What do you expect from a golf lesson?

As the title says... what do you expect from a golf lesson?

I've heard alot of different answers to this question, but at the end of the day, "he's on your dime" as another instruction once said. What do YOU want to accomplish?

Do you have your own agenda or are you waiting for the pro to tell you?
Do you ask "why?" when he asks you to do something?
What is the reason for this new move, why are you doing it, and how will it help you?

Have you done your research on your teaching pro? Is he/she a great player so you hope that they can help you lower your score? If so, the lesson should be on the course. Most great players are not great teachers.

What is your pro's swing philosophy? Why does he follow this philosophy?

And.. the biggest question... has your pro taken the time to talk to you about how you prefer to learn and hear the information? People prefer not only to learn differently (visual, feel, auditory) but they also want their information organized in a certain way: explain the whole picture first OR break it down into parts, or simply a 'feel' which accomplishes what you are trying to change (noetic, empirical, rational)

I have had trouble going to public driving ranges and listening to the instructor recite a golf magazine article to a student just to hear him/her self talk. Its not about the pro.. its about the player. If a pro puts his players' first and his info second, both will have success.

Interested to hear your thoughts and experiences.

I have been blessed to have a great teacher. Every time i go to him he tells me what the problem with my swing is. Then he shows me how to fix it and why it works. Then he watches me hit a bunch of balls to make sure i get it. Sometimes he even does video. He usually gives me a bucket or two after to practice . He is the greatest swing instructor ever. He is a scratch player to. In late 07 he was a +5 or something like that!!

He is a student of Mike Bender(Bender taught Zach Johnson). He uses MEGSA(Most Efficient Golf Swing Attainable) and it has worked wonders. I have gone to him for 4 years now and he has taken me from a 40 maybe 50 hndcp to a 10. In 4 years. The funny thing is I did no searching he just happened to be the replacement for the guy at one of the two places i play at.

Now when i have any trouble I go to him. It takes a while for his instruction to sink in but after a month I am better than i ever was. Great experience. Plan to keep going to him for a while Good luck w/ your lessons.

Sounds Positive. I also liked this with my instructors.

Why do you find that its takes a while to sink in? I guess if he changed your entire setup into something that feels very different and stiff, it will take some time for those feelings to become comfortable. If an instructor asks you to do something Drastically different and completely strange, was the the best diagnosis for you at that time? People kept saying that it takes a while for it to sink... 1 step forwards but 2 steps back... but it sounds like that was made up by a bad golf instructor. I now think that if my instructor can't identify the problem and give me something that works the majority of the time, its not the best solution. I don't expect to be told the secret but I do expect that the person claiming to be a professional on the subject can help me now. When you last had to go to the doctor because you were sick... did you get worse after taking his meds?

I've taken a essons here and there every time I lose a swing groove and basically what I expect is the instructor to pick up within a few swings what I'm doing wrong. I have been seeing a great local guy and he stands back watches two swings without me hitting a ball and knows i'm either pulling shots, slicing, hitting thin, etc. He's able to give me some great drills to get the feeling I should be having during a swing, always tells me to losen my grip (he can pick that up by just seeing the tension in my arms) and sends me on my way and I'm usually good to go for another 40 rounds or so.

I just began lessons at my local course, parents got them for me for christmas. I really enjoy lessons with him because he is very personal and gets to know me. He likes to have fun and joke while teaching, his philosophy is that having fun helps to make the learning experience easier. He also asked what i wanted to work on the first time i went to him. I said, my grip and swing groove, and from there my lessons have progressed. He only likes to see me every two weeks because he feels that i can get the most out of his lessons by practicing in between, rather than using them all within a week. After the first lesson, he basically set me a on track for lessons, i believe next week will be chipping or putting. He also breaks down parts of the golf swing, once you master one part you add another, and then on until the whole concept comes together. He also hooks me up with free range balls when he is in charge of the shop, i believe that the personality of the teacher will tremendously affect the effectiveness of lessons.

My one expectation in a golf lesson is improvement :)

Exactly! Get better now.

