Tag: golf swing

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Golf: Breaking Down The Golf Swing

When I wrote about fault no.1 I mentioned the 9 parts of the golf swing. The golf swing is a continuous motion. For beginning golfers, it is good to understand each part of the golf swing. Even players who have played for a while can benefit from this knowledge. In order to play to the best of your ability, is it necessary to get each part exactly right? Absolutely not. As I have written many times, the swing is not the thing. Your pre-swing actions, before grabbing a club or at the address position, probably affect your shot more. Still, it is helpful to understand the elements of a good golf swing. It is also beneficial to learn the best ways to accomplish them. It is also good to know some of the pitfalls to avoid when executing the golf swing. Without further ado, here is the golf swing

Step 1. Starting the golf swing. The main goal here is to start the club low to the ground for the first 12 to 18 inches of the golf swing. Arnold Palmer thought this was the most important part of the golf swing. He felt if you did this, you could not make a bad swing. The easiest drill I know to get the right feel is to place a large ball behind your club at address. A soccer or volleyball will do. As you start your swing, just push the ball away. This will give you a great feel for keeping the clubhead low to the ground. You will hear a lot about the one-piece takeaway with everything starting at once. Some of that is even being questioned today. I would not worry about the one-piece takeaway. Simply keep the club low to the ground and begin turning your body.

Step 2. Getting the club shaft parallel to the ground. Once the shaft is parallel to the ground, you want to check the position of the clubhead. The clubhead should be pointing in a direction that is parallel to the ground. If you have closed the clubhead to your intended line, then the clubhead will be pointing toward the ground. If you have fanned open the clubhead, then it will be pointing toward the sky. The easiest way to see this is to lay a club on the ground with a tee behind the clubhead to keep the club head from falling over. Take your stance with the middle of your feet even with and perpendicular to the club shaft. Take your swing, and when your club shaft gets parallel to the ground, it should be a perfect match. There will be some players that have a slightly closed clubface at this point in the swing. That is not a bad position and can help in preventing a hook. You will never see anyone really fan open the clubhead at this point in the swing. Even Hogan, whose clubhead was wide open at the top of the swing, was still square at this point in the swing.

Step 3. The left arm is parallel to the ground. At this point in the swing, the club shaft should be perpendicular to the ground. The left arm and the club shaft should form an L. This is where the wrists should be almost fully cocked. Everyone uses their wrists differently, but if the wrists are fully cocked at this point in the swing, then I think you can avoid getting into that wrist-flipping action at the top of the swing. The cocking of the wrists is one of the most interesting subjects of the golf swing, but if you want to increase your distance, getting them fully cocked at this point in the swing will help. To do this, the club shaft needs to be perpendicular to the ground at this point in the swing.

Step 4. The top of the backswing. The key positions here are that the left shoulder should be under your chin. This will give you a 90-degree shoulder turn. Your hips should turn 45 degrees. You should feel that your weight is almost all on the inside part of the right foot. These are guidelines. My view is the more you can turn your hips, the better off your body will be. At this point, your club shaft should be pointing on a line that is parallel to the target or right of the target. Some touring pros may have their shaft pointing left of the target, but they are big and strong. For the average player, this position will just lead to short, crooked shots.

Step 5. Starting down. This is where the swing starts to get tricky. A lot of people will refer to this as the transition. Another observation is that the downswing starts before the backswing is fully completed. If you watch videos of some of the great golf swings or the golf swings of tour players, this is very true. However, thinking about it usually leads to disaster. I think you need to do two things at this point in the golf swing. You must be aware of or feel the change in direction of the golf swing. This will cause a slight pause at the top. It has to happen because nothing can change directions without stopping first. This is a basic law of physics. You want to feel the pause, not consciously do it. Then your next thought should be to get your weight on your left foot before starting down. It is not important how you do it, just do it. You want to try and feel that your arms and hands are starting down slowly from that paused position.

Step 6. Your left arm is parallel to the ground and the club shaft is perpendicular to the ground. The exact same position when your left arm is parallel to the ground on the backswing. The one big difference is that things are happening so fast in the swing at this point you can’t consciously control it. This is where you have to begin to let it go. You have to trust your swing at this point and finish the job. This is why starting down slowly is so important. This is where you can maintain your wrist cock as you start down. If you can do that, the wrists will still be cocked when the arm is parallel to the ground.

