When I started my leave of absence last fall, my goal was to improve my golf game as much as possible. Another goal was to find something I was passionate about that I could work on as a career after golf. I’m sure you’ve noticed that I haven’t posted in a few months and that’s because I’ve found that next thing, and it’s a dating app called Spottle.
Spottle Logo
I first got in touch with the Spottle team in December and learned that they were working on a dating app based on live video chats. I was very intrigued because it was a space I had been interested in for years. Eventually I signed on and that decision has completely shifted my priorities. While my handicap index is below 6 and I’m playing better than ever, I moved back to DC a few weeks ago so I can have a bigger impact with Spottle.
Why the change from golf to a dating app?
Some have sounded disappointed that I’m cutting my 12 months of golf short and “giving up” on it. Here’s the thing. Golf will always be there, but the Spottle opportunity wont. Spottle is something that I believe in. It will help people make better connections more efficiently and effectively, and will make them happier as a result. And I want to make it a success.
What is Spottle?
It’s a dating app that’s a mix of virtual spin the bottle and speed dating. Instead of ‘liking’ profiles based on a few pictures and a bio, users spin a bottle and when it lands, have a 30 second live video chat with another user before deciding if it’s worth continuing the conversation. The video chats only happen at set times throughout the week so this can’t turn into a major time suck. We also have facial recognition which will prevent this from becoming the next Chat Roulette.
Here are a few Spottle screenshots
The goal is to get a real impression of someone before spending time texting or meeting up in real life. We want to reduce catfishing and improve safety by making online dating much more transparent.
If you know anyone who spends too much time on dating apps or has lost faith in dating, see if they want to give Spottle a try by downloading here: get.spottle.app!
We all experience it. We have a great range session and then proceed to stumble through 18 holes, lacking confidence and consistency.
When I start playing poorly, it’s usually because I shorten up my backswing, or am too fast with my upper body on the downswing. These can lead to both pulls and slices depending on the execution, neither of which help to make pars or birdies.
Even though these are physical mistakes, the root cause is the 6 inches between my ears. It’s mental.
On the range there is no water and the sand isn’t so daunting. There is no OB. There are no penalty strokes if you don’t hit a good shot. Then you get on the course and you’re thinking about how you need to hit a decent tee shot or else it’s going to be difficult to par the hole. And if there’s water, oh boy. If you put the ball in the water then a double bogey is in the cards, and starting off like that will ruin your good score. These are my thoughts sometimes, at least, and they make me worse.
I’ve been working on 2 things to help with this.
Choose a shot that I know I can hit
This doesn’t translate to “always play it safe” but it does translate to “hit the smart shot.” If theres a wide fairway that narrows at 290 yards and beyond, I should hit my 3 wood and land in the wide area rather than trying to hit a GREAT drive that has to find the narrow patch. But if I’m 200 from the green with water in front, I’m going to go for it knowing that I can definitely carry that distance with my long irons.
Commit 100% to the shot I’m trying to hit
I tend to unintentionally make minor adjustments to be safe around hazards and while putting. If theres water on the left side of the fairway, there’s a good chance that if I miss, I’ll slice it to the right. If there’s a left breaking putt, I might think during my backswing “this might break more than I thought” and subconsciously open my putter face. What I’m trying to do is pick and shot and fully commit to it. Water on the left? Play a controlled intentional fade. Or aim right center and hit it straight. But only pick 1! And on the greet, pick a line and a speed and commit to it.
It’s easy to let your body adjust because the water is in the back of your mind, but that’s something I’m working to control better. Yes, the ball will sometimes find the water. But you have to try to hit the shot you want to hit. Your setup, swing, and everything else begins with your planned shot, and if you don’t execute on the planned shot, it won’t be pretty.
How I’ve unintentionally practiced this
Did you know that Tiger Woods is an avid SCUBA diver? While I’m a good swimmer and comfortable in any pool, I’ve never loved being in the ocean. But Michelle likes diving, so I started last year.
