Hello golfers,

Welcome to another edition of our newsletter, this week I report from my final Captain and Pro match of the season, we have news from the Staffs PGA, I talk Plane Truth coaching, and we prepare for a weekend of Black Friday sales and offers. Enjoy the read!

Captain & Pro

We played our final Captain & Pro match of the year on Friday and what a finale it was! Andy Metcalfe and Steve Rushton came out the blocks firing and we found ourselves 4 down after 6 holes but by the time we reached the 18th the Captain had a 10 foot putt to halve the match which means we would win as they have to beat us over 18 holes. Hole it and we win, miss it and we lose - you can guess the result as if he’d missed it, I probably wouldn’t be mentioning the event in the newsletter!

Of the eight matches, we lost two of them meaning Nigel Metcalfe & Pete Lowndes and Eamonn Gormley & Jack Murphy will now playoff for the trophy. Qualifying rounds for next year’s series take place towards the end of March.

Pro-am news

There always seems to be clashes in the diary when it comes to golf events and you can’t do everything in this life can you!? I missed the Foremost Golf conference this week as I was already committed to playing the Staffs Winter Pro-Am at Little Aston with 3 Brocton members who had supported our Midland Pro Am at Brocton in the summer. They were really looking forward to it as they had never played the course before and we had a great day, with some golfers playing in short sleeves and the course was in great condition - nearly as good as Brocton.

Plane Truth

Another event I couldn’t quite make was the annual Plane Truth Golf Summit which took place in Scottsdale, Arizona last week. I could have undertaken the level two training certificate in the days prior and I was especially keen to take the exam this year as the Open Championship runnner-up Matt Kuchar, was also going to be in the classroom as a student! I can’t think of another current Tour player, especially in the World Top 10 who would also be one of the most knowledgeable and highest qualified coaches in the game by choice.

Plane Truth is the brainchild of revered American coach Jim Hardy whose client list over the past 40 years is a who’s who of golf and he himself was tutelage by the forefather of golf instruction - England’s John Jacobs. At its core is a sharing platform where myself and about 100 other coaches around the globe get together through social media groups, forums and meet ups to compare lesson experiences and learn from each other, plus we have the unique benefit of having access to many of the players from the PGA Tour - I’ve seen some amazing examples of what is working and isn’t working on the Tour (there’s always a reason a top player drifts away and it’s usually poor information).

I took the level 1 Plane Truth course 6 years ago which was the last time they visited the UK and the pass rate is low as the mark needed to qualify is 85% in the three hour exam - I managed 86%, Matt Kuchar scored 91%. This level two exam involves having to conduct a live lesson with a pupil randomly picked from the nearby range, you can imagine the volunteers surprise when Matt introduces himself as his coach for the next half an hour, and apparently he nailed it. Apart from wanting to be able to fully diagnose his own game by ball-flight, divot and sound of strike which is all you need to know to make the next shot better, Matt was also keen to be able to help his pro-am partners in Tour events if they were struggling which is so refreshing for a Tour player going about their business.

Black Friday - 24th November

Next week is officially the start of Christmas shopping season as Black Friday is upon us.It originated in the 1960’s in America and is the day after Thanksgiving, so effectively similar to our Boxing Day sales. Ironically, now that it’s become a mainstay in the UK marketing calendar, its popularity has declined in America as many retailers use the ‘Christmas Creep’ instead - gradually launching more and more promotions from early November onwards. Our ‘Christmas Creep’ is already underway thanks to the brands offering their own promotions though us :

Our Black Friday event is going to run for the whole of next weekend on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and there’ll be lots of items on sale which will be listed next week.

Plus, I’ll be running some events to improve your game over the weekend too which will be free to take part in and you can book for them now by clicking below. They’ll all take place in the Studio using the GC Quad launch monitor and includes free freshly ground coffee and of course they’re all free of charge for the weekend.

10 Yard Challenge - 15 minutes

Bring along your driver and I’ll see if we can add a minimum of 10 extra yards off the tee in the studio. The average gain last time I did this was over 20 yards!

Wedge Workshop - 30 minutes

Bring along your wedges and I’ll measure the loft, lie and bounce of them to check they are set-up correctly, then I’ll measure your impact to see how much loft you take off the club during impact and fix that if needed, then you can also trial many of the new wedges on the market and we can even stamp your name into the back of your wedges - all for FREE.

Club MOT - 30 minutes

Bring your clubs in and we’ll measure them for suitable loft, lie, swing weight and grips, grind off any scuffs on the irons and wedges and re-polish the ferrules

Ball Fitting - 15 minutes

Bring along an iron and driver and we’ll hit a few shots in the studio and show you which is your best summer ball and winter ball option.

Any of these sessions can be booked on Friday, Saturday or Sunday - call the shop on 01785 661485 or click here to tell me when you’d like to come along and for which game improving session.