Step 7. Impact. The moment of truth. Your body is unwinding. The key point of impact is that your belly button has to be past the ball at this point. Your head is still just above or slightly behind the ball. This is where a lot of people begin to come up and out of the shot. You must stay down and finish the job.

Step 8. The straightening of the right arm. This straightening of the right arm is a result of staying with the shot. You have to be able to resist the temptation to look up to see where the ball is going. A great feeling is that your right shoulder is coming around and literally forcing your head up and out of the way.

Step 9. Finishing the swing. A lot of people like to call this the follow-through. I prefer finishing the swing because that is what you are doing. The straightening of the right arm and finishing the swing in a nice balanced way are very important parts of the swing, even though they happen after the ball has been struck. You want to be aware of these parts of the swing because it stops you from hitting at the ball. You want to be able to hit through the ball. If you are aware of the last two steps of the golf swing, your swing will accelerate through the hitting area and not be slowing down.

This is essentially the golf swing. You do not have to perform each part of the swing perfectly or exactly as it has been described here. Having an idea of what is required will at least help you in developing a style that will be effective for your game. Having an effective sound golf swing will help improve your game. Getting a fairly good golf swing can help, but there is still the short game and putting, which can really drive you nuts if you let it. Hit ’em straight.

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Golf: Mystery No. 3, Why Things Work, Until They Don’t

A thing is defined as an object or entity not precisely designated or capable of being designated. I think thing is the perfect word for what we try on the golf course to get through a round of golf. Those things may include swing thoughts, swing methods, various address positions and mental processes that we think will either get us through a round of golf or improve our golf game in general. In fact, it could be any combination of these things, that one could use to suddenly improve their ball striking abilities. Putting is an even more fickled activity. There are endless ways and techniques that are described in putting. One of the amazing things about all of this is that we are not the only ones doing all of these different things to try and improve are games. You hear about pros changing their swings all the time. They are putting one way one year and then another way the next year. Vijay Singh has won three major championships in 1998, 2000, and 2004. In each of these majors, he won with a distinctly different putting method. From this point on I will go back to calling all of this, things again, because I do not think it makes any difference which of the things we are discussing. They all have the same thing in common. They work for a while and then they don’t, so we go to a new thing. Sometimes we will go back to an old thing that we may have used years before and gosh darn it, it starts to work again. Alas, over time it quits working. Let’s take a look at each part and see if we can unravel this mystery. No spoiler alert here, we don’t but I am going to proceed anyway with lots of theories. I will look at each part, why they may work, why they quit working, and is there any alternative.

Even though I am putting all of these things under one heading there is one of these things that is a little bit different. Swing methods are more of complete swing techniques, where all the other things could be looked at as band aids or quick fixes. Ah yes, good old swing methods or systems. There have been many over the years and I am not going to mention any of them because they all suck. They are associated with some well-known instructor or player and have lots of testimonials. This is what you might call the long version of all the other things listed above. You decide to try one of the methods and give 100% to it. You practice, you make the changes in your swing, and this is what happens in any system. At first there is some back sliding. You’re getting use to new swing and pre-swing techniques, but after x amount of time and rounds, things begin to click. You feel you are hitting the ball better and your scores are even coming down some. What eventually happens is your game goes back to about the same level it was when you started the new system. You will see this with tour players when they change swing coaches. There is the period of adjustment, the supposed break through happens, but then they wind up with pretty much the same record they had with their old swing coach, over the same time period. The band aide treatments just do all of this in a much faster time frame, sometimes in the matter of a few holes. Change your grip, stand taller, stand closer, be more relaxed, change the waggle, speed up your tempo, slow down your tempo, be more rhythmic, finish in balance, swing easier, swing harder, make a full backswing, smooth transition, and finally who gives a shit. Then there is the mental game of picturing the shot, visualization, positive attitude, keeping your cool, not reacting to bad shots, playing conservatively, playing aggressively, letting go of bad shots, making the correct adjustments to the conditions, and finally who gives a shit. Like all of the methods, these things work until they don’t. They usually stop working quicker and rarely make it to the next round. These are facts Jack but why does this happen. I will be damned if I know but here are some theories that are probably worthless, but I don’t care.