Last week we went to Dominica, a beautiful island in the Caribbean for a dive trip. Diving is like golf in the sense that you plan, execute, and have to be committed or things won’t work out well. I get a bit anxious before every dive, especially night dives, so going through the emotional process of committing and executing a plan even though there are other thoughts in my head has helped, I hope.
Michelle and me on the boat after diving one day in Dominica.
Before you hit a shot you decide what you want to do and prepare for the shot. In diving you plan your dive with the other divers and check your gear to make sure everything is working properly.
When you hit the shot, you should try to execute your planned shot. The ball wont always go where you wanted it to go, but you need to give it a chance. With diving, once you are in the water you trust that the equipment checks that you did were sufficient and that your training to monitor buoyancy, air consumption, and depth will keep you safe (and that no deep see creatures will eat you).
When the ball doesn’t go where you planed, move on and prepare for the next shot. In diving you didn’t see what you wanted to, or someone in your group got low on air early and cut the dive short. Appreciate what you DID see and get ready for the next dive.
In both golf and diving you’re doing something that’s supposed to be fun. The experience and execution might not always be exactly what you’re expecting or perfect, but its part of the game.
Do you know of any other ways to practice the mental part of the game off the course? Send me a note at rosenbergmaxa@gmail.com!
I just competed in my first tournament in Florida. It’s part of Minor League Golf, which holds professional tournaments. They also have a training division for people starting to play competitive golf, which is what I played in. But these guys are really good and almost all of them have handicaps better than mine.
The guys I played with were friendly and nice (both amateurs) so I felt pretty good and calm from the start. Through 6 holes I was hitting fairways and greens and was 1 over but then I hit a rough patch. 3 double bogeys, 1 triple bogey, and 1 quadruple bogey were the result of 3 tee shots out of bounds, 1 tee shot that I topped into some bushes, and an easy approach that ended up in the water.
Obviously that’s a lot of bad, but besides that I hit the ball pretty well and had a lot of good shots. On all 3 of my tee shots that went out of bounds, my re-tee (third shot) was drilled down the middle of the fairway.
I miss a couple of 10 foot birdie putts, and had 1 3-putt and 1 4-putt, so as usual, my putting could have been better.
There are a lot of these tournaments so hopefully I’ll put up a good number the next time.
My coach and I are really happy with how the swing is coming along. But for the last month we’ve discussed having my clubs lengthened/getting fit for new clubs. My current irons are 1/4″ long and my driver is 1″ long. Specifically, I’m looking for someone who has experience fitting someone with similarly unique physical dimensions (tall with short arms):
height: 6’5.5″
wrist to floor: 39″
wingspan: 6’3″
It turns out that most fitters and pros do not like to recommend long clubs. They say that longer clubs are harder to control and it’s harder to get the weight and shaft flex right. That makes sense, but it ignores the obvious fact that someone who is very tall would need longer clubs to reach the ground with a normal swing.
My recent fitting
I went to True Spec Golf in Jupiter to get fitted a few weeks ago. I told them that my current clubs are 1/4″ long and that Wayne and I think I need longer clubs. They didn’t measure my heigh or arms, and I only hit irons that were 1 in long. But is that enough? Is it too much? I don’t know because we didn’t test different lengths. I believe they said 1″ long was the longest they had for me to try, so I couldn’t have tried longer than that.
They also told me that their drivers and woods only came in standard length. I asked about length many times and I they told me that they believe that for most players, they can get a better fit with the different shafts and club heads than with longer shafts. You know what happened? My current driver, which is 4 years old and 1″ long, performed better than all the combinations of new heads and shafts. So they recommended I stay with my current driver.
Last week I had 3 of my irons (6, U, and 58 degree) extended to 2″ long so I could test out how the swing plane felt and looked. When I was hitting on the range, it felt like I was able to strike the ball without being so contorted at impact. However, Wayne pointed out that lengthening the clubs has made the weight much higher than normal.