It depends on the severity and type of the illness. If I have a sinus infection, I expect the meds to start working pretty quickly. If I just found out I have cancer, I suspect the chemo will make me at least feel worse for a while even if I'm actually "getting better." I think the type of problem you have will dictate the speed at which you can improve and the pain that it takes in getting there.

I think this is a reasonable analogy, but remember there are good doctors and bad doctors.

...and chemo probably won't fix your slice.

Ty Krieger over at Timacuan?

When I started taking lessons I had a plan of what I would like out of golf. I also had an honest assessment of my game. Typical good shot driver, irons, wedge. Typical bad shot driver, irons, wedge. Stats for a round Driving accuracy, GIR, U/D and SS. What I expected the pro to do is the help me to execute my plan to achive my goals.

I also expected his experience to help point out any pitfalls in the plan I prepared.

I wanted to focus on the short game development figuring that would be a good approach for lower scores and also help with the full swing down the road. This happened to be in-line with the pro's method.

Also, being winter right now it is nice to be in training mode where I can have lots of swing thoughts. As we move into golf season we are going to work on some techniques that I can use to trust my swing on the course and avoid thinking about mechanics while playing.

I have a plan for improvement. However, I trust the pro to give me things to work on to achive that plan. During practice between lessons, I only work on the lesson I have been given. Trusting the pro will give me the best chance at meeting my plan.

So far I have not had to ask why. He has explained the reason for the change and how it fits my plan without the need for me to ask. If I had to ask "why?" it would be a sign that we did not communicate well up front.

The pro I work with uses video so he tends to show how this works with the plan I prepared and what we are attempting to fix.

Dumb luck that I got a good one. If he did not mesh I be looking again. Honestly, I think you can tell a lot about a pro from that way they put togeather their marketing material.

He seems to work with the person based on their ability and where they are. Making the best swing for them based on their physical capabilities.

This is the best part about the pro I am working with. He did ask a little, but his strongest point is he was able to adjust to me on the fly. While working with me I could tell he would let me be when I was concentrating. He would use feel and guide my movement when appropriate. He would provide feedback after each shot which helped. One drill I kept hitting a push and he kept saying "Good". I think I must have had an odd look on my face because he started saying "Good push!" so that is what the drill was supposed to do and everything was better. After a few more shots he gave me the next part of the drill and it all made sense.

I have watched the pro I work with give lessons to others. He tends to be fairly selfless. I noticed however, that some taking lessons did not give trust easily and they had the same swing at the start of the lesson as at the end.

-E

Knowledge... that's what I want. Knowledge I can use to be more consistent and hit shots I want to hit.

Let's be honest here, words and feelings mean different things to different people, so a teacher that simply says do it this way (or only one way) and the lesson is all mechanical positions does not really help me much. If I can fully understand the reasons and the techniques to achieve mechanical improvements then the lesson will stay with me.

I've been blessed to have four great teachers (great by any measure, and recognized widely as at the top of their profession.) Each was quite different. Each used different words and ideas, but there was a strong consistency in the underlying reasons for what they taught. I actually disagreed with one of them about a minor point, but I understand exactly why he wants his players to do this particular thing. It was not a big deal.

The sign read: "Golf Lessons: 10 lessons for $500, or a single lesson for $1,500 (if you expect a miracle, you gotta pay for it!)"


I don't take golf lessons anymore. I found a couple guys who play well to give me a few pointers now and then, and have just been copying the swings of better players and working it out myself. Every time I had a lesson it would screw my swing up, and I'd go out and play terribly afterwards. The only exception to that was the one-off lesson in sand play where the pro made me hit about 150 balls out of the sand in the same session -- that gave me a general idea of how to get out of a bunker.

Every time I'm at the range now I seem to come across an instructor telling some guy my age they're "Doing great!" when they're barely getting the ball airborne. I'm sure there are good golf instructors out there, but a lot of them are eerily reminiscent of those personal trainers who have fat guys sit on bosu balls doing 5 lb. curls as a means of getting in shape. Lots of praise to keep you coming back and shelling out the dough, with no real improvement.