We are all trying to improve, God love us, but most of these things are tried because at least in our own minds our games are actually getting worse. If we shot our handicap every time, I am not too sure we would be doing any of these things. Right now, my index is 5.7. If I shot below 80 every time, I think I would be fairly satisfied and would just go ahead and swing away without a care in the world. In my last 20 rounds I have had 6 rounds in the 80’s and one as high as 88. I have had some horrible ball striking rounds. I have tried all of the quick fixes with some really good results. I am way past trying any system. I know better than that. I feel the quick fixes work because they distract me from what is causing my horrible ball striking day. Sometimes what is causing this may not even be related to golf. Regardless, once I make a change then I get a new feel, whatever that may be, and I immediately start hitting the ball better. Now once if a while, just to make things interesting, I will do something different and continue to play poorly. I usually give it about 2 to 3 holes and then try something else. Some rounds I never seem to make any progress. Another way to look at this is to say none of these things really work, even though they seem to. Changing some relatively minor aspect of your swing should not make all that big of difference. Maybe doing something like that triggers some neurologic pathway that allows you to swing better and that in turn causes better ball striking. The reason it stops working is that this pathway had nothing to do with the poor ball striking and simply loses its effectiveness due to repetition. All of this goes against the idea that we are supposed to groove our swings, so we can repeat our swings on command. There is the adage that you can have a flawed swing if you repeat the mistake all the time. That is why you practice, to groove that swing.

There is no doubt that this is the biggest mystery of the game. It could be summed up in the following way even for the beginner; learn, success failure and repeat. If you look at tour players who have had success and then lose it, never to see their winning form return you could say the middle step disappears. For those of us who have never reached such great heights, the middle step does always happen, it just may be for a very short time. For all the things that I have done to my swing, and it ranges into the 100’s believe me, I have had a few that last a full season, but most don’t last for a week. Maybe we should just swing the way we feel most comfortable and to hell with results. Just accept the fact that you will have good days and bad days on the golf course. Sometimes the bad days stretch out over weeks. When that happens, it is extremely hard not to try and do something. Tucking my right elbow right into my side, I bet that’s the answer. What do you think? Thank God it’s January and I don’t have to think about it for the moment.

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Golf: You Cannot Overswing.

If you look up the definition of overswing, it says trying to swing a bat or club too hard. By that definition, you can overswing in golf. However, overswinging in golf is defined as trying to take the club too far back on the backswing. Anytime the club head goes below the horizontal level at the top of the swing most instructors will call this overswinging. They use all kinds of excuses, like great hand eye co-ordination or lots of practice, to explain why some top players seem to overswing and still have had a lot of success in playing golf. The list will include John Daly, Phil Mickelson, Sam Snead, Jack Nicklaus, Nancy Lopez, Brooke Henderson, Tom Watson, and Gary Player to just name a few. Golfers of the 1920’s 30’s and 40’s had a tendency to have very long backswings. Bobby Jones, Walter Hagen, Lawson Little, Ted Ray, and Tommy Armour all had swings that went well below horizontal on the backswing. Because of calling overswinging a fault, it has caused many a golfer to have way too short of a backswing. Golfers have developed many ways to restrict the backswing because of this belief that you can overswing. This simply is not true. There is a much more of a tendency to not complete the backswing, due to being anxious about trying to hit the ball. In my view a nice long backswing aids in making the transition from backswing to downswing. Before we get into the benefits of realizing that you cannot overswing, let’s look at what “causes” overswinging, and how you can “correct” it. Unfortunately, I am going to have to be rather redundant in order to prove a point.