Looking for a great fitter
So right now I’m still looking for someone who has experience fitting tall people with short arms, and is willing to see if very long clubs will work better than slightly longer than normal.
If you have any recommendations please reach out to me at rosenbergmaxa@gmail.com!
Here is a recent drive cutting the corner on a dogleg.
What’s the skill that you most recently worked on? How long did it take for you to start improving? Were your results uniformly better, or did you still revert back to poor performance often?
There’s no doubt that I am a much better golfer than I was a few months ago. My swing is different, my short game has improved, and my decision making is better. My handicap is now trending below 6. I’m hitting more fairways and green and record fewer putts.
But as I improve, so do my expectations. And unfortunately, golf is a sport where some days it clicks, and some days it doesn’t. So even though I feel like I should par or birdie every hole and shoot in the 70s every round, I still play poorly pretty often.
Some rounds I can’t hit the ball straight, other rounds I can’t get up and down (when you miss the green with your approach shot, but get the ball in the hole with 1 chip and 1 putt), and then there are the rounds where I have a bunch of 3-putts.
These are my most recent scores.
So even though I’m 100% better, I still shot 85 or higher in 6 of my last 15 rounds. That’s super frustrating.
When I play and it all clicks, it’s incredible. I feel like I’ve finally figured it all out, only to card an 87 the next day. I still have not yet had back-to-back rounds in the 70s.
This whole experiment wouldn’t work if I was addicted to playing well. I would have already quit because I don’t play well often enough (yet). Fortunately, it’s the challenge, improvement, and game itself that I love and brings me back each day.
Focus on the challenge and the future
It’s not easy improving a skill as an adult. We don’t like being bad and the learning/improving process is easier done as a child. But we still CAN learn new things. Whether it’s a new language, card game, cooking, excel, networking, or golf, I’ve found it’s best to focus on the challenge and where you want to be in the future, rather than how well you perform on any given day.
With golf it’s easy and hard. Your handicap objectively measures your results over time, but you also see your rounds bounce up and down every day. AND your score doesn’t even always reflect how well you played. Some days I hit the ball great but shoot 84, and other days I feel like I’m playing poorly and end up with a 77. That’s golf.
No matter what you’re trying to improve, figure out a way to objectively measure your performance over time. But don’t be discouraged when your results don’t consistently exceed your expectations. Life isn’t that smooth or predictable, and it wouldn’t be fun if it was.
The third swing analysis video provided by my instructor, Wayne DeFrancesco, is at the end of this post. Check out the first and second ones here. While I have made progress and the swing looks better, there is still a lot to work on.
Here, I finally start to shallow the swing but can definitely shallow it more. The steeper my swing is, the easier it is to hit behind the ball (fat) or skull it (thin), neither of which I want to do.
On the right side of this screenshot you can see the club head start to shallow on my downswing. In the past, the club head would look like it comes straight up out of the top of my hands, but now the club head is flatter and behind me.
I also work on maintaining depth in my waist (hips and but back) and rotating/finishing around to the left of the target, instead of swaying towards the target. This also gives me more space between my body and the ball. My hands to come through this space, which helps with shallowing the club.
One potential MAJOR change is that I am getting fit for clubs this week. The clubs that I currently have were fit for me about 4 years ago. They are 1/4″ inch longer than standard, but we think that I could use some extra length in the club. I’m 6’5″ but my arms are relatively short for my body. So theoretically I would need longer clubs than the average 6’5″ person. If the club is longer, I should be able to stand farther away from the ball and swing on a flatter (instead of steeper) plane.
2018 was a huge year for me. I made some big decisions, saw some amazing places, and made countless memories with friends and family. Here are some of the biggest things I learned over the past 12 months.
