miss it left miss it right but if you start seeing consistent misses let’s say the ball is going high right more often than it used to you’re

Starting to see more spin on the ball more ballooning you got to start thinking to yourself am I doing something am I changing something maybe subconsciously that I’m not aware of and this is why it’s really important to track your flights track your your data look at your body just do these these

Quick checkups periodically to make sure that these subconscious things are creeping into your swing