Out Giving Golf Lessons Today ... No-Wind Fun

I loooove giving golf lessons; but if ever there was a sport that can be tricky to diagnose the issues and recommend the Rx, it's Windsurfing ... followed by golf. Today's student, Marg, has learned to windsurf, even despite my so-so teaching, so I'm pretty sure she can figure out golf.

But I should know that; it's not her first lesson, I've seen her hit the ball, and I know it's only a matter of a few hours (or dozen hours) of the unavoidable coarse and fine-tuning and practice and she'll have one of the better looking swings on the local nine-holes.

Teaching beginners to windsurf may be even more difficult as there are just as many components to the actions needed, and some of them are severely counter intuitive. Although, once you're up and running, you can have a ball splashing about learning at your own speed. The only drawback is that somewhere around cocktail hour — unless you are a kid or a teenager — you will notice you hands feel like they are on fire (chafed to a pinkness of medium-rare steak) and every muscle in your body will start to ache simultaneously...Surprise! But that's what the cocktail is for.

Golf, though, I think requires more patience from beginners: There's a sense — and accompanying impatience — that the preliminary set up sequence should be nowhere near as important as the downswing and impact. Nothing could be further from the truth. So much revolves around foot positioning, alignment, balance, small variations in foot pressure, posture, grip and proper relaxation combined with a well thought-out and often-rehearsed setup routine. With that in the bag, the backswing, downswing and impact are a lot less complicated to sort out.

Joining them both together is perhaps the most interesting piece of the puzzle -- initiating the backswing by flexing/pushing the left knee in toward the ball: it sets up the rotation of the torso, and off you go. 1..2,3.

Anyway, that's all golf lesson talk that's as boring as whaledung to anyone but golf instructors.

The main thing was, that Marg said, "That was fun; we should do that again." What regular golf pro gets to hear that?