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Lee Trevino has forgotten more about golf than the rest of us could ever dream to learn. And the best thing about “The Merry Mex” is that he’s never been shy in sharing it with others.

Back in the 1970s, Trevino was actually a playing editor at GOLF Magazine. Each month he’d offer instruction tips to readers, so earlier this week, I dived into the archive to see what gems I could find from the six-time major champ.

Trevino’s Left Hand Secret

One I found particularly interesting was a short article from Trevino in a 1974 issue. In it, Trevino explains the move that helps him be more accurate off the tee: Keeping your left hand ahead of the clubface on the downswing.

“If the other guys ever learn that it is the back of the left hand that controls the clubface, there would be a lot more winners, and I would have a lot more to worry about,” he says.

Trevino says that keeping your left hand ahead of the clubface is such an important tip for him that he considers it his “secret.” He recommends working on this move with an open stance, which will give your arms room to extend along the way as your body turns.

You can read the full article below:

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Lee Trevino was asked what he felt was important about putting, and he talked about a baby cat. 

Only he can, and only he did. Trevino is both one of golf’s great players, and one of its best talkers, and in an appearance on Friday on the New Breed of Golf with Michael Breed show on SiriusXM, he wonderfully combined the two. We won’t say much more, though. It’s Trevino story time. (Though it’s here where we need to tell you to listen to the entire show, which you can do so here with a subscription.)

News

“Putters are kittens, if you’re a farmer,” he said on the show. “If you’re a farmer, and you know anything about cats, when a cat has a litter of kittens, they’re blind. And they don’t see their mom until about seven days. I won tournaments with a different putter every day. It was an 8802, but it was a different putter. And the reason for it was if I started putting bad with a putter, it recognizes me. 

“You understand. So I would grab a putter that’s still got its eyes closed. I’d grab a putter that has its eyes closed, and it doesn’t know who I am. And after I win the tournament and go to the next week and I start putting bad again, I put it back in the closet and get another one that’s blind. And that’s what I did. I carried a half a dozen or more putters — same kind, but I carried them.”

Is the superstition thought better than the comparison, or vice versa? Who’s to say. Can the tip help you? Hard to know. Trevino also wasn’t done.  

“My mother-in-law used to go crazy,” he said on the show. “She’d tell my wife, she’d say, ‘He changed putters today. He’s leading, and he changed putters.’ And I did. I putted with a Tommy Armour or a 3852, and then I putted with the 8802 and the designed Palmer. Yeah, I putted with those. I never got the yips until I started going to mallet heads and all this other stuff.

Rules

“But I won the PGA with a Ping, you remember, the ‘A’ blade. My wife bought that in Holland, believe it or not, because I hit 18 greens that day in the Dutch Open and I shot 72, and she went in and paid 55 dollars for a putter and I shot 64 the next day with it.”

“So what you’re saying is it’s not that you have to putt with your eyes closed, it’s that your putter has to have its eyes closed,” Breed said. 

“Yeah, the putter has to be blind,” Trevino said. 

Breed, also a longtime instructor, then asked for Trevino’s putting philosophy, and here the six-time major champion answered with thoughts on his style, the best technique and the best users of it. 

We won’t say much more, though. It’s Trevino story time again.

“Well, the reason I got into the yips was simply because I was a holder,” he said on the show. “I was a holder in playing golf and I was a holder in putting. I actually glanced the putt. My putter went up and out, up and out, up and out. And that was just too much movement — my nerves couldn’t take it anymore and I still can’t putt that way anymore. But anyway, the putting stroke, you know, the best putters, as you well know, actually hook the putt and they stop the putter. 

“Gary Player, Gary Player hit the ground. Bobby Locke, he got that from Bobby Locke. Bobby Locke would aim to first base, swing to second base, and the damn putt would go to third base. I mean, that’s what he would do. … And I’m telling you, he was aiming out of bounds. Every shot he hit, he aimed out of bounds to the right. And then he putted the same way. I didn’t think he was putting at the hole the first time that I saw him putt on the green. He was aiming 10 feet right of the hole. And then he would loop it and close the blade and hit it. [Ben] Crenshaw, Crenshaw takes the putter way back, but he doesn’t go through but about four to five inches. You know, he does the same thing — he takes it inside and spanks it.” 

