Out of the blue, in his July 7 blog, our loose-cannon, Swisher Sweet-chomping pal Rebel Blogger ripped celeb instructor Gary Wiren. “Wiren and his gang are pitchmen who will teach you the same thing as anyone else. Good instruction is personalized, one on one and cannot be done in a seminar,” the Reb wrote, going on to say that “perpetual marketers” like Wiren are like puppy mills whose business it is to get as many duffers through the turnstiles as they can for as much as they can get.

Now I know when that hat gets a little tight, the Reb gets his jollies lashing out at anyone who has happened to wander into his radar field (witness his rant about Mississippi Gulf Coast Golf Association PR man Kevin Drum and Tim McDonald’s well-thought-out retort, or his comments about Santee, S.C.). But I want the Reb to answer one simple question:

Have you ever taken a lesson from Wiren in any format, be it one-on-one, group or seminar? Yes or no?

I’ve never met Wiren face to face, though we have some mutual friends and exchange e-mails from time to time, and he frequently leaves comments regarding various TravelGolf.com stories, columns, blogs, etc. Sometimes they’re not complimentary but that’s ok – Dr. Wiren brings a point of view to the table and presents it in a civil manner (and he doesn’t do it from behind the anonymity of a fake name, a hat from Wal Mart and a stogie from the gas station ….. in fact, Wiren’s web site lists his contact info. for all to see). I do know, though, that in addition to being ranked with some pretty lofty company, Wiren was the PGA of America’s 1986 Teacher of the Year; he’s one of just 31 Master Certified Teaching Professionals out of more than 27k PGA members; he’s a member of four Golf Halls of Fame; he’s been awarded the LPGA’s highest award for contributions to teaching; he was a member of the Golf Digest Professional Panel with the likes of Snead, Runyan, Middlecoff and Flick, and on and on and on (no, I’m not obsessed with him, I just looked up this stuff on his web site). Simply put, the guy has to be doing something right and it ain’t just marketing.

So what is it, Reb? Simple question: Have you taken a golf lesson from Gary Wiren?

– Mark

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