From the magic oasis in the desert where hot arid sand gives way to splashing water and
beautiful green fairways, the spectacular Marriott Desert Springs Resort and Spa, this
is Buddy Shelton's natural swing video.
The perfect complement to what is unquestionably the world's finest golf club, the Fiber Speed
2000.
So get ready as Buddy, along with LPGA Touring Pro Marlene Floyd, put your game into a new
orbit.
Here's Buddy.
Hi, I'm Buddy Shelton.
Today I'm with Marlene Floyd, who is one of the LPGA Tour players and TV commentator,
but better than that, she's one of the top teaching professionals for ladies in the country.
We're going to do some things with you today that's going to teach you a simple and natural
golf swing that's going to make this Fiber Speed 2000 work for you and make your game
better, have more control, more power, the ladies.
The ladies are going to love this.
They've all been looking for that 20 or 30 extra yards like the Tour players have.
We're going to teach them with the fundamentals how to turn through it and get that additional
distance that they want.
So remember, whether you're just beginning or you advance, we've got the secret for you.
It's a natural golf swing, made simple, we're going to have some fun, so stick with it.
Five strokes, I took five strokes off my game.
Oh man, what a club.
This club is amazing.
It blew my mind because I was able to drive the ball so great and so accurate.
And I'll tell you, it's the best I've ever swung in a club.
Okay here we are with part one.
First of all, we're going to talk about the Fiber Speed 2000.
You've opened up the box and you've pulled it out and you think, uh oh, the shaft melted
while it was in the mail.
I know you're going to panic and Marlene, this is probably a bad word, but some of them
are thinking whippy.
I think the word flexible myself, but they will feel that.
Flexible is a better term.
We know that the club is a little whippy, but this is the whole idea of the club.
Let me explain a couple of things to you.
Basically we've got a shaft here that flexes more than any shaft that you've ever played
with.
This flex is going to give you extra distance and power on any shot you hit.
The other thing that you're going to have a comment about is you're going to see some
torque.
They're going to see that head rotate and you're going to feel it in your backswing.
You've got to remember that this torque is specially put into this club to absorb off-center
hits.
If you hit it with a club face close, which would normally hook that ball a little bit,
that absorption of that shaft is going to straighten that shot out a little bit.
Instead of hitting it in the left rough, you'll be in the left fairway, just like on the right
side.
Marlene, I think we've got a secret here.
We've got a whippy shaft, which is flexible, and we've got a little torque that's going
to help them out.
Now the important part, and that's swinging the FiberSpeed 2000 and some things you should
know.
Marlene, you know what?
The first thing people are going to do is with this flexible shaft, they're going to
take that club back and they're going to feel it move, and they're going to say, oh my goodness,
I'm going to have to wait on it.
And I know the first time you played with it, I put it in your hands and you said, buddy.
Oh boy, did I ever.
I tell you, I could feel the club move around.
I felt a lot of flex, but every time I hit it, the face squared up and I hit it long
and straight.
It was phenomenal.
It is going to be a different feel.
There's no question.
The other shafts on the market are much too stiff, not enough flex.
This one you're going to feel some movement, but you're going to be so surprised at how
the face catches up perfectly every time.
That's right.
And the key that you need to know is there's no waiting because whether you've got a fast
swing or a slow swing, the shaft's going to react to your swing.
It's going to be there.
Steel shafts and graphite, unfortunately, are there too soon.
They're going to come through too early.
And now you're going to have a club that's off center, offline, going to hook it, fade
it or whatever.
The fiber speed with the torque in it straightens out that little off center shot, and then
that shaft with that flex pops it in there and gives you that 20 extra yards.
Boy, you bet.
Who doesn't want that?
Yeah, I'll take it any time.
Now, let's summarize it.
So basically what we've got, the torque is going to take care of the off center hits.
And if you'll let this flex just react and you just step up there and swing it, that's
the key.
The swing is it and it's very natural.
Let the club do the work.
To me, it just feels like any part of the club I hit, I'm going to keep it straighter.
If I hit it on the inside of the club, I would pull my old club, my old driver to the left
if I hit it on the toe and put a high right.
With this, I hit it on the inside, I hit it straighter.
I might pull it down the left side of the fairway, but it's going to be a lot straighter.
The first experience for most people is they think the club may be too flexible for them,
but they also have never felt the club hit.
So that's why it feels too flexible for them.
But once they've hit it, they see the extra distance they get, and that's completely out
of their mind at that time.
All right.
Here we are with part two.
We're going to take this natural swing that I've been working on for years, and with Marlene's
help, we're going to make it so simple for you to play golf that you won't believe it.
