My Swing (jamo)

[jamo]

I'm a 3 handicap and my struggle is inconsistency. I know that my head dips and i know that here i go a little past parallel.

So, anyway, have at it!

6 Iron- back

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6 iron- head on

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Driver- back

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Driver- head on

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[shooter5757]

Looks pretty good with a low handicap you really gotta do a slow motion next to a tour pro to see some good stuff you can work on.

[Jay-Bird]

Your swing is very powerful. You look like you hit the crap out of the ball.

That being said, I think you are over swinging a bit. Your inconsistencies may come from that. You really seem to fight to keep your balance at the end of some swings. Your right ankle is about to break after those swings. Start, execute and finish the swing in balance and have that right foot straight up and down. Ultimately you will not lose any club head speed by fixing your balance. You will, however, improve ball striking and shot consistency.

I also would move your ball left a bit with your driver. You are hitting down on the ball creating extra spin by attacking down at it. Tee the ball forward a bit. Over time it should help your driver consistency.

[live4u120]

I agree with moving the ball forward a bit with the driver. But just a question: With your driver, it seems like you don't get much of a coil? Or is that just me?

Oh, and awesome avatar. I love that show.

[iacas]

Here's a picture I made with some stills from the videos .

I'll preface this all by saying you're probably a fairly good golfer and everything I'm going to say is almost nit-picking. If you're like me, though, "pretty good" isn't where I'm content to stop.

A1 shows a reasonably good setup though it looks like you're trying to keep your chin up a little. The reason why you might have to do that is seen in A2 - huge lifting and separation of the arms from the chest. You'll also note that even though your chin was up, your head still had to lift (brim of cap is more horizontal, look at how much your head moved up and back from A1 to A2).

The lifting is also going to change your spine angle. Now, the only time I think the spine really gets back to the same angle it was at address is at the point on the downswing when the club is parallel to the ground (C2). As you can see comparing A1 to C2, you're still standing up a bit more here and you'll stay standing up right on through to your follow-through. That's not something to "fix" per se but it's a telling sign and an effect and I think the lifting/separation is a big cause.

On to row B, where we see something you seem to have corrected on your irons. You have a Tiger Woods-esque takeaway. You push your hands back and almost outside a line straight back, roll the club over (open), and get it to a laid off position at the top. In the iron swing (A) you recover and still seem to get the club at least down the line (probably not truly from the inside a bit). With the driver you don't.

B1 shows your setup (you could probably be a little closer and taller so the arms hang more - just a touch). B2 shows the club well outside the hands and how little depth the hands have gotten. Notice how flat your shoulders have turned here. B3 shows the same straighter spine angle but also how far outside your hands the club is at this point on the downswing. Then, in B4, we see how hard your right hand has had to rotate over (the opposite of the takeaway move, rolling open) to try to square the clubface. Notice even from B1 to B2 how much your head moves - backwards and up again.

C1 shows how far off your elbow has gotten from your ribs. It shows how high above your shoulder plane your left arm is. And most importantly it shows how flat your shoulders have turned even with an iron. C2 shows your head movement, and down is not always a bad thing, but it's partly responsible for what you see in C3 - that's not a straight line from the left shoulder to the ball, nor even in your left arm, and the clubhead beats the grip to the ball.

C4 shows a similar left arm breakdown and a ball position that, with the driver, is too far back. You're hitting down on the ball quite a bit here - you can see the clubhead streak from just outside of your right toes to near the ball.

Fixes
I'm just going to give one for now because it's important and I think you need to get it down before you get anything else down: a steeper shoulder turn.

Don't worry about keeping your chin up. Drive your left shoulder down. You're turning almost parallel to the ground - you want to turn at about 35° or so - whatever your spine angle is basically. This single move will help with the head movement, the lifting, and the hands not getting deep enough - but it probably won't totally cure the second or third, particularly if you roll the club with your forearms like you are right now, so watch those.

[jamo]

Thanks for the advice.

As for the ball position, i do spin my driver a lot so that might be a good way to combat that. I think i have the ball that far back is because this fall i tended to have an over-the-top move that made me pull my irons and slice my driver, and i must have inched the ball back in an effort so swing more on plane.

