MySwing (Cath)

[cath]

I've been Playing Golf for: 3 years

My current handicap index or average score is: 21

My typical ball flight is: low

The shot I hate or the "miss" I'm trying to reduce/eliminate is: low hook

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I have been told that I overswing quite a lot and have a reverse pivot. I have reduced my handicap from 36 to 21 in nearly 3 years but would really like to come down more. I'm hoping someone with more knowledge than me can give me some tips from my swing please. Thank You x

[Ole_Tom_Morris]

Well, swing tips are a lot like horoscopes in reliability, and they can do a lot more harm. But let me throw some ideas out there for consideration/discussion.

Back when I was trying to learn the golf swing, a tip I read in a golf magazine really did me in for several years. The tip was that you get more power if your arms are stretched out in front of you in address position. I didn't start to improve (if improve I have) until I got that out of my head.

You reach out at address.   And your club shaft points well above your belt buckle.

In general, when you address the ball, your arms should hang down loosely and naturally as you address the ball.   Why?  Several reasons.  If you reach out at address, your balance during the swing is affected and you are more likely to sway off line, for one.  The ball is farther away from you, and thus harder to hit pure; it's like putting longer shafts on your clubs -- there is theoretically more power but less chance to use that power effectively. ( I think of it as the diff between a slap that has no body weight behind it and a straight right that does.)    And -- your grip is affected for the worse.

About the grip.   The golf grip is a finger grip, not a palm grip, though the club grip does cross the edge of the left palm above the base of the pinkie finger.

If you reach out with the club, you are more likely to take a palm grip.    If you take a palm grip when you reach out at address, you are going to have problems with the way your wrists cock in the backswing and with the release toward impact.   Also you may have trouble returning the clubhead to hit the ball solidly.

[Check:  where does your golf glove wear?   This is a clue to how you grip the club and where movement may be occurring.]

I am curious what happens to your grip at the top of your swing.   When your clubhead drops below horizontal, is it because your grip is failing because your fingers loosen?

You took a full backswing but your follow-through looks more like it goes with a half or 3/4 swing.

Ordinarily the backswing and follow-through are like mirror images, not exactly, but more or less.  So ordinarily with your backswing you'd finish with the clubhead behind your body, and the shaft mostly behind your back.   That didn't happen?   Why?

I tend to think that your hitting a weak low hook is because you are slashing across the ball inside out, and that goes along with the asymetry between your back swing and follow through.

Do you hear a SWOOSH when you swing?   Where does that SWOOSH occur?   Are you braking your swing before you hit the ball and then going into a truncated follow-through?

There's more going on than what I mentioned above, but maybe this will start the ideas flowing.

[Ole_Tom_Morris]

A further comment.   Reaching out with your arms at address looks better.   It looks stronger and more athletic.   You stand more upright.   If you see a pic of a model ready to swing a golf club, that is how they look.

By contrast, when you let your arms droop down as you address the ball, you look like you are slumping over.  You may feel like a gorilla with those arms hanging down.   Like you have poor posture. Yo u may feel undignified bending over the club and the ball.

A lot of pros do look slumped over and round-shouldered as they address the ball;  look at Nick Price or David Toms or the guys on the senior tour.   Buncha old guys with spinal curvature.

Looks are deceiving.  The more powerful compact position is to have the arms hanging down as you grip the club at address.   You can swing with your weight better, and free up that powerful wrist lever action.

[cath]

Ole-Tom-Morris,

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply. I have understood a lot of what you have said, some of it I'm still trying to work out in my head!!

I can see that the club shaft is pointing above my belt buckle and I do look very outstretched. I will go to the driving range and try to lower my arms a little. Should they still be straight or will lowering them make them bend slightly automatically?

About the grip, I think I do grip it in my palms. I changed from a baseball grip to an interlocking grip about 2 months ago. I do find that sometimes i feel the club "move" at the top of my swing.

I would love to be able to finish my swing fully, that is something I have been very aware of. When there is no ball in front of me my practice swing is a full back swing and follow through with the club finishing around my body. For some reason once I have hit the ball the swing just seems to stop! The "swoosh" of the club I think happens just before impact?

I'm keen to try anything to improve, and at my handicap I have a lot of room to improve!

Could I just ask you, from my video do you think I am "overswinging"?

I'll post back once I have tried some of your suggestions, once again, thank you.

[dave s]

hi Cath:

Not a teaching pro here but have a wife that I play with a lot.  She has a similar ball flight as you indicated--not really high flying and sometimes a low hook on tee balls.  For my wife, it's usually that her arms outrace her body through the shot.  She works hard on keeping her body turning through the shot so that the arms don't get there too early.  The result of not turning the body through a shot is the hands turnover too early causing the low hook to show up.

Rotating the body through the shot seems to work for her.

dave

[Ole_Tom_Morris]

I like what Dave said.   "Rotate the body though the shot."   Not hit at the ball and pull up short which it looks like you are doing.  Accelerate the clubhead through the ball so that you hear a SWOOSH right before you hit the ball, then move into your follow through letting momentum carry the club around and up.

"Rotating through"  will likely do more for your score than anything I said.

I'd check that grip especially for the left hand.   Mostly a finger grip, not a palm grip.

How should the arms hang?   I think loosely, relaxed, let gravity decide.     Remember what Sam Snead said about his address:  "My mind is blank and my body is loose as a goose."   Say "loose as a goose" as you address the ball.    Then talk to the ball like he did:  "Old son, you're going for a little ride."

Another problem with reaching out with the club is that the muscles tend to tense up when you hold your arms out.   You don't want to be tense at address.

"Overswinging."   If you look at your video, you take the club back and up so your hands are over your shoulders and then you let the clubhead drop down further so your club is going past horizontal.   Probably not good.   It is modern swing doctrine that you do not go past horizontal, and that you play even better if you stop short of horizontal.   Many of us would play better golf if we used no more than a 3/4 swing.

But don't tell that to John Daly or Hogan of the late 1940s or a number of other pro golfers who went past horizontal.  I like to try to swing like Daly to loosen up or to bomb it.    A triumph of fun over sense. Even Tiger Woods has worked on not taking his shoulders or hands back too far;  when he was younger and more flexible and less worried about aging and scoring he could and would take the club way past horizontal.

In your case I was wondering if your grip loosens when your hands are up high in the backswing so that you let the club fall and then regrip to start the downswing.   I can't tell from the video.

[cath]

Just wanted to give you a quick update. I have been trying to put some of the things you have said into practice this last week. The main things i noticed were my grip, I was def gripping the club in the palm and not the fingers. The other thing was getting my body through the shot. I really feel now like I commit fully and turn fully through the shot and not just stop at the ball. I played today and broke 90...woohoo!! Only had one bad drive (which was a slice, much easier to recover from than a low hook!). I feel so much more confident on the tee. I am still working on some of the other points, but this was a great starting point for me. I drove 220 yards twice today..and they were straight! Thanks again guys.