1. I wasn’t aggressive enough in pursuing my future in prior years
I was at my consulting job for 5 years. At first, my plan was to transfer from DC to NY, but I loved DC so that didn’t happen. I already had a Master of Management from business school and didn’t plan on going back for an MBA. I thought I’d find a startup to join but didn’t fully commit to that. At one point in 2014/2015 I interviewed with a few tech companies in NY and SF but nothing panned out.
Then it got to a point where I was on auto pilot. Work had cycles of being rewarding and then soul crushing, but I had amazing friends and a great life. I didn’t have enough of a fire under my seat to make real moves, but I should have.
I turned 29 last March. This was a huge reason why I made the leap this year to pursue golf. I’ll be 30 soon and that’s pretty scary for me. If you’re interested in learning more about the significance of beginnings/endings/anything related to timing, take a look at Daniel Pink’s “When.” Super interesting. Long story short, I was more motivated to make a change, so I did.
I should have been more aggressive in pursuing my future a few years ago. I could have had just as much fun but been more intentional with my plan. Better late than never, and now my foot is on the gas pedal.
Photo by Blake Cheek on Unsplash
2. My biggest fears about leaving my job to pursue a dream were gone a few months into the journey
Before I decided to pursue golf, I considered taking a LOA to travel the world. I started thinking about this in 2014/2015 but didn’t take any action. There are many different reasons to leave a job (travel, pursue a dream, start a company, etc), but I think a lot of the fears we have are the same:
I wouldn’t be maximizing my professional growth if I stopped working.
Promotions and raises? I have a new definition for professional growth now. Where do I want to be in 2, 5, 10, 20 years? If I keep advancing down a path that I don’t want, is that making progress? If I advance slightly slower because I take some time to re-evaluate my future, isn’t that maximizing my professional growth?
All of my peers will be advancing in their careers while mine is on hold.
You won’t be promoted after you leave work and your friends and coworkers will continue to advance. That’s okay. While you won’t be advancing in the career you had, you will be gaining additional perspective, have time to learn new things and meet new people, and will advance your LIFE. By not making a change, you are giving all of this up.
Most of the time, we can go back to what we were doing before or at least something similar. Trying new things brings new knowledge, experiences, and networks that you wouldn’t otherwise have. I might have a better shot at winning the lottery than becoming a pro golfer, but I know the odds. I want an exciting life. It’s hard to truly impress and excite yourself if you don’t try things where failure is strong possibility.
3. If you don’t know exactly what you want to do in the next few years and beyond, it’s okay to throw a bunch of stuff at the wall to see what sticks
I knew I wanted to do something different but wasn’t sure what. In the spring of 2018 I gave myself a date of November 1, 2018 to make a move and I picked golf.
While this is my focus, I also have a lot of time to work on plan b. What is plan b? I’m not sure yet, but it’s going to be one of the dozen other things I’m working on this year. Making time for a few different things is difficult but I’ve made it work by blocking space on my calendar.
If you don’t know what you want to do (but know you want to do something different), make a list of things you might want to do and actually start one! Write the book about your experience, produce a beat and post it to your Soundcloud, or start volunteering. If one fails, move on and pick another!
For years I’ve kept a list of business ideas and projects in my phone and, until recently, they were just ideas. You don’t need to leave your job to start a passion project or business, but you do need to carve out some time for it.
2019
Getting better at golf, and much more. Big things are coming, stay tuned!
My December goals were mostly a miss if you look at the pass/fail count, but it was very close to being a lot better than that. Of the 10 goals, I only accomplished 2 of them, and they were the 2 not related to golf.
But 3 of my golf goals were missed by 1 or 2 shots. 3 others were off by a bit more. And 1 was a big fail.
Check out the details below.
Here is a list of my December goals with the outcomes
Get at least 2 eagles – FAIL
While I didn’t convert on an eagle, I did have multiple makable putts for eagle.
