My swing (Sheriff420)

[Sheriff420]

What am I doing wrong? I'm new to this so you might have to dumb down your terminology a little bit. I used the v1 home 2.0 software to crop the videos but I don't believe the basic edition will let you save them in slow motion. What (hopefully free) software are y'all using to edit the videos? I know I need cleats because I see that I'm scooting my right foot back at the moment of impact. I can't seem to get the whole heel lifting deal that everyone else does. It is just one more thing to think about aside from making clean contact with the ball. I was having trouble with slicing pretty bad when I first started playing golf (2 months ago) and I figured out that my hands aren't in the same position at the MOI as they were at address. I somehow manage to twist my wrist and the club head opens up, I realized that when I did some slow practice swings. To adjust, I have a mark on my grip that I line up with the side of my thumbnail to toe in the club face to compensate and I got to where the ball moves on out pretty straight. If the range markers are accurate at the driving range I like going to then I'm hitting between 250 and 300 yards with my driver. The reason I say "if" is because its an old guy that turned the field in his back yard into the driving range and I noticed that he moved the ropes that you hit from about 20 yards forward the other day and I don't think he moved the yardage markers. I don't really have that wrist twist with my irons though, maybe because I don't take such a big back swing. My iron play results in a lot of ball topping or blading it. My driver is a Callaway Diablo Edge with 9.5º loft, it was $100 at Play it Again Sports, can't complain about that. My fairway driver is a 15º Callaway Diablo Big Bertha, It tends to do me wrong by hitting the ground or the top of the ball instead of the back of it. That one was $45 at Play it Again Sports, can't complain about that one either. My Irons are Powerbilt Momentum - Kmart clubs. They seem ok but the driver and fairway driver that were in the bag were garbage. The Callaway driver added about 100 yards to my drives. My putter is a Target Line with the perimeter weight and an offset shaft on it. I still can't putt but I can putt better than I did with the Powerbilt putter with the straight shaft. I also picked up a 62º Nicklaus lob wedge and a Nicklaus sand wedge. I believe my set is complete but I'm debating between keeping the Powerbilt irons or getting a set of Callaway Diablo Edge irons to match my driver. Any tips about golf balls to try out would be welcome. I like the Gamer V2 balls. I haven't played the Callaway Diablo balls enough to form an opinion on them. I ran through (lost) a bunch of the Top Flight XL5000 balls and they were slice city. I just picked up a pack of Precept Laddie X balls to give them a go since a guy on the Dodge forum I'm always on really likes them for his weekly play. That guy reserves the $50 a dozen balls for tournaments and says that the Laddie balls are pretty good for the price. I'm probably forgetting some questions but it's late and I'm a bit tired. I need to get some sleep so I can go play a round in the morning.

[Ron Stewart]

First thing I noticed, you gotta keep that left arm straighter, and work on forming a 90 degree angle with your right elbow in the backswing. Work on shortening the backswing. Compare your video with a pro's and notice the differences.

[Sheriff420]

I noticed those two things too, the left arm goes too high instead of level with the shoulders and I don't bring the club parallel to the ground in the back swing which is probably due to the left arm going so high. Do you think I should try to get a little more lean toward the ball when I shoot? It seems like I stand a little too straight up. I watched that video from Jay Lim from another thread that was recently posted and that guys instruction made complete sense to me. It's just putting his instruction into practice might take some doing without someone standing in front of me telling me where I'm going wrong as I'm in the swing.

[Sheriff420]

I just went into the back yard with my cheap fairway driver, thinking about what Jay Lim was saying in his instructional video. I concentrated on keeping my left arm straight and in line with my shoulders on the backswing, my club parallel to the ground and tried to do a clean rotation around my spine with the club. I was surprised that I just barely shaved the leaves off the ground in the starting position of the club each time I swung it. So I smacked a golf ball into the woods and it actually went straight as could be along with me not topping it or smacking the ground first.

[Ron Stewart]

Another thing you may want to consider working on is your posture. You seem to be a bit upright, try getting into a bit more athletic stance. A little more bend in the knees and some squat in the butt may help with your balance in your follow through.  When your over the ball drop your butt down a tad, kinda with the feeling that your going to sit down in a chair. I sure there are a lot of other guys that can give better advice on here, these are just my not so educated opinions. Check on youtube, there are so many helpful vids on there you could spend days and days learning new stuff and comparing your swing.

[uttexas]

Quite a few things to work on.  You appear to have an athletic build and good coordination, so with time your swing and ball striking will improve.

Watch these videos many times.

The key things to notice are as follows:

Low Back (lumbar spine) goes from flexion at address--->extension at the top of the swing--->flexion at the beginning of the forward swing--->extension into impact.  Your back appears somewhat stiff throughout the swing

Right elbow stays more connected to body throughout the swing (only a few, namely, Bubba Watson and John Daley can successfully hit a golf ball repeatedly with that amount of disconnect of the right elbow from the body)

lower body initiates forward swing.  you might feel a pause with the upper body and arms at the top of the backswing as the legs and hips drive forward to initiate the forward swing.

Hips push forward, legs straighten, and low back extends into impact.

Arms extend (straighten) into impact and follow through.  By  keeping right elbow connected to your torso and pushing hips forward, straightening legs, and extending low back into impact; you will create room for your arms to straighten (longer lever arm to generate more force) into impact.

the good slow motion ones on this video start at 1:15

[Sheriff420]

I took what I learned (before I read the last post) to a cheap course up the road today (Ponderosa). I wish I had just hit the driving range instead so I wouldn't have to go find my ball after trying something new, I donated a few to the woods today.

My iron play was terrible because I kept topping the ball.

I did have a few awesome drives but also a few crappy ones.

My putting was pretty bad, I think I should change my user name to 3putt.

I was going to let a much better player that caught up to me on the 13th hole play through but we ended up just finishing the round together.

He cautiously offered me some advice (I guess he didn't want me to take it the wrong way) but I told him that I welcome any criticisms or tips since I still have a lot to learn.

He told me that he noticed that my weight was mostly on my heels instead of the balls of my feet and that he noticed that my back was a little too close to vertical. He also noticed that when I hit my irons that I use too much arm and not enough body throughout the entire swing.

I was trying to copy Jay Lim all day by starting out with my club parallel to the ground, straight out from my belt, then leaning forward until I ground it then bending my knees a little bit. That guy told me that when I bend my knees my back goes more upright and I think that was one of my problems today.

In the videos I would put the club head behind the ball and rest it on the left side of my zipper and that put me the right distance from the ball.

Now I hold the club straight out from my belt and bend at the hips to get the club head in the right spot for the swing. I'm going to keep working on Jay Lims method because the way he explained it seems about perfect to me.

I found out today that if there is a heavy rain storm at 6pm the day before you play on a course that isn't kept up as well as it should be that the greens will have ripples of cut grass all over them. That made for some crappy putt attempts because the ball bounced on the cut grass all the way to the hole on a lot of them.

I also kept losing the cart path because it isn't paved and they're aren't any for over half of every hole. I asked a maintenance guy about it on hole #10 and he said to drive anywhere I wanted as long as it isn't on the greens or the tees.

That place is only $15 a round with a cart so I knew it wouldn't be really nice. It is a good place to practice even though it isn't kept up very well because it's so cheap and there's hardly ever anyone there. As slow as I am I didn't see anyone else playing until that one guy caught up to me.

I also found out today that I really like the Precept Laddie X golf balls.