ujjwaldeb

i had the exact same problem - could draw my irons but not the driver. What i struggled with was the alignment of my body and shoulders to the right of the target. Whenever i tried to do that, i would hit the ball in all sorts of directions as i guess my body was compensating for what it saw as a misalignment (i nearly decapitated a guy on the next mat once , earning myself some dark mutterings!). Finally figured it out this weekend at the range - what worked for me was to align the shoulders towards the target, but take the driver back in a more "around the body" kind of motion than normal. Suddenly, i was hitting draws which started at the target and drew about 10-15 yards , thus ending up left of the target (sometimes it ended up being a snap hook as well, but i guess practice should cure that). Once, i saw it could be done, it was a simple matter to do the same thing but with the body aligned a bit to the right to the target, so that the ball ended up at the target. I think i hit 30 balls and they were all straight or a draw , which is phenomenal for me because i always faded/sliced my driver before this. Can't wait to try it out on the course.

Thanks , rustyredcab and mps67 for your comments. mps, I hadnt noticed the closed clubface at the top - i think it maybe because i take a very strong grip, because my release is not that great. I'll work on that at the range. Also, I sometimes shorten the backswing , especially when i'm looking for accuracy - maybe i should make that the standard. rusty, i checked out the moenorman site - i hadnt actually heard of moe before, but the videos look interesting and in line with my understanding of the physics - i'll do some more digging and try and adopt the techniques. thanks for the help, guys. cheers Ujjwal

Hi guys, I took up this crazy game about 2 years ago. Currently have a EGA handicap of 21.6. I wanted to get some feedback on my driver swing. My distance is about 220m (carry + roll) off the tee. if i'm hitting it well, i have a slight fade - if i'm hitting it badly, i have a pronounced slice :) I noticed that most people at setup have their arms hang down and then their club shaft at an angle to the arms. My arms and club shaft form a straight line at setup. You'll hopefully see what i mean when you watch the video. It could be because i havent had any formal golf instruction - the reason i started doing it that way was because i figured the longer the shaft, the better the velocity of the clubhead (assuming angular momentum is conserved), but i could be way off base. Any comments on the swing overall, as well as the specific question above , are welcome. cheers Ujjwal

following up on my post from Friday(my first birdie), i almost shot my first eagle today ! 340 mtr Par 4 - smoked the drive so it was right in line with the 100m marker, the 9 iron sailed high and long , landed on the green and rolled within a few inches of the hole - however, it kept on going and ended up about 5 feet away. Inevitably, i lipped the birdie putt and had to settle for par, but it was a good experience nonetheless !

Just wanted to report that i got my first birdie ever today and then followed it up with another on the next hole ! The golf gods were out in force... The first one was pretty fluky - hit the tee shot to just short of the green on a 160m Par 3, about 50 ft to the pin but a pretty weirdly sloped green - pulled out the trusty PW and landed the ball on a small hill from which it curved left to inexorably get in the hole ! Pretty darn great feeling , i can tell you that !