always observing and analysing.” In part to find a better climate for Da- vid, the family of six moved from south- ern England to what was then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) when Leadbetter was seven. He became “mad keen” about sports, excelling at cricket and ten- nis. By his early teens, golf became his passion. Achievement ran in the family. Lead- better’s father, Douglas, had been a decorated World War II bomber pilot, flying missions over Rommel’s army in northern Africa. Young David was most drawn to the stories about his maternal grandfather, George Thomas. After being blinded by a bullet during the Battle of the Somme in World War I, Thomas became one of Britain’s lead- ing osteopaths. “After he learned the curriculum by Braille, he developed a reputation for having an amazing sense of touch and feel in his hands,” Leadbetter says. “Pa- tients would come from all over Europe to see him. I connected to his gift be- cause early on I knew I had this ability, whether naturally or through watching sports and becoming obsessed, to be able to see flaws in athletic motion and understand how it could be corrected. That has never been difficult for me.” Leadbetter knew exactly why Faldo had been dissatisfied with a ball flight that launched too high with too much spin, lacking control in the wind. “Nick had the classic swing of the 60s and 70s – very upright with high hands at the top, big hip slide starting down, big reverse C finish,” Leadbetter says. “It created a steep angle of attack that could cause the ball to balloon. There was a lot of timing needed, which was one reason Nick never varied his superb rhythm, but the hands often had to do a lot of work, making it a hard swing to repeat in pressure situations.” Owing to his intense study of the swings of Hogan and Snead, in the 1980s Leadbetter was influential in moving the teaching community away from the reverse-C swing and towards an awareness that the rotation of the trunk, and not the driving of the legs, was the most efficient source of power and stability in the golf swing. Accord- ingly, he guided Faldo into a more
ship. Knowing that Mark O’Meara and Hank Haney had recently collaborated on a successful swing change, Faldo found the amiable and rangy Leadbet- ter wielding his VHS recorder on the practice range at the 1985 Memorial Tournament. “I had shared some of my ideas with Nick the previous December, but now he was very forthright and direct,” re- members Leadbetter. “He said, ‘I know what I’ve got is not good enough to be the best.’ He wanted to win majors. He wanted to be No 1, and he wanted me to help him. “I told him we would be doing some things that were radically different from what he’d been doing and that he would probably go backward before he went forward. I estimated it would take about two years. Nick said, ‘Fine. I want you to throw the book at me.’ You don’t The failures convinced Faldo that his willowy golf swing was not built to hold up to the demands of a major championship. often get someone like that, so I didn’t have any qualms. It was an honour.” In two years and a month, Faldo would win the Open Championship, his first of six majors, at Muirfield. “We were two driven people whose strengths complimented each other, seeking a shared vision, knowing we were doing something new and excit- ing,” Leadbetter says. “There was so much energy, chemistry and karma involved, it almost didn’t matter what the obstacles were, we were going to be successful.” The foundation for that work was laid in early childhood before Leadbet- ter ever heard of golf. A serious asth- matic condition marked by persistent laboured breathing caused his sternum to protrude. “It was a bit of a trauma with the other kids,” he says. “It prob- ably made me a little bit of the outsider,
snapped a few shafts. I needed a sports psy- chologist before there were any. Probably I wasn’t good enough anyway, but I defi- nitely didn’t have the temperament.”
JUST DO THAT At Wentworth in 1989, when Faldo was European Tour Golfer of the Year (opp. page).
When he was 24 and his 10-foot bird- ie putt on the last hole of the 1976 Eu- ropean Tour Q School expired an inch short of the cup, ending an uncharac- teristically clutch closing nine of 32 that left him a stroke short of gaining full playing privileges, he decided his competitive career was over. “The best putt I ever missed,” he says. He turned to teaching. In addition to all the technical knowledge he’d stored up, he’d gained empathy and under- standing as a competitor. He discov- ered he had what his friend J J Rivet, a noted expert in athletic movement, would call a “biomechanical eye” that can spot small flaws, inefficiencies and power leaks in a full-speed swing. Whereas tournament golf had come hard for Leadbetter, teaching tourna- ment golfers came easy. He set up teaching headquarters at the now-defunct Grenelefe Resort, about 70 kilometres southwest of Or- lando. During the early 1980s, he began coaching Nick Price and Denis Watson, both of whom had grown up with Lead- better in Zimbabwe. The three would stay at Leadbetter’s condo, located hard against the practice range, and use the training-camp environment for intense practice sessions to further improve their ball-striking. In 1983, Price won his first PGA Tour title, and in 1984, Watson would win his first three. Nick Faldo, desperate for improve- ment, took notice. The Englishman had been an emerging star, who in 1983 had won five times on the European Tour to earn the Order of Merit and then won on the PGA Tour in 1984. He also had a Ryder Cup record of 11-4-0. Faldo, though, had fallen short while in Sun- day contention of two majors, the 1983 Open and the 1984 Masters, prompting the tabloid tag of “El Foldo.” The fail- ures convinced Faldo that his willowy golf swing was not built to hold up to the demands of a major champion-
GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA 21
JUNE 2025
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