This is what's called a 30-second fix.
I believe that anybody out there can take these natural concepts of a golf swing and
play better within 30 seconds, and I promise you that, and even guarantee it.
So let me talk about a couple of things.
But first of all, I wish I had this tape, because for 20 years I struggled around playing
the golf tour trying to work on a mechanical swing.
I'd hit 500 balls a day, and I'm sure you've hit just as many, and out there trying to
make everything mechanical.
Then I realized it was natural, and all of a sudden things fell in place, and people
that I shared it with started hitting the ball better and keeping it in play and getting
more distant.
So let me just show you a couple of things.
Basically, the natural swing is simple.
The grip, you just grip it naturally.
You stand naturally where you're comfortable.
You take a backswing that just swings the club around you in a comfortable fashion,
and then you turn around and swing toward the hole, learning how to release your hands,
and that's how simple it is.
Thirty-second fix, and we're going to make you play better golf.
So now stay with me.
We're going to go over each point individually and show you how it works.
So now we're going to talk about this simple and natural grip.
Barry, my student here, who's a pretty decent golfer.
He's got a low team handicap, maybe 11 or 12.
The first thing you're going to notice, this is not natural.
The left hand is not facing the right hand.
When you reach out and shake hands with people, that's a natural position of a hand.
This hand is straight up and down.
This hand is straight up and down.
When you put them together, the palms face each other.
You slide them apart, and you've got a grip.
That's how simple it is and how natural it is to grip a golf club.
So in Barry's case, what I want to do is take the left hand, roll it back over a little
bit, then bring the right hand so that the two palms face each other.
So now we've got the hands that can work together.
The problem of them not working together, if this one's turned this way and this one's
this way, we've got a hinge here, one going opposite to it.
They do not work together.
For the grip to work properly, Barry, both hands need to face each other so that they
can rotate and all that.
How hard do you want me to grip the club?
Good question.
How hard do you shake hands with somebody?
If you shake hands with me, you're not trying to break my hand.
You're just holding on.
And there's a little kind of firmness, but there's a naturalness to it.
So here again, I go back to that natural thing.
Shake hands with that club naturally, and it's going to be your friend.
Gotcha.
Okay.
You know, the interesting thing, Marlene, what about the ladies?
I think we might change it a little bit.
Well, Betty, we're real fortunate we have Robin, a beginner, with us today.
Now, Robin's just starting to play, so she doesn't have any bad habits yet, which she's
very fortunate.
Now, on the ladies' grip, as you'll notice her left hand, it's in the palm of the hand.
Almost 95% of the women make this mistake.
It has to be in the fingers of the left hand so that we can get the hinging effect of the
wrist.
The right hand simply goes on as Buddy said.
Now you have the V of the right hand, the V of the left hand facing anywhere from your
right shoulder through your right chin so that they are working together like a clapping
position.
And now to summarize, we want the hand simply in a clapping position.
Ladies, we've got to have that club in the fingers of the left hand, and the one thing
I want to add that's going to give you that extra distance is a little stronger grip.
What do you mean by stronger?
Well, Robin, by stronger, I definitely don't mean a death grip.
I mean just simply taking the right hand and rotating it to the right shoulder, and the
left hand the same direction, rotated slightly to the right shoulder.
If we have both fingers rotated straight up and down the shaft, it's pointed to your chin,
it causes a little bit of a slice or a fade.
When you take the hands off the club, not moving the club face, and rotate them towards
the right shoulder, it makes it a lot easier to release the club with the hands and body.
That's where you get that added distance.
I just can't tell you how much this is going to benefit you with a proper grip and a proper
release, which is going to give you, again, that added distance.
Now we're going to talk about that natural stance.
This is the thing that probably gets me more than anything about the golf swing.
It's very easy to be natural standing somewhere, but what most people do, if you watch a person,
they'll walk up on the tee, and when they sit that club down, all of a sudden, it starts
getting into all this kind of stuff, and I'm not sure if that's real natural.
So here's what I want to point out to you.
Natural stance is this simple.
The feet are about shoulder width apart, okay?
Then we take, we set the club down, we bend our knees.
We flex at the knees so that there's some liquidity in the thing, so they'll work for
you.
The next thing we do, we bend over at the waist just slightly, and the key to the whole
thing in the stance, be natural in the chest and the shoulder area.
Let the arms hang.
We're not trying to do this, and we're not trying to squeeze our neck or squeeze our
shoulders.
We're just standing here very natural, and all of a sudden, you've got bent knees, bent
at the waist, your arms are hanging, and you're very comfortable standing here.
