Everyone is asking will Tiger come back, will he win, will he win a major, is his domination over, how are his swing changes going?

Here are a few obsevations and thoughts after watching him in Abu Dhabi, his first tournament of 2012 and really getting up close and filming him on the course and on the range for the week. 

He is certainly gaining control of his new swing, we can all see that.  A few technical observations are that he starts the club back slightly more closed, which means more toe down than he used to.  It’s almost a reversal of what he did before with Hank Haney, he has a steeper shoulder turn on the backswing and is working the club up on a slightly steeper plane.  It’s an inward hand path, shaft outside his hands as he starts back, and a steeper shaft angle on the backswing.  He is fading the ball ever so slightly, on some shots he is using a lot of upper body rotation and holding off his short and mid irons, also hitting the three wood with a low tracer bullet flight, which is very very impressive!

You have to be strong to swing this way and I hope Tiger’s back and knee hold up during the year.

He still has a lot of power, great imagination around the greens, one thing I have seen in Tiger is a couple of poor pitches from around 70 yds, which he hit a bit heavy and just got on the front edge of the green, I never saw him do  this before.

You can see he exaggerates these moves on his practice swing, but when he swings it’s not as radical as this, it’s more a rehearsal of the pattern he is trying to create in his mind and body.

Can he gain control of the driver with this swing?  We will have to wait and see.  When he really needs a safe shot he is playing a fade.  During the last round in Abu Dhabi he missed a lot more fairways and greens, which after watching him on the range before the last round  this was very surprising as he looked in complete control of his swing.

At the moment everything looks very controlled and he is bedding the swing in to competetive play, maybe his best form will come in April?

Tiger certainly got the attention of the players on the range, many were sneaking a look while they were hitting balls. Tiger does have a great posture and composure, he walks round the golf course in a slow deliberate way.  Certainly when I watch Tiger playing I know I am watching a golfing legend and I cannot forget the amazing shots he has produced throughout his career and all those major wins he has.

He looks at the moment that the flair he has showed throughout his career and his freedom of swing and play is missing, his instinctiveness is not there yet, and this is obviously understandable, maybe we are going to see a more methodical player during this season?

For me the Tiger of previous years was the most exciting player I have ever seen, apart from Seve, and I started watching from the Nicklaus era,1970 onwards, to watch him attacking the course and pulling off amazing shots, fist pumps, birdies, eagles, chip ins, amazing recoveries, playing at  Augusta were magic moments, I hope they return, because whatever view you have of TigerWoods the person, the golf world needs Tiger Woods back at his best, taking on the young guns.

When a superstar in sport has problems, for whatever reason, whether physical, technical, or self inflicted, the question is can they return to where they were?  Can they return to the pinnacle of their sport, in golf at the moment we have several young golfers who have been winning titles, money lists, majors, they have not experienced defeat against Tiger.  They are not Tiger fatigued or battle scarred through consistent losses, hence in the past when he was leading after 54 holes he almost always came out victorious, his competition were beaten before they started.

Now we have many extremely fit, young and very long hitters, they are not mentally beaten golfers, they are not intimidated, they have learnt to win when Tiger was not around, and they cannot wait to beat him when he comes back, to a degree it will make their careers, they are relishing the new challenge ahead.

Tiger is also relishing the challenge of getting back to winning majors and showing everyone that he can return to the pinnacle of golf.

We all will find out if he can come back very soon, and I will be watching him closely at the WGC Matchplay in Tucson in a couple of weeks.   

I hope you can feel how excited I am about this 2012 golf season, it could be AMAZING!

David Bown PGA AA Golf Professional

Authorised Golfing Machine Instructor

contact david@bowngolf.com

07973746872

I was there filming the players and got some great footage of the top players, on the practice ground and the course, it was a very well run tournament on a really good course.

One of the highlights early in the week was when Tiger and Rory arranged to play a nine hole practice round, they got on well and were very chatty. I managed to get some super footage of drives, irons, putts, bunker shots etc, the golf legend Tiger, making a return and the young pretender with huge talent playing and practicing together, it was a priviledge to witness. I have posted some swings on Youtube and here on my website, there are a lot to see,I will keep adding to them, so keep looking!

HSBC opening ceremony

I look forward to seeing more of this during the coming season, which I believe could be a sensational year, and if these players are coming down the last nine holes in a major and we can include Westwood, Donald, Scott, Garcia, Kaymer, Day, Webb Simpson etc etc, it is what we all want to see.

