by Robert Cotter Professional Golf Ball Engineer Director of Golf Swing Instruction, Instant Golf®
If you are brand new to the game of golf or have reached a plateau in your scoring, then this may be the most important letter you ever read.
If you have played for some time and are looking to end years of frustration and inconsistency, or are determined to break below a scoring level be it 100, 90, 80 or 70, then I am eager to show you how to do just that.
Before we get started, let me tell you a little about my background in this great game of golf as my experience and expertise is multifaceted.
I am a professional Golf Ball Design Engineer by trade and have worked for the industry leaders in that arena (you know the names). Chances are you may have played with balls that incorporated my designs, and my contributions have been recognized by the United States Patent Office.
I also write extensively on golf topics including instruction, equipment, and top players. My work has been featured in dozens of publications and industry websites including Today’s Golfer Magazine, The New York Times, Livestrong, The Right Way, eHow, Golf Link, ausgolf, and other prominent golf info channels.
Those credentials aside, my real passion is playing the game and teaching it to others. In fact, the word obsession may more closely describe my interest in instruction.
This is, of course, why you are reading this letter. You are seeking to take your game to a new level.
So let me tell you a bit about my introduction to playing this game as it will show you what is possible in your own pursuit of a great swing and lower scores.
You may be happy to know that I wasn’t born with a golf club in my hands. I was never on the Mike Douglas show hitting balls with Bob Hope at 4 years of age (like Tiger). I didn’t play junior, high school, or college golf.
This all changed one hot summer evening when my father dragged me to the local driving range as he was preparing for a league match the next day.
After hitting 20 balls or so he handed me an old persimmon driver and said, “Here, you give it a try”.
After 5 swings and a string of expletives, I’d missed one, banged a few off the side of the stall, and managed a slice so violent it crawled up the right side range netting and headed out toward the street.
Not a great start to my golf career. But before the night was through, I had managed to get a few out there into the dark sky. And that sound off the driver was, well, quite cool.
So the next day I flipped through a few Golf Digests that were lying around the house, studied a few pictures, and headed back out to the range the same night.
What a train wreck! Only 1 in 5 balls were getting airborne and going in the general direction as planned. And this was mainly because my tempo was good. If I timed one correctly, then contact was decent, and we had a “lift off” of sorts.
Now on another night I heard the local pro giving a lesson behind me in the stall at the end of the range.
I couldn’t hear any of the instruction, but I always knew when he took that club out of his student’s hands and struck the ball himself. His impact sounded like a gun shot! I had never heard anything like that sound. The crack and fizz of the ball climbing and then falling gently to the left was a sight to see.
Now in this game, if you spend that much time at it you may reach a level of repeatability with your swing that allows you to break 100.
It was frustrating to hit that sticking point as I would routinely play with older gents that were, shall we say, a bit round in the trunk.
These guys would smoke their way around the course (literally) and rack up par after par. “You’ll get there, young guy” they would say after totaling up their 77’s and 74’s.
This reality check would become one of my first data points in my pursuit of a consistent, repeating golf swing…
Great golfers walk by you all the time on the street. You wouldn’t know them by any special physical attributes. They come in all ages, shapes, & sizes.
At about eight months into the game, I was starting to break 90. Admittedly, those were the days the putter was working better than usual.
While my ball striking was slowing improving, I was still having frequent blow up holes that kept me stuck at a mid teen handicap level.
I had not built a true repeating swing, a swing that would enable me to consistently break 80 on virtually any course in the country.
Also at this point I was in college pursuing a degree in engineering, though it wasn’t clear what I was going to do with that certificate after graduation.
With my golf addiction in full bloom, I would find myself skipping out to the course a few times a week after classes to squeeze in 18 before dark.
It was a gloomy autumn day. The clouds were rolling in and rain was on the way. But I was determined to get my round in before the storm hit.
I knew I had to have an efficient inward 9 holes to score well and beat the rain. There was no room for side trips into the woods, or losing strokes to water hazards.
I can still remember the eerie calm I had on that back nine. There was also a perceptible change in my body and swing. With those ominous clouds hanging overhead, I started to hit shot after…
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Instant Golf Swing - The Key To A Repeating Golf Swing