The breaking down of the left arm is not overswinging, it is the breaking down of the left arm. Over cocking the wrists is not even a fault but it certainly is not overswinging. Picking the club up with the arms is not overswinging, it is picking up the club with the arms. Loosening of the grip at the top of the swing is not overswinging, it is loosening of the grip at the top of the swing. Overturning of the hips I do not consider a fault, but it does not lead to overswinging. The collapsing of the left knee toward the ball is not overswinging but is collapsing of the left knee toward the ball. Not making a nice turn and coil on the backswing is not overswinging but is not making a turn on the backswing. If you overswing, your clubhead at the top of the swing will point to the right of the target and this will make you have a tendency to come over the top on the downswing. Watch the videos of Jack Nicklaus in, Golf My Way, and you will see his club cross the line, and points to the right of the target. I don’t think Jack came over the top on too many shots. All the things, and there are more, that I have just listed are things that “cause” overswinging. All of these things are significant faults, but they do not lead to overswinging, because overswinging does not exist, therefore is not a fault. You could correct every one of the above faults and by definition you could still easily overswing. In fact, all the pros that we mentioned had none of these faults. You could demonstrate every one of those faults and still not overswing. I think it is much more detrimental to your game by even thinking of trying to restrict your backswing in anyway. It causes the downswing to be rushed, and in order to make a shorter swing work, you must swing with a faster tempo, which is never a good thing for the average golfer. Now let’s look at the things that I do not consider faults, that really contribute to a nice long backswing that winds up being easy on the body and allows you to hit the ball powerfully and yet smoothly.

There is always going to be limitations on how far back a particular individual can take the club back on the backswing. The other thing that dictates the length of the backswing is the length of the club. The shorter the club the shorter the backswing. Swinging with different clubs is a subject for another blog. Fully cocking the wrists will help you make a much longer backswing. Sometimes this full cocking of the wrists is called the collapsing of the wrists, when trying to correct overswinging. The more you can cock your wrists the more of a snap you will get at the bottom of the swing, and this will increase you clubhead speed. To know how far you can comfortably cock your wrists, from your address position, simply pick the club straight up, using only your wrists. Get the feel for that and then simply turn your body as you would for your backswing, and you should be able to get the correct feel at the top of the swing. In order to have a nice long leisurely backswing you need to turn your hips as much as you can on the backswing. Golf instruction will say that you can overturn your hips. This is simply not true. You can turn your hips as much as you want as long as your weight stays on the right side at the top of the swing. Keep your grip nice and firm at the top and there should be no problem with a long backswing. Having a long backswing is the best way to have a nice easy tempo. It is the shorter backswing that requires a much quicker tempo. The quicker your tempo the more well time your swing must be. That is what requires more practice than anything, timing your swing. Don’t do anything that you think is going to restrict or inhibit your backswing. Just wind it up as much as you can in a nice easy fashion and then just start the backswing nice a slow with the hands coming straight down from the top. Your ball striking should improve, and your body should be able to swing the club much easier with less stress on those joints, tendons and muscles. See you on the links.

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Golf Stories: The 2000’s

The 2000’s saw my golf game go into a basic decline, that made me start the blog, so I would keep on playing golf. It is not to say that good things did not happen, in the first 10 years of the new century. I acquired holes in one number 4 and 5, and did play some good golf periodically, but for the most part, things did not go all that well when it came to my golf game. I did go down to Florida for one winter, and taught at a golf school, and have tried to find the answer to this goofy game, since around 2010. While I think I have learned a lot about the game, and myself during this time, I have not come close to finding the key, to this game called golf. I thought I had it a couple of times, and it is all documented in the blog, but I have really never been able to play, up to what I consider, to be my true potential. But enough of the present, and lets look at some of the things that happened in the early 2000’s.