They made the game look very easy ,it was a very long course, 7,500 yds and thick rough, the power they have at their disposal is phenomenal and can overpower a golf course, but to win a tournament you still have to pick the right club, judge the conditions, control your distances, hole putts and retain your concentration, accept a poor shot or bad bounce and the occasional penalty shots, and keep it going for seventy two holes. 

The winner Robert Rock played so well under the pressure of playing with Tiger Woods and many people believed Tiger would win, me included, I watched them both warm up and go through their practice routines, Robert Rock looked solid, but Tiger looked more impressive and was controlling the flight of the ball so well, it looked a formality, well sport and golf is never that as we know. 

The standard of golf on the European Tour is so good, the strength in depth, new players coming through, the quality of the courses, it is a great product and I shall be watching till the final event in The Race to Dubai season. 

It was a brilliant way to start the 2012 European tour and see close up, the return of the TIGER !

David Bown PGA AA Golf Professional

Authorised Golfing Machine Instructor

 contact david@bowngolf.com

07973 746872

But as luck has it, a great opportunity has arisen for me to go to Abu Dhabi and Dubai to see the HSBC golf tournament, its Tigers first tour event of the year and world no 1 Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Rory McIlroy are all playing so its a bigeee!

Will be great to see Tiger close up and his swing changes, and I also really hope we get a close tournament with Tiger, Rory, Lee and Luke all playing well and a real finale, it just happens so rarely when the top two or three players in the world are battling it out over the final eighteen holes,

This of course is a great opportunity to get some hi speed video footage of all the worlds best  after some winter tuning and I will be there filming everyone of them.

Will have them posted up on my website when I return.

Take a look on Sky sports they are covering the event from Jan 26 th to 29th and see some great golf.

CONTACT  david@bowngolf

07973 746872

The TOUR STRIKER  is a superb training aid because it is designed to work when your hands and clubshaft are forward of the ball at impact, and it gives you the feel of striking a downward blow and encourages you to take a divot after the ball.

If you flick your wrists or scoop trying to lift the ball the club is designed in such a way that you will hit the ball sole of the club, and the ball will not get airbourne.

All the great ball strikers have the shaft of their club leaning forward at impact to varying degrees.

So if you lack power in your shots, hit thin or fat shots and lack consistency the TOUR STRIKER is for you, which means EVERYONE can benefit from using one.

I got my supply recently and have personally tried the 56 deg wedge, the eight iron and the seven iron and immediately the club makes you more aware of keeping your hands leading through impact, and I have hit shots and demonstrated this to my students and they work, the shot flies normally and it swings like a regular iron.

A great addition to my teaching armoury and  they are now in my teaching bag and my students really like them, I can highly recommend the club.

If you would like to try the TOUR STRIKER and buy one, I have ladies clubs, wedges, seven irons and eight irons, please contact me as I do have them in stock.

Contact me on.

david@bowngolf

tel 07973 746872

Seve at Wentworth

The great Seve Ballesteros what a player, he had charisma, magic, you just had to watch him play because you never knew what was going to happen, something magical usually did !  

My opportunity of watching Seve was at Wentworth in the eighties at the World Matchplay tournament played in October, all the superstars of golf played in the tournament then, I remember watching Nicklaus, Player, Watson, Miller, Trevino, Norman, Faldo, Graham, Marsh, Irwin, , these players were heroes, and there was an aura about Nicklaus, Player,Trevino, Miller etc, but none of these players had the charisma, flair and pure magnetism of Seve Ballesteros !

One year I went with my video camera and was filming the players and I went down to the practice ground and there was Seve just about to start hitting balls, there were barriers all round, but here was a great opportunity to film the man himself, I got up the courage to  ask him if I could video him, he replied yes and told me where to stand. That is how I got such a great view of his swing down the line ! 

There are a few things to comment on, firstly the sound when he hit the ball, I hope you can here a bit of that, and his divots were so square , he moved so freely and fluidly during his swing,his rhythm, it was a gracefulness, but he had huge power as well, plus an amazing touch around the greens, with the looks of a hollywood actor, what a combination !

Here is a clip of Seve using a short iron, I was very fortunate because I filmed him hitting many shots from the same position, from wedge to driver, from the caddie leaving him the balls to start, to Seve finishing with his caddie collecting them all and just hitting a few more wedges at the end.

It was a great day for me, and he will be remembered by me as a golfing genius, and that I managed to see up close his remarkable talent !

I hope you all enjoy this clip, I just want to keep watching it !

