ProgolferLiu

Maybe that's why they've never won majors :D The biggest issue for me continues to be a very flat shoulder turn on the downswing with my right hip slinging across to the left. The "feeling of vertical shoulder plane" just does not exist in the tennis forehand. One of my playing partners today brought up that my hips open up so fast and my shoulders are so darn flat sometimes. Continues to be frustrating for sure.

I started about 15 years ago and was very serious about it for 3 years. At that time, I bought "The Golf Instruction Manual" which had a foreward by Ernie Els which I modeled my swing after. Besides this book, a co-worker gave me the Medicus 5-iron and off I went. Got myself down to a 5 handicap towards the end of the 3rd year. After that, I went off to work in Asia and did not play much until about 2 years ago when I really got back into it again and it felt like I was relearning everything. Watched alot of videos online, read alot about the golf swing and definitely have a much better technical understanding of the golfswing. The only thing I would change if I had a do-over would be to play golf left handed (I am a natural righty that plays alot of tennis) so as to keep my dominant side towards the target to get a better pulling effect.

Yup. I do have to admit golfers and tennis players have an excuse for every thing bad that happens to them. But, I am going lefty next offseason so I can eliminate that excuse.

I wanted to hear opinions from folks to see if two different sports could be inhibiting one another. As of now, I am concluding that tennis does make it more difficult for me to be good at golf because of the movements that a relatively high level tennis player requires. IE... fast hips, flat shoulders, staying on toes, etc. This harkens back to my high school tennis days where our coach forbid us from playing racketball or badminton due to their more wristy actions. However, I do feel the one handed backhand shot in tennis can be very beneficial if I play golf left handed (dominant hand on top). Thanks for all the different ideas!

I was having a pretty good round today keeping my elbows connected and maintaining spine angle until after impact. I was also consciously keeping my head behind the ball. Then all of a sudden I lost focus on the 12th hole, came up too early in the downswing leading to horizontal shoulders (very natural tennis forehand), sliced and ob off the tee. Resulted in a triple. Snap hooked the next tee shot...got away with a bogey. Sliced the one after that to a 225 yards par 3...another triple. All in all, I walked off the course with an 81 which could have been much better. It's definitely been a frustrating journey for me the past 9 months. I also noticed my tennis tendencies are more pronounced if I play a round after tennis without any range time to get the golf feel back.

Thanks for the responses. Fundamentally, I think my swing is fairly solid according to video and swingvest analysis. The challenge for me has been to continuously try to not allow my tennis tendencies (fast hip rotations, flat shoulders, and weight on toes tendencies) to all of a sudden pop up during a round. This has been disastrous for me. My scorecards are littered with lots of pars, few birdies AND doubles with a sprinkle of triple. I was able to get out to the range this past weekend and took a few swings with a left handed 6-iron and driver. Obviously, very very awkward at first, but I can definitely feel much more of a pulling effect by my right side (now my dominant front side swinging left handed). When I did connect, they were equal to if not better feeling than any right handed shots I've hit. This feels absolutely just like my single handed backhand in tennis. Most likely at this point, I may just hold off on any more hitting left handed until the golf/tennis season is over and go at it in the winter.

Some folks I've spoken to out here in the SF Bay Area seem to think Gary's swing already has the golfer preset the secondary axis tilt. What are your thoughts on this? On paper, it does makes some sense to me, but I have yet to experiment with it.

This reminds me very much of the "right sided swing" taught by Gary Edwin. Reverse K at setup with the majority of the weight on the front side through entire swing. From what I can see, there is very little that can go wrong, but would sacrifice some distance. A local club pro teaches this swing, but the response has been that it's great for shorter irons, but longer clubs are difficult with this swing.

Thanks for the quick responses. The flipping the switch from lumberjack to surgeon analogy really hit me in the head right after reading it. Tennis has been ingrained in my body since my childhood and I can still play at a fairly high level even without regular practice as long as I stay in shape. I was hoping that my golf would eventually become just as "automatic". My golf improved the most in the about 18 months ago since taking it seriously and really trying to understand the golf swing, but again, the most frustrating part is hitting a plateau the last 6-9 months or so with no perceived improvement. The stats I keep from my rounds do indicate when I have my blowup holes it's typically a result of a nasty slice caused by a lack of weight transfer on the downswing...again, usually as a result of my "automatic" fast hip rotation from tennis :( This led me to do a bit of research on tennis players who picked up golf and the only conclusion I can draw is that they played golf left handed (for righties). Next time at the range, I may just borrow a couple of lefty clubs at the clubhouse and give it a shot. At this point, I don't mind starting over as long as playing lefty will remove the "tennis cap" on my golf game. Thanks!

All, I've been researching this for quite some time and have finally reached the conclusion that my tennis (I play frequently and is currently 5.0, formerly college Div1 level) is basically capping my golf game. Right now in golf, my handicap is about a 7 and typically get in 1 round a week and 2 range sessions. Since I picked up golf about 6 years ago, I've been consistently working on the game (studying golf swings, doing drills at the range, short game, putting etc.) and have a fair good understanding of the golf swing. I understand there are many similarities between the golf swing and tennis strokes, but what I have found are the following inhibitors by tennis on golf: 1. Tennis players with open stance on their forehands rotate their hips laterally from right to left, not transferring weight forward. If this is translated to the golf swing, this causes the OTT move and lack of weight transfer to the left side. It took me about 3 months of drills recently to "control" this early and fast hip rotation, but still requires regular maintenance and continuous focus when I am playing a round. The minute I forget to focus on this during a round, my right arm dominates and major slice...often resulting in a couple of doubles or even triple in my round as this tends top happen at the worst moments (tee shots!) 2. Tennis players are constantly on their toes...again, when translated to my golf swing, this caused me to regularly shift my weight to my toes/balls of my feet on the downsing resulting in the OTT move/shank. 3. Tennis (like most sports) is very much a reactive sport. I still have not found an good mental cues to reverse this to golf. Other research data points: 1. There have been a number of current and retired golf pros that play good golf: Ivan Lendl (I think he even qualified for the Senior Tour) 2. Mardy Fish-current pro and scratch golfer 3. Pete Sampras 4. Rafael Nadal... And so, here is the key point about these tennis pros...they all play tennis opposite to their dominate tennis hand. Lendl and Fish golfs left handed. Nadal who plays tennis left handed, but golfs right handed. I remember Lendl mentioned once that his right side was so dominant, the only way to get the pulling sensation was to play left handed. Right now, my frustration is that I feel I have reached the ceiling in my golf game placed on by my tennis game and the only way to reach my potential in golf is to start over and play left handed...which I am willing to do, but would appreciate feedback/advice from anyone who has reached the same conclusions I have. All thoughts appreciated.