Tiger: Not the same man, better?

Tiger does amp up the social media machine more the Trump! Maybe…
This time around, I noticed a lot less of the biting commentary about his return. People have come to terms that he will not be that same player. I contend that he may be better.

His misses were left, only left, which is better. He still has the potential to miss both ways as anyone, (don’t let Brandel tell you that they all have that control) but he is now making a swing that he can build on. He has to and does protect his back by using a fuller hip turn.(Remember that Seniors!) He seems to take it a little more inside and halfway back is more closed with the clubface. All manageable, because he is relying on this athleticism and timing. That last part erks Chamblee, but I haven’t found a fine player who doesn’t rely on timing.

Finally, in the second round you saw the genius of Tiger…his brain. He thought his way around and relied less on the brawn of a 20 year old Tiger used the brain of a 46 year old Nicklaus! I hope that he can finish well, a win would be historic and unrealistic. But Tiger is middle aged! And for most tour players his age the driver-sand wedge courses of the Senior PGA are soon approaching…I think he’s different, but I’m optimistic. I think Tiger has a big upside with this swing. Check out a few of these if you haven’t already:

Now if you want to see some poor decisions, check out the back nine. There’s plenty to see.
What do y’all think? Opinions? Opinions?

Meet your local PGA Pros: Chad Hutsell

I love this regular feature of getting to know our local PGA Professionals and I am amazed at the immense talent we have right here in our own backyard. Like you, they love their golf and enjoy talking about it. They rarely toot their own horn, so I’m here to introduce you to these folks and share my admiration for the job they do. I have been fortunate in my career to be associated and work with national PGA award winners, PGA Tour players, rule officials, course owner/operators and served as host of a PGA Tour event myself. But, in my 30+ years in the business, this next pro you’re going to meet, may be the best all-around complete pro that I have ever worked with. Meet Chad Hutsell, Head Golf Professional, Swan Lake Resort:

JE: Chad, thanks for taking the time to talk with Golden Age Golf. Tell us about yourself, where your from, family, hobbies and such.

CH: I was born and raised in the Indianapolis, Indiana metro area.  I attended Brownsburg (Indiana) High School where I played golf, soccer and basketball and later attended Butler University on a golf scholarship.  I earned a BS of Science Degree in Marketing while at Butler.  I married my wife Emily in 1999 which was the same year that brought us to North Central Indiana and Plymouth.  Emily is also originally from Brownsburg and graduated from Indiana State University.  We have one son, Nate who is a freshman at Plymouth High School. Nate is the JV Goalie on the soccer team, plays on the freshman basketball team and the golf team this coming Spring.  He also really enjoys his trick scooter.  He recently learned how to do a back flip off a half pipe ramp.  Now he is trying a full back flip with a 180 degree turn.  It’s scary but amazing the tricks he can do! When time permits, I enjoy woodworking and attempting and completing projects around the house.  I built several pieces of furniture around our house and completed 80% of the work of finishing our basement on my own.  I enjoy learning about these different projects and get a lot of satisfaction in learning and accomplishing new skills.  As a family, we really enjoy visiting Disney World in Florida.  We have traveled with my sister’s family and my parents several times and they are the best memories you can imagine when we are together as a big group.  Additionally I enjoy a specific golf trip every fall with my father to the Asheville, North Carolina area.  Nate joined us for the first time this year and it was a blast.  The beauty of the Smoky and Appalachian mountains along with great golf courses and family is something I look forward to every year.

JE: Who inspired you to play golf and to get into the business side of the sport?

CH: The game of golf has been an integral part of my life for 40 years.  My father introduced and inspired me to the game around the age of 4.  He began by taking me to the driving range to fiddle around hitting balls, at first with plastic clubs and eventually with real clubs.  I have been incredibly fortunate in the opportunities my father was able to provide in golf and the love of the game he instilled in me.  From those early beginnings my involvement morphed into playing with him, family golf vacations, golf lessons, a junior competitive career, high school golf, college golf and now golf at the professional level.  I played and enjoyed other sports, but golf was always the glue.  As many of us who enter the business can attest, other Golf Professionals we encountered undoubtedly influenced our decisions to make golf a career.  For me there were numerous who made significant impressions along the way.  But, the most influential is John Dunham who was the longtime PGA Professional at Highland Golf & Country Club in Indianapolis.  While I was in college at Butler University, I went to work for John at Highland.  Initially, I worked in the bag room/outside operations but quickly was lucky to assume more responsibility as their Caddie Master for 2 summers. I learned a lot from that experience and from John on his expectations for a great Caddie program.  As a business major at Butler, I considered a few employment options, but always had golf on my mind.  During my Senior year, I went to John to discuss a career in golf and experienced another stroke of good fortune.  John saw something and went above and beyond to create a position for me to be one of his Assistant Golf Professionals.  This was a position he didn’t really have or have to have.  He made it happen.  That was an incredible opportunity and this forum simply doesn’t provide enough time to cover everything that I learned from John.  Simply put, I learned how to be a Golf Professional from John Dunham. I appreciate that very much and am very gracious to all that he offered me.

JE: How long have you been a PGA pro, where did you start in the business and tell us your job history. 

