Green Valley Golf Tips: It’s not down here; it’s out there

There’s no catcher haunched in front of the umpire with mitt outstretched.

Golfers have to set their own targets, and pro Marvol Barnard will tell you it’s not the ball.

“The body follows the club,” she tells her student, “so when you focus your swing on the target ahead, you tend to get your weight transferred at the right time and you don’t really need to be locked onto the ball.”

So, what does that say about the “keep your eye on the ball” clich/?

Though she acknowledges the adage’s universal appeal in all sports, keeping your focus “out there,” rather than “down here” in golf means the ball can actually become almost an interruption in the path of a fluid swing toward a target in the distance.

“The target creates the swing,” she says, as she explains how that change of focus can eliminate all the “technique talk” in our heads as we get ready to hit it.

“When you toss a ball underhanded to a target, do you really think about your tossing technique?” she asks the student, recalling a golfer she worked with once who was always on his back foot.

She had him throw a ball at a target over the hill, freezing his position to show him that he was correctly on his front foot at the finish.

“You may push it or pull it some, she says, but a “club-throwing” swing can cure the ‘over-the-top’ malady.”

This is one of those times when it’s okay to throw a club, so she asks her client first to toss a club out into the fairway and try to emulate what he thinks the swing should be.

“A child will usually throw the first club right at the target,” she explains, but since most players are tied to the rotation in their swings, the club usually flies off to the left because the golfer will “flip the wrists” instead of getting the body through.

“Now try to toss it to your target out there,” she says to him, emphasizing extension of the arms and a natural follow-through, just like he’s throwing a ball instead of a club.

Next, she has him swing the club slowly toward the target he’s chosen, “just to get the feel,” she describes it.

Now it’s time to hit a few balls and concentrate on holding the club at the finish in the direction of the target.

A little game of catch follows, first facing each other, then standing sideways to the pro, making sure the student tosses the ball smoothly toward her hands, and finally instruction on how to pick out a very specific target — a tree limb, a sprinkler, maybe just a cloud.

Each time the student says he will hit to that target, she asks him, “Where did your mind go while you were swinging, back down to the ball, or is it still out there?”

Using pictures taken from Extraordinary Golf by Fred Shoemaker, a valued instructor’s resource for Barnard, she illustrates for her student how the golfer in the first photo has her head locked down on the area around her feet, using mostly arms and hands to propel the ball, compared to the second swing that clearly displays movement of the head and body that follow the club-throwing motion toward a target ahead.

When the focus is on the ball, rather than the chosen target, she continues, a lot of bad things happen.

We release the hands early, resulting in what many golfers call “casting.”

Body movement stops and weight will often go to the back foot, instead of transferring to the front, so the body “stalls out” around the ball, and we finish with “all arms.”

The dramatic difference helps convince her client that he needs to pick out a very specific target for every shot, the more specific the better, and then let the body flow through toward it, rather than allowing himself to get stalled down at his feet.

“What happens at your feet is really only a result of the willingness and confidence to swing freely out toward a target,” she tells him.

It’s a convincing argument for a major belief change — it’s not down here; it’s out there.

Mike Touzeau is a freelance writer for the Green Valley News.

Know your pro

Marvol Barnard is one of only 180 women in America with both LPGA and PGA certifications. She keeps it simple, adapting her lessons to the unique history of each individual at all levels of play, feeling that instruction has been made just too complicated for most students.

She and her husband lived on a boat in Alaska for 20 years, visiting winters, though they’re full-time here now. She has been an independent contractor teaching at Haven Golf Club for the past eight years. In October she will continue her popular 3-hour school for $90 (including lunch) that takes six students maximum per session from putter to driver.

Barnard can be reached at 591-1475 for lessons.