Mastering Golf Swing Changes: Insights & Challenges

SportsGrid
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Nov 11, 2026
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Video Summary
AI GeneratedA professional golfer discusses the psychological and physical challenges of implementing swing changes while preparing for Q School. He explores the tension between conscious technical adjustments and the need for unconscious athletic execution on the course, emphasizing the importance of repetition and trust to bridge the gap between practice and competition.
So we talked about how good of an athlete you are, and I imagine
you're somebody, too, that's got great hand-eye coordination
and somebody that might be able to make a motor pattern change,
maybe a little bit easier than somebody else.
But what I want to get into at this part is.
You said you wanted to make some swing changes.
First, I want to know kind of what they are.
And I also want to hear just about the process that you've kind
of gone through over the last, let's say, month
as you kind of lead up into the final stage of Q School,
trying to get that PGA Tour card.
What have you noticed in just like your practice
and your prep and being able to take it to the golf course,
knowing that, hey, this is a time where I want
to be able to think about it,
but then try to get to the golf course
and just try to play and just be an athlete?
Is that something that...
Is challenging for you or is it something that kind
of comes natural to you making a quote-unquote swing change?
I think it's a blessing and a curse.
It comes naturally, but it's a blessing and a curse
because I can overdo things very, very quickly.
And I also have trust issues
when it comes to listening to coaches and or myself.
Information?
Is it more just like making sure that like the matchups are going
to be in the right place for like how you deliver the golf club?
Yeah, I think it's like if somebody tells me,
like right now I'm working on my wrist
angles on top of my swing,
like if I'm laid off and the club face is wide open, then that
weight of my hands is going to kick that club steep,
come down, and it's all timing at the
bottom.
So right now I'm working on getting my hands,
you know, Jeff Smith actually posted a really
cool Instagram about a screwdriver technique where
if you bow your wrist, now the club
lays directly off, but if you bow the wrist and rotate in,
I think it's, I don't know
if it's pronation, supination.
You probably know that with my medical background,
but then it's not laid off.
So I think it's getting myself into a position where
then I can make an athletic move.
I was reading a book by, it's right over there,
and I forget it, Dr. Bob Rotella.
I think it's like every shot is a, no, it's a, golf's not even perfect.
I read too many books.
It's been a while, but I haven't read it.
He talks about the three stages of making a swing change or golf.
When you start off at unconscious incompetent.
Then you go to conscious-competent,
and then you need to get to unconscious-competent.
So right now, I'm
in this conscious-competent stage where I'm making a swing change,
it looks great, it's producing the right flight,
but when I get on the golf course,
you can't be consciously thinking about swing.
You need to let it happen
and let that unconscious mind control the competent shots.
So that's sort of the next phase for me right now.
It's more get reps,
trust your coach,
trust your swing change,
make it look pretty or whatever,
you know,
make all the Instagram people happy that your swing looks pretty.
And then I've never missed a shot on Instagram.
I don't know about you,
That's impossible.
I've seen you on TV.
You hit a couple of shots.
I've missed a couple of shots on TV.
I can tell you that.
But I think getting to that unconscious
part where you can go out and play
golf is the tricky part.
And that's where like the disconnect comes from.
Some people,
most people I'd say,
But I am a believer if I do enough reps,
it'll just bleed in and I can go out there and just play golf.
Can you trick the brain?
Can you trick the brain to becoming in this unconscious mode?
Or do you think it literally takes rep after rep after rep?
Do you think there's a rep amount for you
to get into that unconscious mode?
I think we all think about Tiger Woods
and the amount of time he would spend.
I mean, this is a guy that didn't swing
the golf club the same over the course of his
career, made multiple swing changes,
and became number one in the world with about every single
motion, which I think is...
What a professional golfer like myself
and you might be able to say, I don't know how he did it.
Because when I go from one field to another,
that especially feels kind of dramatically different.
It takes a while for me to get on the golf course.
First off, like knowing where to aim because aiming and the adjustments
that you make sometimes of what you might manipulate
in your golf swing, whether you're a right aimer, you're going to get
the face looking at the ball early or you're somebody that all
of a sudden now you're holding it with your wrist angles and rotating.
You're thinking like, OK, am I in my draw, my fade?
What shots do I have?
