I have spent more than 100 days of my life watching and listening to Manuel de la Torre teach golf. Most of these days began by 8:30 a.m. and continued through a dinner at night where Manuel was still answering questions about the lessons of that day. This experience began for me on September 26, 1983, and I wrote a page of notes about the lesson I received from Manuel that day. At the end of the day of lessons, I showed Manuel this written summary of his lesson with me. He read through it and stopped at the third point where he took my pencil and crossed out one word. The sentence read: “Simply swing the club forward with the arms (the upper arms) from the top of the swing through to the finish in one, uninterrupted motion.” He had crossed out the word “through,” and he asked me, “Through what?” He had spent a good portion of the lesson with me on removing the tension and effort that I exerted to try to hit the ball hard and far, but with one word I tried to sneak it all back in. I have that sheet of paper framed, and while Manuel did a good job of crossing out that one word, I know that I still put it back in on too many swings.
Manuel’s concept of what the student needs to do to produce good shots is very simple. It is all laid out by the ninth page in Manuel’s book, Understanding the Golf Swing. The concept has not changed in all of these years, but the subtle explanations, the everyday life examples, the innovative ways that Manuel has to get the student to perform in a better way are still being developed in every lesson that is given.
My intent in writing this book is to give a glimpse of what it is like to take a golf lesson with Manuel. This text is the result of many years of note-taking that took place on the practice tee, and I tried to keep the feel of that situation where the student is asked questions, ponders the answers, changes intentions, is given explanations, reaches new understandings, and generally produces better swings. All of this in a brief space of time. During a lesson, Manuel will ask the student to use his or her mind to try to become associated with the perfection that is a swinging motion. Manuel will often have more belief in and respect for the abilities of the students than they have in themselves. This will usually change by the end of the lesson as the student understands and knows that he or she can really do it.
While respected by many of the noted teachers of today, Manuel is sometimes considered an “old-timer” who is good with beginners, but not quite modern and up-to-date with his teaching. I have enjoyed seeing and learning from many of the most highly-regarded teachers in golf over the years, and I can say that Manuel is the most sophisticated and coherent golf teacher that I have ever seen. He is not a self-promoter and is always more concerned about the student than his own reputation.
I have had great concern in writing this book, because those that know Manuel realize how important he considers every word in an explanation of the golf swing. Please know that all of the good parts are just accurate representations of what Manuel has said and done during the golf lessons, and the awkward phrases are all mine. I am proud that I spent several hours with Manuel at Milwaukee Country Club and elsewhere going over every lesson/section in this book to get it correct, in addition to multiple phone conversations. Besides being a great teacher, he is the best proofreader that you will find. The format of the book is simply to have a quote from Manuel followed by an explanation of the circumstances in a lesson or teaching seminar that led to his comment.
Manuel’s excellence as a teacher is not just the completeness and the correctness of his concept: it is the idea that the students are given something that, the more they do it, the better they will become. The student is not given a half-truth, or some golf instruction cliché that can be overdone and will create problems down the road. Also, the student will leave the lesson saying, “I understand this and I can do this. It works! I can’t wait to go play.” Manuel explains the physics and the geometry, but it is his understanding of the psychology that makes the lesson such a beneficial experience for his students.
John Hayes
November 2008
