Hello everyone. I’ve been asked to put down on paper my experiences with my self and my golfing life so all you GGA alumni and soon to be alumni can get to know me and maybe see yourself in my story somewhere. So here goes.

My name is Daniel J Bassett Jr.  My friends call me Doc.  I live in Meriden , Connecticut and have for my whole life, which as of this past June 30th is 40 years. (man, where has it all gone?).  I am 5' 10" and I weigh about 182 lbs.  I am married to my childhood sweetheart Lorraine .   We have been married almost 13 years and have been with each other for 23 plus years. She is the only thing in the world that gives me as much pleasure (and anguish?) as golf.  She has been through it all with me.  From my crying about not being good enough to play with the "good" guys to my crying about being called a sandbagger all the way down to my low of 9.0 handicap. (Seems like I do a lot of crying huh?)  Anyway my story is probably the typical story you'll here as the Alumni letters start rolling in.

I didn't start playing golf until I was about 24 years old.  I worked the night shift and the guys that worked there at Pratt and Whitney Aircraft would go golfing in the summer and bowling in the winter.  Being a competitive person who was excelled in the "main" sports in school, I couldn't wait to show these "geezers" what a "real athlete" was. (Incidentally I'm now older than those so called geezers were then.)  I started and played for my high school baseball and basketball teams so how hard could this game where the ball doesn't even move be?  Well it didn't take me long to figure out that this game was harder than anything I'd ever done in the past.  I mean with those other sports I just excelled without even trying. I use to think it was only my competitiveness that was the difference between me and others, thinking I did well because I "wanted it" more than they did.  I liked golf right from the very start but I just couldn't "get it".  We kept handicaps for our leagues and tournaments and although I took lessons and practiced my butt off I just couldn't break 90 and most times didn't break 100. The lowest I ever got my handicap was 24.2 back then. (I still have the card because I was so proud I had finally broken the 25 barrier.)  I really didn't know why I couldn't stop that darn slice I had back then but man it was the biggest slice anyone had seen.  I still haven't seen anyone play that bad since.  I mean I even use to slice wedges, I had to try to aim way left to make up for the slice of even my most lofted clubs.

Well as the years rolled by I became more and more frustrated with the game and eventually it became one of those things to do while me and my buddies drank and goofed off on the course. I really use to resent the fact that being as competitive as I am inside, I just couldn't seem to play this game good at all and soon I just stopped playing.  I got heavy into softball and adult league baseball games where I could be competitive and do some winning and grinning.  I would still play golf a few times a year but hated the fact that this game, what I use to think was a "sissy game " growing up,  just could not be played in any kind of seriousness because I just really stunk at it.

During the winters I played on a state championship dart team and the guys would play golf together in the summers and I would get my butt kicked by my teammates.  I mean they were no Jack Nicklaus’ or Arnold Palmer’s but they were in the high 80's low 90's while I would hover around 100. I would practice, take lessons and it seemed I just got worse.  Then in the bar one night during a dart league game I saw an infomercial about Natural Golf and I remembered the Golf Digest article that was in the infomercial. So the next day I went up into my attic to try to find the magazine that I had seen the night before.  I found it and inside it had an article about Moe Norman and it had a side piece that said "You can learn to swing like Moe".  So I just tried to do what it said in the article:  Hold your right hand out in front of you and turn it at a 45 degree angle and then pull the back of your hand to your forearm and then put the club in it like that.  It went in to a few things so I went to the range and I couldn't believe my eyes.  I was actually hitting the ball straight-sort of. But the huge banana was gone, gone, gone!  At that time I belonged to an executive course that had a par of 30.  I was usually around 43 to 48 on that course for 9 holes. The 2nd day after hearing about this Natural Golf thing I went out and shot 33!  I just couldn't believe it.  From then on I was hooked on the Moe Norman swing.

I ordered the Lifetime of better golf package, which I thought was a great name because it seemed like my golfing life had been turned upside down.  I got in touch with a Natural Golf instructor by the name of Fran O'Keefe who was teaching up in Maine .  In the early days of Natural Golf, I'm talking about 1998 which is when I first started with Natural Golf, it was hard to find an instructor.  But I did and I agreed to go up to Maine for the weekend with my wife, who loves Maine having vacationed there as a child, and spent the time learning all I could about my new direction in golf.  I thought Fran was a good instructor and other than being a Red Sox fan we got along good.  I took to this new "simple" swing very easily.  All the sudden I'm beating my friends, sometimes, and having fun.  In the early days of my involvement of Natural Golf I really enjoyed the learning and the new playability of my new golf game.  I was very happy.