For the shoulder turn, that is something that i have toyed with over the past year, but have never really made an effort to put in my swing. As it would have it, i can hit the ball already much farther when i an joking around and doing a John Daly backswing, and i presume this is from the extra turn.
When i have gone to the extra shoulder turn the problem arises that i tend to go way past parallel so i guess i have to watch that, or tone it down a little.



Thanks! And anymore advice from anyone else would still be much appreciated!

[iacas]

When i have gone to the extra shoulder turn the problem arises that i tend to go way past parallel so i guess i have to watch that, or tone it down a little.

???

I didn't recommend any "extra" shoulder turn. I simply said you needed to stop turning your shoulders so level - flat - and that they should turn on a steeper angle. Left shoulder down more from the address position.... etc.

[jamo]

Wow, my bad then, i feel dumb.

That makes a lot more sense, i must have read it wrong, sorry about that and thanks for the advice.

[jerry g]

it looks like you are lifting the club at takeaway too quickly rather than taking the club back closer to the ground for the first foot and a half or so. i'm not sure how to explain maybe lifting the clubhead very steeply right away instead of more parallel to the ground before the club starts upwards. that make sense? that might be a byproduct of a steeper shoulder turn i'm not sure. the wording steeper shoulder turn is a bit confusing to me so not sure. that just seemed to be the most glaring thing i saw from the vids and the balance issue

[jamo]

I went to the range today and tried the steeper shoulder angle, or what really felt like it, i didnt have a camera, and it was great! I was making really good contact, and it felt like at the beginning of the downswing the club just fell into place. The only problem that arose occasionally was too much weight on my front foot which led to a few chinks and a few skulled shots, but most were really good! Thanks and i'll continue to work on it some more, or as long as this fairly mild New England weather keeps up.

[iammpspeer]

im not going to read everyone else's post, but imo it looked like you were hitting a flop shot type swing for ur iron and driver... and I would say your right elbow is too far from your body.

[jerry g]

your videos aren't working very good for me now. worked ok before but now not so much.

[kleraudio]

Great posts here man, Erik and the other guys know their stuff.

One little piece I can offer: Seems like your casting a bit on the face on vid with your irons. I fight this same thing, if your already getting solid distance, if you can figure how to lag that club, you'll be getting even more distance.

The thing that helps me is to hold the angle between the left hand and the club shaft as long as possible. This gets the hands to drop and helps you to drop right into the "slot". Like I said its something Ive been working on, but when you strike a ball so clean, its kind of addicting!

Oh and what cam did you use? I gotta get some vids of my swing up here.

Thanks and good luck! You've got a low HC already, these improvements might help you drop a stroke or two!

Jim

[jamo]

I do struggle with casting a bit but the changes that i made due to erik's post see to have stopped it.

[jamo]

Here are some new videos from a fange session today. I only have the 6-iron because i was inside and didnt have enough time for the driver.

iacas, do the shoulders look more vertical? I've been working on that and keeping my head from moving up on the backswing. As a side note, i've also been trying to maintain a right angle in the right elbow on the back view.


face on 6-iron

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back view 6-iron

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[iammpspeer]

In the first one, it looks like you are bending your left elbow a little much.

On the second one, you were out of balance at the very end when you fell forward and turned towards to camera.

This is just what I saw at normal speed, I do not have any means to slow it down to look at it further, ill let Erik do this, he is much better at the ticky tack stuff.

[laquintaboy82]

You look like your a pretty athletic guy, nice J.B holmes type of motion. Your leg work looks pretty good but your upper body gets to disconected from your arms. Your lifting the club straight up on the takeaway and your right elbow is in an A-Rod position rather than a Tiger position. If your falling over after you swing your swinging to hard. Still a good swing.

[Nickynoodles]

Nice swing. In your first video with the 6 iron it almost looks like my swing. I use stack and tilt and you got the weight on your front leg and a straighter back leg just like my swing. I also like how your using a 6 iron and the ball is still a little behind the middle of your stance towards your back leg. I had a little disagreement with a guy on here a couple days ago that i was wrong when i said the ball doesnt get to the middle of my stance till i hit a 6. The shorter irons i play back. Whatevers comfortable and gets you to hit down on the ball is best. Do you get good backspin with your 6? I seen the swing and with the power and nice downswing it looks like you would. I pull the 6 back pretty good but when i get to the 5 i can get it to stop but not come back that much. All in all i think your swing is great but that might just be because it looks like my swing lol .