by Roger Zotti
The least fun part of writing the book was putting the rules and definitions together,” said Mary Galvano, author of “Ladies, Get a Grip: Playing Golf for Business and Pleasure the Feminine Way” and an LPGA class A golf professional. But the other things, such as “talking about why we need golf, the history of golf, golf instruction, nutrition, the mental game – all those were fun to write about.”
What Mary, a golf instructor for twenty years, found most rewarding about writing “Ladies, Get a Grip” was completing a project she thought about for several years and “expressing my own points of view and putting my teaching in print for everyone to see, and also helping women and men experience the benefits of golf.”
Because “there are so many golf books out there,” said Mary, she wanted her book to be different. She writes: “Much of the information in this book can be used on the golf course.” At the same time, Mary writes that “golf is… a mirror of one’s life,” which is the book’s recurring motif and nicely illustrated in Chapter 2, “The Mental Game.” That’s where Mary, in the clear and unpretentious language that distinguishes her writing style, talks about nervousness as being natural (“…it means you care about the situation you are in”); about making mistakes and then recovering (“…recovery is more impressive anyway”); about preparedness and practice as the keys to confidence; and about the dangers of over-confidence (she learned not to take her “abilities for granted”).
The danger of over-thinking is also one of the chapter’s key points. Most of the great golfers, Mary writes, “when asked what they are thinking of in between shots … have said something other than golf. Not to say they aren’t concentrating on the performance at hand. They are just not working [themselves] up to where they are too nervous to make a shot.” Sage advice on and off the golf course.
As a writer and golfer Mary’s foremost influence was her father, the late Phil Galvano. “He wrote three golf books – all of them were New York Times best-sellers,” Mary pointed out. (“Ladies get a Grip” is dedicated to her father, whom she calls “the greatest teacher I have ever had, not only in golf but in life.”) Books she enjoys reading are “biographies and those having to do with being better than you are.” As for her favorite authors, Mary “looks up to a plethora of writers.”
At this juncture, Mary has two books in the works. One is for children, she said, “and has nothing to do with golf.” The other is about the mental game of golf and competing under pressure. Mary writes for various magazines and syndicated columns for several newspapers in Fort Myers, FL. Her website is www.marygalvano.com.
Posted on October 1st, 2008 | category: Author