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Lee Trevino was asked what he felt was important about putting, and he talked about a baby cat. 

Only he can, and only he did. Trevino is both one of golf’s great players, and one of its best talkers, and in an appearance on Friday on the New Breed of Golf with Michael Breed show on SiriusXM, he wonderfully combined the two. We won’t say much more, though. It’s Trevino story time. (Though it’s here where we need to tell you to listen to the entire show, which you can do so here with a subscription.)

News

“Putters are kittens, if you’re a farmer,” he said on the show. “If you’re a farmer, and you know anything about cats, when a cat has a litter of kittens, they’re blind. And they don’t see their mom until about seven days. I won tournaments with a different putter every day. It was an 8802, but it was a different putter. And the reason for it was if I started putting bad with a putter, it recognizes me. 

“You understand. So I would grab a putter that’s still got its eyes closed. I’d grab a putter that has its eyes closed, and it doesn’t know who I am. And after I win the tournament and go to the next week and I start putting bad again, I put it back in the closet and get another one that’s blind. And that’s what I did. I carried a half a dozen or more putters — same kind, but I carried them.”

Is the superstition thought better than the comparison, or vice versa? Who’s to say. Can the tip help you? Hard to know. Trevino also wasn’t done.  

“My mother-in-law used to go crazy,” he said on the show. “She’d tell my wife, she’d say, ‘He changed putters today. He’s leading, and he changed putters.’ And I did. I putted with a Tommy Armour or a 3852, and then I putted with the 8802 and the designed Palmer. Yeah, I putted with those. I never got the yips until I started going to mallet heads and all this other stuff.

Rules

“But I won the PGA with a Ping, you remember, the ‘A’ blade. My wife bought that in Holland, believe it or not, because I hit 18 greens that day in the Dutch Open and I shot 72, and she went in and paid 55 dollars for a putter and I shot 64 the next day with it.”

“So what you’re saying is it’s not that you have to putt with your eyes closed, it’s that your putter has to have its eyes closed,” Breed said. 

“Yeah, the putter has to be blind,” Trevino said. 

Breed, also a longtime instructor, then asked for Trevino’s putting philosophy, and here the six-time major champion answered with thoughts on his style, the best technique and the best users of it. 

We won’t say much more, though. It’s Trevino story time again.

“Well, the reason I got into the yips was simply because I was a holder,” he said on the show. “I was a holder in playing golf and I was a holder in putting. I actually glanced the putt. My putter went up and out, up and out, up and out. And that was just too much movement — my nerves couldn’t take it anymore and I still can’t putt that way anymore. But anyway, the putting stroke, you know, the best putters, as you well know, actually hook the putt and they stop the putter. 

“Gary Player, Gary Player hit the ground. Bobby Locke, he got that from Bobby Locke. Bobby Locke would aim to first base, swing to second base, and the damn putt would go to third base. I mean, that’s what he would do. … And I’m telling you, he was aiming out of bounds. Every shot he hit, he aimed out of bounds to the right. And then he putted the same way. I didn’t think he was putting at the hole the first time that I saw him putt on the green. He was aiming 10 feet right of the hole. And then he would loop it and close the blade and hit it. [Ben] Crenshaw, Crenshaw takes the putter way back, but he doesn’t go through but about four to five inches. You know, he does the same thing — he takes it inside and spanks it.” 

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Lee Trevino says he’s not shocked players are leaving the PGA Tour to ply their trade for LIV Golf. 

And he also wouldn’t be surprised if the controversial, Saudi-backed series fails. 

“To tell you the truth, I haven’t given it much thought because I don’t think it’ll last,” he said on the New Breed of Golf with Michael Breed show on SiriusXM. “I really don’t. I don’t think it’ll last.”

