After this interview http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/index.php?sh...p;#entry1758742
the same journalist drops by Paddy's house for a chat.

Paddy explains his reasoning behind his swing tinkering:

Harrington penning a golfing riddle
By Karl MacGinty
Friday, 10 July 2009


Padraig Harrington






It's like Chris Bonnington (famous rock climber) getting to within spitting distance of the summit at Everest — then parachuting back to base camp.

All season, Padraig Harrington has fielded questions beginning with the same word. Why?

Why change a swing which won two Major championships last summer?

For many, it's the sporting mystery of our time.

“I'm sitting here aghast,” one reporter exclaimed at a recent press conference when the Dubliner candidly stated, “I don't want to play like I did last year.”

Yet this riddle of the links was unravelled over a cup of tea at Harrington's home in Rathmichael recently.

A casual conversation, in which he chatted about his own sporting heroes, men such as Bernhard Langer and Henrik Larsen, would yield a fascinating insight into the nature of Ireland's triple Major champion — and explain his mystifying compulsion to modify the most successful formula in Irish sporting history. It went something like this:

Q: Do we understand you at all?

PH: Do I understand myself?

Q: Are great sportsmen different to the rest of us? Can we only try and imagine what they, or you, do?

PH: It's complicated to explain what's going on. I'm trying to understand the whole process (of playing golf) so that I can control it. I wouldn't be able to accept performing without knowing why. I don't think I'd enjoy winning if I didn't know why I was winning. I think the ultimate satisfaction of winning is understanding how I got there. While I admire sporting achievement, I pay very little respect to somebody who wins without knowing why.

Q: Like the guy who smashes the balls up in pool and some go in?

PH: No. No. Actually it's the opposite. It would be the guy who gets in on the pool table; has the perfect cueing action and clears everything up but has no understanding of what he's doing.

Q: Who, for example?

PH: I'm not going to give you examples but I am all the time trying to figure out, do people understand what they're doing?

Q: Like Maradona?

PH: Yeah. I've very little time for wasted talent and very little time for the talent that has no understanding of why they do what they do. If somebody's best in the world at something and they can't explain in detail why they were there, I wouldn't be interested.

Q: So you are different?

PH: I'm not different. There are plenty of people like me. It's just my make-up.

Q: There aren't plenty of great sportsmen.

PH: That's only because I'm prepared to go the extra mile. Yet, there are loads of people like me. If I was a tech nerd, I'd be the guy who pulls apart his computer to see how it works. Of course, I've no interest in doing that to my computer. With my golf game, however, I want to pull it apart and see what everything does.

Q: Can that be damaging?

PH: Howard Hughes. As a 14-year-old kid, he got his dad to buy him a sports car so he could pull it apart. He spent a month breaking it down bit-by-bit and then putting it all back together. Well, that's me with my golf game.

Q: Is that what makes you a Major champion?

PH: That's what makes me!

Q: So, who are the sportsmen you most admire for their ability to explain why they are what they are?

PH: The likes of Langer. Three times he had the yips and not only did he overcome it but he managed to be a great putter every time he came back. To me that's incredible. It's the ultimate talent. The soccer player I've most admired is Henrik Larsen. I admire people like him, who have worked to get where they are and the influence they have on the people around them, people who see their good habits.

Q: Is it possible that you enjoy so much the process of breaking things down and building them back up again, it's almost masochistic?

PH: No doubt about it.

Q: So it's not good unless you really suffer for it? Is that what this year's been about?

PH: That's wrong. It's wrong to believe you have to suffer to improve. I'd be worried if that was me. There again (he laughs), maybe it is.

It was said in jest, but Harrington's quest for technical perfection has resembled self-flagellation recently as his back swing grew shorter and spasmodic under the weight of deliberation.

Naturally, he wants to emulate Peter Thomson's feat in 1956 and win a third successive Open at Turnberry next week — if he manages to strip the Elastoplast off his swing by next Thursday, Harrington might even do it.

He certainly defied all the odds in last year's US PGA. “I wasn't feeling great about my game that week,” he admits.

“It wasn't as if I was having the perfect week but I got the job done.”

If he doesn't hang onto The Claret Jug next week, he'll satisfy himself that all he's learned about his game in the past six months will improve his prospects of winning other Majors in the future.

