The sound of shot after shot being hit by the rest of the players who have come to TPC Las Vegas TOUR Academy to hone their game rattles in my ear. The golf pro, sitting behind a computer monitor shouts instructions, “Again! Again! Another. Another”
I swing from the hip. I swing from my heels. I swing as if I have never held a club in my hand. Somehow this magical lesson has done its best to help me lose my swing. I literally have no swing left. My grip is wrong. My approach is wrong. Alter the back swing. Hold the finish.
Vegas!
Find out where to play golf in Las Vegas
With all that there is to do in Las Vegas I decide to add the stress of a major swing change? I approach the first tee with all the confidence of a 1st grader leaving the half day of kindergarten to attempt a full day of school complete with a lunch pail and backpack. I’m naïve as I face the ball and look down the fairway, Par 4, 349 yards with a slight dogleg right. My old swing would have had me over swinging to the tune of an 80 yard second shot from the left rough. Instead, I pause on the tee and attempt a disrupted swing with a driver that feels like a sledge hammer.
The ball sails high and slightly to the right. Oh, great, now I have a slice! The ball lands in the first cut and I’m actually about 60 yards from the center. My short game is my strength. I lose the thoughts of the practice range and my 60 degree wedge sticks it so close I can’t tell if the ball is sitting on the lip or within a gimme of an opening birdie.
30 minutes worth of lessons from a golf pro and two shots later I’m the guy with all the confidence.
Hole number 2 brings back the doubts as I’m faced with a par 3 over the desert to a dot of a green with the Las Vegas skyline in the back ground.
196 yards with my new swing?
I’d like to tell you that I listened to the golf pro when he had me focus on bringing my hips through the ball. I’d love to tell you that my hands were right where they needed to be in order for me to see the ball sail through the air and land softly on the green. Instead I scream “fore” as a group jumped out of their carts and my ball ricocheted off of the desert rocks. My second shot landed me close enough to miss a bogey putt.
My third hole had me playing from under a juvenile Joshua tree and the fifth hole nearly made me consider ordering drinks from the cart girl.
By hole 9 I nearly lost my will to continue on but then the swing felt comfortable. Some where 48 shots in to my round I felt it come back. I felt my game and the lessons find each other and I went on to play back nine that demands to be spoken about for months to come.
Need lessons? You need the TOUR Academy at TPC Las Vegas
TOURAcademy Las Vegas
Sign up for 2- 5 day golf schools or simple clinics that will help you find your game. They have it all from swing technology to some tough love when it comes to swing mechanics. Check out their website and fin d the right program for you.
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