A Tribute to Philippe

I first met Phillipe de Bucherre at the newly opened Leadbetter Golf Academy at Cengkareng at the beginning of the year. After a short interaction, I decided to entrust him with improving my game. Philippe 31, a tall and young Belgian, is a great golfer. He was a scratch player at the age of 14 and applied the same intensity he had as a player to brcoming a great coach. He is blessed with enthusiasm, a boyish charm and a pleasant personality, making him particularly easy to be with. Over the last nine months, we did three things - change my swing, improve shotmaking and focus on thinking better. A lot of time was spent in Philippe's den - filled with multiple cameras, a sophisticated pressure plate, and a computer to review the shots made - committing to a swing change. We conversed more than we hit balls. I need to understand what we are trying to do before committing to a change. He watched me swing, showed me on the monitor and explained what he wanted me to do. He broke down the mechanics and isolated the fixes one by one. He convinced me to change my grip (painful), cock early, alter my stance with more angles (painful), encourage a greater shift to the left at impact and steepen my swing plane (painful). Bit by bit, consistency was built back into the basic swing, with the ball flying straighter, higher and further.

Shotmaking - ie the ability to shape a shot - left to right, right to left, high or low, making the ball roll or have backspin, hitting it out of different lies, out of the bunker with different flights - is the key to playing great golf. Shotmaking is more difficult and requires practice, but Philippe walked me through what was possible. He challenged me to think of five ways to get the ball on the green. A simple bump and run with different clubs was introduced, as were the flop, shot from both a deadpan and thick rough, and shots from the bunker. He has asked me to get a fourth wedge for months. This is my Christmas gift to myself. The third segment is observing and thinking right. Seeing the shot from the hole to the ball rather than the other way around opened up a new perspective. I play the percentage game. Even top professionals hit on average 14 greens per round (hence the importance of the short game). I mentally expect a shot dispersion of 7% of the distance and therefore adjust my aiming point to avoid trouble (very very useful). I dissect the greens according to the ridges so as to avoid putting over two ridges. When putting, I think of the club face hitting the ball square. Put together, the improvement has been the most marked in my twenty years of golf. Philippe is by far - and I mean this with little flattery - the best coach I have had. He is confident, responds to my questions clearly, influences and encourages me. I am far from being a great player but I have possibly taken off 5 strokes off my game, as Philippe told me he would. In the month of Oct and Nov, I recorded 5 under 80 games - a 77, 79 and a 78, 78 and 76 - a golden period for consistency. For those who follow me on facebook, I only post courses where I have shot under 80 rounds. I know this period may not last, but I will enjoy it while it does. So cheers Philippe, you are responsible for a large part of my improvement. But you do realise it also takes a determined and talented student too, who has now become a walking advertisement for your academy......