He told me he had played for one year, and had a few golf lessons, his average scores are around the one hundred mark.

I asked him what he wanted out of his golf lesson, he told me he wanted to fix his slice and hit the ball further.

Not an unusual request down on the driving range!

He hit a few golf shots and yes, they all sliced a long way, very high, losing a lot of distance.

The Cause

Derek  had put so much effort into moving, to try and get more clubhead speed, he moved his whole upper body way too much, both going back and through.

The reason this was happening was because he thought incorrectly that he had to use the strength from his arms and shoulders, to generate more distance, so he then gripped the club to tightly and made his upper body dominate his downswing, making the club wipe across the ball from out to in.

Derek was so keen to work with me and improve we had six sessions in five days working on full swing, chipping, putting, and bunker shots.

He was very focused and asked many questions. He was a great student to work with, and he got great results.

The Correction

I worked on getting him to hold the club in a more relaxed way, getting the tension out of his shoulders, forearms and wrists, he was so tight!

A key thought for Derek was to feel softer in his wrists, this took some getting used too as before he had no wrist hinge to speak of, because he was so tight, just a massive turn of his upper body on his backswing, and a corresponding twist on his downswing.

Also, having a feeling of letting his arms just fall down at the start of his downswing, this helped him keep the club on the desired  plane into the impact zone, and helped him resist pushing with his upper body, creating that twist.

During our last session Derek was hitting his eight iron, six iron and his 17 deg hybrid either straight or with a slight draw, his ball flight was lower.  He had increased his distance considerably and was not exhausted after hitting sixty balls! 

I was very impressed with his results, his striking of the ball was much crisper, and a good twenty five yards longer, and there was more to come. 

As Derek left I congratulated him on what he had achieved and asked him when he was going to play next & try his new swing?

He replied I am playing tomorrow at St Georges Hill, and playing Walton Heath a few days later!

Great stuff Derek.  Enjoy your golf!                                                                                                           

   email david@bowngolf.com

  tel       07973746872

Luckily everything had healed up well and he no discomfort or mobility problems.

He had at  one time been of three handicap, but was now playing off fourteen, he explained that he could not hit the driver as he wanted , it was either starting straight  and cutting to the right towards the end of its flight or flying straight left of target, could also start it left going left. He can hit the ball 280 off the tee and is a powerful player.

So I stood behind him as he set up to the ball with the driver, I always look at alignment, posture, ball position, grip, weight distribution at address.

I let him hit five or six drives, all were either starting straght and cutting about 40 yards to the right, or starting left and cutting thirty yards to the right.

From down the line I could see his downswing path was slightly across and above his intended path into the ball, his backswing was on plane, his turn was a fraction short but controlled, very strong at the top.

He had a narrow stance, his ball position was slightly to far back, his right shoulder was out of alignment to the left, and he looked a bit top heavy at at set up, weight to much towards his toes. 

So I got him to move his right foot across to the right about six inches, his ball position one inch further forward, move his weight further back towards his heels, and move his right shoulder down and back slightly.so that he was now parallel to his target, altough he felt his shoulders were closed !

He now had had more weight behind the ball at address and was better balanced and more stable and grounded

All in all I moved  the ball one inch, his upper body one inch, his weight from his toes to just over his ankle joint , so he was better balanced,  and his spine angle came up slightly, and he was nearer the ball slightly.   So we made about six inches of adjustments in total. He now had his upper body aligned better to the target. No need to alter his grip, it was perfect , his backswing was compact, on plane, no swing thoughts needed, no conscious manipulation of the hands now needed as he swings .

First swing he hit a long high shot, a strong flight, that after it reached the top of its flight it very slightly turned to the left as it came back to earth !

He actually hit it virtually straight , slight draw and long , WOW !

He was delighted, he now needs to practice recognising where he is at set up, and start to get the feel of his new set up so he can reproduce the correct alignments easily and feel comfortable.

So to sum up.

He had too much weight on his toes, ball too far back and his upper body was out of alignment , so he found it very difficult to swing the club on the correct plane through the impact zone, he said “ I feel less effort as I swing, its more fluid now, I am not fighting it”

Always look at your set up first, grip, posture, ball position, weight distribution, and alignment first, get these right first before making any swing changes, everyone should be able to have a good set up, its so important.

After all those years of trying to win the Open, Darren Clarke finally achieved his golfing dream!
To become the champion golfer for 2011 and go down in history as the Open champion.

