Question 11

A: The major differences between IMA systems technique is just that, a technique not a method. No one method is correct for everyone and the Natural Golf method swing is based on a 60+ year old Moe Norman. Moe Norman did many things differently in his thirties from what he is doing today and demonstrated on the Natural Golf videos.

Because I have had the extreme pleasure of knowing Moe on a personal level we discussed the golf swing at great length. Moe showed me a photo of his golf swing from his early thirties, when no one questioned that he was the best ball striker alive. When Moe was in his thirties he went to parallel on his back stroke. At impact Moe's right foot was not flat on the ground, but rolled in. Moe has become overweight and therefore has a restrictive backswing. Moe also explained to me that looking different added to what he considered showmanship. There were and still are idiosyncratic parts of Moe's swing that are simply not necessary to emulate.

What has happened is that today's Natural Golf swing represents and teaches the swing of an aging, overweight, and as we have recently learned ailing Moe. What happens is first mature players and even professional golfers lose distance from a traditional swing by emulating a 67 year old Moe. They will also look strikingly bizarre or at least substantially different from everyone around them. This combination makes it an impossible sell to a world class golfer.

Imagine saying, try this swing. It will make you feel subconcious and you'll look odd, plus you have the added benefit of hitting it 10 to 15% shorter then you do now. Not to mention that the person instructing you will be lucky to score under 85, with only a handful of exceptions, who all learned from me, or from someone I personally worked with.

I mean no disrespect to Moe, and he will be the first to confirm that he is not the ball striker that he was in his thirties, forties, or fifties. I wish him a speedy recovery from bypass surgery.

Everything that Moe told me about fundamentals of the single axis technique is revealed in my video. While Vice President of Natural Golf I formulated a standardized teaching technique based on Jack Kuykendalls science, and Moe Norman's discussions and film of his his swing in his 30's.

Through IMA's techniques you will not lose club head speed, and typically gain 7 to 20 miles per hour swing speed. After the car accidents I was in, my swing speed diminished to around 107 mph. Only two and a half months into the IMA method, my swing speed was 115 mph.

In regard to Jerry Heard's Super Swing, the method is very similar to Jack Kuykendall's original discovery before Jack knew Moe Norman existed. With the Super Swing you simplify the pivot and weight transfer, place the golf club in line with and square to the path, and swing on a more vertical plane through a single axis set up.

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