Editor's Note: In late 2002, Jaacob Bowden was successfully working in the mid-west corporate world as a 26 year old computer engineer. Feeling disenchanted with his work, Jaacob quit his job, took his savings, and moved out to California to pursue a golf career despite only being an average length hitting 14-handicap golfer. As luck would have it, he was taken under the wing of Dan Shauger and Guinness World Record Long Driver Mike Austin. Only 5 months later, Jaacob won the Pinnacle Distance Challenge with a televised drive of 381-yards beating out over 160 competitors including the current 2008 RE/MAX World Long Drive Senior Division Champion, Dan Boever. Jaacob has since gone on to hit an event record 421-yard drive to win a World Championship Qualifier and has turned professional and posted tournament scores in the 60s. Jaacob runs his own golf website called Swing Man Golf.The Golf Channel's Casey Bierer has a Conversation with Jaacob Bowden.
Casey / Q:
Jaacob, it was a pretty risky move you made giving up your stability to pursue a sport while you were only an average amateur player. Why did you make that decision and what made you think that you would have a chance of making it as a professional?
Jaacob / A:
I have always had aspirations - a dream if you will - to be a professional athlete. But at that point in my life I figured it was pretty well too late for that dream. However, I was growing disenchanted with my work and was looking for a change. So I made myself a list of things to do or to pursue in life. One of those things was to attend every major sports event at least once - one Super Bowl, one World Series, one NBA Finals, etc. When I flew to Atlanta for work, the 2002 PGA Championship happened to be in town at the Atlanta Athletic Club, and I decided to go. While walking around on the tournament course, I suddenly felt a jolt of energy and sense of being alive that I hadn't felt for a long time. Something told me that I had what it took to be out there playing with those guys. After going to a few other smaller Tour events afterwards to make sure I wasn't crazy, I put together a plan for myself to live off my savings for a year and train to become a professional.
Casey / Q:
As I said, though, a very risky proposition.
Jaacob / A:
Yes, it was risky, but I had some previous level of athletic success and I figured it was even more risky to go through life and later on wonder if I could have made it had I only tried. I told myself it was only too late if I didn't start right then.
Casey/Q:
How did it come about that you started working with Dan Shauger and Mike Austin?
Jaacob/A:
About a month after I moved to California in late January of 2003, I was hitting balls on the driving range at Lost Canyons in Simi Valley, and the winds were gusting through the mountains like crazy. In one of my back swings I got blown off balance towards the guy behind me. Were it not for him getting blown back as well, I would have fallen in to him. As we were shaking our heads, laughing, and remarking on our dedication to being the only ones practicing that day in such adverse conditions, we started up a conversation. When I told him why I had moved out to California, he generously offered to help train me. I think not only was he curious to know whether or not I could make such a transition, but, I think he was also inspired that I had taken such a leap of faith.
Casey/Q:
How did Mike Austin come in to the picture?
Jaacob/A:
Well, during our conversation, Dan had asked me if I had ever heard of this guy named Mike Austin. Dan informed me that Mike was the guy that had hit a Guinness World Record 515-yard drive in the 1974 US National Senior Open in Las Vegas. Furthermore, he had done it at the age of 64 with a persimmon wood 43.5" steel-shafted driver and balata ball. Not only had Dan been good friends with Austin for the last 20 years, but, Dan said that Mike also lived just a few minutes from the course. He asked me if I wanted to meet Mike and, of course, I said yes.
Casey / Q:
And, of course, Mike Austin's golf career is well documented. But, you didn't really know that at the time.
Jaacob/A:
No I didn't. But there was just something about Dan Shauger and the way he talked about Mike Austin...I don't know. There was almost a mystical quality about it all. So, soon thereafter, I went over to Mike's house with Dan. It was a modest size house with a small lawn, it was filled from floor to ceiling with decades worth of golf stuff, and the walls were filled with trophies, plaques, and autographed pictures of famous people Mike had met and worked with. At first, I felt a bit star struck, but Mike was very nice to me and we seemed to all hit it off really well. Other people had told me how Mike would raise his voice and get angry and seem bitter towards people when he was working and/or talking with them, and although I could see this, for whatever reason he always seemed really calm with me. I'm not sure why or how to explain it, but I got the sense that when I looked at him, he felt as though I understood him. Over the next month or so, Dan and I would work together almost every day and we made numerous trips over to Mike's house to hang out and have Mike check on my progress.
Casey/Q:
How did that go?
