My Swing (Lihu)

[Lihu]

[QUOTE name="Lihu" url="/t/71030/my-swing-lihu/558#post_1157474"] Not sure, did you extract this shot where I stated 6i in the caption or title prior to the frame?[/QUOTE] Hi Lefty, I took it from the video where you have white pants and a blue top with horizontal stripes. I m not sure which club is it. How do you hide pics ? In your signature you have "In my bag". Then you click and shows content. How do you do that ? Thanks

Hit the text next to the "spoiler" or plus sign. Probably my PW?

[Lihu]

Did 5 minutes drills waiting for a couple people teeing off. Getting that "spin" feel around the spine.

Range was closed for "clean picking" by hand apparently. So, I got out on the course with a cart which felt like cheating. . .

Brookside 2 Blues back 12 holes. Shot 5 over with a 3 putt double on a par 3 (which I rushed because a couple golfers let me pass) and 4 bogeys and one birdie. 8 GIR, 4 nearGIR, lots of tap in pars. Putting. . .was great! So, the front 7 I usually shoot about 2-3 over, it's the back 9 that's usually super tight and harder. . .I feel like I can shoot this well every time I use a golf cart, thus cheating. Plus, I did it without my 52 degree club too!

I suppose the range time I spent all last week hitting over 2500 balls helped me get more greens too. . .

[Lihu]

5 min. Mirror work. Getting the arms and swing more compact.

Range work, finally.

Focused on a more compact swing. I feel really compact when I swing, and yet the distances seem to be the same. The flight is higher even with my old blades and Xstiff shafts. Going to have to check if I am not casting or not.

Spent almost an entire bucket working with the 60 and the PW. Forgot my 52 again. Some 9i and 8i, then another half bucket with just 9i and 8i.

My drives were sloppy compared to my short clubs. At least it felt sloppy. Going to try to take video tomorrow. Finally getting decent flights with my 3W with a tee. Going to get shorter and shorter tees to work on getting more confidence off the deck with the 3W. I was proud that I didn't top my 3W in yesterday's round, but the flight was far from optimal.

I'm pretty sure I still hit a few shots OTT, I could tell because they pulled hard right. Most of my shots were pushed a little with maybe a dozen pulls. Slight improvement that I got about 10% what I consider decent shots. Most were a little fat or thin. Not sure which I hate more, slightly thin or fat. Generally lost about 5 yards with those shots with the occasional 10-20 yard short shot. Those that lost 20 were most likely much fatter and possibly cast as the flights were generally much higher.

As far as number of balls is concerned 240 balls seems to be on the light side as far as a workout is concerned, but it seems to be perfect in terms of my feeling after a 2-3 hour session. 360 balls in a slightly longer time doesn't leave me with a strong desire to hit more the next day, but I might alternate.

I am planning on playing 3-4 rounds per week and scoring all of them, as I no longer need to practice shots on the course any more. There's no way I could get the same amount of practice on the course as on the range. I also have way more confidence on the course the "few" times I go. Thinking back upon it, I definitely got more accurate hitting greens yesterday, because I hit 2500 balls the week before my round. Hitting or trying to hit that little round plate on the driving range from 125 yards was much harder than hitting a green. It's also surprisingly fun.

[Lihu]

From this morning, and I think I found out why my shots are going higher. . .I'm way over to the toe. Amazed I didn't lose too much distance, if at all.

60 degree from top, PW, 9i, 8i, 7i, 6i

Probably 80 shots with 60 and PW each 9i, 8i are probably 50 each, 7i and 6i probably around 20 shots each.

[No Mulligans]

What did you use so the balls would leave those marks?

Doesn't look 'way over' to the toe to me.  You should see where I hit it on the toe sometimes.

[Lihu]

What did you use so the balls would leave those marks?

Doesn't look 'way over' to the toe to me.  You should see where I hit it on the toe sometimes.

They're just range balls. I think it's just surface dirt and plastic/paint from the balls. Range balls always leave marks when they start getting a little scuffed up. The older ones actually leave little bits of the cover in the grooves too. Didn't need to use the Dr. Scholl's foot powder. . .

Thanks for the comment, but I know I'm either casting or coming way OTT or both. The balls do not appear to be losing distance or trajectory (does not seem to be pulling?), but I know it's happening from video I took this evening. I know it can be better. I just need to take my time with each shot.

