10-Lessons Purchased... What First??

So for my Christmas present, I bought a 10-lesson package from GolfTEC. Each lesson is 30 minutes. If you had 10 lessons to plan, how would you suggest I use them? A lot of you guys are scratch, or better than scratch golfers and I value your opinions.

More about me and how I play.
I'm a high-handicapper, shooting in the high 90's. I only play 3 or 4 times a month if I'm lucky. I'd like to be in the low 90's or high 80's by the beginning of summer. Its tiring to play badly, and I'm sick of it.
By far, the worst part of my game is driving. 1 out of 10 shots I'll really get a hold of the ball and it'll go 250+ yards. But most of my drives are 190-220 yds with a fade, fade/slice ball flight. Fairway metal play is horrible, and I rarely pull my 3W out of the bag unless I'm hitting it off the tee. My long iron play is decent, but has much in the way of improvement to go. Mid-irons and Wedges are strong, the best part of my game, easily. Putting... is a whole 'nother animal, and in my opinion can't really be taught.. just takes practice.

I live in St. Louis. Unlike you folks who live in Florida and Southern California, it's winter here and the clubs have been in storage since Thanksgiving. So I'm anxious to get back in the saddle. It starts getting nice enough to play around here sometime in late March, so I'm trying to time my lessons accordingly.

Here's how I'm going to approach my lessons (but I can be easily pursuaded).
# Subject, When
1 Driving, Late January
2 Driving, Mid February
3 Long Irons, Late February
4 Driving Performance Session (75-minutes), Early March
5 Mid-Irons, Mid March
6 Wedges & Putting, Late March
7 On-Course Course Management, Early April
8 TBD
9 TBD
10 TBD

IMO, start with posture and balance. You can work on all the other stuff but unless you have good posture and balance, it'll be impossible to fix your faults. My experience has been that most of my swing faults stemmed from poor balance.

I would agree that during the season it would be best to get a lesson, and inbetween lessons, work on what you've learned. I am, however, in the MidWest. So working on it inbetween lessons is going to be tough. That's kind of why I want to plan out my first few lessons, until the weather forecast is more in my favor.

GolfTEC doesn't have a practice area? Or there aren't indoor ranges?

My suggestion is to not take lessons until your schedule (and the weather) is such that you can practice after the lesson. Otherwise, you're not going to be able to take anything from it, and it won't help you. You'd just be wasting money.

Yeah, they have indoor practice bays. But that's yet another fee, to use them. I'll ponder it.

It's been 2 months since I picked up my clubs, so I'm anxious to get started, even if it's somewhat premature. I don't want to lose the progress I was making at the end of '09.

I work in St. Louis. According to GolfTec newspaper ads and their website, GT specializes in swing analysis and swing building, and can fit golf clubs. So, they will probably do an assessment for the first lesson or two.

They claim they will get you beyond scattershot lessons to a swing system. Here's the GT website:
http://www.golftec.com/essentials/vision.html

Right. I had a Driving Performance Assessment with GolfTEC last year and it helped me quite a bit. I was so impressed with their video swing analysis, and their web lesson technologies, that I decided to take all my lessons there instead of finding the pro at my local golf course. First lesson is already scheduled for this upcoming Wednesday... I'm just not positive yet on what I should have the coach work on.

golftec teach their lessons indoors, right? well, that's fine if you're working on making good contact with the ball. but it you really want good practice with a driver, methinks you'd be better off outside. just mho.

I completely agree with this... if you don't practice in between lessons they will be a complete waste. Most likely the instructor WILL change your swing. When he does, you will need to beat balls to ingrain those changes otherwise you'll just end up going over the same stuff next lesson when the instructor see's you haven't made any progress. I know in MI I would hit up the heated outdoor ranges, they'd charge $7-10 for a large bucket... usually you'd have to hit off matts, but at least the outdoor heated ranges allow you to SEE ball flight, unlike a golf dome. Honestly I would spread the lessons out through an entire year if possible (10 is a lot) and that way much of the stuff we'd be going over would be implimented during the season when I can actually practice off of grass and simulate playing conditions, etc.

yeah... I'm a big believer in seeing ball flight when I practice. I avoid golf domes and hitting nets like the plague... maybe OK once in a while, but not to go beat balls week in week out.

