30-Day (Was COVID) Practice Plan Challenge - April 1-30 2020

[iacas]

BTW, those of you who post videos: if I have a critique, it's of course meant to help. Teaching this stuff (and thus being able to demonstrate it, etc.) is what I do. You won't be perfect (hell, I'm not even all that great all the time), but you can probably do better if I point something out.

[WillieT]

16 minutes ago, iacas said:

BTW, those of you who post videos: if I have a critique, it's of course meant to help. Teaching this stuff (and thus being able to demonstrate it, etc.) is what I do. You won't be perfect (hell, I'm not even all that great all the time), but you can probably do better if I point something out.

For me, I welcome the pointers to my videos for my own learning.  I want to know where I need to look.  

[iacas]

8 minutes ago, WillieT said:

For me, I welcome the pointers to my videos for my own learning.  I want to know where I need to look.  

Check your finish position versus mine, where the shaft is pointing relative to the triangle in the arms… and the weight location. But mostly the arms/shaft.

[Sean_D]

Day 6 complete. I’m a cheap bastard, so I used pennies instead of dimes. It was very easy to tell between thin and good chips (I tend to thin chips more than chunk them). Definitely a drill I will continue to do.

[NM Golf]

Day 6, No video, but i bet I did this drill for 30 minutes today. Great drill!

[Darkfrog]

Repeated the day 5 drill with better success today, but still some work to do on this one.

Day 6

Didn’t have any dimes so I used a pair of small ball markers. I did 15 reps; 5 with a short motion, 5 with a medium length motion, and 5 with a long motion. This drill wasn’t a problem for me, only hit the rear marker once during one of the long motions. Felt pretty good after this. 

[boogielicious]

7 hours ago, NM Golf said:

Day 6, No video, but i bet I did this drill for 30 minutes today. Great drill!

It will be my go to rainy day drill in the basement now.

[iacas]

Day 7 – Pitching (Sole or “Glide”)

As I wrote on Day 6, I prefer not to define “chips” and “pitches” by how far the ball flies or rolls out, nor by the height or launch angle of the ball, but rather by the motions themselves. A pitch, to me, is a shot that uses little shaft lean and exposes the sole, bounce, or “glide” of the clubhead to the ground, providing a good amount of forgiveness to the shot as the clubhead will “glide” along the ground for an extended period of time. Depending on how they’ve been taught, amateurs make a lot of mistakes when pitching, including:

• Tipping back to try to get height on the shot.
• Trying to manually “throw” the clubhead under the ball, or “forcing” it under.
• Taking a very open stance, which often effectively moves the ball back in your stance.
• Taking the clubhead up and out away from them so they can “cut under” the ball.

Today’s drills are:

• 2:00 – Swing back, let the clubhead fall down with gravity.
• 4:00 – Backswing, fall, and pivot without a ball. Then repeat this motion with a ball, hitting the ball.
• 1:00 – Pitch two balls at the same time.

Note: I tend to teach both ends of the “spectrum” – chipping at one end, pitching at the other – with the understanding that virtually every short game shot you hit on the course exists somewhere in between. You almost never hit a “pure chip” or a “pure pitch,” but if you know where the endpoints are, the rest is up to your imagination.

Video:

Would still love to hear any feedback — positive, negative, or neutral. Thanks y'all!

[woodzie264]

Reminds me of the four ball challenge from years ago...

I believe my form will look better nowadays

Edited April 7, 2020 by woodzie264

[TN94z]

Day 6 completed. I have actually been working on this in the yard pretty often. Just focusing on setting up and then getting a more weight to the lead leg as part of setup. For some reason, I tend to get away from this when playing so I'm working on making it a habit.

[Edsland]

Awesome drill, after some chores ill set up the net and work on it

[Nail]

Im a bit late to this thread, so I've done the first 6 days today. This thread is absolute gold though, if i lived within a few hundred miles of you Erik I would 100% get lessons, everything is made so easy to understand. Here is what I got done today.

Is a bit of shaft lean at address a problem? I am far more comfortable with the club more forward than upright at address, with my wrists a liitle hinged already, is this bad?

 

 

This drill has me slightly worried, my left wrist is quite flat at the top of the backswing, should i cup it more or is it only a problem if I cant rotate fast enough?

 

 

 

Watching this back it looks quite poor, I dont seem to have my shoulders level so probably not enough weight on my front foot. I had always chipped with an open stance too so found it different. 

[billchao]

Day 7:

Not a full video of my practice, just a short demonstration of the drills and putting it all together.

[SteveH]

Erik, my lob wedge has 7' of bounce and my SW has 14'.  Which would be the better choice to use for this pitching drill ? I used the LW for the dime drill as my thinking was that the leading edge was thinner ?  Thanks

[woodzie264]

5 minutes ago, SteveH said:

Erik, my lob wedge has 7' of bounce and my SW has 14'.  Which would be the better choice to use for this pitching drill ? I used the LW for the dime drill as my thinking was that the leading edge was thinner ?  Thanks

Pretty sure he’ll have you use the SW as, I believe, he’s an advocate of more bounce and that most people don’t have enough of it. But he can answer for himself

[WillieT]

13 hours ago, iacas said:

Check your finish position versus mine, where the shaft is pointing relative to the triangle in the arms… and the weight location. But mostly the arms/shaft.

Thanks man...will continue to work those areas. 

[iacas]

3 hours ago, Nail said:

Is a bit of shaft lean at address a problem? I am far more comfortable with the club more forward than upright at address, with my wrists a liitle hinged already, is this bad?

In the full swing? No, not at all. It should be forward a bit. Some people just go crazy forward in an attempt to have a "flat" left wrist at setup.

3 hours ago, Nail said:

This drill has me slightly worried, my left wrist is quite flat at the top of the backswing, should i cup it more or is it only a problem if I cant rotate fast enough?

If your grip is neutral it will tend to be pretty flat at the top. Stronger grips will tend to be cupped slightly. I could have made that clearer in the video, but I remember thinking it was going on for a long time as it was… 😉

3 hours ago, Nail said:

Watching this back it looks quite poor, I dont seem to have my shoulders level so probably not enough weight on my front foot. I had always chipped with an open stance too so found it different. 

Your shoulders won't actually get to level. Mine aren't. It just feels like your right shoulder is "higher" to help your weight get forward.

1 hour ago, billchao said:

 

Not a full video of my practice, just a short demonstration of the drills and putting it all together.

That ball started rolling away and you just let it! I kept waiting for you to stop it with your clubhead.

58 minutes ago, SteveH said:

Erik, my lob wedge has 7' of bounce and my SW has 14'.  Which would be the better choice to use for this pitching drill ? I used the LW for the dime drill as my thinking was that the leading edge was thinner ?  Thanks

Tough to say without seeing them, but yeah, the 14 is probably better. The 7° one probably "fakes" bounce with a wide sole without much camber, too, which limits its flexibility.

(If it is a wide, flat, little-camber sole.)

[woodzie264]

Day 7 - pitching 

for the first part of the drill, I found it really hard to left the club fall - so weird. 
 

I have love the quickie pitch video in the instructional content since the day I found it. Very useful shot. 
 

after watching Erik’s video, I realized why my “miss” with shot is to chunk it or hit it fat as I tend to swing down and pivot rather than letting it fall more naturally and pivot. 

Edited April 7, 2020 by woodzie264