The problem with hitting at the range is that so many people are rapid firing balls and it speeds me up too. Bad. Need to bring ear buds and listen to music until I get my own cadence ingrained.

[iacas]

460 balls at the range today starting at 5:10. That's probably my limit. I was hitting 9i 5-10 yards shorter than when I started.

@Lihu , buddy, c'mon. I don't hit 460 balls in a week. There are months I don't think I hit 460 balls (granted, I could practice a bit more… :D).

460 balls hitting one ball every 45 seconds or so (really every 30+ seconds, but time to review some film, time to change clubs, time to drink some water, etc. makes it work out to 45 seconds or so) = 345 minutes. That's nearly six hours.

You're doing it wrong.

[mvmac]

Be careful with hitting so many balls @Lihu . If they're just full speed "on course" swings then all you're doing is ingraining bad habits.

[Lihu]

Yeah, no doubt, wrong. Quite honestly, I just wanted to see how many balls I could hit before getting tired. I guess I found out. :-D Ironically, I hit more this afternoon too while waiting for my son. The plan was to chip, but I found an abandoned bucket, and felt the urge to hit them. Then we went to Golfsmith to test out a 56 degree for my son and ended up hitting 6i for a bit with him. I won't be doing that any time soon. . .tomorrow is going to be a 5S practice session and will leave some balls for other people. This unlimited range ball thing is like those all you can eat buffets, I just don't know when to stop. . .got. . .to. . .control. . .myself. . .:-(

[mvmac]

Yeah, no doubt, wrong. Quite honestly, I just wanted to see how many balls I could hit before getting tired. I guess I found out.

Ironically, I hit more this afternoon too while waiting for my son. The plan was to chip, but I found an abandoned bucket, and felt the urge to hit them. Then we went to Golfsmith to test out a 56 degree for my son and ended up hitting 6i for a bit with him.

I won't be doing that any time soon. . .tomorrow is going to be a 5S practice session and will leave some balls for other people. This unlimited range ball thing is like those all you can eat buffets, I just don't know when to stop. . .got. . .to. . .control. . .myself. . .

Yeah I would limit yourself to one bucket, or even half a bucket but take 45-60 minutes to hit that bucket.

It's kind of like working out. You want to get the most out of your time. Doing 500 squats isn't that much better than doing 100-200, law of diminishing returns and all that.

[Lihu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lihu

Yeah, no doubt, wrong. Quite honestly, I just wanted to see how many balls I could hit before getting tired. I guess I found out.

Ironically, I hit more this afternoon too while waiting for my son. The plan was to chip, but I found an abandoned bucket, and felt the urge to hit them. Then we went to Golfsmith to test out a 56 degree for my son and ended up hitting 6i for a bit with him.

I won't be doing that any time soon. . .tomorrow is going to be a 5S practice session and will leave some balls for other people. This unlimited range ball thing is like those all you can eat buffets, I just don't know when to stop. . .got. . .to. . .control. . .myself. . .

Yeah I would limit yourself to one bucket, or even half a bucket but take 45-60 minutes to hit that bucket.

It's kind of like working out. You want to get the most out of your time. Doing 500 squats isn't that much better than doing 100-200, law of diminishing returns and all that.

Yeah, I was kind of thinking this as my shots got weaker. Thanks.

[Lihu]

Man, my quads and glutes were really sore this morning. Serves me right. . .

[Lihu]

5 minutes mirror drill swing. Starting today's session in 15 minutes. Will only hit 50-60 balls full swing. The rest will be for sub 106 yard practice with LW.

Range was closed, so I played 18 holes Brookside Course 1 Blue tees, but repeated some holes because there were so many people on the course today. No score to post. The 6700-6800 yard course appears to be very comfortable for me. If I scored I would have had triple, double, 7 bogey, 6 par and I played the 2 hardest holes twice. That's roughly +12 on 18 holes. Not quite fitting into the shoot high 70's criteria, but it still felt comfortable. Here's why.