Like Howard Hughes, Harrington is obsessed with understanding the high-performance car, finding as much pleasure in rebuilding and perfecting it than taking it out on the road.

That thought process sets him apart and makes his decision to change a winning formula such a riddle for the rest of us.

As he said himself: “That's what makes me!” Exceptional.

Source: http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/sport/go...e-14397146.html

Thanks, very informative!

I just don't follow what he is saying though. I know you want to know why it works, heck I know I wonder why things works all the time, but as the old saying goes, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". I don't remeber where I read this, but it was a good basketball player, who was asked about why he was so good his response was, "I don't know, I don't ask questions, I shoot the ball it goes in. I win, and I go home to my wife and kids." This response, make more sense to me, with all that he had accomplished, why would you go seeking answers, that have to this point turned out to be devestating to his career.

Yes, Tiger woods makes swing changes, but I don't recall Tiger having multiple missed cuts in a row. God forbid he didn't win a major in a year. But then again, Paddy isnt Tiger.

What he's saying is that he doesn't want to be a David Duval. Playing great without understanding why, then losing it and not being able to get it back quickly. He obviously has more of a Scientist/Engineer type of mindset. He won't be completely fulfilled until he understands the why. Most people of this ilk hate the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" mentality. They prefer "whatever it is, I can find a way to make it better." Don't forget, it's this mentality that got Paddy his 3 majors to begin with. People with this mentality don't live in the land of instant gratification. They enjoy the process of discovery and hard work.

Other guys don't care about the why, they just go hit it, find it and hit it again. Guys like Daly and Couples.

I totally understand this mindset. Look at how many golfers have "had it" and then lost it never to quite get it back. All levels of the game from HCP25+ to major winners (in their own context).

What Paddy is doing is trying to get to that next level, where he understands how it all fits together and can put it back together if something goes wrong somewhere. Tiger has exactly the same mentality IMO - he wants to "own his swing". Paddy now has the luxury of being a triple major winner, so to some extent the pressure is off - hes earned himself some time.

Agree also with his comments re PGA win - he was not really doing anything, but hung in there because of his amazing scrambling, then found just enough to win (with Sergio assisting a wee bit).

Have great respect for the guy.

I agree, he needs a repair kit and a full box of spare parts or whatever just in case.
BTW, he studied accountancy at university which may explain his outlook.

Another Harrington interview - “I don't want to play like I did last year

Dont worry Paddy, you aren't.

I think this shows two things
1) He MUST be a member on this site, with a special interest in the Swing/Fitness forum
2) He is a complete headcase. I can relate to that, because I think in exactly the same way. I just have to know every detail about everything I do, before I get the feeling that I can do it right. I think it is called paralysis by analysis. But don't make fun of it, it's a tough life, I can tell you.

I do understand two sides of this: On one side, I see what Paddy is saying. In a way, I do the same thing at the mid-handicap level (I think). I achieved my long-time goal of breaking 80...did it 3 times in a span of months. But then, somehow I feel my swing can still be improved--I don't necessarily rebuild my entire swing--but I end up making changes that takes me out of the "if it ain't broke" category....I read somewhere how Harrington goes into the offseason scared that when he starts to play again, he believes that he'll wake up and completely loses his swing....I know the feeling.

But on the other side of the argument, I can see how others say that ultimately, the goal is to win: "YOU PLAY TO WIN THE GAME!" (remember who said that?).

I'm hoping he does come back...might not be this year, but I hope he does start winning again. Imagine the second guessing that happens if Paddy never wins again? Paddy is just the kind of person that won't give a damn what others think, and that's a good thing. But inside, he'll have to hear people whispering "What if?"

Edit: question added: Would Paddy be happy if he never wins again but ends up understanding the swing better???

Didn't Howard Hughes go nuts?

Cheers,

Ben

+1 lost his marbles alright

Found a more extensive (and better written) piece on Paddy. Very interesting what the UPS/DHL guy said when delivering stuff to Paddy's house:

Padraig Harrington: Curious case of Paddy and the postman
Irish champion took his game apart to see what made it work but now he must put it all back together again. James Corrigan speaks to Padraig Harrington

Sunday, 12 July
'I probably wouldn't be able to accept performing without knowing why,' says Padraig Harrington


Never has a hat-trick hunter taken aim at glory with so many of his own fans anticipating him skewing it embarrassingly wide. Padraig Harrington probably realised this when he answered his front door recently to be confronted by a delivery man with a big parcel to be signed for in one hand and some personal baggage to be dispensed with in the other. "Be Jaysus, Padraig," folklore already has him saying. "You're playing a lot of shite at the minute."

