Revamping my swing

[stricklerlee]

This is really going to hurt. I have been playing golf on and off for about 6 years. I have shot a 36 a couple of times, am a 9 handicap and I am about to change my swing. I have found out that my back swing is flat and inside but when it reaches the top, it is a perfect swing angle(45 degrees). Nobody really told me how to fix it but after watching a couple of videos on youtube and a really neat drill like this one

I am starting to think that this will really help lower my handicap.

The problem is after discovering the perfect swing plane and trying it out, it felt very stiff. I know that this week, my golf shots will be horrible and I have a long way to go before I get comfortable with it.

[Cracker24]

Good on you. Like you know changes like these aren't easy, especially when dealing with swing plane. Over the past six months i have been  working on the exact same thing as you say you are about to embark on. Without seeing video of your swing obviously i don't know how similar yours is to how mine was pre changes. I'll presume that it's Matt Kucharish.

Obviously I don't want to send you in the wrong direction not being a teacher, but I'll let you know what i did and hopefully you can learn from that.

First of all, try and get rid of your habits before getting to technical, you said that it feels very stiff and unnatural, don't worry thats completely normal, my advice would be to make swing after swing with as steep a backswing as possible, after doing this for a period of time(when it feels natural to swing somewhat on plane), you'll be in a position to get into the technical stuff.

I don't know what type of swing theory you buy into, or if you have a coach, but the most important thing when making changes imo is to workout where you want to go with your swing and commit to it. Obviously being a member of this site the golf evolution would probably make sense, from what i've seen it looks like top quality instruction. Personally my swing is quite different to their model(from what i've seen), particularly in the backswing. What i did is pick a tour player who had a similar build to myself and a swing with minimal compensations. So that is obviously an idea as well, especially with the amount of high quality videos on youtube etc.

Once you've chosen a method, practice! But be careful in how you practice, in the six months that i have been making my changes, i've been to the range once and played 4 rounds of golf, 3 being in tournaments. In this technical process you just want to be in front of a mirror working on positions as much as possible, there is a good thread which details this really well, in swing thoughts, 5 S's for success or something like that. Don't go out on the course till you feel comfortable in your swing, and make sure you film your swing when you do decide to play, cause your body can do very strange things when you actually get to hitting the little white dot.

Anyway, hope I haven't scared you away from these changes, it honestly is the most rewarding thing you can do in golf imo. You really can't beat discovering a new feeling which gets your right elbow folding correctly in front of the mirror haha. Good luck and am looking forward to hearing about you progress.