Walk the length of a chip shot, and you’ll find someone with a LIV thought. Or someone who will ask for yours. But few can give it to you straighter than Trevino, who opined on nearly everything LIV over just two questions on Friday.

“Lee, you see what’s happening in the world of golf and in particular the PGA Tour,” began Breed, also a longtime instructor. “You were, in my opinion, probably one of six to 10 people that were essential for the PGA Tour and the success that it enjoyed and what it ultimately led to now. You see what has taken place over the last little bit with Henrik Stenson walking away from a Ryder Cup captaincy so that he can go play LIV. You see other players that are making the jump — Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka. As an individual that is, in part, responsible for the success of the PGA Tour, I’m curious how this LIV thing lives inside of you. 

“What’s your reaction to what is taking place in professional golf?”

In order, Trevino’s answer included his spin on why pros would consider leaving the Tour for LIV; the ages of players in the series; whether LIV would succeed; what the Tour should do; and the reported signing bonuses being offered.  

“Well, it’s not surprising, I mean, as much money as they’re paying them,” Trevino began on the show. “These players are looking after their families. They’re getting a tremendous amount of money just to jump over. 

“None of them are young. The youngest one, I guess, is Bryson [DeChambeau]. I’m not sure; in other words, a star. 

Rules

“I haven’t paid too much attention to it. I knew that it was coming. You can’t control that. There’s no possible way you control it. You know what we do? We just sail our ship the way we are sailing our ship and eventually the sails, I think, are going to break on that ship. …

“I mean, they paid a billion dollars for talent. I mean, come on. I was trying to figure it out in my head the other day. They probably paid a billion dollars for talent, right. I mean, that’s what they did. What did they pay Mickelson? I just heard numbers.” 

“200 is what I heard,” Breed said. 

“I mean, he’s 52 years old. Does he have to play until he’s 90 or what? I don’t know. That’s a lot of money. And you can set your whole family up with that.”

That’s about 200 words, and five takes. But maybe most notable is that while Trevino covered a chunk of the subject’s talking points, he also was relatively unmoved at LIV as a threat and that the status quo from the PGA Tour could win the day. You’re not hearing that as often as you did earlier this year — don’t forget Rory McIlroy’s thought in late February that LIV was “dead in the water,” which he recently backtracked on — and the Tour has adjusted over the past half-year, notably bumping up purses, adjusting its schedule and strengthening its alliance with the DP World Tour, the formerly named European Tour. 

Instruction

Breed then asked the six-time major winner about LIV’s format, which includes 54 holes, a shotgun start, team play and eight events. (They will play 14 next year.)

“Lee, let me just ask you real quickly: When you look at an event that’s 54 holes, it’s a shotgun start, it’s guaranteed money, there’s no cut — I mean, Ernie Els came out this week and said this is not what I consider to be championship golf,” Breed started. “I’m curious, when you see that, do you view that as championship golf? Do you think that that is just sort of a circus experience?”

Here, Trevino talked about the in-person viewing experience; repeated his belief that LIV wouldn’t work; and offered a concern.   

“Well, I don’t know about a circus experience, but I think it’s a different thing entirely,” Trevino said. “I mean, there’s no possible way that we could do that simply because of our galleries, our sponsors. I mean, we’re not going to go to that over here. I mean, how do you get the gallery out? I mean, if a guy wants to watch somebody, he’s got to be there at a certain time because everybody tees off at the same time. And he might not do that. I mean, there’s people that work and say I want to go out at 2 o’clock and follow my guy the last nine holes. I mean, you can do that on our tour. You can go out at 7 o’clock in the morning and watch someone and then go to work at 1 o’clock. Going shotgun with 54 players or whatever they have and the shotgun start, I don’t know how it’s going to work. I have no clue how it’s going to work. 

