Mastering Technique Might Mean More Than You Think

Taking a deeper dive into what it really means to master your technique and some advantages you might not be considering or thinking about.

hi John Ericson here at Advanced ball striking wanted to talk today a little bit about technique and the motivation for why people really want to play golf or really do anything for that matter I think people play golf for different reasons of course um some people play for business reasons you know it’s good to know how to play golf a lot of business deals have been done on golf courses you know there’s a reason for that some people like to get out and just exercise and you know walk around the in the park you know hopefully they’re walking around and not riding in a cart you know better exercise I still walk the game I enjoy walking the course and seeing you can see more of the course and a lot more of what’s going on out there if you walk it uh but getting back to you know reasons why people play for me you know one of the great reasons I’ve enjoyed golf is the pursuit of excellence and technique and I think that that’s a very good motivation to have because as you improve your Technique just the technique of what you’re doing it’s going to lower your scores because you’re going to get control of the golf ball with better technique so big Advantage there I think you can enjoy the game more with good technique having the ability to hit the ball where you’re aiming where you’re looking and start playing the course more like a chess game there’s another level there of enjoyment rather than just looking down the Fairway and just swinging hard at it and go out and find it and hit it again you know there’s some enjoyment in that I suppose but it’s a lot more enjoyable when you’re actually strategically working the golf ball around the golf course I think also with technique comes confidence I know when I was younger I had a certain technique I was using a swinging technique and I had very good teachers for that Ben Doyle and Greg mhat were great swinging technique teachers as I got on the tour I realized to compete I needed to have a different technique so I switched over hitting that I’ve been through this conversation before but the pursuit whether for swinging or hitting learning the technique learning what that feels like in the body applying that and owning it like you would learn to ride a bicycle you know there’s a technique to that there’s a there’s a feel of it you know why why would you want to learn anything um I was talking to my friend that’s a surfer the other day and you know we were talking about the enjoyment of our perspective passions and you know he said it’s just that feeling of getting up just dropping in on a wave down you go and moving your weight forward and kind of this weightless thing you’re kind of committing to it and knowing that that board’s going to be underneath you and catch you as you you know slide down the wave and then take off on you you know and it’s not a competitive thing it’s just a pure enjoyment of the experience of what that feels like in the body I think for me you know my primary motivation was really that in golf you know what does it feel like to swing the club and have control of the shaft the club head the club face as you’re maneuvering that around the body and all the different techniques that we can apply you know to make that happen for us that process of learning the satisfaction from improving your Technique which then blossoms out and you enjoy the game more you build confidence a feeling of accomplishment and a and just a good feeling up knowing how to do it I’m a musician also and I play guitar and drums as well and I remember before I played drums watching a really good drummer and how they would have four limb Independence and I could see each limb was doing something completely different I thought what’s that like you know what is that like to feel it in the body it’s one thing to look at it but it’s more enjoyable to actually be able to do it um and it was a long process it took a long time to learn that just like it’s taken a long time to learn Golf and to learn the technique but it helps to have good instruction and there’s a lot of landmines along the way and you can end up getting what you think is good technique and it’s bad technique and you don’t improve and you get worse and and it can be really frustrating espe especially if people are spending a lot of money um so it it’s kind of uh similar to um like say martial arts you sign up for karate class or Kung Fu or something and you know in the name of self-defense but I I think the reason for doing that is to embrace the discipline to learn about the human body because we’re in a human body and how the body can move and and understanding the chi and the dantean and how everything moves from the core and gripping the ground and ground pressures and and the movements of your opponent coming at you and all of this this discipline that’s been going on for thousands of years and to to then join that lineage of that and to participate in that is really a wonderful thing it’s very a very spiritual experience and very much in golf too you know the way that I look at golf coming down a lineage of of mastering you know a craft within