Hello Sandtrappers,
My name is Justin Tobin. I'm 32 years old and live in the Philadelphia area. I work as an event staging video technician for corporate (and collegiate) meetings and events. I sometimes work events at very nice golf courses, and it's torture looking out at the course not being able to play.
My golfing background is not extensive at all, but it's somewhat interesting. I began playing at 15 years old with a set of junior lefty clubs; I'm naturally left-handed. I took two group lessons and played a few rounds but gave up the game about a year later due to a higher interest at the time in other sports. About 12 years later (at 28 years old), I picked the game back up playing very casually maybe one or two times a month with my buddies, and would rent lefty clubs when I played. I never broke 100 during this time and would routinely end up shooting around 110. About two years ago, my uncle gave me his old set of clubs and they were right-handed, so I relearned the game right-handed. After some practice (this was the first time I had actually put effort into practicing and developing a swing by myself), I played my first right-handed round and shot my normal 110. I had lost power switching sides, but my consistency improved (I was still putting LH but everything else RH). After about a year with very minimal improvement, I realized that I enjoy and play the game enough to justify making a big (for me) purchase and buying a set of LH clubs. On a friend's recommendation and after my own research, I decided to build and purchase my own set of custom LH clubs from Gigagolf. It is a good starter set for me given that I'm essentially starting over.
After receiving my clubs exactly one week ago today, I have since become obsessed with the game and developing myself a new swing from scratch. I started by reading Harvey Penick's Little Red Book, and then watching a bunch of free videos I've found from various sources on the Internet. I decided to study Gary Player's golf swing since he has been a very successful player and has a similar build to me (we are both short at 5'7"). I haven't adopted his famous step-through follow-through, but have listened to all the instructional videos of his I could find. After 8 hours of practice over two days, I played my first round on that 2nd day walking my local course and scored a 111. I shot a 51 on the front, but then I guess I was sore and tired because I really ran out of steam shooting a very ugly 60 on the back (this was also my first time playing strictly to USGA rules). I practiced for four hours again the next day, and the following day played another round on a much tougher course and shot a 107.
Anyway, after much research I stumbled upon this site, and I'm excited to be here! I'm looking forward to learning from the experience of everyone in here as well as offer up any insights I may have despite my very beginner status. Once I have time, I plan to upload videos of my swing in the member swing forum, and be active offering input there. Thanks in advance to any and all who help me with my progression.
Best,
Justin
