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Green Valley Golf Tips: Start your golf game on the right foot

Mike touzeau | Special to the Green Valley News
Quail Creek resident Linda von Felden benefits from head pro Dennis Johnson’s beginner’s lesson.

By Mike Touzeau, Special to the Green Valley News

Published: Saturday, July 26, 2008 5:12 PM MST

Never picked up a club?

Even if it’s trying to rekindle interest in a game you took up 30 years ago, the raw rookie’s lesson might be the most important, if for no other reason than ensuring you won’t pick up some bad habits right off the bat.

“Do yourself a favor and take a series of beginning lessons from a pro, so you get off on the right foot,” agrees Quail Creek head pro Dennis Johnson, who has been helping fellow resident Linda von Felden get acquainted with what most think is the toughest new sport to learn.

“He got me enthused about learning how to play,” she said, “with no pressure.”

After inquiries about any personal physical issues the student might have that could affect their ability to learn to swing freely, Johnson begins with the basics of the set-up, which includes grip, stance, posture, and ball placement, then gradually introduces the mechanics of the swing, and finally how touch affects distance and accuracy.

“Golf is a game of action, where most other sports involve reaction,” Johnson points out to the student, emphasizing that improper set-up can absolutely affect everything negatively for not only the beginner, but the pro as well, which is why it is the most important first thing to learn.

Grip: Johnson demonstrates how the palm of one hand faces the other, and with the thumbs pointing down, the grip should be firm but not tight, to avoid any tension.

Stance: He aligns the student on the balls of her feet, which are shoulder width apart with the knees slightly flexed.

Posture: Proper posture, he tells her, with spine angle and club angle perpendicular, will place you over the ball, head motionless, with the hands “dangling naturally,” as close to the body as possible.

“The biggest fault I see in amateurs,” he says, “is that they reach their hands out too far from their bodies.”

Ball placement: He has her lower the club so the shaft shows about a 45-degree angle, the club head centered between her feet.

Before students are permitted to swing, Johnson has them position a wedge for a “half-swing,” pointing the butt of the club at 9 o’clock in the direction of the target, which leaves the club head pointing in the opposite direction at 3 o’clock, the shaft exactly parallel to the ground.

Emphasizing a descending blow, he starts them out with a few balls on the range with this partial 9-to-3 swing so they can find the “sweet spot” on the club face, encouraging them to get the club deep under the ball without trying to “help” it into the air, showing them how the club does the work for them.

“Sometimes they forget that the club has loft,” he says, as he tries to get her to quit “muscling” the club, but rather let it “fall” through the swing path.

Gradually, he moves her from a 9-to-3 swing to an 8-to-4, then a 10-to-2.

“The full swing is nothing more than an extension of this partial swing,” he explains.

Once he sees her learning to let the club swing easily through the ball, he chooses some targets and she begins to see how more club speed without over swinging can generate the distance desired.

Before long the student learns what kind of swing produces what kind of outcome they want.

“You can learn the wrong swing plane right away,” Johnson cautions, “if you don’t learn the right set-up right away.”

As he takes the beginner from the half-swing to the full swing, correcting set-up fundamentals as they work, Johnson extends encouragement, helping the raw rookie take the first steps toward learning the game he’s loved since he first grabbed a club almost 50 years ago — the right way the first time.

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

Know your pro

Quail Creek head pro Dennis Johnson came to Quail Creek four years ago from Colorado, where he was assistant pro in Vail, then head pro in Steamboat Springs for 16 years.

The former St. Cloud State University star was named the Northern Intercollegiate Conference Player of the Year in 1976 after leading his team to the conference title — something he was accustomed to, since he also led his North Branch, Minnesota high school team to three straight state golf championships.

As a college senior, he noted the lifestyle of the head pro at the country club where his team played, and knew right then he wanted to be a PGA professional, so he earned his Class-A rating in 1982.

Johnson believes mechanics are important to have, but students need to learn to translate that knowledge into “feel.”

Once you know “how to do it,” you have to be able to “feel how the body does it,” especially the hands, he says, since they control the instrument, which controls the flight of the ball.

He can be reached at 393-5802 for lessons.


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