Padraig Taking Career Inspiration From Howard Hughes **
Absolutely do not miss Karl MacGinty's setup and interview with Padraig Harrington about making swing changes after winning two straight majors.
Q: Are great sportsmen different to the rest of us? Can we only try and imagine what they, or you, do?
PH: It's complicated to explain what's going on. I'm trying to understand the whole process (of playing golf) so that I can control it. I wouldn't be able to accept performing without knowing why. I don't think I'd enjoy winning if I didn't know why I was winning. I think the ultimate satisfaction of winning is understanding how I got there. While I admire sporting achievement, I pay very little respect to somebody who wins without knowing why.
Q: Like the guy who smashes the balls up in pool and some go in?
PH: No. No. Actually it's the opposite. It would be the guy who gets in on the pool table; has the perfect cueing action and clears everything up but has no understanding of what he's doing.
Q: Who, for example?
PH: I'm not going to give you examples but I am all the time trying to figure out, do people understand what they're doing?
Q: Like Maradona?
PH: Yeah. I've very little time for wasted talent and very little time for the talent that has no understanding of why they do what they do. If somebody's best in the world at something and they can't explain in detail why they were there, I wouldn't be interested.
And here I thought most great athletes were successful because they didn't have a clue what made them so good!
Q: Can that be damaging?
PH: Howard Hughes. As a 14-year-old kid, he got his dad to buy him a sports car so he could pull it apart. He spent a month breaking it down bit-by-bit and then putting it all back together. Well, that's me with my golf game.
Howard also spent the last few years of his life locked up in the Desert Inn wearing Kleenex boxes for shoes.
Damaging? Oh you be the judge.
Geoff
**Lawrence Donegan talks to Padraig's teacher Bob Torrance about what the defending Open Champion is trying to do with his swing. Meanwhile, the tabloids are enjoying this one:
Friday, July 10, 2009 at 10:13 AM
View Printer Friendly Version
Email Article to Friend
Reader Comments (16)
That's crazy talk.
Paddy remains on my 'don't pick' pool list for the foreseeable future.
Whoa! Talk about your point-missers. Cue theme from "The Twilight Zone."
Baker-Finch . . . Lehman . . . Duval . . . Paddy?
He's trying to understand what he does, so he can do it again. In other words, he wants to "own his swing." As Tiger has said, that's where the satisfaction comes from.
Paddy could win a 3rd Claret Jug, but if he isn't in command of his swing, he would find no satisfaction out of it.
Roberto Di Vicenzo.
Amen.
I have a tourney today and that is just what I needed.
I gagged in the competition so the quote is obviously worthless.