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At the same time, Palmer, Nicklaus, and Gary Player parlayed their tournament success into an empire of instructional publications- magazine articles, television tips, and ghost written, handsomely illustrated books. National magazines such as Golf and Golf Digest capitalized on the newfound popularity of the game to achieve relatively mass circulations and a national forum of cutting-edge instructional techniques. Golf instructors too, found that golf magazines, and their increasingly visible work with touring professionals, brought them more business than they could handle on a local level. So, although golf schools had been in existence since just after the war, in 1968 the first national golf schools would evolve.
Golf did not sustain in the 1970's the same level of popularity it had enjoyed in the 1960's, but significant changes were looming for the game as golf's expansion had created a large enough golf economy to allow for substantial investment in research and development. The groundwork was laid in the 1970's for radical transformation of turf preparation, golf club technology, and instructional technique. The cavity-backed iron, the metal wood, the graphite shaft, as well as revolutionary changes in irrigation technique and turf-laying, date to the 1970's. All would have substantial impact on the game as golfers achieved better and better control over the golf ball (in flight direction, overall distance, and spin characteristics.)
Golf instruction, particularly golf schools, would not enjoy a real economic boom until the 1980's but the influential theory of connection, video analysis of the golf swing, and the emphasis on big-muscle leadership date to the pioneering work of David Leadbetter, Jimmy Ballard and others in the late 1970's and early 1980's. Golf instruction also became more specialized, as teachers by the mid 1980's began to emphasize their expertise with "practical instruction" (John Jacobs), "short game instruction" (Dave Pelz), "women’s instruction" (Penny Zavichas and Linda Craft), or "mental conditioning" (Bob Rotella and Chuck Hogan).
Today
By the 1990's, and into the new millennium, golf instruction in the U.S. had boomed to the point that there are now a multitude of national golf schools offering hundreds of programs across the country, with a cornucopia of techniques, price points, regimens, and training goals. The largest of these is America’s Favorite Golf Schools with more than 40 locations nationwide. Virtually all of the national golf schools offer books and videotapes for sale. Prominent golf gurus such as Dave Pelz, Bob Toski, Rick Smith, and Jim Flick are in demand not only with the touring pros but at skyrocketing master class rates at the finest resorts. Harvey Penick's Little Red Book also became the biggest selling sports book of all time. In short, golf instruction has expanded into one of the largest and most vibrant sectors of the substantial golf economy.
Looking back over the entire grand parade of gurus and teachers, if one were to assign a grade to golf instruction as a whole, six centuries into it, one would pencil "I" for "incomplete". It's well-worth knowing that even in this day of gurus and their technical wizardry, fewer than half of the world’s players can regularly break 100. It's also fitting to mention that when James Durham recorded 94 at the Old Course at St Andrews in 1767, he set a course record that lasted 86 years. Golf instruction has indeed come a long way.
