Wendy Ferrara grew up playing golf with her father. By the time she got to Ithaca College, she was competing on the men's team. Her short game had to be sharp, because “those boys hit it forever.”
She went on to become a licensed physical therapist and built a golf rehabilitation program at her clinic in New Jersey.
"My love for golf and my love for physical therapy and helping people literally brought me to this point."
Even with her Northern upbringing, Vero Beach always felt like home. Her grandfather lived here. Her family vacationed here. When she and her husband built a house and started splitting their time between New Jersey and Florida, Bent Pine was already her favorite course in town.
A Joe Lee design, this course was built on a distinctive sand ridge where the soil provides superior conditions to support Bermuda and Tif Eagle grasses, towering pines, palmettos and indigenous Florida wildlife. For a teaching professional, a course like this is as much a classroom as the range.
In 2022, she accepted the Club’s Director of Instruction role.
Today, Wendy has 25 years of teaching behind her—and a lesson tee full of members who span every age and ability level. Joint replacements, spine fractures, cancer recovery, beginner and advanced lessons, junior scholarships—the range of what she sees in a week is genuinely wide.
A lesson with Wendy starts with a conversation. Before she asks you to take a club back, she wants to know who you are as a golfer.
She asks about your scoring history, how often you play, what you’ve been working on, and what’s been failing you. She wants to know whether something hurts, if you have had surgery, or if something limits your movement.
"My eyes and my brain never stop watching movement patterns," she says. "But there's a lot to take into consideration. Their equipment, how many times they play, how much they practice, and just understanding their technical level of knowledge."
Wendy spent years as a sports and orthopedic physical therapist before transitioning into teaching, and her approach reflects both.
"When students come to me, it's very much like being in the clinic. I look at tendencies. I listen to their goals and to what their problem lists are,” she says. "The blueprint for how I teach is almost like an evaluation. You're rehabilitating the swing as well as the person."
She uses video analysis when it helps, factors in any physical limitations, and builds from there. By assessing different angles, positions, postures, and balance, her goal is consistent contact, and the blueprint to it is different for everyone.
"The two most common issues I see in players is their lack of trust in contact and their misunderstanding of body movement (that fear at the moment where club meets ball). There's an adjustment that has to happen, and a lot of it is mental," Wendy explains. “Rehearsing drills more frequently is how patterns are changed and confidence is built.”
The mental side of golf gets underestimated, and Wendy argues it is built into the game itself.
But that gap is where many rounds fall apart. Members might struggle with maintaining pre-shot routines, staying focused on their process, and separating their feelings from their performance. Wendy focuses on helping members trust what they already have.
With beginners, Wendy starts small with short shots, real grass, and a quiet corner of the range. A chip that finds the air and rolls toward the target does more for a new player's confidence than an hour of full-swing theory.
"They get so excited just to see a little bit of trajectory, a ball going on line with such little effort."
Bent Pine is a gem for women who play the game. Between the 9-hole and 18-hole women's groups, there are well over a hundred active players on the roster and that community keeps growing.
Wendy works with them, meeting each player where she is and building from there. She wants to give them enough command of the short game to feel comfortable when it counts.
Advanced players are completely different. They arrive with years of ingrained habits—and often strong beliefs from internet fixes.
"The hardest thing with advanced players is to get them to unlearn something. They need much more conversation. We need to dig out what they're thinking."
Wendy offers both range and playing lessons, and for advanced players the latter often makes all the difference. A playing lesson is where everything she has been working on with a member gets tested in real conditions, hole by hole, shot by shot.
Wendy feels that the members make her work meaningful.
"I've never ever had anybody not be able to get back to playing. The challenge of taking the limitation and making it work, that to me is probably the most rewarding."
She’s developed her teaching philosophy working alongside David Glenz, a PGA Tour professional and New Jersey Hall of Famer. She helps members know how the club moves, know how their bodies move, and blend the two.
"Success comes in all sizes. It's not always about the winning score or the longest drive. It's more about those small moments where a road map is developed toward self-improvement," she shares.
For anyone wanting to improve their game, Wendy says to practice often, spend time inside 50 yards, and get friendly with your wedges. The short game is where handicaps drop.
"Get a little better today than you were yesterday," she says. "That's it."
Wendy is one of two Golf Magazine Top 100 Teachers at Bent Pine – and her instruction is a testament to the club’s exceptional golfing experience. The golf here has always attracted people who take the game seriously, and the instruction has kept pace with that.
For members, access to Wendy is just one part of what Bent Pine offers. It’s worth knowing what is waiting on the other side of that decision.