The concern that courses like Merion are becoming obsolete for the U.S. Open because they're too short is a little nuts. It might be obsolete for the very best players in the world, but Merion is more than almost anyone can handle. So Hogan hit a 1-iron into the 18th hole and today they're hitting an 8-iron? I have a great solution to that: Just hold the U.S. Open somewhere else and stop lengthening all these courses. The game is hard enough for the rest of the golfers who play it.
The 30-minute lesson is usually a disaster. The student is dissatisfied because it simply isn't enough time to get something accomplished. If the session is stretched to 45 minutes—which is usually the case—the teacher isn't thrilled, because he got paid for only 30 minutes of his time. In most cases a one-hour lesson is the best.
When I taught at Pinehurst in the early '80s we used to do clinics at night in the hotel. One night Dr. Richard Coop, the great sport psychologist, came to hear me speak, and when I got done I asked him how he thought I did. What Dr. Coop told me has had a lasting impression on my teaching. He told me that I needed first to remember that the audience hears only 10 percent of what you say. So from that point on I've always made sure that I repeat my main points at least 10 times to guarantee that my students get 100 percent of what I have to say.
I've often been accused of teaching a system, but I must say that's usually by people who have never seen me teach. Anyway, I think most teachers have kind of a model in their minds of how they think the club should be swung. What I've hung my hat on has always been the importance of swing plane. This isn't any new theory. Ben Hogan talked about the swing plane. The difference is that I'm less concerned with the plane of the left arm, which was Ben Hogan's point of reference. I'm more concerned about the plane of the golf club and the plane of the clubface. The movement of the club in space and the position of the clubface relative to the shaft is just about everything to me. There are many things an individual must do with his body to make the club perform as it should, and teaching that is an art. If you inject enough art into the science, it no longer is a system.
Hogan's concept of swing plane shaped my teaching philosophy, but I think it was flawed. His image of the plane, the straight line that went from the ball up through the shoulders and beyond, is too upright. Nor do I believe the left arm is the point of reference. I'm a huge proponent of swing plane, but my focal point is the clubshaft. I prefer the club to swing on a plane that is always parallel to the original plane that the shaft was on at address. I do believe, as Hogan did, that every person has a different swing plane depending on their build.
Hogan, by the way, is perceived as hitting a fade whenever he could. That might be true, but I believe his natural ball flight was a slight draw. Mark O'Meara told me that when he met with Mr. Hogan, he asked him what the correct flight on a shot should be. Hogan told him that the ideal ball flight was a draw from right to left. His explanation was that because the golf club swings on an arc that goes from inside in the backswing to straight at impact and back to the inside in the through-swing, the correct shot would be a slight draw. So while a lot of people saw Hogan play fades, they were manufactured and ran contrary to the shape of his swing.
At my golf schools, golfers do whatever they want. I'm against regimentation—full swing at 9 a.m., bunker play at 10 a.m., and so on. Most students hate that. If someone wants to stay on the practice tee all day long, I'm more than fine with that, because that's how he's going to have fun. Usually they get worn out and want to go chip for a while. But drag guys over to the putting green if they don't want to go? No way. It's their money.
The three best ball-strikers in most people's minds are Moe Norman, Lee Trevino and Ben Hogan. The one thing that all three were missing that is a part of today's game is raw power. There is no substitute for clubhead speed. It widens your capabilities tremendously in terms of ball flight. That's why I think that Tiger will join this group of greatest ball-strikers. With Tiger it's often like a heavyweight fighting middleweights.
If you take lessons from me and don't improve, the fault is all mine.
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