the body and and increasing your uh ability to strike a ball through technique you know I recently posted on the the Master’s video I did and you know and coming across the scorecard Walter Hagen the ha Walter Hagen Walter Hagen shooting 68 at Augusta in 1939 okay the course was 6,800 yards into the 1990s you know 68 6900 yard it’s about the same length course all the way into the ’90s here we got Walter Hagen 1939 shooting 68 and certainly the greens were not as good you 1939 as they as they were much later on much smoother and more reliable putting surfaces so how did he do that in in 1939 with oh it seemed very archaic gear I mean I do think that the gear in 1939 was inferior to the gear that came along in the 1950s I think the 1950s actually made the best golf clubs um the best shafts the the best heads more compact the heads were about half an inch the irons half an inch more compact in the 50s than they were in the 30s the clubs are actually bigger more like the modern clubs actually in the 1930s but moving the the center of gravity and the weight distribution into a more compact head gave gave better Mass behind the strike and actually improved the ball striking I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Hogan Nelson sne you know that uh air produced some of the greatest ball Strikers and then you had the the Young Junior players in the 1950s growing up on those clubs Nicholas Palmer trino Gary Player you know coming out of that era of equipment 1930s I don’t think the equipment was was as good and the golf ball in 1939 is probably not as good a ball as it was in the 50s or the 60s I’m not sure when golf balls the bot golf balls were the best the best performance golf balls higher spinning meaning you can control it more for good players you want a high spinning ball to be able to maneuver it around you know I I grew up in playing in the kind of 70s and 80s into the mid90s with a high spinning bat ball and I still find that to be a superior golf ball to anything that’s out today balls go farther now yeah but we had you know top flights and Pinnacles the farther back then nobody used them because it was better to have control of the golf ball with the spin for the good players not for the not for the hackers or the poor amate players like to just hit it far but getting back to the martial art thing you know why would you do that so you know you learn you learn these things for self-defense and you know the argument would be well just get a gun you know forget all that stuff I don’t want to practice I don’t want to learn all these things uh just get a a gun and hey hey hey get selfdefense right but there there’s more to it the experience in the body just buying a gun is not going to give you the experience of learning how to uh defend yourself in a you know a a street fight or fist fight right somebody pulls out a gun you know okay it’s a different thing but getting that experience in the body knowing how to defend yourself uh if somebody is attacking you or whatever um you know there there is an argument for that but the feeling of learning that I think is is is really a fantastic thing of what you’re doing in the body same thing with golf now you can go out and buy a new driver a bigheaded thing with a you know shaft that’s 2 three 4 inches longer and smashing the ball out there say hey look look this is great but you know it’s it’s kind of like going out buying a gun you’re not really getting the experience so you know what’s motivated me you know as as a player was Tech technique I always felt like that was my path better technique better technique is going to make me better and it did it was true better technique helped me out U there’s an argument a strong argument for that and also motivated me to want to get up in the morning and and uh practice rather than you know just trying to find some you know a cheap shortcut or I’m going to get this club or something like that um so my mind you know I go back to recently fairly recently playing over at Cypress Point and uh you the wind kicked up in the afternoon you know we teed off maybe around 1:00 and the wind really kicked up by the time we turned into the back nine probably around 3:00 coming back in that Pacific Ocean Breeze just coming straight into you you know 10 11 and 12 and uh you know hit a good drive out there as long and pl 20 M hour wind straight into you and I’d hit a one iron in off the Fairway so I hit you know great one iron shot flushed it right on the green that felt really good I remember that now um I feel a sense of accomplishment being able to have executed that shot with a one iron knocked it on a small green from you know 200 probably 210 yards out or something into into a stiff wind with the one iron next hole two iron into the green same thing great shot knck it on the green you know I remember that now if I just went out and bought some hybrid or something oh this club get easy to hit and SWAT it at and knocked on the green I don’t it’s a better feeling of accomplishment I’m out there playing cyber point because of the enjoyment I’m not playing in a tournament playing with a a couple of friends of mine and uh you know just the experience of that kind of like surfing hey I’m out here playing golf because I love playing and I love hitting