CH: I started in the business as an Assistant Golf Professional at Highland Golf & Country Club working for John right out of college in May 1994.  I worked for John for 5 seasons until the beginning of 1999.  Along the way I had a great opportunity in the winter of 94/95 to work at PGA National Resort and Spa in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.  At the time, I was young and had a lot of fun at PGA National.  Little did I know then how I would later reflect on that when I arrived at Swan Lake Resort.  Also, in this time period, I entered our Association’s Apprentice program called the Golf Professional Training Program and became a Class A PGA Professional in February 1998.  In 1999, I interviewed at the age of 27 for the position of Head Golf Professional at Plymouth Country Club.  I again was very fortunate and got the job.  I owe a lot of gratitude to Plymouth CC and it’s members for allowing me to grow as a Head Golf Professional until the end of 2010.  I had a short stint as the General Manager at The Course at Aberdeen in Valparaiso, IN in 2011.  I had the good fortune to work with fellow Swan Lake Resort Professional and Assistant General Manager, Matt Hovermale while at Aberdeen.  It was a short but good experience to work there and get to meet Matt. Yet again, as luck would have it, the opportunity to be the Head Golf Professional at Swan Lake came up in late 2011.  I was blessed to be chosen for the role and have been here since January of 2012.  It has been a fantastic experience and as I said earlier, I am continually excited about what we are doing and achieving.

JE: Chad, tell us what your job responsibilities are here at the resort, your challenges and the future of Swan Lake Resort.

CH: My title at the Resort is Head Golf Professional.  My responsibilities are management of the golf operation and guest experience for golf.  I manage 2 Assistant Golf Professionals and approx. 6 inside staff and 35 outside operations staff.  I am responsible for the golf retail operation which includes the purchasing, displaying, selling and inventory control of all golf merchandise.  I oversee the operation of 36 holes of golf coordinating various different customer segments such as Stay and Play/Resort guests, Club Members, public play, league players, and corporate golf groups.  I handle the coordination of several consumer golf shows that we attend.  I work closely with Resort staff and our Stay and Play Sales Representatives to coordinate golf tee times for Resort guests.  Additionally, I am responsible for the direction of our golf membership program with regards to pricing, program development and program administration.  There are many aspects to my position and I might be leaving out a couple of items, but being busy is why I love what I do.   As with many positions/industries there are challenges that we face.  As you can see, we have numerous types of golf customers.  Our biggest challenge is finding ways to piece those customers together and provide a great experience for all of them.  As the Resort grows and each segments grow, it can be challenging to fit all those pieces together.  Aspects of continued growth of the golf operation and fresh ideas for events and programming are also always on my mind.  The last 5 years has been a great adventure at Swan Lake Resort with much growth.  I continue to be excited about our direction and continued opportunities.

JE: Tell us about your typical day and what do you like to do best. 

CH: A typical day is difficult to describe because they are usually anything but typical.  I can share some the things that I might do often if not every day.  As almost all of us do, there is time spent at the computer checking and communicating email.  There are countless opportunities for customer service, literally everyone I come into contact with every day. I might have new merchandise to process into inventory and put onto display.  Almost daily there are voicemails to return.  I am often searching for, selling or working with groups having golf outings with us. There are various meetings I am required to attend, some weekly and some monthly.  I interact numerous times a week with our Golf Course Superintendent and his two Assistants with regards to current course conditions and future needs we have for events and his on course projects. I try to be very engaged with our golf staff both inside and outside on a daily basis.  They are the heart and soul of our golf operation.  I appreciate them so much.  They have more opportunities for interaction with guests than I do.  They are very important.  I like to communicate to and with them often and actually work alongside them.  I still know how to wash a golf cart and don’t mind at all! It’s important that my staff know that there is no job too small or seemingly unimportant that I won’t do.  They will then feel the same and that mentality makes us all better.  There is a lot of conversation about, promotion of and preparation for the events that we conduct whether they are a corporate golf outing, large Stay and Play group or a Member event.  Unfortunately, weather/mother nature has had too much of a hand in our daily operation over the past couple of seasons.  Changing and difficult weather conditions can put a strain on the operation and cause us to do much scrambling to assist our guests.  When weather dictates we are not available for golf, there are many things that have to happen to find opportunities for golfers to golf.  This is a great list of typical daily tasks, but not everything.  This diverse and ever changing list of tasks is actually why I love my job and our operation here at Swan Lake.  There are so many moving parts and I enjoy the challenge.  Oh, and occasionally I play golf! That’s nice since playing and enjoying the game is where it all started for me.

JE: You are a student of the golf industry in some respects, what is your progress report on the state of the game and the business? 

