Make a Permanent Swing Change in 5 Minutes

Posted on May 20, 2012 | 6 Comments

Any golf swing is a series of small body movements which combine to produce a complex motor pattern designed to move a golf ball with a golf club. This movement pattern is extremely personal and is a function of what your body is physically capable of doing along with many thousands of repetitions which you have performed to perfect your own swing. You have worked very hard to get the golf swing you have and as a result you are very good at repeating it.

I believe all golfers enjoy their golf when they play well, and that the vast majority of golfers are willing to make a change in order to play well more often. The problem arises with how they typically go about making that change.

Making a permanent and lasting change to a golf swing is not easy. It is not accomplished by taking a swing tip, making a few practice swings and then having it be a part of your game that you can call on at will. Remember, you worked long and hard to perfect your current swing pattern. It will not go away easily.

There is a definite progression of drills that I have found to be extremely effective in helping players change their swing patterns. It involves an investment of as little as 5 minutes per day, and if you follow this outline I can guarantee you a better golf game.

  1. Know what it is in your golf swing that needs to change to get the results you want.
  2. Breakdown the motion into small pieces that you will learn one at a time and then put back together over time. Steps 1 and 2 will probably require the help of your PGA Professional or Coach.
  3. Practice the body motion of the new swing at home for 5 minutes per day, every day, for one week.
  4. Introduce the club and perform the swing motion slowly – 5 minutes per day, every day, for one week.
  5. Only if you can make the move without a ball are you permitted to add the ball in this step. You may now hit a ball with you new swing. Ball must be on a low tee and cannot be hit further than 30 yards. No target at this point. Simply pretend you are standing on the beach hitting balls in the ocean. You should continue to do the previous step at home 5 minutes per day, every day.
  6. If you can perform the new skill slowly, only then may you gradually add speed over a period of a couple of weeks, still with no target. If at any time the new movement breaks down or you are not having success, STOP and go back to the previous step.
  7. Once you can perform the new swing motion at speed add targets to your practice.
  8. Then start to change clubs and targets regularly until you can perform the new swing every time.

The vast majority of players will not follow this regimen. They will continue to look for the quick fix or tip of the week. They may very well see some short term improvement to their game, but it will not be long lasting and will not hold up under pressure. Their scores will stay basically the same year after year.

But what about you? Are you willing to invest the time and effort to become the best player you can be? Or are you happy to play at your current level for the rest of your golfing career? The decision is yours.

Swing Plane backswing

Swing Plane downswing

I hope you enjoyed this post on how to make a swing change. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ 6 Comments

Posted in Effective Practice, Improvement Process

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Spin Your Bunker Shots

Posted on May 13, 2012 | Leave a comment

There are two questions I get asked regularly when I am giving a bunker lesson. The first is “how do I get the ball out of the bunker and on the green consistently?”, and the second is “how do I get spin on my bunker shots?” These two questions are very closely related. If you can spin the ball out of a bunker then you can control the flight and distance of the shot which allows you to get the ball on the green consistently. So how do you put backspin on the ball coming out of a bunker?

Set Up

  • Stand with your feet fairly close together and slightly open to your target line
  • Shuffle the feet into the sand to give you stability while swinging the club
  • Rotate the clubface so that it is slightly open to the target line and then take your grip. This will increase the effective loft on the club through impact and encourage the sole of the club to strike the sand before the leading edge. This will cause the club to skid across the sand rather than dig in.
  • The ball should be positioned level with your lead heel.
  • Weight should be set 60% on the lead foot with the center of your chest level with the ball.

 The Swing

  • The club is swung along the line of the shoulders
  • The wrists hinge the club up in the backswing while the lead arm stays extended to maintain width in the swing
  • The arms swing past the ball before the club head. Too many players throw the club head to the ball causing the all too familiar heavy and thin shots.
  • The follow through is high with both arms and club head

 Impact

This is the crucial part if the bunker shot. The club enters the sand before getting to the ball, but the main objective is to take the sand from the target side of the ball and swing through so as to get that piece of sand onto the green. This will ensure you swing through the shot and finish with a high follow through. The momentum of this swing will carry the ball onto the green.

Now if you want to increase the amount of spin on your bunker shots there are a couple of things you need to do.