Seeing the ball flight is extremely important...but be 100% SURE you understand how to analyze it properly. That said...an indoor situation can be very good if you can practice along with a first rate launch monitor (more places are starting to get Trackman, Flightscope). Because of things like wind, etc. being eliminated the launch monitor can make a great substitution for seeing the flight itself. Also the indoor situation can be very convenient when it comes to night time practice, weather and other things.

Dave

I live in St. Louis and hit balls 3 times a week or so, even managed to get in a few rounds in December and January. Weather isn't that bad. We had two weeks of extreme cold and the rest has been ok. All of the ranges have stalls with heaters if you need them.

kurt,

having gone through the 10 lesson package with GolfTec i can give you an idea on what's going to happen.

1) they will do everything they can to get your swing to mimic the "tour swing" (aka the modern swing). you will need to buy into this swing, their methodology, and your teacher.
2) while you can certainly dictate what you can work on (driving, putting, wedges), you will mostly work on your FULL swing, usually on fixing one thing each lesson. i've spent a lesson each on putting and chipping but my suggestion is to save all the lessons for your full swing.
3) if you aren't able to fix the issue (hard to do if you can't practice), your progress will be minimal. in this way, you get what you put into it (much like everything else).
4) i purchased a package that included practice time on their hitting bays. pretty much a waste of time and money.

i personally made great strides with golftec- i was a 92-97 guy before and now break 85 pretty consistenly- and purchased another 10 lessons. having said that it took a LOT of work on my part.

good luck!

Mike,

Hello fellow-St Louisan. Where do you practice? I live out in the Westplex, as they call it. There is only one place out this way which has semi-indoor bays, and I don't think they are heated (Pheasant Run). Sure, it's gotten into the lower 50s a few days. But that's the high which peaks around 2 in the afternoon; mostly it's been downright cold... too cold for golf IMO. Having a place to go after work with lights and heated bays would be the ticket.

Thanks for the foreshadowing of what's to come. I'm hopeful the 10 lessons will help me like it helped you. Scoring in the 80's would be great.

I would recommend you spend the first five or six lessons working from the hole backwards. Learn to putt, learn to chip, learn to pitch. Those skills will bring your score down faster than getting a better swing will. Also, if you learn to pitch well, that motion should be basis of building your full swing. Just take your pitching stroke and do more of it. For recreational golf, there's a lot to be said for that approach.

My 2 cents. I would never walk in there with a plan. You dont walk in a start saying this is what i want to do or this is what i want to start with. The teacher is a PGA pro and he is going to know what you need help with after seeing your swing. I personally never even heard of starting off with putting and chipping like the other guy said. Whats best to do and whats most likely going to happen is your going to walk in there. He or she is going to tell you to warm up for 5-10 minutes. There going to come in after your warm and tell you to hit a couple 6-7 irons shots and watch you. After you hit a few balls hes going to either tell you whats going on with your swing or show you via video. You want to be completely honest. Tell him your problems, your mis hits, your goals and the shots you find difficult. Listen to everything he or she says. Now that you've done some talking, make sure that you let the pro reciprocate. After the pro has evaluated both you and your swing, he or she will be able to give you feedback on where you should go from there. So keep listening. In fact, take notes if you have to. Dont rate your success or failure of a lesson in how many balls you hit. You can hit very few shots and have a very productive lesson. An instructor may have you repeat a certain swing in an attempt to develop a swing thought, or feel. You will notice when the suggested change is becoming more effective. Let the professional tell you when to hit and what club to use. Another thing is never hit a ball while the instructor is talking to you. You want to be all eyes and ears. Its a big no-no to sit there practice swinging and hitting balls while there telling you something. Your going to have doubts too. Your going to be changing things like your stance, posture, grip ect. and not feel comfortable but you have to stick with it. It will get better believe me. Your going to be changing for the better not worse. Last but not least after your lesson ask questions. He or she should tell you what to practice on in between lessons but make sure you also ask questions, no question is a stupid question. They have heard them all and yours is no different. You pay them good money and you want to get everything you can out of them. Good Luck man and dont get discouraged. Keep it at and it will pay off in the end.

I'm starting a series of 10 myself tomorrow. I had this grand vision of coming up with a plan, and sending the pro video ahead of time so he could study my swing in advance, blah... blah....

Didn't do any of it.

One thing I would like to do, is record the lessons. I have a little Aiptek HD camera (sort of like a beefier flip video) with a mini tri-pod. Is that an appropriate thing to ask to do?