The following year Fran left to move to Florida and I had to find a new Natural Golf instructor.  In the mean time I got all the tapes I could find on Moe Norman and Natural Golf.  I was playing well at my Executive course; I got a hole in one in my 2nd year and this got me into Natural Golf’s Hall of Fame.  Man things were looking good to me, Natural Golf was a miracle!  In July of 1999 I shot an even par 30 three separate times and a 29 once.  I shot 80 at the course I play now that August, and shot my lowest 18 holes with a 65, 35 -30.   In September I won the Miner Hills Inaugural Club Championship.  Can you believe it?  Two years before I could barely break 100 and now I'm shooting rounds of 5 over par and winning club championships.   Things were looking good.  And then just as suddenly I started to play bad again.  I don't know what happened, things just started to not work the same.  I was looking for a new Natural Golf instructor and found one who had recently took up residence in Connecticut . (All this time Peter Fox was living in Connecticut , but I didn't know it)  After I started working with the new instructor, who I though was good, I started noticing some differences in the way he taught Natural Golf and the way Fran taught Natural Golf and what the tapes and Moe were saying.  I had a feeling something was going on here and I didn't know who or what to believe.  First of all, I had more time studying Natural Golf than he had, which probably doesn’t mean anything now that I look at it but at the time it really did and I would question everything he was telling me to do.  He gave me the impression that he only made money off me if I bought clubs, that Natural Golf got all the school money so there was a big burden I felt to buy another set of Natural Golf clubs,( I had already bought a set from Fran).  But I didn't want to make the only instructor I had in Connecticut mad so I ended up buying another set of Natural Golf clubs and hated them.  And my game kinda hung there at about an 18 handicap.  I had gotten it down to about a 14 when I was playing good but then it went up to 18 and I couldn’t get back down.

I think it was about a year or so with my second Natural Golf instructor and he moved to Florida as well.  So here I was again looking for some help for my game but definitely not ever going back to the old ways, I was definitely sticking with Natural Golf.  Then in I think it was about in 2000 or 2001 I saw in one of the Natural Golf magazines that Todd Graves was going to stop playing on tours and he was going to concentrate on teaching schools.  I was so mad.   All I kept thinking about was how all the rich guys and company CEO’s were going to get the guy from the tapes to show them how to do it.

You see, I'm a sheet metal journeyman, and construction workers are not the type of guys you think of being able to afford the Natural Golf Signature School with Todd Graves .  I conjured up a bunch of well to do gentlemen getting the best over us working types once again.  But as I read deeper into the article it said that Todd Graves Signature Natural Golf schools were just about the same price, maybe a bit more but I don't think it was much because I knew it was within my means, which aren't much.  I perked up a bit but then I thought how in the world am I ever going to go, my wife would never be on board with this, Damn!  So I sulked around a bit for a couple days and my wife finally says “What’s your problem?”  I said forget it,  “You'll never understand.”   Long story short she says, “Of course we can go”.  She has family down in Florida and we hadn't seen Mickey in awhile so she was on board.  Awesome!

So the first Little Moe Invitational Tournament was my first meeting with the Todd & Tim Graves .  I had a couple hour lesson at one of the schools they were teaching and it was great!  From the very first time I was being taught I knew that it was a good fit.  The one thing I never had to do was question the directions.  I mean, if Todd says it, then it is. How could I argue with the guy who learned straight from Moe and was called “Little Moe”?  There was no wondering if I've been with the Natural Golf / Moe swing longer or if this guy knows what he's talking about.  I mean he’s the man.  So the lesson and the clinic's at the Little Moe and I was off and running again with my game.  My scores started to come back down again and it was and is just awesome.

It’s been about 4 years now since I've been under GGA's direct teaching. I've gone from the fifth flight in my course tournaments to the first.  The first year I was with these guys I won the Fifth flight gross competition as an 18 handicap.  The next year I finished 3rd overall and 1st net in the third flight playing as a 14 handicap.  Last year I was the 16th seed in the first flight, making the first flight by 9/10's of stroke.  I had to play the first seed in match play and was giving no chance by anyone.  Well, I beat him.  He shot 72 and I shot 80 but with the allocated strokes I moved on.  I won my next match and lost my next match on the 18th hole.  We were tied on 17 but I made par to his birdie.  So I ended up tied for 3rd playing as a 10 handicap. (My index was 9.0 but my course handicap was a 10.)  So I have been as low as a 9.0 so far under Tim and Todd’s tutelage.  I say was because at present I'm higher than that right now but this is part of the process.