CH: I am personally encouraged about the state of golf.  It would be easy to feel otherwise and there is still some evidence to support that feeling, but thinking negatively isn’t going to make things better.  I love what I do. I get to come to the golf course every day for my profession.  It’s really great.  No matter the circumstances I have to be positive and bring passion to what I do every day.  It doesn’t matter if we have 20 golfer or 200 golfers.  To them it doesn’t matter.  There are expectations they have and it is our job daily, weekly, monthly and yearly to exceed those expectations. On a local level and personal level, the state of golf at Swan Lake Resort is very good.  Since 2012 we have experienced record growth across many segments.  From a golf operation standpoint, we have seen growing rounds played in all segments, a massive growth in club membership, great support of the programming we conduct and very solid growth of our Resort guest Stay and Play business.  I am fortunate to work for a great organization and be a part of an organization that is seeing positive growth.  On a larger scale, the game has some challenges to remain viable.  Even so, I remain positive.  I believe the most difficult struggles the business has had are behind us and there are a lot of creative people and creative strategies being implemented and tested to help grow the game.  We will continue to do our part at Swan Lake Resort to contribute and grow the game.

JE: You have a busy schedule running the golf operations for the resort. How do you keep your own golf game is shape?
Chad is the Course Record Holder on both the BLACK and SILVER courses with score of 63 and 64 respectively. 

CH:I do still play the game and am fortunate to be able to occasionally kick it into high gear and play well.  I’m not sure how it happens anymore exactly.  I don’t practice as much as I used to.  I am competitive but try not to place the expectations on myself that I once did.  Every opportunity to be on the course with family, friends and our members is fortunate.  I try to enjoy that time. Luckily my golf swing still produces a predictable shot shape of the ball moving from right to left (a draw) regardless of how much I play or practice.  That predictability is how I am able to get it around the course.  That is really the most fundamental key to anyone’s game.  Consistency and predictability.  Those allow you to be sure of yourself and score better on the course.  Also, after decades of trying and failing a lot of the time, I am more aware of what I am physically capable of doing with the golf ball. It might be too conservative for some, but I am just more aware of which types of shots and when to use those shots, than I used to be.  This awareness by no means eliminates all bad shots and all bad rounds, but it help minimize those to a degree when I don’t practice much.

JE: From talking to you about your game, your mental toughness seems to be a strong suite. What advice would you give the average amateur in that regard? 

CH: Golf is a physical game but equally a mental challenge.  The advice I would give to the average amateur is this: Practice a little more.  In that practice focus less on the full swing and more on the short game.  Try to arrive early enough to warm up but again, focusing less on the full swing and more on the short game (chips and putts) prior to the round.  Take a deep breath, exhale and keep your head up.  Look around at all that is beautiful and going on around you.  In our busy lives, we can have a head down approach a lot of the time.  Get your head up (but not during the swing)!  There is a lot to be thankful for especially while on the course.  Golf is a challenging game.  Don’t be afraid to get some qualified help.  By qualified, I mean your local PGA Professional.  By qualified, I don’t mean your buddy! Enjoy him as a golfing partner but not your swing coach.  Sorry to all the buddies out there.  From an on course advice standpoint, I refer to what I mentioned about my own game.  Match your goals realistically with your physical capabilities.  Your expectations will be more in line and more easily met as opposed to the opposite.  Do your best to think positively at the start of the hole.  Don’t think about the worst things that can happen with your driver, the last time you hit it left into the tree/water, I better not hit it right b/c there is trouble over there, this is the worst club in my bag, etc., etc.  It might sound cliché or over simplified, but I stand on the tee box and see, think and feel hitting it in the fairway.  I don’t see the trouble such as water, trees, sand. I not trying to avoid something. I am trying to do something which is to hit it in the fairway.   It has to start with a positive.  It doesn’t guarantee a positive result but it helps immeasurably.  Be self aware, consistent and predictable.  If you do those things your scoring and outcome will be improve.  I hope this helps.

JE: How, in your role as club pro, do you try to make an impact on your community? 

CH: A great question.  I have been involved in various different causes in the community but can surely can do more and wish to do more.  In the meantime, what I can do and what I have tried to do for all these years, is bring a strong work ethic and passion to being a Golf Professional.  Hopefully, that drive and passion has been translated into a lot of great memories and experiences for my customers over all these years.  That would make me happy.

JE: Any final general thoughts on golf in  Northern Indiana?

CH: Golf in Northern Indiana is well positioned.  There are plenty of facilities to support the game and facilities of all types.  There are many great Golf Professionals as well.  I hope you all enjoy the game and play just a little more golf in 2017.  Please visit your local PGA Professional for help with your game.  We would love to help you improve!  Have a great off season and I hope to see you at Swan Lake next year.
 

Thank you Chad for sharing your thoughts and tips for our local golfers, I’m sure that our readers can benefit from your expertise. And folks, stop out to see Chad someday, even if it’s just to say hello! And if you can get him talking about his mental approach to golf you may have struck gold! He is one of the few pros that I’ve been around who can get into that “zone” and stay there, so he has a lot to share in that respect.
Chad has been recognized numerous times for his service to Swan Lake Resort in the hosting of the NJCAA National Golf Championships in 2012, ’14 and ’16, as well as being host to multiple Indiana Junior Golf, Marshall County Junior Tour, Golf Channel Amateur Tour, local high school, PGA Junior League Regional matches and many more charity and school fundraising events. He is also recipient of the Indiana PGA Section “Resort Merchandiser of the Year” 2015. Special thanks to Chad for his unrelenting contributions to golf in our community.