Marlene, what do you figure for the ladies?
Well, Buddy, I think the posture is terrific, what you said, but ladies have a tendency
to get too narrow in the stance.
They have their feet much too close together, and it gives them a very flippy, handsy swing.
Ladies, we need the width of the feet exactly the width of your shoulders.
You need the weight slightly on the insides of your feet, but definitely over your shoelaces.
You need to be grounded.
If you were going to punch somebody, you'd be grounded, and you'd hit them this way.
So, you want your weight right over your shoelaces, shoulder width apart, so you can get that
added distance by the use of your legs.
You know, you brought that up about the ladies standing too close.
Men seem to think their shoulders about this wide, so we get the men standing out here
this way.
So, the men, you need to watch that too.
Be natural and get those feet back under your shoulders again.
And like I say, I'm not going to use this word natural, but 500 times today.
The natural part is think of the other sports.
If you're playing tennis, you stand in this fashion waiting on the serve.
If you're a quarterback on a football team, you stand this way behind center.
If you're a basketball player, you stand in there guarding somebody this way.
Basketball player that's waiting on the guy to run through the line, the linebacker is
standing this way.
Golfers, stand this way.
You know, let's get it all together.
Let's be natural, walk up there, set that club down, flex knees, flex at the waist,
arms hanging, very natural.
You're ready to play.
So the benefits of the natural stance is basically if you can stand in this position, it's going
to make the swing be fluid and flow and all together.
But if you can't stand comfortably, you're not going to swing.
So let's go to another step.
Now we're ready for that natural backswing.
You know what the key word is here?
Backswing.
Most people, when they think of a backswing, they think of picking the club up and putting
it back here somehow or another.
Backswing is just what it's called.
You take the club and you swing it over your back.
Now to do that, a couple of things you've got to remember.
One is let the entire body work for you.
As I take this club and swing it back and over my back and back into this around me
position, I let my hips turn, my knees kind of torque a little bit, my shoulders turn,
and I've got my back to the hole.
So basically I'm up here cocked and ready to go.
Now Marlene, I know the ladies sometimes have a little problem with that backswing.
What ladies tend to do here is ladies let their hips and shoulders work around in a
circle and they cock their hands this way.
The ladies just need to feel the resistance in the right leg and let the whole chest and
arms, as you said, move backwards with some resistance here.
Resistance is the way you get power.
Yeah, and guys, you know, the guys will take and they'll turn their hips and hold them
pretty tight and let the shoulders turn where, like the lady, she doesn't get the hip resistance
in there so that you're coiled like a spring.
You want to feel like you're coiled like a spring.
And one of the key things is think around.
And what I want to do here, I'm going to bring Barry back in.
Barry, come back over and let's show them one of the key flaws of a backswing.
I probably see this happen more than anything in all my students.
Take a backswing and stop at the top.
Now what happens is people have been taught all their lives to take the club straight
back.
When you do that, it puts the club up here over your head and the easiest place to go
from here is over the top, cutting across the ball, going to make you slice it or pull
it, depending on what your hands do.
So basically what we want is around.
Remember the key word in a backswing is around.
So as we start back, we go around the body and we set it up back in here over this right
shoulder and over our back.
This makes you have a better shoulder turn.
It moves your weight over onto your right leg.
It coils the whole body so that now you get that spring effect of releasing everything.
So here it is.
One more time, we go back as it goes around and up.
It's not back and up.
It is back and around.
And it's set there and we're ready.
The key to this thing is if you get in this position, you're going to uncore.
It's going to give you more power.
You're going to uncore and the club is going to be in position to keep you from slicing
and pushing that ball or even topping it.
That's it.
So let's go to the next step.
Well, we've gone through a lot and we've got you ready to hit the golf ball.
Marlene, the neat thing about it is we've got the grip.
We've got the stance.
We've got the backswing.
The person sitting there ready to release it and unload.
So why don't we go to that follow through and maybe you want to bring your student in?
I do.
Let's bring Robin back in.
Now, Robin, remember we're going to make a nice backswing where we're going to coil you
up, swing the club up over your back.
Now the ladies we want to feel, go ahead, Robin, we're going to feel some resistance
in that right leg.
Now from there on the downswing, the power move is to take the right foot, the right
knee, the right hip and this entire chest and turn as quickly as you can to your target.
Go.
Now remember, you still want to be in your posture and you want your arms a little soft.
This is not real tight.
Robin is a beginner and she's learning the proper technique from the beginning.
Let's do it one more time, Robin.
Again, we want to coil up over our right leg.
You can see she's coiled.
