Fixing a gopher burner?

[lamebums]

I'm tired of the times I hit a perfect drive on a long par 4 or par 5, out into the middle of the fairway. I then pull my 3 wood out, and hit the ball off the deck. A solid two out of three times, I'll watch the ball rise 3 feet off the ground and travel only 150 yards. What am I doing wrong, because I cannot avoid the gopher burner? The majority of the remaining third shots are fat, so I think I'm either hitting under the ball, or towards the top... but never on the sweet spot.

So, basically, what am I doing wrong?

[allin]

This probably is not a swing fault. If you hit your driver well you can hit your 3 wood well. Overswinging, tempo, balance or tension is the first place I would look.

[lamebums]

I'm going to point the finger at overswinging, if that's the case, since if I hit it halfassedly, I will hit it on the sweet spot, it just obviously won't go as far.

[golfchief]

Sounds more like your getting to steep with the 3 wood, try sweeping the club thru the ball.

[supercow]

Watch your spine angle.... I've had intermittent problems with shallow faced fairway woods and most of the time its been due to a change of spine angle (tendency to rise up on the backswing and then drop on the downswing which leads to fat/thin shots).

[Ringer]

You must learn to get the leading edge of the clubface BELOW the equator of the ball. This means learning to extend after the ball, low and forward toward the target.

I posted a video drill for the release which will help you with this issue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvet1EmSS7Q