News

“To tell you the truth, I haven’t given it much thought because I don’t think it’ll last. I really don’t. I don’t think it’ll last. I think that, you know, eventually they’ll see to where — I mean, it takes a lot of organization to run this tour. I mean, this thing just didn’t all of a sudden just jump, pop out. We’ve been doing this for 54 years, you know, once we got away from the PGA. So yeah, it’s not easy. It’s not easy. But I don’t think it’s going to go anyplace.  

“I just hope it doesn’t damage our sponsorships. That’s when it actually starts getting serious is if the sponsors start quitting and doing this and doing that.” 

And that’s about 300 three words and three takes. The hottest, of course, is that LIV won’t last, and if you’re a PGA Tour fan, you should feel encouraged. Though, if things get messy Trevino’s sponsorship thought should be worrisome.

We’ll all learn some more in a week. 

LIV plays its third event starting Friday. 

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Welcome to Play Smart, a column to help you play smarter, better golf from Game Improvement Editor Luke Kerr-Dineen (who you can follow on Twitter right here).

He’s 82 years old, with a career that would be the envy of golfers throughout history, and a legendary reputation as perhaps golf’s best-ever ball striker.

Yet Lee Trevino is, above all else, a golf nerd. Endlessly fascinated by the game, even though you’d be forgiven for thinking he’s already learned everything there is to know about it.

This infectious quality of Trevino showed itself once again on Monday, while the legend was on site at the 150th Open Championship. He’s was making the rounds on the range when at one point he stopped to talk with Brian “one putt” Harman. That’s what Trevino calls him, he revealed to Harman, because Trevino says every time he sees Harman he’s making putts.

But the conversation quickly shifted to talk of the full swing, says GOLF Top 100 Teacher Justin Parsons, Harman’s coach who was on the ground for the conversation. He snapped a picture of the moment, and shares what Trevino told his student.

Trevino’s swing thought

Harman and Trevino are both similar heights and Trevino was built similarly in his prime. That lends itself to some technical similarities.

“They’ve both got a very square trail side [at setup] and a very open lead side,” Parsons explains.

For both players, standing slightly open allowed more hip rotation through the ball. That’s part of what they talked about, Parsons said, but it also led to Trevino sharing a crucial swing thought that made it all work.

“[Trevino] said he felt he kept the pressure inside his trail foot,” Parsons said. “He would load up in that position and then spring off it.”

Pressure in this context, for reference, is the feeling of pushing down into the ground. When Trevino says he’s keeping the pressure on the inside of his trail foot, he’s effectively saying he’s keeping keeping his weight on the inside of his trail foot throughout his swing.

That feeling allowed Trevino to load his trail leg, without drifting too far off center. And that’s what he shared with Harman during Open week.

“What you’re seeing in that picture is Harman explaining something similar, what he’s feeling during his swing.”

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ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — Rory McIlroy stepped up to the second tee at the Old Course, judged the wind — slightly down — and punished a tight draw driver down the right side of the fairway. It kicked hard forward as it landed. Then it rolled. And it rolled. And it rolled. The hole is 420 yards, but McIlroy putted his second shot from just short of the green.

St. Andrews is a racetrack this week. The fairways are a delightful sepia tone. Golf balls bound forward, and sideways, sometimes predictably and often not. And that’s the reason Lee Trevino thinks the 150th Open will be appointment viewing.

Trevino, himself a two-time Open Champion, played alongside McIlroy, Tiger Woods and LPGA star Georgia Hall in a four-hole Celebration of Champions on Monday afternoon. He experienced firsthand just how hard the course was playing. That’s hard as in firm. And that’s firm as in easy — like extra yardage off the tee, chip shots into par-4s and golfers potentially overpowering the course. But firm can mean hard, too, because that extra yardage can get you into trouble — and that’s where Trevino expects fireworks.

“Because these guys hit it so far, they can reach five par-4s. They’re going to get after it,” he said. “I’ve already told a couple guys: Don’t try to win this Thursday or Friday. Because you’ll make a big number and you’ll get behind the 8-ball. If you get four, five, seven, eight shots behind on Saturday or Sunday, then go like hell. Try to drive every green and make every birdie you can and catch up.”

