Drills and the right club that day

Winter has hit with a vengeance at the home of Finding the Tips. I hope that you and yours are warm and cozy if you’re enduring this Arctic blast. It should make the upcoming golf season all the sweeter.

While we’re waiting for spring to be sprung, we can still work on our games. One of the outcomes from golf instruction studies in recent years is the realization that slow drills help us ingrain good habits in our swings. Alex Elliott gives us such a drill that he promises will do more good in five minutes than hitting thousands of balls on the range or simulator. Sign me up, coach!

Giles Gill knows that amateurs struggle with the transition from backswing to downswing. He offers up three minutes of instructions and drills to help us make the transition smoother and more powerful.

The fastest way to improve scoring is to become a better putter. Jamie Fraser is the Director of Instruction at the Hal Sutton Golf Academy in Houston. He gives us a simple drill to help us putt the ball more online.

And speaking of Hal Sutton, I’m reminded of one of most iconic sound bites in televised golf history. Let’s take a look back at the 2000 Tournament Players Championship.

In this issue

• Compress the ball drills

• Transition like the pros

• The gate to great putting

• The right club that day

Stop wasting time

Alex Elliott gives us a new drill that will get you compressing the golf ball in an easy way, in just five minutes.

This drill helps you improve contact with the ball by focusing on your swing position a foot or two after impact. Try it! You’ll like it!

Eureka! Improve transition

Watching the pros on TV, the golf swing looks so easy. They swing to the top and then just hit the ball. But the transition to the downswing is something that confounds most of us.

Giles Gill gives us three minutes of instruction and drills that will help make that move much easier and repeatable.

Hole more putts

Jamie Fraser, Director of Instruction at the Hal Sutton Golf Academy, gives us a great drill to help us putt the ball more online. It’s a simple drill – you just need a putter and two coins or tees.

But more than that, Jamie also offers advice on how to take the drill onto the golf course so you can make more putts. 

Sutton hit the right club that day

Hal Sutton’s first win on the PGA Tour was the 1982 Walt Disney World Golf Classic. The next year he won the PGA Championship, his only major victory.

But earlier in 1983, Sutton was the winner of the Tournament Players Championship, shooting a final round 69 to erase a five-shot deficit at the start of the round.

As great as that TPC victory was, Sutton’s 2000 win at the Sawgrass Stadium course produced one of the most iconic moments in golf history.

Sutton was having a great tournament. He enjoyed a one-shot lead after each of the first two rounds. But it could have been much better.

During the third round, Sutton stood on the tee of the famed 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass with a four-shot lead over Tiger Woods. But an errant tee shot into the water surrounding the island green resulted in a triple bogey.

In the last round, Sutton was cruising again. After 15 holes, he held a three-shot lead over Tiger.

It’s a good thing he did.

The final round started on Sunday afternoon for the last pair in the tournament. However, thunderstorms forced the players off the course after 12 holes.

With rain having softened the fairways as play resumed the next day, Sutton reasoned he might not be able to reach the par 5 16th green in two shots. He knew, though, that the much longer Woods would probably have a putt for eagle.

That’s exactly what happened. Sutton laid up with his second shot and finished the hole in par. Woods made his eagle putt and the lead was cut to one shot.

After making triple on 17 the day before, Sutton somehow managed to clear his mind and match Woods with par on 17. While he may not have shown it, I’m sure there was a huge internal sigh of relief when Sutton left the island green.

On 18, after a good drive, Sutton had 179 yards left to hole. He hit a six-iron. TV Analyst Johnny Miller suggested that Sutton should be aiming well right of the flag. Instead, as on-course commentator Roger Maltbie reported, the shot was headed at the flag.

Watching the ball travel towards the flag, Sutton implored the golf gods for all the televised gallery to hear: “Be the right club today!” When the ball finished about 12 feet from the hole, he slapped fives with his long-time caddie Freddie Burns.

Let’s put this shot into historical context.  After this TPC, Woods would go on to win the 2000 US Open, British Open and the PGA championships. He followed that up with his 2001 Masters victory, giving him the Tiger Slam.

But on the last Monday of March 2000, Hal Sutton prevailed over Woods in his absolute prime.

He not only claimed his second TPC championship, but he also received the first seven-figure winner’s purse in PGA Tour history.

If I had to summarize Hal Sutton’s career, I’d say he:

• Won 14 PGA tournaments

• Won a major championship

• Beat Tiger Woods head-to-head in 2000

That’s a career to hang your hat on!