Highlighting Adam Kolloff: The Coach Who Shaped My Journey in Golf

Written By Sabrina Xiaorui Wu

Coach Adam Kolloff using Trackman technology to analyze a golfer's swing during a lesson. (Photo courtesy of Pure Drive Golf)

The experiences of all female golfers are shaped not only by training and tournaments, but by the support of a community of people who have believed in them every step of the way. One of the most crucial of these people is a coach who not only understands the game but is also able to adapt his/her teaching style to fit the player and truly bring out their greatest potential. A great coach recognizes what a player needs and is willing to go at the player’s pace. As cliché as it may sound, the extent of a Coach’s impact on a player’s connection to their sport is often underestimated.

For me, this role fell to Coach Adam Kolloff. At my lowest points in golf, he was always there, listening to and acknowledging my opinions/perspectives while doing his best to support me in whatever form I needed, such as through technical or mental advice or simply through a story about a similar experience he went through to let me know I wasn’t alone in my struggles.

As such, for my debut article in the SHEGOLF Blog, it is only fitting for me to recognize Coach Adam and his journey, because without him and his influence, I would not be the female golfer I am today.

What follows is a closer look at his experiences and perspectives that has made him such an impactful teacher.

If you drive down Washington Street in Woburn, Massachusetts and turn left onto Curtin Drive, you will find a set of insignificant-looking buildings on your left. Nestled within those buildings is a door that reads “Pure Drive Golf”. At first glance, the facility looks just like hundreds of others across the country, but if you turn 180 degrees to face the back wall, you will find countless frames that demonstrate what sets this place apart. Inside some of them are awards, while others hold articles from top golf magazines. Each is dedicated to or associated with a man named Adam Kolloff, an accomplished golf instructor and the owner of the business. What truly sets Adam and his business apart is his unique approach to teaching, his thorough understanding of the field, and his status as an innovator, designing his own training aids to help players improve their golf game.

Adam began his golf career as an instructor at the Liberty National Golf Club. While working there, he saw its amazing practice facility which was only open to the private members. This got him thinking about creating a business that would make facilities similar to those he saw at Liberty National accessible to the general public, thereby giving more players a chance to access tools which would help them to improve their game. In 2018, this business idea became a reality. Now, seven years later, Adam has built a large community surrounding Pure Drive Golf, including passionate instructors and the thousands of people who visit the facility for instruction, club fitting, or practice. In Adam’s own words, “everyone [who] comes to Pure Drive [has] created something really special… [it’s] a place where golfers can come together and improve their game… It’s really exciting to see how things are going”.

Adam’s integration of technology with golf instruction is a main factor that sets him apart from others in the golf instruction field. Through the use of Trackman technology, which can provide data points that help measure aspects of the golf swing such as club speed, attack angle, and club path, Adam can more effectively identify problem areas in a golfer’s swing. As he puts it, one “can't always see what’s going on in the golf swing [as] it’s really hard with the naked eye to identify what is the reason the ball went where it did. The data is really helpful for us as teachers [because] it puts the golf swing under the microscope… [which] makes it easier to identify the right thing that [students] need to work on”. Over the years Adam has developed an extraordinarily detailed understanding of Trackman to the point that he wrote and published a book called The Ultimate Guide to TrackMan Swing Analysis in 2016, which breaks down how to analyze and best utilize the data Trackman offers.

Another aspect of Adam’s unique teaching style is his building block approach to coaching. When a student comes in for a lesson, he first identifies the base level he needs to help the student with, which could be the grip, iron shots, stance, all of which depends on the golfer that he is working with, as Adam understands that golfers at different levels have different bases, and helping them to improve that base could provide a stronger foundation for that player’s game. In short, Adam’s training style is golfer-focused as he tries “to teach the individual golfer, not teach an individual method… [since he] tries to be very open with students”.

Adam is also one of a few golf instructors to hold the title of inventor. He has developed his own training aids, which help to address common problems found in golfers. Two of his most notable training aids are Pure Plane Pro and the Practice Glove. 

Pure Plane Pro is a training aid that addresses one of the most common problems faced by golfers: not being able to control ball flight, as many golfers have a faulty swing path that leads to inconsistency. Adam developed Pure Plane Pro, an aid that can be placed on the ground to hold an alignment stick at an adjustable angle, giving golfers and teachers an individualized practice station. The innovation comes from using another golf club to hold the training aid down, allowing for the design to be lightweight and easy to use. . Feedback has also been positive, as this training tool is not only lightweight, so it’s easy to travel with, but it’s also customizable, making it appealing to teachers and students alike.

As for the Practice Glove, Adam has seen many players struggle to develop a consistent grip. This led him to begin to think about what he could put on the glove to help golfers hold the club properly. By experimenting with drawing dots and lines, he eventually realized that a strap could be attached to the glove, which helps to lock in the grip once the club is positioned correctly in the hands. Most golf instructors who were shown this glove were really excited, as the problem of maintaining a consistent grip is common among golfers of all ages.

When asked regarding his take on golf today, Adam further emphasized the rise of technology integration in this sport, and how it is at the frontline of the changes golf has gone through since he started teaching over a decade ago. He says there are now “so many different ways to teach… [and] so many tools that instructors can use” especially with more advanced technology such as Trackman, biomechanical data sensors, force plate technology (helps to analyze weight distribution), which, while helpful, could still allow for countless opinions that would make it intimidating for people trying to get started in the game. But he believes the net change has been positive, as more staff are now being employed at golf courses, more camps are opening in the summer, PGA junior leagues are gaining popularity as junior golf expands, and women’s golf is also on the rise. 

When asked about advice for prospective golf instructors, Adam recommends that it’s best to get started coaching as soon as possible. In his own words, “you’ve got to get involved right away… don’t be afraid to go for it… even if [your] knowledge level is not where you would like it to be. The best thing you can learn is from experience”. Then for junior golfers, Adam points out they need to be “careful [while] setting expectations [because setting] expectations too high sets you up for frustration with failure”, since the game of golf  “is like a roller coaster.” Playing really well for one tournament does not guarantee you will do the same for the next. Adam also mentions that it’s important that golf does not seem “like a job”. He recommends that junior golfers remember to “play with friends as much as possible… [because it’s] more relaxed and fun,” which helps develop skills faster by reducing the pressure. 

So “have fun with [golf]. You can’t get too serious too quickly”.