1. Increase loft – by either changing to a more lofted club or if you already have your most lofted club, then spin the shaft to open the club face more at address to increase the loft.

2. Increase speed – the faster the club is moving through impact the more spin you can put on the ball.

3. Less sand – too much sand between the club face and the ball will decrease the amount of spin on your shot. You want to take a small, shallow divot, rather than what I see too often which is more of a digging action. Let the trail edge of the wedge (the bounce) hit the sand first so that the club skids across the sand.

A great drill to help you achieve these three elements is to draw a line in the sand from just inside your left heel out to slightly behind where the ball would be positioned. Now take practice swings taking shallow divots, only hitting the sand on the target side of the line and throwing that sand up onto the green. Once you can do this with some consistency, then introduce a ball and place it on the target side of the line and repeat the drill. If you are set up correctly the ball will start to come out higher and with more spin.

Line Drill

Ball and Line

I hope you enjoyed this post on how to spin your bunker shots. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Short Game

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Golf is Not About the Swing

Posted on May 6, 2012 | Leave a comment

Watch any PGA Tour telecast and all you will hear are commentators talking about how beautiful a certain players swing is, how someone else has a less than desirable quirky move in their swing and the things the average player should copy from the tour players. Last time I checked the ball doesn’t care what your swing looks like. It cares what the club face is doing at the moment of impact. How you looked getting it there is totally irrelevant. Golf is not about how pretty your swing looks. It’s about learning skills and executing them when you need to.

If you are going to get better and shoot lower scores then working on your game has got to mean more than improving swing positions and making the swing look better. There a wide variety of skills required to play the game well, and if you want to play your best then you need to know what skills are more important than others and be sure your coach is helping you to get better at those higher priority skills.

Priority #1: Ball Control – The ability to get the ball in play from the tee and then get it somewhere near your target on the second shot is critical to good scoring. Penalty shots will quickly inflate your score so the importance of avoiding them cannot be overstated. The key to this area of your game is not how many great shots do you hit, but rather how good are you at avoiding disasters. Distance with your shots is of far less importance than how well you can control the ball’s direction.

Priority #2: Putting – If penalties are the number one killer of a good score, then 3 putts are number 2. Too often I see players working on their full swing because their ball curves a little off line, yet they regularly have over 40 putts per round. If you are not having 32 putts or less per round, then you need to invest some time working on your putting.

Priority #3: Scrambling – We focus so much on how far we can hit a golf ball, but we choose to overlook how quickly you are able to get the ball in the hole. Playing golf is not purely a distance game. It is about getting the ball in the hole in as few as strokes as possible. There is no point in hitting a driver 250 yards in one stroke if it takes another 4 or 5 strokes to get the ball in the hole from 50 yards. If you are unable to consistently hit the ball within 20 feet of the hole from inside 50 yards, then working on this area of your game will help to dramatically lower your scores.

Assess your game today. Decide the skills, that if improved will give you the greatest reduction in score and then allocate your practice time accordingly. You will be glad you did.

I hope you enjoyed this post. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Improvement Process

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Topping the Ball – Keeping your head down is not the answer

Posted on April 30, 2012 | Leave a comment

How many times after you have topped a shot or seen another player top a shot, have you heard “Oh, you lifted your head”.  I have several videos of players who still have their eyes fixated on the ground, after they have topped the ball 50 yards down the range, only to have them tell me they lifted their head. When I show them the video they can hardly believe their eyes. They did a fantastic job of keeping their head down and yet they still topped the ball. Why?

Keeping your head down is one of the great misconceptions in the game of golf. There are a couple of reasons why a player will have trouble compressing the ball at impact, but the most common one I see, and see almost every day, is a loss of posture during the swing.

A loss of posture, or early extension, is when the player moves the hips closer to the ball, usually during the downswing, forcing the upper body to straighten to counterbalance the thrusting of the hips. The straightening of the upper body moves the swing center away from the golf ball thus making it almost impossible to compress the ball, while making it very easy to hit topped shots. To compress the ball at impact and have more solid shots, you must stay in posture during the golf swing.