these great shots on this great golf course just like a surfer dropping in on a wave at a great break at a great Point dropping in and surfing and and having that experience I I think that’s a great motivation to have so you know what we’re teaching here at advaned ball striking is is technique focus on the technique learn good technique time proven technique the technique that the Great Master Strikers used from you know from Sam sne George nson Ben Hogan Mo Norman you know holding shax through the strike understanding ground pressures what we’ve got to do with the body to create this I was down and Southern California this last week and I I took a walk in the evening and there was a driving range nearby kind lighted driving range so I I’ll just walk over there sit down on a branch bench and you know watch some of the golfers it was um you know probably like 50 stalls I think the range must have been 100 yards wide there’s one guy that uh I noticed I hitting in front of me really strong you know look like he just been working out of Gold’s Gym for the last 3 or 5 years or something and uh looked like he never really played golf before I mean I’m guessing just terrible technique you know nothing good about the technique but just strong and you know big arms and he just didn’t really turn his body much but he just just swatted at the golf ball like it was a fly swatter like just he just stood there arms and hands and it was so strong it looked like it was just going to break the shaft like just like he was going to snap it and every now and then he would connect and hit a golf ball that would fly well over 300 yards carry though a couple of his shots actually missed a 100 yard driving range to the left and the right out on of the street but occasionally you hit one and then I could tell he’d be like oh yeah yeah you know he’s that’s it you know to the next up thinking I just is going to just repeat that again it’s very hard to repeat things that are just done in the arms and hands alone much more repetitive when things are working off the core and very easy to repeat when everything is just moving together just hitting boom in consistent everything working together is compared with this independent sort of hand slapping sort of thing you know I didn’t say anything to him because you know people you know don’t like unsolicited advice about anything so I just just as an observer but I also noticed that on the driving range of the maybe 50 people that were out there say probably 40 of them had drivers in their hands and were just swatting at it and just trying to hit it far and I think that that’s not really what golf is about I maybe there’s a certain amount of enjoyment just being out on the Range swatting at and occasionally hitting a good shot with a with a big frying pan driver but but to really Master the game of golf you’re going to need a lot more than that to do it and consistently getting control of the golf ball is is the way to do it through a good technique so just wanted to talk about that and you know just remind you know us all of just the enjoyment and the love of mastering something within the body whether it’s a you you’re musician or you’re a surfer or a skier or whatever it is that you love doing getting better technique and feeling that in the body and knowing what the body has to do there’s great enjoyment from that and I know Hogan talked about that he said there was just Blissful thing to just go out and hit golf books had great technique nson said the same thing Mo said the same thing you know the feel of greatness feel of greatness you know um so it it’s a worthwhile Pursuit and I think um what we’ve done here at Advanced ball striking is we we we are able to show how you can develop technique without having to go out to the range and smash thousands of golf balls you can do this through training different you know working with impact bags different drills we do do this at home for 10 or 15 minutes a day and really improve your Technique you know most of us have lives and you know we’ve got uh families and uh jobs and you just don’t have that much time to be out there you know you know when I was working hardest as as a young professional in college ESP when I turned Pro and I didn’t have to go to school anymore and had all day to practice I mean you I was up early in the morning I go out run run three miles and uh you know get out to the golf course uh you know crack of dawn and hit 500 golf balls a day and go out and play 18 holes go back work on my short game and Chip and Putt for a few hours and then go to the range and hit some more balls and go play another nine holes or sometimes another 18 and and you know you know and then come home just wiped out and go have some dinner with my friends or something like that and kind of rinse and repeat and do that when I was home and then you know the two are life too so you know big commitment but I’m not really sure all that was necessary you know I I think had I known then what I know now I could have spent a lot more time working on my technique and and and refining that and not relied so much on just you know boy if you hit enough golf balls you know you’re going to get it so um yeah another thing I was always impressed by the players that um that didn’t have