My fourth hole in one took place at the Club of Nevellewood, on November 2, 2003. It was by far the best of the five. It was on the 17th hole, a 180 yard par 3, with a green that was wider than it was long. The pin was on the right side of the green, which was the toughest pin placement, because you had to carry the trap, in order to shoot at the pin. I was having a good back nine, after a mediocre front of 40. I came to the 17th hole one under on the back nine. I decided in my typical fashion, what the hell, to shoot at the pin. I hit a 6 iron perfectly, and it hit about 3 feet in front, and to the left of the pin. Even though I had played the course a few times, I was not that familiar with that part of the green. There was an upslope on that side of the green. My balled rolled to the very top of the slope, and started the slow trickle back to the pin. We could see from the tee box that the ball was still moving back to the pin. In what seemed like an eternity, it just kept moving slowly down the hill, until it disappeared into the cup. It was a very pleasant surprise, and quickly got me to 3 under on the back. Even with all the excitement of the hole in one, I managed to par the last hole, and shoot a very nice 33 on the back. My fifth, and final hole in one, came in June of 2005 at Castle Shannon golf course near Steubenville, Ohio. It was another hole in one I did not see go into the hole. The hole was playing 200 yards downhill and I again hit a 6 iron. With the sun glare, I could not see the ball hit the green and thought it was short. This was further confirmed in my eyes, when my playing partner Pete hit a beautiful fade, that hit just short of the green, and bounced up about 15 feet short of the pin, which we saw all the way. Driving down to the hole, we could not see a ball short of the green, but when we got closer, there was a ball mark about 8 feet short of the hole. I took one look at Pete and said, “That SOB is in the hole”, and sure enough I was right. The back tees on the hole list the hole being 245 yards and when they put the notice in the paper, they listed hole 245, and it said I had hit a 6 iron. I got some calls on that one, wondering how I had hit a 6 iron 245 yards, and into the hole, no less. I gave out very little info on that one, because it was fun to let people think I had really done that. Other than the some other spectacular shots, one time I went 2, 3, on a par 3 and 5, and almost holed both shots, my golf was for the most part disappointing.

My winter of teaching was fun, and I went through a major swing change myself. I met a lot of interesting people down in Florida, but none more interesting than Babe Belagamba, who was the head of instruction at the school that I taught in Orlando. The Babe was the definition of a character. He was an inventor and had many of his inventions at the school. I still use some of his quotes to this day. He gave me many a lesson and I remember him telling me “Your body is not doing what you think its doing, trust me, you’ll see it on the video”. Of course, he was right. His swing principles, were to make sure your right elbow was digging into your side at address, have your weight pressed into the right side of the left heel, and take the club pretty quickly to the inside to help you turn on the take away. He was not a big believer in visualizing the shot, but more in controlling the body. He wanted you to feeling a stretch up the left side at the top of the swing and release it like a sling shot. I do not do a lot of what he taught me, back then but maybe I should. My favorite quote of his is ” Several years of school, can produce a good brain surgeon, but golf is a lifetime education in frustration. He was right, golf is not brain surgery. Unfortunately Babe passed away in 2006, just a little over a year, after I had met him, and I never got to hear enough of his golf wisdom.

The decade ended with me about ready to quit the game, for the second time, and I thought that this time, it would be for good. Then I happened to see in the local paper, a listing of golf courses, in the area. I started to count them up, and all of these were all public courses, that were at least 6000 yards long. In other words, no par 3 or executive courses. I noticed that there were around 100 golf courses, within 90 minutes of my house, and I thought, why not try to play them all, and start a blog about it. Rate the courses, including the hot dog at the turn, and see if I might be able to figure out this game, in the process. The blog has evolved in to it’s current form where I discuss various subjects involving the necessities of life. Yes, golf is a necessity of life. The non golfers, non meditators, non foodies, and non sports nuts, really don’t know what you are missing. It’s never to late to find out what life is really all about. See you on the links.

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

It’s been about a month since the last blog and I have been playing at about a 4 to 5 times a week clip.  It looks like the 18 month slump is officially over.  Since the last blog my handicap has dropped from 6.9 to 5.4 and 14 of my last 16 rounds have been below 80, although I did have a run where I shot 4 straight 79’s, but hey, that is breaking 80.  It is a far cry from last year where I went a full 8 weeks without breaking 80. So what has changed.