The winning score may well be very low this week, but Trevino predicted bundles of birdies will be accompanied by occasional crooked numbers. That combination is tantalizing.

Putters

“This golf course is easy if you do everything perfect,” he said. “But if you’re a little off with an iron or a driver, this course is a booga-bear. With the gorse and the heather and the deep bunkers with the big faces and everything, it can play extremely hard.”

That hard meant firm and difficult.

“The greens are slow right now, but they’ll not be slow by Saturday,” he said, gesturing in the direction of the 18th, where he’d just finished. The greens are still mostly green. For now. “They’ve been watering them to keep them alive. They’re gonna let ’em go now, I know they will. And they’ll be really slick and powdery by Saturday and Sunday.”

Trevino wore a grin all Monday afternoon. He delights in cracking up Woods and McIlroy. He said he was blown away by Hall’s ball-striking. And he was tickled to see Jack Nicklaus, who joined the group on the first tee, posed for photos on the Swilcan Bridge and traded good-natured barbs at several points throughout the round.

At age 82, Trevino remains an Open junkie. While he downplayed his own accomplishments — “I don’t look much at that stuff,” he said — he has an obsessive knowledge of this championship’s history. He can name you Willie Park’s 12-hole scores from the 1800s. He speaks eagerly about King James’ relationship with the game and how that affected St. Andrews. He tells stories about the Old Course’s reversible routing and how really, it ought to be played clockwise rather than counterclockwise. And he delights in sharing it with terrific golfers from younger generations.

As for his evaluation of Woods’ chances?

“I will say this — [his leg injury] hasn’t bothered his playing a bit. He told me this at the [PNC] Father-Son: ‘My problem is not hitting it. My problem is I can’t walk.'”

“It’s going to be tough,” Trevino said, thinking about Woods making that walk. “He’s going to have to wiggle a little bit on some of the holes, because of the ups and downs. Bunkers are going to be tough, but he hasn’t hit one yet! He has no problem hitting it,” he concluded.

Trevino watched eagerly as McIlroy and Woods ripped driver at the reachable 18th. McIlroy’s moonshot landed higher and relatively softer, settling pin-high on the green. Woods’ effort was slightly flatter and tumbled forward over the back, settling just a few yards shy of several menacing out-of-bounds stakes. Trevino pointed them out and predicted we’ll see several unfortunate O.B. balls. He grinned.

“There’s no lead that’s going to be safe here. No lead’s going to be safe. If a guy has a four- or five-shot lead and there’s guys that are way back, they’ll be able to go after it, and they’ll go after it. They’ll go after 2, they’ll go after 6, they’ll drive it in the bunker on 7, then there’s 9, 10, 12, 18 — I can’t wait.”

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Condoleezza Rice didn’t pick up golf until she was 50. She didn’t really learn about putting, though, until she played with Lee Trevino. 

Today, Rice is a golf nut. A secretary of state under former President George W. Bush, she  became one of the first female members of Augusta National. This week, she was named this year’s Ambassador of Golf ahead of the Senior Players Championship. Still, she remembers well her start in the game. 

“Three-day camp at the Greenbrier,” Rice said this week at the ceremony naming her the ambassador. “The first day, we’re hitting 7-iron, 7-iron, 7-iron, and I’m thinking this is every bit as boring as I thought it was. The second day, we’re hitting 7-iron, 7-iron, 7-iron. 

“The third day, they handed me a driver and it went [motions forward], and I thought, I have my sport.”

In an interview with GOLF earlier this year, Rice described those first days similarly. 

“It was [in 2006], the summer after I became Secretary of State. I went on vacation with my cousin at the Greenbrier in West Virginia,” Rice said. “I had been a figure skater growing up, and I’d always been athletic. Anyway, her husband gave us lessons, and the first day, they had us hitting 7-iron, 7-iron, 7-iron, and I was so bored. The second day, they let us hit a driver, and I knew I had found my new sport.”

“Ah, so it was the big dog,” GOLF writer Chris Nashawaty said. 