The process or the journey is something you'll hear a lot about from Todd and Tim. You see, the golf swing is not a destination, it’s not something that you travel to and all the sudden there you are.  It’s always in motion.  You’re always working on something or at least you should be.  I learned that the hard way this past winter but I'll get to that in a minute.  I have been to three Moe Norman tournaments along with the clinics they put on at these, I have been to two 3 day golf schools and  one 5 day Build Your Game Camp.  I am a member of their mail-in video program.  After every one of these schools or camps or clinics my handicap goes up.  Now you may say, “Isn’t it supposed to go down?”, and it has and does continue to drop.  But first, the handicap has always gone up. When you are trying to change something or get rid of a compensation you are not playing well or not as well as you normally do.  You have to go through these things in order to get to the Promised Land, which I feel is the exact replica of Moe Norman or even Todd’s swing.  But in order to get there you have to do what the artist does that chisels the work of art out of a giant rock.  He simply takes away anything that doesn't look like the finished project that’s in his head and leaves the rest.  That is what GGA is doing to my swing; they are taking out all the parts that don't look like Moe’s swing and leaving the rest and giving me the tools to put the rest in.  The process is a b**ch.  It is very frustrating at times and jubilant at others.  But it is never the same as it was, it is always moving.  One of the great things they do is they teach you a scratch game short game.  This way while you’re working on your swing to have perfect ball striking you will have a great short game to bail you out some so the scoring valleys aren't as low.

I said I'd mention this winter’s mistake later and it is later.  At the end of last year I was hitting the ball as good as I've ever have and I thought I'd take this winter off so as not to change anything and figure this year I' d only work on short game stuff and I'd have a killer game.  Some how my body didn't get the message and I started this year off as a 9 or 10 handicap and have ballooned up.  By not moving forward this winter on fundamentals I moved backwards in my game.  This coupled with the normal upswing of my spring 3 day school has me in the frustration part of the journey but I've been here before and I know that it will not last forever and it just gives me more motivation to make the changes that I am working on.

I hope everyone who reads this has the chance to meet Todd and Tim.  Your golf game will never be the same if you do. At the very least I would implore everyone to get the videos, as well as get a tape in to them so they can take a look and get you on your journey to a better game.  The best thing you can do for your game if you have the time and finances is to go to a Build Your Game Camp, it’s the best thing I have done so far, hands down.  Luckily for me, Todd & Tim have made an annual trip to my home area every year for the last 4 years.  What I did in Connecticut is I simply put enough people together for it to be worth it to them to come here. They (Todd & Tim) have a motto, “If you have the golfers they will come”.  I'm glad to say we've had them here once a year ever since.

If you’re on the fence on whether to trust them with your game I'm telling you that you absolutely will not regret it - I never have.  From my best in conventional golf, a  24.2 handicap,  trying to break 100, to breaking (80) 7 out of my last 10 rounds last year and a low of 9.0 so far using the Moe Norman Method.  Which do you think I'm going to do?  I'd like to put my email address down so all of you can talk to me if you'd like but with all the email scramblers grabbing names for spam I can't put it here but you can get it on the chat room just by pushing my screen name(doc9) and sending it to me that way.  I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have.

One of the hardest things at first is to trying to swing differently and playing with your regular partners and hearing all the crap about if it is so good then why isn't anyone on tour playing it. Every one of us who plays the Moe Norman method has heard these taunts. So one of the great things that we have done on the Moe chat rooms is form different chapters of Moe swingers so you can get together with other Moe swingers in your area to sort of get a little pep talk or just to feel "normal" while you play.   It’s great to play golf with people who swing or are trying to swing the Moe Norman way.   It at the very least lets you let your guard down for the day so as not to feel like you have to prove the swing every time you play.   At our New England chapter last year I brought my camcorder with me and we taped all of our swings and sent it in to GGA to have evaluated at a discounted price.   Some of the guys don't have access to a camera so it really worked out well for us.

Well, I hope I have given you all a little insight into one persons journey into the land of the Moe Norman swing, and the GGA.   It’s the best thing that I have ever done for my golf game.   I'm not sure If I would even still be playing now if I hadn't gotten involved with the single axis swing. I do know that I will never play any other kind of golf.   I bet you won't either if you give it a try.   Good luck to all of you and please feel free to contact me through the chat room.   I'd be glad to help or just listen to your journey story.

Keep it straight, Dan