Harrington can laugh at this reaction and, indeed, many similar ones that have greeted the atrocious form which has so far characterised the season following the immortal one of the year before. "I've got it all the time," the Irishman told The Independent on Sunday. "Advice, different suggestions, strange letters. There was one telling me to bathe in salt to get rid of all that radiation. Probably the funniest put-down, however, came from somebody close to me. My son Ciaran had run off into some long grass, someone asked where he was and this person replied, 'He's like his dad, he's in the rough'. She's a non-golfer, so she had obviously heard it from somebody else."

And therein lies the problem with winning back-to-back Opens, and after that back-to-back majors: that passenger known as excessive expectation which success foolishly brings along in its sidecar. Or is it a problem? Typically, Harrington has managed to convince himself of the contrary. "If people didn't realise I'd played badly for the last six months, it would mean I wasn't in the limelight and I was a journeyman pro," he said. "Even though I will have to work hard not to let it all get into my thinking, I'm better off in the situation I'm in."

Still, that situation was looking on the bleak outskirts of forlorn at the start of last week. With Turnberry just one more prep tournament away, Harrington had missed five cuts in a row and in the process had become the first professional to win two out of the last four majors and still not figure in the world's top 10.

Inevitably, the unlikelihood of him breaking a 53-year golfing void and winning three Opens in succession have been written large in the betting odds. Four others earned the chance to emulate Peter Thomson and they were priced thus: Arnold Palmer, 1963, 2-1; Lee Trevino, 1973, 6-1; Tom Watson, 1984, 5-1; Tiger Woods, 2007, 6-4. And Harrington in '09? 25-1 (or 33s if you can bother to go Googling). As shots at history go, the Dubliner was clearly adjudged to be armed with a water pistol.

But then came the Irish PGA Championship, and with it a glimmer and an omen. In 2007 Harrington won the Irish PGA in a play-off and went on to win at Carnoustie in a play-off. Last year he won the Irish PGA by four shots and went on to win at Birkdale by four shots. Yesterday he won the Irish PGA by seven shots. Is there any point the rest turning up at Turnberry? Very probably, yes. While Harrington was understandably chuffed, not everyone was so enthused after what was, in all honesty, little more than a club pro's event. Is Harrington any more likely to take his once in-a-lifetime chance of a treble? Again, there is the common view and there is the Paddy view. "It's never crossed my mind that this will be my only chance of three Opens in succession," he said. "I'm looking forward to my future in majors and I feel like I will win more. You see, winning three is much, much, much more difficult than winning two. Mathematically, I'm sure if you did the odds of it happening, the chances of a third is exponentially incredibly higher than two.

"It's a pointless thing to say I can go out and win it. That wouldn't help me win it. Even though I turn up and it will be three in a row, it's not like I'm winning all three in the one week. I'm just playing one event and I have to treat it like any of the majors I've played. It's not like I haven't tried 100 per cent in every one of them. I can't try any harder."

That might well sound like gibberish to some but then plenty of what Harrington utters invariably sounds like gibberish to somebody, somewhere. If ever an individual's ramblings can be described as being a window into the state of his mind then, on occasion, the words of Harrington are indeed as crystal clear as mud. This has been particularly true as he has struggled to explain the destructive tinkering he may or may not have made since his USPGA victory in Detroit last August.

Harrington has veered from revealing that his wife, relatives, caddie and yes, postman had urged him to stop all the swing changes and concentrate on what defined him as a great in the first place, to insisting that is just part of an ongoing process which he successfully paused when winning his three majors and which he will successfully pause again.

What does seem certain is that Harrington has failed to resemble Harrington, let alone to perform like Harrington. Even his revered short game has suffered an identity crisis. Whatever form the technical adjustments have taken, and whatever time frame they have followed, his search for perfection – or rather his search for the understanding of that perfection – has undeniably come at a cost. He explained his reasons for ripping apart a winning formula last week. "I probably wouldn't be able to accept performing without knowing why," he said. "I don't think I'd enjoy winning if I didn't know why I was winning. Understanding how I got there is the ultimate satisfaction. If somebody was the best at something in the world and they couldn't tell me why they were there I wouldn't be interested. That's my make-up. When Howard Hughes was a kid, he bought a Model T Ford or a Mercedes and pulled it apart to see how it all worked. That's me with my golf game."