“Exactly,” Rice said. “And when I returned to D.C. I would go out to [the course at] Andrews Air Force Base, and I found a pro there. When you’re secretary of state, they shut down the front six and the back six, and you can get out there and wander around. I fell in love with the game. It was my one chance to get outside and escape. If it was 37 degrees or above, I would be there.”

This brings us to Rice, Trevino, the lesson and one helluva story. 

Instruction

There’s really only one thing to note here ahead of time. As great as Trevino is at golf — and he’s one of the greatest ever — he’s just as brutally honest. With that, Rice remembered a round she played with the six-time major champion and Bush. 

“And we’re playing with Lee Trevino, and I’m starstruck because I just loved Lee Trevino as a kid; I watched them on TV all the time,” Rice said at this week’s ceremony, the video of which was shared by the PGA Tour Champions. “And I don’t know if any of you have ever played with him, but he talks in his backswing, he talks in your backswing, he’s constantly talking.”

“Yeah, you do a lot of listening,” the emcee said. 

“Yes, I mean, a lot of listening,” Rice said. “And so President Bush steps into his putt, he leaves it 3 feet short or something and Lee Trevino comes over and he says, Mr. President, never in the history of golf has the hole come back to the ball. 

“And I tried to remember that from then on.”

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Welcome to our new series, golfer-to-golfer, where we try to learn from all different kinds of avid players out there, in hopes that the rest of us can take away something that might improve our own games.

This week, we’re talking to one of the best ball-strikers on tour, Will Zalatoris, and learning what he learned from one of the best golfers of all time: Lee Trevino

Will Zalatoris is only 25 years old and relatively new to the scene, but he always seems to carry with him a comfortable confidence. Like he’s been here before.

Zalatoris, for his part, suggests he knows where it comes from: Picking the minds of those around him, and seeing what he can learn.

“I’m a golf junkie,” he said ahead of the first round first round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational. “I’ll try little things here and there that I hear guys trying. I’m always trying to find the next edge.”

Zalatoris says he plays golf five days a week during his off weeks, which he spends in Dallas. Jordan Spieth is one guy he plays with, and learns from, often — “anytime Jordan Spieth’s inside of 100 yards, I’m watching. I want to see how he does things,” he says. Scottie Scheffler is another common playing partner. As is one of the best of all time: Lee Trevino.

“The stuff that he does even now, he’s 80-plus years old, and he still can shape the ball both ways and still get it out there,” he says. “There’s things that I actually do in my game that I actually kind of mimic Trevino to an extent.”

Crossing paths with Trevino over the years has allowed Zalatoris to pick his brain about all manner of things, from the golf swing to the Masters. And that allowed him to walk away with a tip that he still uses anytime he tries to hit a draw or a fade.

Trevino’s tip to Zalatoris

Zalatoris said one day he started to talk with Trevino about working the ball: How best to hit a fade or draw on command. Zalatoris asked him some questions, and was surprised at what Trevino had to say.

“When he hits draws, he tends to weaken his right hand, and when he hits fades, he actually weakens his left hand,” Zalatoris explains. What’s surprising about this is that weak grips tend to lead to slices, and vice versa. But Trevino has a good reason for doing it. “His thought on that is you can be as aggressive as you want of getting the ball to shape. You don’t have to feel like you’re holding on to something.”

It’s the act of being aggressive, he says, that will allow you to hit your best draw or fade. And to do that, doing the opposite with your grip will allow you to make an unencumbered swing.

So, that’s what Zalatoris does now anytime he’s working the ball. It was a surprising solution, but not as surprising as what happened next, Zalatoris explains:

“He starts asking questions about my golf game,” he says. “I’m like why are you asking me questions? I’m 25 years old, you’ve been around the game a helluva lot longer than I’ve been alive.”

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Don’t judge, but one of my favorite new hobbies is scouring eBay for old GOLF Magazines, buying those magazines and then reading those magazines. There’s so much good stuff in there, and for a golf history nerd, a fascinating look back in time.