Jaacob/A:
It was truly remarkable. By the end of March we had worked my longest drive in the fairway from 330 yards up to 355 yards, then to 377 yards, and then to 393 yards. I almost couldn't believe it because I remember from the previous year when I was at my corporate job I was happy to hit a drive that rolled out to the 250 yard marker.
Casey / Q:
Now you realize, Jaacob, that if your prowess for hitting long drives wasn't documented by the fact that you have done it on television in a sanctioned long drive competition, this story would seem a bit far fetched, right? I mean, from hitting it 250 yards to almost 400 yards just doesn't seem possible.
Jaacob / A:
Well, I do realize this. But, luckily, reality is what it is and I have indeed managed to hit some very long drives when it really mattered most.
Casey/Q:
What did Dan and Mike teach you from a mechanics standpoint that made such a big difference in your distance?
Jaacob/A:
Well, aside from getting rid of a lot of tension and smoothing out my motion, there were three things that were different than anything I had ever heard up to that point.
Casey / Q:
This is the point, Jaacob, where people just started to pay really close attention.
Jaacob / A:
Yeah, I can imagine it is. First was the idea of a swing circle center. That is the point where shoulder, neck, and spine come together. They taught me how to set up with a very exact measurement to the ball and to pivot around this point in the swing by moving the lower spine back and forth in such a way that the power of the legs was leveraged out through the club and transferred in to the shot. You see, if you look at the body, and in particular the skeletal system, it is built of various types of levers. For example, there are ball and sockets in your ankles, hinges in your knees, ball and sockets in your hips, etc. Mike and Dan showed me how to hit the ball through this system of compound levers using my legs as the driving force. It's why the ball goes so much farther than what would seem possible based on how hard it looks like I'm swinging. It's the same principle as someone who is unable to lift a car with their bare hands, but who can easily do so with very little effort by using the leverage of a car jack.
Casey / Q:
OK, and number two?
Jaacob / A:
Second was the idea of throwing the club from the top rather than delaying the release as long as possible. This shouldn't be confused with casting the club, but basically it's a way that you can generate a bit extra club head speed and hit the ball farther when combined with the leg pivot.
Casey / Q:
And the third point?
Jaacob / A:
The third point was this concept of counter-rotating the blade on the way back rather than the conventional rolling open of the club face. It's done in such a way that a great deal of timing is taken out of the swing, and that keeps the blade closer to square relative to the swing path through the hitting area. It's also a type of motion that makes it much easier to free-wheel it and swing as fast as you want and still have control over the ball.
Casey / Q:
Now, it seems to me that you must have a natural aptitude for understanding what Mike Austin and Dan Shauger were teaching you and a lot of natural talent to put it all in to practice. Is that a fair comment?
Jaacob / A:
Well, I agree with that. And IÕm not saying every person is going to be able to hit a 400 yard drive. But I do believe that the information given to me by Mike and Dan can help most golfers add tremendous distance to their games. I know it's all a little tricky to explain without a visual demonstration. So to help with that we've got some pictures and basic videos on our Swing Man Golf YouTube Channel and ones with even more detail on the inside of the Swing Man Golf website itself.
Casey/Q:
Tell me about the Swing Man Golf website.
Jaacob/A:
Well, obviously, it has a lot of stuff on it that I learned from Dan and Mike, but it also has a lot of other things about golf, too. When people started hearing about my dramatic improvement I began getting a lot of email asking how it was all done. Rather than continuing to try to explain everything over email, I thought it would make it easier for everyone if I put together a site with text, pictures, and video explanations. In addition to going in to the things I previously mentioned and featuring a blog where I continue to answer questions, it also gets in to how people can get more out of their equipment, how they can improve their golf games in general, plus this relatively new idea of swing speed training.
Casey/Q:
Swing speed training...what about that? You are pretty fit and I conditioning must have a lot to do with speed, right?
Jaacob/A:
That's actually an interesting one. There's no doubt that eating healthier, exercising regularly, and being fit has a place in performing better in both golf and life. However, you can be incredibly fit and not hit the ball far at all. You can also be terribly out of shape and absolutely kill the ball. So aside from swing mechanics and optimizing your equipment, it's more about a person's ability to generate speed than it is being fit. Typical amateurs swing 70-95 mph. Tour pros swing 105-130 mph and Long Drive Pros swing 135 to 150 mph. Obviously then, swing speed is important.
Casey / Q:
And, you put it all out there for people to read and see and learn and experience, don't you?