Naturally, what has improved tremendously is my putting.  I am no longer putting with this more unconventional method, but it does give me something to go back to, if I really start to have problems again.  I will write about this method in future blogs, if I continue to find success on the greens .  I have change three things in my long golf game.  I am much more cognizant of where I am aiming.   I am more aware of my posture and the distance I stand from the ball.  I have changed my take away or the first 18 to 24 inches of my swing. At any televised golf tournament the standard and practically only shot of the golfer when he is making a shot, is from behind the player. For whatever reason I started noticing that tour players seem to take the club away from the ball just slightly different for every club in the bag. For the driver they seem to take the club just slightly outside the line and for every club going down they start to move a little more to the inside. Just to break in down into sections: Driver just outside the line;  Fairway metals straight back;  long to mid irons slightly inside the line; short irons and wedges inside the line.  My theory is this.  By taking it outside the line on the driver this promotes the ability to give a more sweeping action on the downswing.   Moving inside the line more quickly on the wedges promotes a more downward swing, which creates the down and through action needed for these clubs.  I do not know if I am right or not, but since I have started having a take away that is a little different for every club, my ball striking has improved 100%, and distance has increased by 15 to 20 yards with the same equipment. Then I did one other thing on the physical side of the game.

I became Jim Furyk.  What does that mean?  Jim Furyk’s dad was a PGA professional and allowed Jim to swing the way he does because he felt a natural swing will hold up under pressure better than a manufactured one.  Let that one sink in for awhile. That may be one the greatest statements ever made on the golf swing. I will discuss this more in future blogs, but let’s just say that I am now swinging my natural way with all its faults and nuances. For 6 weeks, I have played with no swing thoughts and no swing fixes.  I have become Jim Furyk.  I am still having some problems with the chip yips but even they have improved. I consider that part of the mental game, which I will save for later.  Will I continue to improve? Who knows. I will say golf has become much more fun, since I have freed myself up to just let er rip. To be continued.

 

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

Well, its been two months since the last time I have blogged about my game. I have been playing the same amount as usual, about 3 to 4 times a week. Since the first of April I have played 26 rounds, with some 9 hole rounds thrown in. The golf, overall, has been mediocre at best and sometimes pretty horrible. I have had about the same number of rounds in the 80’s and 70’s. At least no more rounds in the 90’s although one was close, 89. My four tournament rounds have all been in the 80’s with one birdie in 72 holes.  Naturally, I have been trying all sorts of things to bring me out of this funk, that I have been in, since the middle of March. I have had just enough good rounds, one 74 and two 76’s, with a couple of 77’s and 78’s thrown in, to keep my handicap in the mid 5’s. The new rule about not counting rounds when you play alone is also helping. So with heading into the summer months here is what I think may bring back.

If there is one thing I have learned through this down time is that the swing is not the problem. That can be said about any golfer with a single digit handicap, and any pro tour golfer. The proof of this is the current analysis of Jordan Spieth’s golf swing. Spieth has had some 4th round issues since his infamous Masters collapse. Naturally, this has led Spieth to be on the slow motion camera more than any golfer in history. Watch his right knee, watch his left knee, watch his follow through, and blah blah blah. This past week Spieth wins the Colonial. Now let me ask you something. Did he really hit the ball any better in this 4th round than the 4th rounds where he did not close the deal? HELL NO. What he did do of course, is putt better than humanly possible for the last 10 holes, plus a chip in. How much do you think that had to do with his right knee or left knee. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.

Here is the final conclusion. One of my mantras even 6 years ago has been that 85% of all bad shots are caused before you start the swing. I revised that just last year to 90%. Now I can say with certainty that it is 100%. I am talking here about golfers with single digit handicaps. There are some swing fundamentals, of course. If you are shooting in the 70’s then you have that down pat. There are so many things you can do wrong at address. I will discuss these in future blogs, especially if I am right about this. I can tell you that this is all I will be working on in the next few months. As I always say the numbers never lie, so we will see what happens. Maybe this game is not as goofy as I think.

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

Well, it’s been 25 days since the last blog, and a lot has happened. I have been able to play 8 rounds of golf, which makes 11 for the year. This is the most I have been able to play, this early in the season. Now, here are the scores, and hold on to your hats. 76, 90, 92, 94, 90, 85, 78. Yes, that’s right 4 straight rounds in the 90’s. I haven’t had a stretch like that since I was probably 13 yrs. old. Now, some of this was due to experimentation, but I have done this before, and never saw scores like this. The first 90 score even had 2 birdies. These scores could not be blamed on the weather. The conditions weren’t perfect but they weren’t that bad. The scores can not be blamed on early season rust. You can see, I shot a 76 which featured a one under 35 on the back nine. As usual there was something to be learned and there were some interesting facts from these horrific rounds.

