My Swing (Polyester)

I've been Playing Golf for: 4 rounds & about 2000 range shots

My current handicap index or average score is: 34

My typical ball flight is: straight short/mid irons, slice long irons & woods

The shot I hate or the "miss" I'm trying to reduce/eliminate is: slice

Some background about my swing:

I used to play ice hockey which was probably the cause why I was initially hitting over the top (should be fixed now, I'll probably post some DTL shots tomorrow).

I suspect that for the same reason I have a tendency to keep my hands bent at the impact point & overwork my hands(working on that).

I think that there's something positive from the ice hockey hobby also, I seem to slide/drive my hips forward quite naturally

OT: The awesome slide your hips thread actually lead me to this forum about a month ago

My swing is already quite constant, but I've been struggling with slices a lot.

Hopefully I can get better with your help.

Also please be lenient about possible spelling/grammar errors as I'm not a native english speaker

Videos:

These videos were recorded today 28.07.14 with Sony HDR-AS30 which records 720p @ 120 fps but encodes video as 30 fps automatically.

Some thoughts about the videos and this days range session:

After a short stray from sliding my hips to rotating my hips I focused today on "anchoring" the back leg to the ground and keeping my shoulders tight/squared.

For some reason I started slicing my 8 iron which I haven't done for a month.

As I was going through my shots after the practice session I noticed that my grip sucks donkey balls, my upper wrist is quite bent at the start which leads the club face to be quite open if the swing squares properly.

4 iron slice face on

4 iron straight face on

8 iron slice face on

8 iron straight face on

Thanks a lot for the pointers!

1. Getting rid of that overbending will probably be a challenge, but I'll try it out next time I get to the range (quite a lighting fest out there at the moment)

When I mentioned that my grip was bad in the starting post  I meant this:

2. I think that I can get my upper body rotating properly if I extend my back leg and rotate my hips properly in the upswing (this is actually quite natural to me, I don't know where I picked up the idea that my hips shouldn't move at all in the upswing)

3. I agree that my swing is too long and narrow. While the windup plays a critical part in the top posture, I think that a lot of it is caused by my bending left arm and my overly stable back leg. The bent and stable back leg prevents my hips from moving -> spine needs to give in if the shoulders are forced to proper position (the shoulder line in the 3rd pic is quite close to the example) and IMO my spine looks bit crooked/twisted in the 3rd pic

Are my ideas & thoughts any good or should I just stick to the pointers you gave me. I usually try to challenge all the pieces of advice I get because it often teaches me a lot more than just passive accepting. Just to clarify, I didn't mean to be ungrateful or a smart ass by any means.

I hope that damn thunderstorm stops soon so that I can go out to the range.

Been three times to the range since the last post (I only play on weekends because my work days are quite long)

First session was quite disastrous, I heavily over did my hip rotation on the backswing and it looked really messed up. On the last 10 or so I didn't try to rotate but I rather loosened my back leg and managed to get some solid shots. ~80 balls shot

Second session was truly tormenting... During the first bucket there were two guys who talked rather loud after each shot and I had real hard time concentrating on my shots. Then I had the range for me alone for about 10 shots and this couple in their 40s came. It took 2 minutes and they started fighting about hitting the ball or something the guy was swearing like a sailor and the woman just yapped something back constantly. Best part was that it kept going for half an hour with only a few short breaks. To add the insult I forgot to use bug repellent and these nasty pestilences kept disrupting my concentration even more. God how pissed I was when I left the range.

OT Note to self:

Always take earphones and bug repellent to the range!

Third session which was today was quite good, actually excellent if compared to the second session .  I focused on limiting my shoulder rotation at the top position and tried to bend my wrists less. My backswings felt like I was making 3/4 swings because I was so accustomed to heavily overextending my backswing . I was topping quite a lot and I think it was due to my bad posture at the start (back is S-curved) and overall I was having some troubles at positioning myself properly at the start. Most of the shots I managed actually hit properly flew straight, there was an occasional hook and some sliced shots but I think I'm on the right track.

7i DTL

7i FO

They were set to public but I forgot to publish them...

I don't know why and when I've picked the bending of the wrists but it is really ingrained into my swing. I tried quite a few shots with taking off slowly with my wrists but it messed my tempo so badly that I was swinging air a lot. It'll probably take over 20 buckets to neutralize the bend at the start. Even so I think I did manage to ease it little bit.