He had control of his swing and his mind during those four rounds of golf played in atrocious and testing weather conditions.
What a deserving champion, we all know the hard times Darren has had to go through, and to come through all of that, come out the other side, and win now, must be even more special to him .

He was asked at the beginning of the week all about Rory, how is he playing etc, all the younger players were in the limelight, it was the new age of the young guns, so we were told, McIlroy, Fowler, Mannessaro, Ishikowa, Donald is world number one, Westwood was there, Poulter, Rose, Casey.
The Americans were out of it we were told. Well they were all over the leaderboard this year!

Good old Darren!

Golf is a funny old game, and just because we witness a sensational performance by Rory Mcilroy to become US Open champion, GMac wins the year before, Donald is world number one, Westwood is always around, Harrington won back to back Opens, the media tell us that the Americans are finished, rubbish!

A class act is a class act whatever their nationality. They have players coming through and they want to turn the momentum around.

European golf is outstanding, we are very strong, Ryder cup success, success breeds success. A fellow European tour player wins a major, the next guy says I can beat him, I play every week against him, and I have beaten him on the regular tour, I can do it again.

I think Rory Mcilroy has learned a lot from Darren Clarke, but Darren has learned a lot from a young gun called Rory, mainly, CONFIDENCE and FOCUS and BELIEF, he always had the skills, the ball striking ability, he won WGC event against Tiger several years ago.

Interestingly the swing I show you was taken last year when Darren had to qualify at Sunningdale to play in the 2010 Open!

What a difference a year makes!

Keep believing, no matter what happens.

Darren did!

A great example here.

For someone 5ft 10 in & 11st 6 lb/160 lbs to hit the ball 300 yds with a 3 metal on one tee shot! is incredible and to also hit many drives over 300 yds and play with that control is amazing.

His performance in winning the US Open will be talked about for some time, he was two strokes a round better than his nearest rival, he led from start to finish, all his so called weaknesses as repeated over and over by the golf analysts dissappeared, his putting would not hold up, could he scramble, his course management was poor, no what we all saw was a young man unleashing his pure golfing talent on the golfing world, he was focused, he had something to prove, his swing a thing of beauty was under full control, the crowd loved him, he destroyed his Augusta woes, & he is the youngest US Open champion for over eighty years ! WOW !

His whole game seemed to click, the putting looked good, his control of distance and holing out was exceptional, his short game was on song, his irons were like lasers, especially the first three rounds, all you saw were irons right on the flags, his driving was immense, long and high with draw, which suited the course, he looked fearless, and he had control over his mind, which was a huge factor in this incredible performance.

The stats for the tournament , in greens in regulation and driving accuracy and distance were brilliant.

So Rory had the whole package this week, and I sincerely hope we see him have many more major wins in the coming years.

Rory we all knew you had the talent and the game, and now you have that inner belief and strength that all winners possess , Congratulations to you & as the americans say you were AWESOME !

The King and I

On the range at PGA West

Hi everyone , as promised I am letting you know about a fantastic golfing trip I did in February to LA, San Diego and La Quinta, near Palm Springs .

I have just returned from blue skies, warm sunshine and golf courses and practice facilities you will not better anywhere in the world! I hope you are not too jealous!

A real bonus for me was meeting the King of golf Arnold Palmer, what a lovely man, a real gentleman and golfing legend.

I was staying at PGA West in La Quinta near Palm Springs in the desert, palm trees and water hazards everywhere as well, at the Pete Dye Stadium course the greens 12 on the stimpmeter , think Augusta speed !

My trip took me to Torrey Pines to see a PGA tour event, near San Diego, great course, followed Tiger round for several holes, and he did not hit a fairway, so he is still struggling to get his game back to the level we all know.
Later on I went to the LA Open at Riviera golf course at Pacific Palisades, a very famous course due to the exploits of the great Ben Hogan, who won there on several occasions, there is a statue to commemorate the golfing legend.

Legend Ben Hogan

I filmed many of the top players at the events in hi -speed video and will be putting these up on my video section of my website, players such as Dustin Johnson, Goosen, Appleby, Donald, Bubba Watson etc, I hope you find them interesting.

I also took the opportunity to learm from the best and visited Gregg McHatton a PGA professional and a teacher who has the highest level you can attain in the Golfing Machine, and a very serious researcher of the golf swing.Gregg can explain the physics of the golf swing in a very understandable way, and he gains his knowledge by thousands of hours research and study of the best players, to prove his point.
It was great talking to Gregg and learning the real DNA of the golf swing, it was fascinating as he explained his swing code that is not based on opinion but fact.