From my experience as a competitive player I have seen a lot of issues being the cause of the wrong internal idea. I like the post that talked about each person's representation on the meaning of words and that proper communication is only achieved when the meanings are understood. I've heard "you're taking it a little inside". Inside what? its a relative term. are my hands too far inside? is it the club? A big pet peeve of mine are 'cliche golf tips' and we have all heard them.

Since we're talking about proper communication.. how do you want to learn your swing? Are you interested in something simple like "put the club here", and therefore work on one feeling. Hopefully the instructor can monitor this because it can fall to the wrong side of the fix. Do you want your instructor to explain the cause and effect and how you can correct this through a series of drills? Everybody wants to know how to change it differently. If an instructor told a player like Elk to 'just put it here', that instructor might just be in for a severe lesson on angles, geometry and physics. If you start on a scientific rant detailing the law of conservation of angular momentum and how this affects centripetal and/or centrifugal forces through separation with a player like Els, the instructor might get the 'deer in headlights' look.

I have been privileged to learn from great coaches who can discuss it the terms I prefer. A term that has come up in my years of learning is to find 'feel through proper mechanics'. This is a saying used by the Golfing Machine which unless you're playing golf on another planet, explains the swing in terms of geometry and physics and the laws therein.
I also prefer visually seeing my current action and what it looks like when I try to exaggerate my positions. If I can see what I'm doing in my mind's eye, I have a better chance of doing it successfully.


Is there anyone here that signs on for a weekly session with continuous learning? The quote of "$500 for a package of lessons and $1500 for one" is a great example that the quick fix or small swing tip will only last so long and is not true learning. Not everyone is into a serious commitment to constant improvement - we are a big minority - but those players who can understand What's going wrong, Why its happening, and How do I fix it with drills and position checks, can apply this to a practice plan and build a swing, rather than try to fix a swing.

I look at a lot of great players who have undergone big swing changes and its takes some time to transfer these changes to your long term memory so that they created a new pattern. I remember reading an article about some of Tiger's swing changes and how he worked on the feeling away from the golf ball for days before testing it with ball flight. There's a big difference between the intent to control the golf club and the intent to hit a golf ball a target.

How much time do you spend hitting shots at targets versus working on a swing feeling/thought ?

I met with my coach this morning for our normal 3 hour session. If I miss anything over 170 yards right now, its starting a little right of target and staying out there but it feels great. My driver sometimes takes a slight nose dive to the left. I thought it could have been the clubface so we examined that for a while.

Our lessons are not about hitting golf balls but examining what I am trying to accomplish and how I 'intend' to do that. Those are 2 different things. it was 45 minutes before I hit a golf ball. We talked about how it could feel so great with a strong ball flight, great divot, but just travel a bit right. When I say a bit right, I mean about 10-13 yards right of target.

We started with ball position and after just 2 or 3 'mock setups', where I thought I was playing my ball was not Truly where it was. My eyes where lying to me! My personal feeling was that it felt farther forward that it really was which put together with my current swing pattern, brought the clubface into the ball too early.

When i work with the competitive kids we see this all the time with 'it doesn't feel right' but the video and mirrors show strong positions. What you Feel is not Real.

How would you feel if you're regular lesson turned out to be a lesson on the mental game. Maybe your preshot and postshot routine, or the whole lesson was about creating an image of what you want the ball flight to look like?

i think most of us get our little mental tips from the media or from other people's perspectives while sitting in the clubhouse - which is all good. you can get your inspiration anywhere.

I've met with 4 mental coaches in the past 7 years and each one has their own way. I have managed to take a little information from each and arrange it so it all works together and its amazing how it all flows!

Would see the value ($) in a mental lesson?

Everything you wrote is correct. I have been a golf instructor for over 20 years, and here is what I expect my students to get out of a lesson: 1. a clear understanding of what they are supposed to do and how to do it 2. practice drills to help them execute the changes 3. a scheduled follow up lesson so progress can be observed If a student is trying to learn the game, make a drastic change in his or her swing, or does not really understand alignment, etc., then I schedule a playing lesson so we can see what happens "out there"---where it really counts.