Sorry for the interjection as you are in good hands if you listen to Mike, but you don't need 20 range buckets to change the way you take the club back.. All you need is a mirror and 10-15 minutes doom it correctly.. The best piece of advice that I can give you is stick to changing one thing at a time, and what ever you do don't fool your self into believing that you are changing the picture doing full speed swings.. I probably lost a month or two of improvement early on because of that! If you can't so it at extreme low speeds you'll never do it at fast ones!

I agree with Eyad on this one, I made a lot of my major changes without really hitting balls. I simply set up the camera and recorded myself working on a feel that gave the result needed. This worked for both shortening my backswing and eliminating my hip sway. I think there are very few things you actually need to hit balls to ingrain in your swing.

Thanks for the replies.

I usually do half an hour of slow motion practice swings with a broomstick (I live in a flat and the roof isn't high enough to swing comfortably an actual club) each night after I've finished cutting my videos. The problem is that when you take a club in your hand the swing changes quite a bit and when you place a ball in front of you, the old habits kick in even harder.

When I start to make changes to my swing some parts of the swing usually relapse to natural feeling bad habits. For instance before I signed in and posted in this thread I was working on planting the back leg firmly on the downswing to encourage hip slide and to prevent kicking my knee towards the ball. Now I have so many things to focus on during the upswing that I slightly lift my back heel and kick towards the ball.

I really think that the wrist bend is probably the hardest habit/ritual to get rid off for me. I had to concentrate really hard today in order to not bend the wrist and this change will haunt me for quite a while.

OT: I was quite prepared to break my swing apart in order to get it right, but man it's devastating when your shots suddenly become very unstable.

I'm glad I only started this summer so that the baby steps don't feel that bad. I can only imagine how frustrating it must be if you are close to singles and ýou start to reform your swing.

About todays session:

2 buckets

Focused really hard to not bend the wrists on the takeoff, my upswings were really slow

A lot of variation on the shots, quite equal distribution on solids, hooks, slices & tops. Previously hooks were quite rare for me and I used to top 2-3 balls per bucket.

Face on shots are a bit bad due to sun being directly behind my back...

6i DTL top

6i DTL solid

6i FO top

6i FO solid

One alone badly played 9 out (playing alone when there's multiple 4 man groups in front of you is the epitome of boring) and two range sessions later I'm bit wiser again. Now that I'm getting rid of the initial wrist bend I need to focus on the overextension of my backswing. On both range sessions I tried to focus on keeping my left arm as straight as possible (and it felt straight) but I'm still curling over at the top.

During next sessions I'm going to focus on getting my grip end to point towards ground at top position. just made some very slow swings with sandy and the proper top position felt like a half swing.

After I get the hang of the proper backswing I think I need to start paying some attention to striking downwards on the downswing as I'm topping or hitting thin half of my shots at the moment.

No vids this time as there's no notable difference to the previous videos I posted.

Last Friday I had the worst range session in a while and it was the first time that I became really frustrated on a range.

Went playing the next day and I managed to drop my HCP from 34 to 31,5

So I was trying to get rid of excessive leg/hip movement because I was striking at a quite strange angle. Also I just lately managed to start keeping my left arm straight through the whole swing so it probably counted to the large amount of hooked and pulled shots.

When I actually manage to keep my legs in check and follow through the swing the shots feel great and fly straight as an arrow.

Enough blabbing. Here's two separate shots with pw from face on and dtl angles

PW - Face On

PW - DTL

Take a head cover and place under your left arm and keep it there when you swing. Your left arm becomes disconnected during your takeaway. With the head cover drill it will help you with your takeaway and excessive wrist bend. It will also help you to compact and shorten your swing down.

I think I'll get some shots from behind me the next time I go to dedicated range session to see how much my right arm separates from the body.

The thing is that if I try to squeeze my right arm in, my right shoulder feels like it'll tear apart. My right A-C ligament has been partially torn for countless times and I've went through a surgery because of it. So I'm not too fancy about the towel in the arm pit idea.

Played 109 today and got 35 points. I think that my biggest issue on the course is that I fail way too many shots because I take my eyes off the ball in order to admire the flight path

Also my short game from 40 yd to 10 yd is like lottery.

Cant argue with that mate. Good job on the 35 pointer. You seem to be doing well for only playing a short time, keep it up.