The first thing was my over all reaction to these rounds. I did not fret or worry about them at all. You might think that this is real easy to do because it is early in the season. Let’s  see how you react, if you did this in June or July. But this is four straight rounds in the NINETIES. Two of the rounds were partially due to some horrendous putting of 40 putts each. It made me aware of how easy this can happen and how a prolonged slump can be just around the corner.

I don’t know if I really needed to be made more aware of this, but it really brought home the fact that it’s not where your good shots wind up but it’s where your bad ones go. During this 4 round stretch I hit a lot of quality shots, but I hit a lot of horrible shots, that ended up in hazards and entirely off the golf course. The quality shots caused some swing experiments to last longer than they should have.

Because of this bad stretch, I found a major swing flaw that I had, and I mean major. I will discuss this in a future blog, but let’s just say for now it started my small comeback in the last 2 rounds. The 78 was highlighted by quite a bizarre finish. The last 6 holes went like this: Birdie, Double Bogey, Birdie, Double Bogey, Par, and a 30 yard pitch in for an Eagle.

Lastly I would like to write about two golf related items. Naturally the Masters is coming up and I am anxious to watch it as much as anybody else. Do I think I know who is going to win? Hell no. My bold prediction is this. The scores will be high. Any time the Masters scoring record is threatened they set the course up to be impossible the next year. Just look it up. I don’t think this will be an exception. So expect another U. S. Open kind of Masters and I think that is a damn shame. Do I think the best golfer in the world will win the Masters. NO. WHY. Because the best golfer in the world won’t even be playing in the Masters, Lydia Ko. Chew on that for awhile.

 

 

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

Today I am going to discuss the other two things that I thought had real potential to help one’s golf game, but turned out to be, just dust in the wind. The first one was the mind body connection. It was initiated by the old argument of how much is this game mental, and how much is it physical. My contention is that it is a 50-50 split, but there is a definite disconnect between the mind and the body in many instances, which will cause bad shots, or poor results. I discussed these instances about two years ago and I am not going to write about them today but the goal was to find a  way to keep the mind and the body connected. It was a fruitless effort, but one that I still think maybe worth pursuing. Then last year I tried to find what I called, your that day golf swing. In fact, I thought this was the answer. It went something like this. You should go into each round with an open mind, and not be influenced by what went well in the last round. I even had a cute little saying, “abandon that swing thought before it abandons you. Needless to say this was not the answer for various reasons that are not worth going into.

So that was the past and I am ready to move on from those acid trips,  as I head into the new golf year. What am I going to do now? Well, as usual I have some ideas. One of my many mantras has been 85% of all bad shots are caused by things you do before you swing. At the end of last year I amended that to 95%.  I am going to try to prove that theory. I am going to do some unique and different things at address that go against some traditional golf teaching but is much more aligned with the way the body is supposed to move. I am going to continue to take a hard look at how the wrists function during the golf swing.  I am beginning to feel that this is a big key on good solid ball striking. I have already played four 18 hole rounds, and three 9 hole rounds this year, and so far have made no progress on the above. I have been fine tuning some things, that may prove to productive.  As this year progresses the better I do, will mean that progress is being made and there will be more blogs. That is one thing about golf the numbers never lie.

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

Today I am going to discuss some of the things I have tried over the last five and a half years of writing this blog, which I hoped would make this game easier to play. There were three, that I named, the shoulder control swing, the mind body connection, and finding your that day golf swing, which I thought was the answer. Over the next 3 weeks as golf season get’s closer and closer I will  discuss each one, and where I went wrong.