It has been shown that there is strong correlation between weak glutes (the muscles you sit on), tight hamstrings, and early extension during the golf swing. A quick test I would do on the range to check a player’s glute strength is an exercise called a bridge. You lay on your back, pull the feet up so they are on the ground under the knees, arms are held up in front of the chest, then you raise the buttocks off the ground forming a straight line between the shoulders and the knees. Once in this position I will get the player to take one foot off the ground and extend the leg out straight. If the glutes are weak or inhibited the hamstrings may start to cramp, or there will be considerable instability in holding this position.

Weak glutes and tight hamstrings are very common amongst golfers. We generally spend too many hours each week sitting at a desk, and with the knees bent at 90 degrees this allows the hamstrings to get shorter. While sitting does nothing to add strength to the glute muscles.

When I see this in a player I will suggest they work with our Physical Therapist and start a simple exercise program to correct the muscle imbalances. Without the adequate strength and stability the player’s body will never make the move that we are trying to attain. All they will do is continue to early extend and top the ball, no matter how many practice drills they do. The body will not make a move it does not have the strength to perform.

While the player is working through their exercise program I will also have them working on changing the motor pattern of staying in posture during the swing. Just because they have the strength and flexibility to perform the movement doesn’t mean the pattern will change automatically. The best drill for improving early extension is to place a chair behind you and work through the following movement progression, making sure that you stay in contact with the chair until well after impact.

1. Body motion with arms crossed

2. Hold a basketball in both hands in front of you, turn into the backswing keeping the ball in front of your chest, then turn through and toss the ball.

3. Slow swings with a club.

4. Half shots swinging a club.

The next time a golfing buddy tells you that you are lifting your head, try this drill. If the topped shot is really the result of early extension and a loss of posture, then this drill will be difficult to do and the reality may be that you did a nice job keeping your head down. It is the posture throughout the swing you need to work on.

Address with a chair

Drill with a Basketball

Drill with Golf Club

I hope you enjoyed this post on topping the ball. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Effective Practice, Full Swing, Golf Fitness

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

5 Biggest Mistakes Golfers Make in Trying to Improve Their Game

Posted on April 23, 2012 | 5 Comments

There is not a golfer on the planet that doesn’t enjoy playing well. We all have so much more fun when we hit the ball long and straight and add up a score which is lower than we have ever had before. But too many golfers experience this feeling far too often.

There is a definitive process to follow in order to play good golf and to consistently improve your scores. There are also things I see golfers do that prevents them from improving their golf game and today I want to share with you my Top 5 mistakes players make when trying to improve their game.

1. Not understanding what changes need to be made – The golf swing can be simple and complex at the same time. Not knowing what moves cause certain results is dangerous when you start to tinker with parts of your swing. It can be a lot like a house of cards – move the wrong card and the whole house falls apart.

Quite often you will have a series on compensatory motions combining within your swing to give you the level of consistency you now enjoy. Knowing what to change to give you the result you want is critical to making improvement. If you take a haphazard approach to this then you can expect erratic results.

2. Not working on the area that will yield the greatest change in score – The main goal is not to have the prettiest golf swing or to be the longest hitter in your group. It is to get the ball in the hole in as few strokes as possible. I see too many players working on hitting their driver longer when improving their chipping and putting will have a much greater effect on their scores.

Keep statistics from at least five rounds and track fairways hit, greens in regulation, putts, penalties, green saves and sand saves. A effective and inexpensive program to help you do this is www.mygolfgameplan.com. This is the one I use with my players. It allows us to track all the important statistical categories as well as set goals in each category.  The area that needs the most attention will be more obvious with the numbers in front of you.

3. Expecting change to happen quickly – You have worked very hard and had many, many swings to get very good at repeating your current swing. To expect that swing to change by simply changing your swing thoughts and a few practice swings is unrealistic. When Tiger Woods changed swing coaches from Hank Haney to Sean Foley, it took the greatest player of our generation two years of working on the swing change every day, before he won again.

You have a full time job and a variety of other commitments before you can even find time to practice your new swing motion. Even small changes will take time to be learned and then replace the old, more ingrained swing patterns.

4. Expecting change to happen easily – There is a definite process to follow when changing swing patterns. After only a few swings on the range you simply will not be able to perform the new swing consistently, under pressure. You must first learn how to make the new swing motion and then work through a series of practice sessions where the pressure and situation slowly becomes more like what you experience on the golf course. Only after completing such a process can you expect to reproduce the new swing on the course.