Jaacob / A:
Well, I do. Why hide it? I mean, it's a gift of knowledge that should be shared. What's unfortunate, though, is that most amateurs and even most professionals don't realize how relatively easy it is to increase their swing speed through basic training. In fact, I have a swing speed training program that I developed for people on the Swing Man Golf website that takes about 10 minutes twice per week, and it's very common for subscribers to see increases of 12-16 mph (30-40 yards) in the first 30 days. For those that want to do more, I also list out on the site how I increased my swing speed by 26 mph in 37 days while training for the RE/MAX World Long Drive Championship Qualifying in 2006, and how I got up to 155 mph in 2007 and won a Local Qualifier with a grid-record 421-yard drive.
Casey/Q:
Phil Reed (author of "In Search of the Greatest Golf Swing: Chasing the Legend of Mike Austin") who was an average length hitting golfer, was able to break the 300-yard barrier many times by working with Mike Austin, Dan, and yourself. Considering what he has accomplished and what Mike and Dan did with you, do you believe you could take a golfer of average length and athletic ability and turn them in to consistent 300 plus yard drivers of the ball in say one or two month period?
Jaacob/A:
Part of that will depend on the course that the person is playing. Remember that average professionals drive the ball around 285 yards. However, at the Mercedes-Benz Championship, the tournament driving distance average was only 252 yards. This means that the average amateur golfer who hits around 220 yards would average around 187 yards at the same venue. Thus, since some courses play longer or shorter than others, it would be easier to accomplish the feat at certain courses.
Casey / Q:
Well, how about in ideal conditions?
Jaacob / A:
I would say that it is indeed possible with the right combination of club and ball fitting, swing mechanics improvement, and swing speed training. People that I help through the website regularly see improvements of 30-40 yards in the first month, even without much time and effort put in to their transformation. I know people are busy, so when building the Basic Program for swing speed training, I tried to keep that in mind - minimal training time and money invested - while being something that could be done at home and yet still with great results. But, the sky is the limit. If you are willing to give it a little bit more effort, even greater improvements are feasible.
Casey / Q:
Give me an example of the biggest success feedback you've received so far by following your system.
Jaacob / A:
There was a guy in his 50s named Steve who started with Swing Man Golf last winter swinging around 95-100 mph. By spring time, he had reached a maximum of 139 mph and had gotten so long that he began competing in the Super Senior Division of the RE/MAX World Long Drive Championships and ended up winning his Local Qualifier.
Casey / Q:
That's impressive. Now, before I let you go, tell me what's going on in your playing career, not just your long drive career.
Jaacob / A:
Well, I have been working very hard on my overall game, not just my long driving skills. I've turned professional and played in a number of tournaments. I have been steadily improving and recently made another professional cut with a 71-68. So, I am encouraged. I intend to play as many events on the European Tour's Challenge Tour as I can next year. That's the equivalent of the Nationwide Tour. If I can keep my head above water financially - itÕs not easy financing your own golf career if you aren't independently wealthy - I believe I can get to the level I need to in order to compete successfully in the upper pro ranks. That is certainly my goal and my dream. And somehow, I'm not always sure how, at some point I usually achieve the goals I set for myself.
Casey / Q:
Well, it certainly doesn't seem like distance will be a problem for you.
Jaacob / A:
No, you're right about that. Distance thank goodness is not a problem for me.
Casey / Q:
Jaacob, thank you for taking the time to talk with me. I hope your success story will be an inspiration to golfers everywhere who aspire to hitting the ball longer. I wish you the best in your career and I'll be sure to be checking out and keeping up with you through your Swing Man Golf website.
Jaacob / A:
Thank you for taking the time, Casey. It was my pleasure.
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What YOU Get:  A Member Login for unlimited 24/7 access to Swing Man Golf Online Training Community (OTC) & unique Swing Speed Training Programs Over 50 Web Pages of Text, Picture, and Video content Over 60 total minutes of Video Golf Instruction More than 125 Pictures Showing Various Golf Positions and Techniques Monthly Newsletter that provides members with updates, "Latest Blogs", "Golf Tips" & more All-inclusive Forum for members to interactive with each other about "Mike Austin/Dan Shauger", "Tours", "Swing Man Golf Techniques" & more Access to Reputable Club Fitter /Maker Locator Tool FREE Lifetime Text, Picture, and Video Content Updates 20% off on ALL Golf Instruction when you work with Jaacob in person Exceptional Customer Service 3 BONUSES including "Secrets of Mike Austin's 515-Yard Drive","Shortcuts to Lower Scores" & "Getting More Out of Your Equipment" |
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