Rinker’s Golf Tips Top 100 Teacher Brian Manzella. Brian Manzella grew up in New Orleans, Louisiana and got started playing golf with his dad (like a lot of us) when he was around 10 years old. His dad was a weekend golfer who had a five handicap. Brian played a little bit of college golf and at the age of 20, took an assistant pro job at City Park in New Orleans. The pro there was 71 year old Henry Thomas and he was king. Brian talked about the good old days, when the tour would play an event in a city, and the head pro would be invited to play in the field with the Hogans and Sneads. Henry Thomas knew all the players and was quite a teacher and stick himself. Mr. Thomas was doing a convention at the club one day and needed someone who could work a camera. Brian became part of the show, and showed Mr. Thomas that he could interact with the guests and help them with their games. Before this, Brian was working with the juniors as kind of a talent scout for Mr. Thomas. Brian said, “There is nothing better to teach than little kids. You can’t tell them too much, there attention span is minimal, and the lesson can go bad really quickly.” Brain recalled a junior program where he had a lesson with Tour player Johnny Pott, and how that impacted him in a positive way.
I asked Brian about how he got started with the book, “The Golfing Machine” by Homer Kelly that was published in 1969. He said he remembered an article in Golf Digest in the early 1980’s called, “Players and their Bibles.” Dave Stockton had “Psycho cybernetics,” Larry Nelson had “Hogan’s Five Fundamentals” and Bobby Clampett had “The Golfing Machine.” Brian played in a college event in Jackson, MS and finally found the book, which wasn’t easy in those days. In 1987 Brian flew out to California to see Bobby Clampett’s instructor, Ben Doyle. Ben taught him that you can never underestimate a student. While they may not be able to hit the ball as far as a pro, they could hit it as pure as a pro, just not quite as often. Ben and Brian became fixtures at the PGA Coaching and Teaching Summits after this.
I asked Brian about the lower body in the golf swing and how ground force is used. He said the center of pressure moves to the back foot by the first parallel or when the shaft gets parallel to the ground on the back swing. If it’s not then, it’s just after that first parallel. On the forward swing, when the lead arm gets parallel to the ground which isn’t that far forward, the weight has already moved as far forward toward the target as it is going to. He simply stated the swing is, “Right foot hands to the right ear, Left foot hands to the left ear” for a right handed golfer.
Brian ended with a tip for a caller about how to stop coming over the top. He talked about how Hogan, at the start of his down swing, turned his hips even more away from the target, and he backed into the ball with his left hip. His left hip moved forward and his hips finished their rotation on the back swing. He said that has helped a lot of people. Brian Manzella can be reached at BrianManzella.com.