My latest purchase was a 1973 edition of GOLF Magazine which features an annoyed-looking Lee Trevino (who was serving as GOLF Magazine’s Instruction Editor) with the cover line: “Trevino Declares War On Slow Play.”

Trevino is the undisputed fast-playing king of golf, and while the snarkier above us say that Trevino clearly lost this war on slow play that he waged in 1973, I prefer thinking that it’s a war that’s still being fought. Especially because his suggestions that he offers up in his scathing article still hold true. In many ways, you could publish the article right now and it would still pass the smell test.

“There are some places you’d better carry a lunch and a razor,” he writes. “The trouble is that waiting on every shot may cause you to use the razor for something besides shaving.”

So, without further ado, here’s what Trevino said golf should do to encourage faster play.

1. Shorter courses

Here’s a suggestion of Trevino’s we should still head: Make the courses shorter, which will be more fun and help everyone play faster.

“There has been over the past few years a trend toward longer and tougher golf courses, which has contributed vastly toward the longer, time consuming process of getting in 18 holes,” he writes. “Enough is enough, when you consider that the average national handicap is 16.”

2. Fewer bunkers

He alludes it there, but a big theme of Trevino’s cover story (which you can read below) is that average courses are too hard for average golfers. This is especially true when it comes to bunkers, which Trevino writes should be fewer in number and less penalizing.

“These courses have enough sand to wear out a corps of camels,” he writes. “There are some architects around to whom I have talked who are leaning more towards the 6,400- and 6,500-yard courses with traps that the average hacker can putt out of, fewer traps and the accent on trees as hazards.”

3. More rangers

But if it’s bunkers Trevino wants less of, it’s on-course rangers he wants more of.

“The use of more rangers also is a great aid in speeding play. In most cases, the ranger will not find it necessary to say anything to a lagging group. His mere appearance is a psychological spur reminding them they are falling behind,” Trevino says.

4. An end to ‘honors’

Interestingly, one of Trevino’s biggest slow play pet peeves is the concept of honors. It should be ready golf all the way, he says, as long as you stay safe.

“As far as I’m concerned, one of the greatest of all time wasters is honors. Waiting until the guy hits first; waiting until the guy who’s away putts first, even though he may be parking his cart 50 yards away,” Trevino writes. “By the time everybody has figured out what everybody else has had it takes longer than a truce meeting … but honors have been satisfied, so the guy with the six finally gets to hit first. The first guy ready should be able to hit first.”

5. Park your cart at the back of greens

Trevino says part of the issue of slow play is golfers not knowing golf cart etiquette. He wants every golfer to know the best place to park their golf cart is behind the green.

“A majority of golfers simply drive them to the front of the green, pitch up, leave the car and proceed,” he says. “Then, when they have holed out, they must walk straight back into the line of fire for the next group.”

6. Fewer practice swings

Two themes that stand out in this article: Trevino thinks golfers simply take too many practice swings, both on the greens (we’ll get to that) and for their full shots. They’re unnecessary and exhausting, Trevino says.

“They not only waste a lot of time but they also have to kill you off eventually,” he says. “You hit the ball 85 times and you swing 400 times, all you’ve done is knock yourself out.”

7. Stop marking your ball

Another habit golfers need to shake, Trevino says, is marking your ball, which he thinks is excessive and often done unnecessarily.

“The marking of balls on the green is tremendously overdone, you’ll act like a Supreme Court judge when he marks his ball two clubheads to the side. Then, nine times out of 10, when it finally comes his turn to putt he puts the ball down wherever the coin happens to be and putts out,” he writes.

8. Two waggles

File waggles in the same category of practice swings: Trevino thinks golfers take too many of them. Instead, they should use the same amount, every time.

“You’ll see these guys all over the place,” he writes. “They’ll waggle three, four or five times, but never the same number. You begin to wonder: ‘God, isn’t he ever gonna hit it?’”

9. No more television’ acting on the greens

At one point Trevino relays a story about a playing partner who took an inordinate number of putting strokes, inspired by what the golfer sees on television.