The race to put it back together again in time for Turnberry has been one of the more intriguing challenges of this golfing campaign. Harrington is in no doubt that it is possible – "it can all turn around that quickly" – and neither is he in any doubt that, if his game is capable of entering him into that Sunday stretch mix, his psyche remains capable of doing the delivering. Two Opens and that American major have been enough to confirm that but he has found inspiration in the tapes of "The Duel in the Sun". While the majority watch the replays of Tom Watson's famous victory over Jack Nicklaus and are stunned by the quality of golf, Harrington was impressed by the competitive spirit shown by the pair.

"I remember hearing about the 'Duel' and got the tapes," he said. "What was phenomenal about it was that I had this impression of the absolute perfect golf being played. But when I actually watched it, it's more about the unbelievable competition, the fire in their eyes. They didn't hit every shot perfect, but they were recovering from every shot when they had to. It was the sheer 'I'm going to get this job done, regardless'. That's what made it so exciting and that's particularly what I admire about Watson. He was able to hit a bad shot and then stand up and just hit the greatest shot ever afterwards, like the one before didn't happen. And Nicklaus obviously overcame everything mentally. But Watson... it was just sheer bravado on his part. The ability to just keep ripping it like he's never missed a shot in his life, I love that attitude. Keeping it in the here and now."

That is a mantra which Harrington clearly lives by and certainly strives to play by. Everything he does is about the present and that is why he believes it will be possible to shrug off so many months of mediocrity. This is not the time for reflection or to go chasing the legends. He has enough contemporary rivals in his sights as it is. "No, I have never looked at who has won three majors in the history of the game," he claimed. "What I have looked at is who have won three majors who are currently playing the game. One hundred per cent I make a distinction. The last thing I want to do is to feel like what I've achieved in the game is the pinnacle. It may be, but I don't want to feel like that until I've retired.

"So I've continued to focus on trying to win more majors. I'm very aware that myself, Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els and Vijay Singh are the only competitive players who have won three outside of Tiger. You know, the next one of the three of us to win four will set that player apart. At 37, I'm the youngest of those four players and that's very important for me.

"Yeah, when I finish up I'll look back and say 'I won three majors, who else did that?' And, of course, there'll be my standing in the history of Irish sport to analyse. But that's for sitting back in the rocking chair with the grandchildren and telling them the great stories of what you did. It's not for now. I think it's very important that players shouldn't get involved in that, because I've seen the harm on many a good player's career in dwelling on their success. You've got to move on."

In his own unique way Harrington has tried to do just that. So many steps backwards and yesterday just a few steps forward. It will all end up at Turnberry. Once there, who knows? Paddy will be a jewel in whatever sun consents to shine, regardless.

Life and times

Born: 31 August 1971, Dublin

Height: 6ft 1in

Education: Went to Colaiste Eanna secondary school at the same time as fellow Ryder Cup golfer Paul McGinley; he went on to complete an accountacy degree before turning professional.

Family: Married his wife Caroline in 1997; they have two sons, Patrick (born in 2003) and Ciaran (born in 2007).

Career: Turned pro in 1995 and has now won three majors – the Open back-to-back in 2007 and '08, and the 2008 USPGA. European Tour player of the year in 2007 and '08. He is coached by Sam Torrance's father Bob.


Source - http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/golf/pa...an-1742621.html

Too much Bob Rotella. Psychologist quackpot - although that's a disservice to actual MDs.

I can definitely relate to Paddy. I have the same type of personality. I hate to say it, but instead of practicing to improve my play, it seems I play so I can see what I need to work on in practice. The results (winning/losing) are secondary and just a byproduct of the practice. This is for all sports and competition. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy winning. But the result of the contest is secondary to how I play. And there is nothing I can do about it. It is engrained in my bios. And if I have a bad day, great! I can immediately to the range or another court (whatever sport I am playing) and practice. It is just like therapy.

Booo! you beat me to it.