She's got a little tension in her right leg.
From here, Robin, we take the right foot, the right knee, the right hip and your whole chest
and you push and swing to the target.
Then you have a nice and balanced follow through, a little better in the posture.
There you go.
Now, Buddy, that's a good swing.
That looked great, Marlene.
Let me mention a couple of things while we're standing here because I think it's very important.
We've talked about men and ladies a couple of times in this thing and you can see that
we've got some differences.
One of the things men do in the follow through is when they start down, they will swing their
arms through and leave all this behind.
Just like Marlene demonstrated with Robin here, it's very important that in this follow
through that we take the right knee, the right foot, the right hip and everything and turn
it into the shot so that now when we're standing here, there's nothing back this way.
Everything is looking right down that fairway where that ball is traveling to.
That is one of the key things to a natural swing because it's very natural to swing here
and not to swing there and leave everything back.
Now, we'll make one more comment.
It's very important.
I think people leave things back because they're concentrating on the ball.
When I go from back swing to follow through, the natural thing is to do it all in one motion.
Do not think of hitting the ball but let the ball get in the way.
So I'm standing here.
I go back.
I follow through.
Everything is looking down the fairway.
It's what I expect to be a great shot.
Okay, we're at our last part but one of the most crucial parts of the golf swing.
We're going to be talking about the hand release.
The release of the hands in the golf swing.
Basically what we have here is a grip that is supposed to release the club for you and
most people don't know what a release is.
If I set a release to somebody, they're going to think, well, that's when I'll whip my wrist.
I'm going to do that to hit that golf ball.
And that's incorrect.
The release of the wrist is basically a rotation of your arms and wrist while you're swinging
the golf club.
So let's look at it this way.
Let's take it up.
I'm going to bring it up into this position so that we can take the club back and watch
the hands rotate.
Now as I take the club back, my hands roll over into a position where it looks like they're
open.
Now let me point out something here.
Many of you are thinking of this club face.
I don't think about my club face too often because I know that the face and the back
of my hand are pointing the same place.
So if I take my hands and roll them this way, then I know the club rolled that way.
And then you're looking at it and it looks like it's wide open.
And it is maybe.
So what you want to do as you start back down into the ball, the hands roll back to the
square position.
And then they pass through and roll into a position that you might think is closed.
Now in professional lingo, this is square, square, square.
But to you, it looks open, square, closed.
And basically all we've got is a hand that went this way, rolled into the ball, and went
this way without this little slap in the middle.
So the key thing here is the release of the hands is not flipping the club, but it is
a smooth rotation of the hands rolling open, rolling square, rolling shut, and you've got
to finish.
And now that golf ball doesn't take off to the right anymore.
Got that nice little sweet draw going right down the middle.
So what I want to do now, we've gone through it all.
Marlene, why don't you come on over and let's summarize this thing a little bit.
The key is the natural, I believe.
And so let's talk about it just a hair here.
We've got the grip.
It's very natural.
We reach out.
Both hands are facing each other, which is just common.
The stance, very natural.
You stand in here with your knees flexed, bend at the waist, your arms are hanging,
shoulders are not tense.
There's no tense bone in my body.
I'm ready to swing.
Next step is a natural backswing, which moves the club around my body.
I coil, wind up, I'm over on this right side, ready to fire.
And when I fire at the ball, the natural thing is to finish the swing and not hit at the
ball.
So I go from here through the ball, turn all the way through, shift my weight through.
And I'm standing here watching it go down the middle of the fairway with a little draw
on it, Marlene, because I took my hands and rolled into that release and didn't let my
hands flip over.
Got that extra power and got that control on me.
On the ladies, as you were talking about your stance, remember, we want to have the ladies
have your stance, the width of your shoulder.
On the grip, the ladies must have the grip in the fingers of the left hand.
A little stronger grip, remember having both hands rotated slightly to the right or towards
your right shoulder.
The women, we want them to load up against that right leg.
We want to get the shoulders behind the ball with some tension.
And on the release, I take the whole right side and we turn and we're balanced and finished
on the follow through.
And as they turn through and fire their whole side through, that's where they get all that
distance.
That's it.
And you know the key to it is the word that goes with natural is swing.
You don't ever hit a golf ball.
You swing a golf club.
And if you'll just think, I'm going to naturally just swing this thing, then you're going to
have all the fun and all the straight shots you want and more distance to make that game
a lot easier.
I'm so excited about this.
You know, I've talked about it for a half hour or so.
I'm going to have to hit some balls.
You want to have some?
I've got the bug too.
Okay, let's go hit some.
Yeah, I like it, I like it.