Average at least 2 birdies each round – FAIL
My average was 1.9 for the month, and if I had 1 more birdie I would have accomplished this goal. I had 1 round with 4, a bunch with 2, but also a handful with only 1 or none.
Average less than 1 double bogey each round – BIG FAIL
I actually averaged over 3 doubles each round this month. I had a few really bad rounds that skewed this number
Average score of less than 5 on par 5s – FAIL
My average was 5.5 on par 5s this month. I had a handful of water/hazards and have not been putting my approach shot close to the pin when I decide to lay up. A few of my birdies have come on par 5s, but I should definitely be able to bring this down if I can minimize the hazards and put the shots of 100 yards and in closer to the pin.
Average under 33 putts per round – FAIL
I averaged 33.1 putts per round this month. If I made 2 additional putts this month, I would have achieved the goal.
Break 80 3 times – FAIL
I only broke 80 1 time. I had a few close calls. A few putts here and a couple shots that don’t hit a hazard
Scoring average below 81 – FAIL
My scoring average this month was 82.
Lower handicap to 6.8 – FAIL
My handicap lowered to 6.9. Another goal that I barely missed.
Do yoga 3 days each week – PASS
This was one of the 2 that I was able to fully control.
Post at least once each week on the blog – PASS
This is another that I was able to fully control.
Goals for January
My goals for January are pretty similar to December.
This is the second swing analysis video that my coach, Wayne, put together. If you missed the first video analysis, you can view it here.
In this video I work on:
Simplifying my backswing by not over rotating
Maintaining width
Shallowing the club on the downswing
Getting my arms away from my body at address
The full swing analysis video is at the bottom of this post.
Shallowing the club
Of everything I’ve been working on, it’s been hardest to shallow the club. A lot of the other changes like going to an overlapping grip, having a neutral stance at address, and keeping my hands in front of the ball at impact have been relatively easy. So far I’ve been able to be slightly more shallow than before, but it’s still a work in progress.
We’ve worked on shallowing by doing a number of different drills, including pausing at the top of the backswing and trying to get the right elbow to make a new move down, trying to get the feel of throwing a baseball with a submarine motion, and using sticks in the ground to adjust the club path.
I used to just hit a ton of balls on the range. But now, even when I have something to focus on with my swing, I still spend over half my practice time working on chipping and putting.
While on the range I use alignment sticks to help with my aim at address, work on controlling the trajectory of the ball, and focus on shallowing the club to hit a draw. I still throw in a few intentional cuts to make sure my body remembers how to hit that shot, though.
Check out the full video below.
This swing analysis video from December 12, 2018 covers what I’ve been working on over the first month with Wayne.
When I started this journey I knew I would need to get some professional help. Watching youtube and instagram swing analysis videos can only do so much. I had 2 separate pros recommend the same guy in Boca, and it’s worked out great so far.
I’ve made a bunch of changes since I started working with Wayne. We’ve had 5 sessions over the past month and a half, and have already made a ton of progress. I’ve smashed my personal best score, posting 73 twice in the last 2 weeks. And I know that I’ll break 70 any day now.
This is a screenshot from the video from 11/13
A bunch of you have asked for more swing analysis so I’m going to periodically post the swing analysis videos that Wayne puts together.
This first video focuses on some of the initial swing changes I made over the first couple weeks. It’s a few weeks old at this point, but I’ll post the more recent video analysis in the next couple of days.
Some of those changes are listed below, but please keep in mind that these are changes based on MY original swing. Making the same changes will not necessarily benefit your swing, but the concepts in the video will definitely help.
The changes I worked on
Switching from a baseball grip to overlapping my right pinky on top of the knuckle of my left index finger.
Moving the ball forward in my stance (closer to my left foot).
Not flipping my hands at the ball – this is pretty common for amateur players. The idea is that your hands should be ahead of the ball at impact, and that you don’t need to try to lift the ball in the air.
Check out the full video below and let me know what you think!
This is the first video swing analysis that my coach, Wayne, sent over.