to practice a lot you know the guys when I was out on tour I you know there were guys that just didn’t really practice much out there I’m sure they at some time in their life they did but the fact they were on the road it almost seemed like they were avoiding practicing they wanted to just play maybe work on a couple quick little things after the round and then just get back to their hotel and go have dinner go see the sites or something like that and um I was felt like those guys were the ones that had better technique you know if if you could you know go out and shoot 66 and not practice I mean that kind of meant you had better technique than somebody that had to do it through just sheer hard work and determination you I was a little bit more on that side of the I was kind of a grinder and hit a lot of golf balls and you know really put in a lot of hard hours but there were people that didn’t practice nearly as much as I did that that played a lot better than I did and uh I I admired them for having their great techniques some some of them were just big parters too you know out all night and drinking and partying and and they go out and shoot 66 and you just be you know I they got a lot of criticism but for me I I I respected them for that you know the fact that they could do that you know a hangover whatever and go on and still get it done you have to have good technique to do that you can get away with a lot of things with good technique so technique technique technique technique very important I think it’s a worthwhile Pursuit feel it in the body enjoy it in the body and I think it’s a great motivation and U you know learning with a one iron is what I do I do almost all my practicing with a one iron why because it’s the hardest Club to hit it’s very very hard I can hit a one iron a driver on a te or a little bigger headed Fairway Wood much easier to hit than a one iron if I can hit a one iron I can hit a two iron or three iron easy and if I give me a seven iron it just seems like a little toy like boom you know really easy the the mastering the technique of hitting a one iron you know I think has great value in that kind of like the talent code book that some of you have read or I was referred to and I talked about some of the different um disciplines in sports I think we talked about the South American soccer players that were you know so Brazilian team and they would play a much more difficult game when they were kids growing up and then when they got on the bigger fields and everything he like oh this is easy you know um doing something that’s harder and more disciplined I think can help so one iron is excellent problem with today uh you go out to a big box store or golf shop and the salesperson comes up and they says oh how can I help you um and you say well I’d like to purchase a one iron today you they’re going of look at you like huh what we don’t carry one IR nobody hits us you don’t want to mess with that here hit this Club hit this hybrid it’ll be a lot easier to hit but I think it’s missing the point okay the great technique you should be able to hit a one and you should be able to hit a good if you have good technique you can hit a one if you can hit that you can hit anything so I think things are going in a different direction as far as priorities learn the technique and you can you could be that Walter Hagen go out there and shoot 68 at Augusta National with some 1930s clubs do that you got good technique you know um just to do it through a club or technology or whatever you’re not getting the feeling in the body be like a drummer saying you know hey you’re watching Buddy Rich I did the recent video that got taken down was talking about the technique of tripping the stick that he did and doing that well you could say well why do that just have a drum machine just program the beats and there’s my music blah blah you know missing the point it’s the feeling of in the body what does it feel like to be a great drummer to be able to really feel the music and listen to what’s going on around you and kind of conducting a group or whatever you know that is a completely different experience than just programming you know beats you know it has its place I’m this saying it’s wrong but it it’s a different experience and I think there’s Great Value in learning something in the body learn how to play musical instrument learn how to hit a one iron it’s a worthwhile Pursuit learn to hit that one iron and you can buy one on eBay for 10 bucks or something probably there’s probably one for $15 you get right now in fact you should get on there and get get the first one you can get but nothing’s going to teach you better you figure out how to do that you know and I I think sebie B steros was handed maybe a two iron or something when he was a little kid and his dad gave a two iron you learn how to hit this you can hit that and you can hit anything it worked out pretty good for him there too kind of like the Talent Code so anyway just some thoughts on that um you know the beauty of internalizing your Technique get that into the body uh learn to master the game uh learn to hit the hardest club like that through good technique you’ll find it incredibly enjoyable very rewarding and that’s kind of my thoughts for today we’ll see you next time