Greg Norman - August 24, 2012

• By Morning Drive Team
• Aug 24, 2012 8:12 AM ET

World Golf Hall of Fame Member Greg Norman has a Champions Golf Academy in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and while many look at golf as a cruel game, he looks at golf as a fickle game as there are times when many of us can shoot low rounds for a while and then stop progressing for many different reasons. What he is trying to do with the Champions Golf Academy is teach values to junior golfers that will give them experience in competing but also giving them to tools to know how to get better and how to get through the tough times on the course because we all have those moments.

When looking at junior academies in the United States against academies overseas, Norman said that some of the important issues include understanding what junior golfers in a given region need to learn in golf and also finding a way to keep golf as affordable as possible to as many junior golfers as possible. Junior golfers in the United States do not necessarily have the same approach as junior golfers in China and he learned that from personal experience. Some people approach golf from a physical standpoint while others approach golf from a mental standpoint and you have to customize your teachings to fit those approaches.

Norman is one of several golf course designers who are known for building difficult courses and as a result he as well as the others are constantly asked why they build courses to be so difficult. He reminded people that he and other designers often do what the course owners tell them to do and in many cases the owners and developers want a difficult course that will hopefully host a PGA TOUR event or even a Major Championship. There have been plenty of instances when he has advised owners not to demand a course that is too difficult in part because he believes that golf courses should be able to allow players of all abilities to not only succeed but also have fun.

When asked about the news out of Augusta National that the first two female members will be invited, he feels that the move towards this moment began when Billy Payne became Chairman. Payne is a very intelligent man who has a lot of experience in running organizations including the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. He could be wrong about this, but he thinks that Payne had been thinking about the induction of the first female members since before he became Chairman. Both Condoleezza Rice and Darla Moore are very impressive people in their respective fields and Norman feels that they will contribute a lot to Augusta National as the first female members.