Bryson DeChambeau - Great Going!

I am always amazed at how journalists, commentators and golfers take shots at Homer Kelley’s book The Golfing Machine, and yet after 46 years, just like the Energizer Bunny, it keeps on ticking even though people try to give it a licking!  Take for example, Ryan Lavner’s article on Bryson DeChambeau after he won the 2015 US Amateur 7 and 6.  Lavner’s choice of words is “how The Machine had malfunctioned.”  “Bryson DeChambeau was thrashing around deep in the trees, dancing around poison ivy leaves, wondering how The Machine had malfunctioned.” Oh, yes, Lavner was trying to give us, the reader, some cute adjectives to describe Bryson’s play toward the end of the first round.  But then Lavner comes back in the article to praise Bryson but does so with a left-handed complement, “part-mad scientist, part-artist.”  “Five days of national television exposure have made clear what the rankings do not:  DeChambeau is the best amateur in the world, a part-mad scientist and a part-artist who can mow down opponents with machine-like efficiency.”  Mr. Kelley states in 1-L, “It is soon apparent that the body can duplicate a machine.  Grasp the parallel and escape limiting old concepts.  Develop the "Machine Feel" to where you can just turn it loose and trust it.”  Bryson showed everyone during the 2015 US Amateur exactly the meaning Mr. Kelley wrote about 46 years ago.

For those nay-sayers out there, and I know there are many, I would like to remind you that many of the famous instructors have studied Mr. Kelley’s work: David Leadbetter – whose work with Nick Faldo and his truly well designed Double Shift created some memorable wins; Mike Bennett and Andy Plummer (Stack and Tilt); Jim McLean (who lived near Mr. Kelley), to name a few.  Golf Instructors, similar to golfers, search and search, until they find a clue, and they believe it is their secret.  They refuse to share their thinking because maybe in sharing it, it will degrade the secret’s veracity. Which is why so many instructors never tell anyone that they studied The Golfing Machine.

Now, in this new generation of golfers, Bryson DeChambeau found Mr. Kelley’s 46 year old work, which is based on geometry and physics, (and over the last 46 years they have not changed). Bryson states “That’s been the goal, after all, ever since the curious 15-year-old began studying Homer Kelly’s “The Golfing Machine, a teaching manual that allows a player to build his own swing with 24 components and 144 variations”.  Bryson like any other player will experience things like over acceleration, or his Hinge Action may not be perfectly timed whereby the ball (the perfect computer) will fly off target, which is no different than any other golfer.  The difference is Bryson knows where to look for the answer to any of the woes that may come up now or in the future.  He knows that there are 24 components, but also the requirements for a properly orchestrated Zone 1 Pivot which transports the Zone 2 Power Package that will assist in aligning the Zone 3 Hands.  He not only knows where to look to find answers, he also knows that his is a human body which from time to time may be faster, slower, steeper or shallower but he also know about ““Bryson Golf” – rhythm, momentum, feel,” and its these on which he can rely.

Yes, Golfing Machiners (a term used to describe Mr. Kelley enthusiasts) are feeling a bit exonerated – again, after years of put downs, snide remarks and verbal bashings by former Instructors, Bryson with his zero #3 accumulator motion showed them.

Joe Daniels,