What Are You Working On? - Page 47

short game... found an old plastic 55 gallon drum and cut it in half. I go outside a 4 foot fence and try to chip into the barrel that's 12 feet inside. Great fun plus it is really helping those dreaded bunker chips.
 

Lately I've had a tendency to get my weight on my toes during the back swing, which moves my head toward the ball, then on the downswing I stay there and this causes me to hit towards the heel.  

 

Trying to shorten my backswing a little too, that has also helped to keep my head from moving in.  My biggest backswing problem is that I don't know when I'm at a half swing, 3/4 swing, parallel or past parallel.  When my coach says to take a half swing, and I see it on the monitor after the swing, I am just a few degrees shy of parallel, and it totally felt like I was only half way back (left arm at 9:00)!    

 

And as always, working on getting on to my left side.  Also working on turning through the shot more, and not stopping and swinging my arms.

 

Lastly, I sometimes hold too much lag and don't fully release it, which is exposing the hosel.     

 

Starting to get better though!

 

1. More hand depth 2. Both ankles rolling on the downswing -- the back foot on its instep and the front foot on its outstep 3. More palmar flexion 4. Straighter arms -- mostly on the follow-thru

Very good story LovinItAll; sorry for the loss of your friend.

 

Today I went again to try out my new Sun Mountain Speed Cart V1 instead of carrying my clubs. I love walking while playing and what a difference that cart made. I still sweated my keister off but my shoulders and body felt fine on the back nine. At 44 years old, walking and carrying the clubs in this Georgia heat/humidity isn't something I can manage anymore.

 

On my misses lately, I've been feeling myself grabbing the club at the bottom with my left hand. Thin shots, fat shots, etc but not all the time. I'd just received an email from a site about cupping and decided to key in on a seemingly elementary part of the swing but something I'd let creep back at times. Today's swing key was keeping a firm right wrist down and through impact. I hit the driver/woods pretty well and my irons were very accurate and crisp. My misses weren't bad and I was able to scramble to post a 79 despite only hitting 8 fairways and 7 greens. I ended up with 30 putts with no 3 putts.

 

One other thought for the round..................BE DELIBERATE. Not slow but deliberate. I checked alignment religiously on nearly all shots (no one's perfect) and even though I hit some bad shots, I felt focused for much of the round.

Dusting off the ol' swing extender for my next range session. I bought it a couple years ago, but I had so many problems back then it didn't do anything for me. Now that I've been able to fix a lot of my major issues, it will finally be able to help me. Excited!

Staying down on the shot through impact. I just cannot keep myself from jumping up. This is large due to the fact that my hips and lower body move closer to the ball... grr.

Heading to my course's free practice facilities in about an hour, here's the list.

 

1. Consistent chipping for distance(I can make short chips, but longer chips with more roll are where I need work).

2. Consistent pitching for accuracy(I'm allright at getting the pitch ball in the air and distance is usually not too bad, need to work on getting the ball to go straight and consistent).

3. Medium length putts(about 5-10 foot), I can two putt most longer putts and can one putt most shorter ones. I need consistency and to get closer to being able to one putt the 5 footers. 

4. Bunker shots if time, getting the ball out and close. 

 

Wish me luck!

I am so new to the game. I have only been playing a few months now so I am working on just about every part of the game. I guess I am trying to learn the game in general.

Update: Just got back and here's how it went in terms of most improved to least

 

1. Most improved-  Consistent chipping for distance- managed to get the formula down, straight back and forward swing with my sand wedge. Check out the consistency of these 5 chips all taken sequentially from different distances(5-10 yds), lie(rough, deep rough and fringe) and angles(all balls were in different spots. Pretty good precision and accuracy imho(for a beginner). They are all within a 1 yard radius I would estimate, there is my putter for comparison.

 

 

 

 

2. Next most improved- Consistent pitching for distance and accuracy. Seems now I need to work more on getting the ball up in the air instead of having it roll for distance, overall my short game is improving with pitching being one of my stronger suits right now. I also figured out to use a PW for longer pitches from fairway and it is possible to use a sand wedge for pitches from the rough. I still bring my right knee in as per advice from a PGA pro video I saw. 

 

3. Next improved- Bunker shots. I spent close to an hour in two different bunkers today. One was for practicing approach shot, green bunkers and the other was meant to simulate a fairway bunker(i.e. get the ball on the fairway and then take your next shot. I found a good method for scooping the ball out better for high lipped bunkers, it involves holding the wedge slight sideways to help it scoop the ball out. Works well on fairway bunkers with high lips. The approach bunkers were easier for me with my Titleist Vokey 56 making short work of most shots, landing on the green or at worst on the rough for an up and down. 

 

4. Least improved- putting. If anything my putting got worse, I am convince I need a new putter as my skill with putting is good but I feel my 30 year old putter design is holding me back. I am, and always have been a decent putter but it seems I'm over-thinking it too much and trying to do too much stuff right at once. If I keep my basic pendulum stroke it works the best, currently my battle are with uphill,downhill and heavily braked putts, which I'm sure bothers everyone. 

Overall a productive 2-3 hours practicing, I can tell I'm getting better and I can't wait to see the improvements when I actually get back on the course(haven't taken a true full swing on a course in about 3 weeks. 

http://thesandtrap.com/t/40164/my-swing-mvmac/54#post_745841

I hate having a lot of swing thoughts, but I have two:  stay down, and keep a shorter backswing.  Staying down is becoming second nature (I topped only one of 90 or so balls that I hit with my irons or hybrids during my range work on Friday, and that one was because I lost my concentration).  The shorter backswing takes a little more effortn but when I do it I have a better chance of hitting the ball on the sweet spot and having an inside-out swing.  When I try to swing too hard I'll get the club out of position and end up having to make corrections during the forward swing which has had me hitting the ball with an outside-in swing and hitting more on the toe than the sweet spot.

 

The other thing is that at the beginning of the year I had a baseball grip.  I switched to an overlap but did it wrong for three months, until it was pointed out to me on a TST thread (thanks), so now after correcting that I'm on my third grip of the year. I think that this one is going to work for me.  It felt really good after just a few minutes of hitting with it.

I just started experimenting with a baseball grip...have always used an interlocking grip...but find I hit ball more solidly ...greater distance, less fade/slice action.

Also get much better results with wedges...higher with more backspin.

 

Only negative thus far is control...tend to hook more but initial results lead me to further experiment with this approach.It may be that I use different grips for different clubs moving forward...time will tell..

I'm working on a few things now:

 

• Trying to make better contact: I've found that I've been hitting the ground first, then the ball, with my irons and hybrids, so I'm trying to fix my swing to eliminate that. I've also noticed that I haven't been hitting the ball in the centre of the clubface. Again, I'm trying to alter my swing to fix this.

 

• Driver Distance: I've had to slow down my driver swing in order not to slice the ball as much, so I'm losing some distance off my drives. I'm slowly increasing my swing speed and trying to figure out what is causing the slice.

Taking a break after brilliantly doing a cannonball into 3 feet of water.  Hoping I didn't do something permanent to my disks.

For me pretty much everything as I've only been playing since February. Recently though, off the tee and chipping. I've only played roughly 8 rounds and my lowest score is 108. I constantly lose balls with a vicious slice out of the box. And I've been know to blow up a few holes chipping from around the green. I told my brother I will not play another round until I get rid of the slice with my driver. Thankfully pitching and putting have been my saving grace.

 

One day I hope to be able to get that specific in what I need to improve :D

 

 

Right now I'm working on a full shoulder turn.  I tend to stop rotating and use my arms too much

Deciding which ball to use. 

 

That's it.