When we got to today’s Attitude & Motivation class, we got to take a personal, behind-the-scenes tour of the PGA TOUR Superstore located right next door. I told you the school was in an ideal spot.
Turns out Dave, the GM of the Arizona Avenue store, graduated from the Golf Academy’s San Diego campus (the first of the five GAA campuses) back in 1986. Even when we were there a little after 8:00a, the store was spotless. That’s a testament to Dave and his staff especially when you consider that the store is 60,000 square feet! The new Titleist Pro V1 and Pro V1x golf balls came out today, and they were putting the finishing touches on the display when we arrived.
This store is one of three of it’s kind in the Valley. It’s owned by Arthur Blank, the former Home Depot guy and current owner of the Atlanta Falcons. Of the 22 PGA TOUR Superstores nationwide, it’s the Scottsdale store that does the best. Today’s tour was an interesting and candid look at the retail side of the golf industry for sure.
In Golf Fundamentals, we learned more about the nine different ball flights: pull hook, pull, pull slice, hook, straight, slice, push hook, push, and push slice. Ball flight is determined by the club face position at impact and swing path. Face angle accounts for 85% of of ball direction on average while path accounts for the other 15%. When evaluating someone’s swing, it makes the most sense start with clubface angle and proceed from there.
After showing us how to us the V1 Swing Analysis System, Jay took us into one of the golf simulators and showed us how TrackMan measures the relationship between clubface angle and swing path in determining ball spin and ball direction. Seeing the concepts in a 3D environment really helped drive these principles home.
Tomorrow, it’s on to Business Management followed by History of Golf.