“I played with a fellow recently who before each putt took a half dozen practice strokes before he’d step up to the ball. Finally I pointed out to him that all those practice strokes didn’t seem to be doing him much good since he couldn’t hole anything longer than Pancho Villa’s mustache,” Trevino quips.

Along those lines, Trevino said golfers are simply wasting time on the practice green. Not just with their practice strokes, but even before they step into the ball.

“I’d estimate that 75 percent or more of the average players waste too much time green reading,” he says. “Reading a green is simple: Bermuda grows towards the setting sun, bent grass grows downhill, that’s it.”

10. Allow partial par-3 play through

Finally, Trevino has an interesting idea for par-3s. Allow the group behind you to hit into the green once you’ve reached the green, then putt out as they’re making their way up.

“The par three is one of the chief roadblocks, thus a sign advising players to wave on the next group’s tee shots once they reached the green permits that group to move toward the green while the group putting is holing out,” he says. “Little things, but important in the race against the clock.”

The post Lee Trevino ‘declared war on slow play’ in 1973. Would his 10 solutions help now? appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘He’s the best ever’: Lee Trevino revealed a grip tip to Tiger, Charlie Woods appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘He’s the best ever’: Lee Trevino revealed a grip tip to Tiger, Charlie Woods appeared first on Golf.

Lee Trevino is 82 now, and even one of his biggest fans admitted that “it’s not what it used to be.” Still, when “it” was what it once was, and you know that “it” may very well leave your body one day but never your head, you and your 12-year-old son track down your favorite teacher at the end of the range and watch, listen and oftentimes laugh. 

And there Tiger and Charlie Woods stood, for a good 15 minutes, before struggling to go.   

“He wasn’t really giving a lesson to Charlie. He was just talking, like he does,” the 15-time major winner said of his and his son’s range time with Trevino late last month at the PNC Championship. “I got a chance to be around Lee quite a bit early in my career, and to see the quality of strike, the guy is 82 years old — come on, it’s not what it used to be, but he finds the middle of the face each and every time. I don’t care how old you are. The audio, he still has the audio, and he still has the shape of shots. Just doesn’t go as far, but no one has control of that golf ball as well as he has.

Instruction

“The old Balata ball into the wind and the shots that he played and how he did it, hardpan in Texas, and it transferred to pretty much everywhere around the world; people would just sit there and listen. Just listen — you guys know, you walk the range, and you know guys how to hit a golf ball. Lee was that guy.”

And still is. Shortly after the session after the Friday pro-am of the PNC, the Champions Tour captured and shared about two minutes of the back-and-forth, and in it, Trevino dished on the shot that causes him the most fear — “a 50-yard shot with the pin on the right, with water, with water, with water right there” — and how to hit it. Last week, the Tour put out a second video, and the one-minute, three-second clip is well worth a watch below.

In this video, Trevino shared the benefits of lowering your hands on the club. With Tiger and Charlie a few yards behind him, Trevino rolled out a ball, took one of the elder Woods’ wedges and demonstrated. 

“See, with this wedge here, if you wanted to hit this little wedge to that target, so you put your hands down here and so you can make it curl like that,” Trevino said. “And the reason, when your hands are down here and you pull ’em up, you got the angle.”     

He then took one of his own hybrids, rolled out another ball and swung again. 

“It’s just like this with my hybrid,” Trevino said. “Sometimes I get to a point where I can’t hit an iron very good anymore, Tiger. You know, I don’t have enough speed, so sometimes I get 175 and I need to go in there this way, all I have to do is lower the hands here and just a — there you go. And put it right in there. I don’t even have to swing hard, and I don’t have to hold ’cause with the hands there, they’ll come up and you have the angle.”

On and on it went. But at this point in the video, Trevino noticed that his audience included more than just Tiger and Charlie. 

“And I’m going to pass the hat, goddammit, for lessons,” he cracked.  

“He’s the best. He’s the best ever,” Tiger said.  

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