5. Trying to do it on your own – The best players in the world work with a coach. They do this because they cannot see their own swing, nor is their expertise in swing mechanics and cause and effect of the golf swing. If the best players in the world need assistance in playing to the best of their ability, then you do too. Find a PGA Professional who you can relate to and talk to them about putting together a personal plan for improving your golf game. Start this process today and you will be on your way to consistently lowering your scores.

I hope you enjoyed this post on the mistakes golfers make when trying to improve their game. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ 5 Comments

Posted in Improvement Process

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Keys to Hitting the Ball Longer – The role of the club head

Posted on April 15, 2012 | Leave a comment

In the search for greater distance our first thought is to try and increase club head speed. Although club head speed is critical to achieving long tee shots, there are two components to long drives that are even more important and are often overlooked.

The first is that the ball must hit the middle of the clubface. A club head is designed to transfer most force to the ball it is struck with the middle of the face. A ball that is hit only half an inch off center will lose approximately 10 yards in distance. So you can see that even if you increase the club head speed, and that increase causes you to make an off-center strike, you could actually hit the ball shorter at a higher club head speed.

The second critical component is that the clubface must be square (or very close to square) to the swing path. When the clubface is not square it imparts sidespin on the ball that will cause the ball to curve off line. It has been said that a ball that has a draw flight (it travels from right to left for a right-handed player), will travel longer. That may be true with an iron where the closed clubface will de-loft the club effectively turning your 7 iron into a 6- iron. But with the driver it is important to get the ball up in the air and have it stay there for as long as possible. Thus the straighter the ball flight the longer the flight time and thus the greater overall distance.

Instructors focus on areas of the golf swing that will help people to strike the ball in the middle of the clubface, with the face square to the path of the swing. We know that this will produce not only long shots but also consistent ones that can be easily controlled. Increasing club head speed may seem like the best way to increase distance, and it can be, as long as you continue to strike the ball in the middle of the clubface and with a face square to your swing path.

Toe Hit

Open Clubface

I hope you enjoyed this post. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Full Swing

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

Keys to Hitting the Ball Longer – Sequencing the motion

Posted on April 8, 2012 | 2 Comments

Many players believe that if they can simply work the club through a series of positions then they will have  a good golf swing and thus be able to hit the ball long and straight. Video and high resolution cameras have allowed us to see the golf swing as a series of positions where some may be more advantageous than others. But the golf swing is not a game of connect the dots. Good positions in a golf swing account for very little unless you also have good dynamics and thus timing. But what is good timing?

Timing in the golf swing is the sequence of body movements during the down swing that allow the club face to return to square at impact and with maximum club head speed. The correct sequence of movements to start the downswing is to start from the ground up allowing the club to build speed to the ball. It is very much a domino effect where if one piece works out of order then the final effect is compromised.

The down swing is begun with a slight shift of weight to the lead foot. The hips then start to unwind over the lead leg while the arms fall. The upper body unwinds next as a reaction to the unwinding of the lower body, and drags the arms and then the club into impact. The overall action is very similar to that of a baseball throw. If the throw is driven from the hand and shoulders then overall distance is sacrificed. Only when the action is started from the ground up can maximum distance be achieved.

A great drill to get the feel for this sequencing is the step drill. Take your normal address position then take the lead foot and place it beside the rear foot. The club is taken to the top of the back swing and then pause. Start the down swing by taking a step towards target with the foot returning to its set up position. There is a definite weight shift to the lead foot, as you step, and the arms begin to drop towards the rear leg. The weight continues to shift to the lead leg with the hips unwinding and the upper body reacting to the lower body, until you finish fully on the lead leg in your normal finish position.

This is a great drill but does take a little practice to perfect. Make sure to take many practice swings without a ball to really learn the motion before placing a ball on a low tee and playing shots with a 7 or 8 iron. Focus initially on the sequencing rather than in trying to generate maximum speed. As you become more comfortable with the drill, only then should you start to increase the club head speed.

Step drill – backswing

Step drill – downswing

I hope you enjoyed this post on how to better sequence your swing motion. As always comments are welcome and appreciated.

Good Golfing

Derek

PS. If you really enjoyed this post, please consider helping me out and spreading the word below. Thanks!

→ 2 Comments

Posted in Full Swing, Improvement Process

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,