Even though I sliced a lot of tee shots, I was able to play driver/iron on every hole and was 10-40 yards short on only 4 holes (2 less than 10, 1 20 and the last one 40). I only pulled out a 3W for a tee shot. If I had decided to just hit out of the bunker instead of attempting a "controlled" distance and spin shot, I think I could have shaved off 2 strokes from that hole. Also, not consciously playing a hero shot with my 3i the first time around could have saved me from the double. The blowups were both on par 5s. On my double my tee shot hit a tree on the left. 3i into another tree. 6i ticked the top of a tree and knocked off a large heavy pine cone. 4i to green side pin high from 200 yards. 2 chips and a putt. The triple was tee shot faded/sliced into a tree. 3i to within 100 yards. LW to the bunker, 3 attempted aimed tight lie type shots out of the bunker, chip and tap in putt.

If I could also learn to use my hybrid and 3W off the deck my scores could potentially go down a couple more strokes. +7 seems to be a reachable normal goal? I have shot +6 before playing on the same tees, but it was a lucky round where everything came together. Even though my legs are still a little sore today, I was able to hit to distance on my irons up to 4i. My 4i was from a shot that landed on a nice fluffy lie. Now I know why some people cheat by fluffing their lies, and lying about fluffing.

A lot of big "ifs", I have a lot more range work to do, but stoked to do proper practice to improve more. So, I did the 5S practice swings while I was playing alone, but it's tough to convince playing partners that my practice swing is 1 minute. . .

Well, the good news is that I did limit myself to less than 40 full shots. All the range work seems to have made me much stronger.

Planning to do proper practice tomorrow morning.

[Lihu]

Did some more wrist set work today.

I've been able to keep my wrist straight throughout the entire swing while still getting power from my core. The drill swing Mike had me use is exercising different things at this point. I'll take some video this Sunday in my back yard net to have him or others check my progress. It's been a month since I've posted a video even though I've been using video feedback every day. . .

[Lihu]

Played 9 holes with my son today. There was a mix of the gold and blue tees as there was a tournament today.

I have to say that even with my "slices" (some people claim they are fades), it was not that much harder than the 6800 yard tees. That was a pleasant surprise. I sliced a 4i into a tree on the 8th hole and it ended up in a nice position for a par.

I shot 43 and my son shot 41. Not bad for somewhere in the vicinity of 7000 yards.

[mvmac]

Hit a single bucket. I think I'm too tired to hit well. Although, the temperature was in the low 60Fs, my drives were low and short.

Did carry my 8i (~41 to 42 degree loft) to the 150 yard flag on average. Some farther some shorter. The ones that pulled tended to go farther the ones I pushed tended to fall a little shorter. Probably an 8-ish yard variation.

Are you sure your 8 iron is 41-42º? That's more like a 9 iron.

[Lihu]

[QUOTE name="Lihu" url="/t/82963/5-minutes-daily-practice-challenge-july-2015/180#post_1166875"]   Hit a single bucket. I think I'm too tired to hit well. Although, the temperature was in the low 60Fs, my drives were low and short. Did carry my 8i (~41 to 42 degree loft) to the 150 yard flag on average. Some farther some shorter. The ones that pulled tended to go farther the ones I pushed tended to fall a little shorter. Probably an 8-ish yard variation. [/QUOTE] Are you sure your 8 iron is 41-42º? That's more like a 9 iron.

Within a degree or so. I had them bent flat, and the pro also added loft in the process of making them flatter. He measured a degree or two more loft than a standard MP-32 which is 39, and was hesitant to fix it. When I got them measured by someone else they were all 2 degrees loftier. Remember that I complained about hitting too short? This is when I had them checked, and used this as an excuse for hitting them so short. Later as you might recall, Dana stated "I know why you hit so short. . ." Then fixed it with the wrist cock? Well, a month or so later I even started using my hips and torso to get even more speed. Well, in any case this is why I know the lofts are half a club weak relative to their design which is half a club weaker than modern clubs. However, the lengths are about 1/4" longer than the equivalent Ping i20. That's probably why flattening and adding loft to them did not change the distances from standard. The guy who owned my clubs before me was probably taller than me since they were more upright than standard as well. 2 degrees up. I had them bent to 2 degrees flat. When I had them flattened, the 2 degrees of erroneously added loft was offset by the 1/4" extra length, and now that I am swinging with my body and getting some release they go the standard distances.

[Lihu]

This video is about 2 weeks old, and I am still working hard on my path and OTT move, but I figured it is a my swing thread. It should contain at least progress up to two weeks ago. I'll try to make some time when I get back from vacation/business travel to take some more of my drill swings.

EDIT: Oops, the last club is an MP-32 8i (41 degree loft).