First, the shoulder control golf swing, that I introduced in January of 2013. I even did two videos on the subject in March of 2014. The shoulder control swing is exactly what it says, in that the turning of the shoulders can control all aspects of the golf swing. By folding your arms across your chest, and making a golf swing, your legs will move perfectly, and of course with your arms folded across your chest, they are have nothing to do with your swing. I played with this swing for almost 2 years and had some really good success. I shot one of my best rounds, during the time of the blog, and struck the ball quite well. I had some problems trying to adapt this method to my short game and putting. I struck the ball well, but I did have problems trying to work the ball with this method, particularly trying to hit a draw. It was during the 2014 golf season that I began to abandon this method, although I would go back to it for brief times, even in the 2015 season. So what was the problem? It was those damn arms. Here is one of the simplest, and yet one of the  most frustrating keys to the golf swing. On the downswing, the belly button has to pass the golf ball before the arms. Do this and you will hit a quality golf. Here is where I made the mistake. Turning the shoulders does actually control the leg action. When you make a correct shoulder turn on the backswing and downswing the legs have to move in the correct way. They literally have no choice. When you release the arms from across your chest and place you hands on the golf club, the shoulders no longer can control those pesky arms. You have to make a conscious decision to do so. Bobby Jones said it best when discussing putting and keeping your body still. Trying to keep your body perfectly still, can create too much tension in the stroke, so he advocated relaxation, and if the body moved a little bit so be it. By TRYING to keep the arms out of the swing, and mostly being unsuccessful anyway, just became too much of a distraction.  The shoulder control swing is a great teaching aid and drill on how a golf swing should really feel, when the arms are not involved.

I played the first round of the year about 12 days ago at Scenic Valley, and if I was even having the slightest doubt that this was a goofy game, the first round of the year ended all of that. The first drive of year was a low right liner that went about 180 yard that left me no shot to the green so I laid up to the right about 20 yards short of the green. I hit a great pitch to about 3 feet and made the putt, par. The next hole I hit an ok drive, hit wedge in about 12 feet below the hole and made the putt, birdie. The third hole an uphill par 5 I hit a fair drive, a 2 iron over the water, and another wedge in about 15 feet and made that putt, birdie. Now I have played Scenic Valley a lot over the last 10 years and I have never been 2 under par after 3 holes and here I was 2 under on the very first round of the year in February with temps in the low 40’s. Needless to say I got back to reality in a hurry with a double bogey on the next hole, and did manage to scrape it around to break 80 with a 78. Had not hit a ball in 2 months and birdie 2 of the first three holes. Goofy, you got that right.

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The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer

After last week’s blog about the wrists and what the PGA pros do to manipulate the club head, let’s just say we have only just begun. This week I am going to discuss the half way back position. That is the terminology I am going to use for when the club head is parallel to the ground, half way back. Nobody allowed the club to get to an open position at this point in the swing, even though there were 15 players out of 61 that got the club face open at the top of the swing. To review, there were 21 players that were square half way back, 17 were slightly shut, and 23 that were shut. So what conclusions can be drawn.

Obviously, whether it be consciously or unconsciously, no player wants to fan the club open early in the swing.  My thinking is that by opening the club face early in the swing, it  would have a tendency to make the swing really on the flat side. You would get a lot of forearm rotation early in the golf swing, which apparently is not a good thing.

I think some of the shut face positions are due to a natural tendency to want the club face to continue to look at the target line for as long as possible. I see a lot of beginning golfers get in this position half way back.

There were only 12 players or about 20%, who were both square half way back and at the top of there swings. This to me would be the ideal way to swing and I am sure would be the way most instructors would try to teach. Eighty per cent have some variation on the square and square method. You have to wonder how much of this is consciously done or is this something that players work on and just can not seem to correct. Surely they know that they do this with all the video they watch of their swings.

Within this 80% group, there has to be a lot going on to make some of the moves they make from the half way back position to the top of the swing. So lets look at the three that make the biggest moves, that is going from the shut position half way back to open at the top. There were 3 players  Ray Floyd, Colin Montgomery, and Jack Nicklaus who did this and I mentioned last week that Ben Hogan went from slightly shut to wide open. All four had pretty distinct swings with Floyd’s being the most unorthodox. Again it’s pretty hard to draw any conclusions from those 4 players about why their hands and wrists worked the way they did.

In conclusion, the lesson to be learned here is don’t start opening the club face until you get at least past the half way back part of the backswing. That is even if you want to open the club face at the top but that will be discussed in later blogs as we get to the top of the swing and bring it back to the ball. Heading to San Diego to see the grand kids for Christmas, so it will probably be about 2 weeks before I continue the wrist study.