So You Joined TST and Posted a Member Swing Thread…

[iacas]

So you've joined the site and posted a thread in the Member Swings forum , eh? Good for you! And if nobody's said it yet, welcome to The Sand Trap!

This post will list a few quick things intended to help you make the most of the free advice you'll receive in your "My Swing" thread.

Details

First, if you haven't already, provide as much detail as possible. Share detail about your recent history, any past lessons you've had, any physical limitations you may have, the works. The more detailed information you can give us, the better.

Honesty is the Best Policy

Your handicap - and your skill level - are what they are. There's absolutely no need to fib to some strangers on the Internet about them. If you have trouble hitting the ball solidly, and you're a 19 handicapper, you won't be helping yourself to say that you're an 11 who just fades the ball a bit more than you'd like. Be honest with yourself, and be honest with others.

Post Elsewhere and Mind Your Camera Angles

These are mentioned in the "Rules" thread linked at the top of the Member Swings forum, but they bear repeating here as well. First, please mind your camera angles. This article explains where to set up your camera for filming your golf swing. Good camera angles help people diagnose things more readily and more accurately.

Also, post somewhere else. We understand if the ability to get a "free" analysis of sorts is what drew you to the site, but there are a LOT more other threads in which you can post, share your opinions, tell us about yourself, etc. The upside for you? The more friendly you are, and the more people get to know you, the more they'll want to help you out. Several of our long-time members have a "following" in their "My Swing" threads with people cheering them on, helping them out, and watching their progress. You get more help from people who consider you a "friend" than someone who just showed up and wants some free tips.

Multiple "Tips" and Prioritization

So you've posted, and gotten lots of tips from people. It's no secret that Mike ( @mvmac ) and myself (Erik, @iacas ) are instructors. I'm even the guy that trains instructors, including Mike, in a system we call "5 Simple Keys®." 5SK is not a "one-swing" method, but rather focuses on the five commonalities of the game's best players. You can read more about that here .

The point of that is that we don't teach "one swing" to anyone here, but feel fairly strongly that any swing advice you get should pretty much help with one of five keys. That doesn't mean the person has to say "this will help with Key #2" or even talk about 5SK at all.

What this really gets down to is prioritization. It's almost impossible to try to work on several things at once. Even working on two or three things at once is virtually impossible. So we recommend that you use 5SK as a sort of "template" for guiding you towards proper prioritization.

- If you struggle most hitting the ball solidly every time you swing: look at tips that speak to Keys #1-#3.

- If you struggle with controlling the flight of your golf ball, but strike it solidly all the time: look at tips that speak to Keys #4 and #5.

Your job? Once you've got some feedback, it's to assess the biggest problems in your game against the tips and advice you receive, then, choose only one priority item on which to work. Sometimes it's as easy as doing what the majority of people see. Sometimes you have to apply your history and understanding to choose your priority item. Sometimes your priority will be whatever the person you trust most says it is.

Whatever your reasoning, try to find a single priority item, post that you're going to work on that, and let others know. Then…

Work on It

The best advice in the world is wasted if you don't apply it.

So, once you've found your priority, work on it.

What do we mean by that? Well, we don't mean to just take the tip to the range or your next round of golf and "try it out" while making full swings or keeping score.

What does "work on it" really mean? Basically, it means that you should apply the 5 "S"s of Effective Practice: (this is unrelated to 5SK).

Follow Up!

A fellow member gives you advice. You use his advice, practice properly, and shave three strokes off your game or eliminate your slice.

Unless you update your thread, the other member might never know they helped you, so update your thread and thank the guy who helped you out! Heck, update the thread while you're working on it too. Use it as a journal for the feels and videos of your practice. Post regularly. You'll continue to get more and more feedback, and more and more tips. People will begin to "follow along" with your journey towards improvement.

---

All of these tips above are designed to help YOU get the most out of YOUR "My Swing" thread. Again, welcome to The Sand Trap .com (TST), and be sure to check out our blog , our equipment and courses sections, and of course the many other threads available for comment and chit-chat and so on in our forum .

[mvmac]

Thanks for posting Erik, this will be helpful to a lot of people.

[Lihu]

Thanks for posting this.

I just wish you had posted this a year and a half ago. . .

[Shindig]

What's a good regularity of update [i]videos[/i]? I plan to update, at least text-wise with what's going on, every 2-3 range trips at the very least, but how often should a new video come up? When it's becoming more comfortable is my guess, but I figured i'd ask. I know that when I sign up for evolvr this summer, that's four videos per month -- if I'm hitting the range 2-3 times per week, would a video update in the "my swing" thread be appropriate at that interval too?

[Golfingdad]

What's a good regularity of update videos? I plan to update, at least text-wise with what's going on, every 2-3 range trips at the very least, but how often should a new video come up? When it's becoming more comfortable is my guess, but I figured i'd ask.

I know that when I sign up for evolvr this summer, that's four videos per month -- if I'm hitting the range 2-3 times per week, would a video update in the "my swing" thread be appropriate at that interval too?

There is no real rule.  I go on little binges where I don't upload anything for a few months, and then I post several over the course of a couple of weeks.  I only submit to Evolvr when I feel like I'm stuck, or feel like I'm ready for the next step.  Lately, it's usually the former, and it's only about one per month.  In the meantime, if I video something, I might just post it here for posterity.  Not all of my videos are posted with the goal of getting feedback (since I'm getting that through Evolvr anyway), it's more of just a journal.

Also, post somewhere else. We understand if the ability to get a "free" analysis of sorts is what drew you to the site, but there are a LOT more other threads in which you can post, share your opinions, tell us about yourself, etc. The upside for you? The more friendly you are, and the more people get to know you, the more they'll want to help you out. Several of our long-time members have a "following" in their "My Swing" threads with people cheering them on, helping them out, and watching their progress. You get more help from people who consider you a "friend" than someone who just showed up and wants some free tips.

I just wanted to quote this piece for emphasis.

[mdl]

Post Elsewhere and Mind Your Camera Angles

...

Also, post somewhere else. We understand if the ability to get a "free" analysis of sorts is what drew you to the site, but there are a LOT more other threads in which you can post, share your opinions, tell us about yourself, etc. The upside for you? The more friendly you are, and the more people get to know you, the more they'll want to help you out. Several of our long-time members have a "following" in their "My Swing" threads with people cheering them on, helping them out, and watching their progress. You get more help from people who consider you a "friend" than someone who just showed up and wants some free tips.

Just thought I'd repost this as I think it's an important point.  There's a great community here, and I've learned a ton from becoming a part of it, not just from posting my own videos or comparing my personal videos with other member's and tagging along on the advice given there.  If you're posting a video here, that probably means you've got the golf bug and are interested in dedicating some time to learning the game and getting better.  I've learned lots of stuff here just through becoming an active member of the community.  Some things that come to mind are and , as well as tons about the rules of golf.

Some other things that are useful are getting ideas about how other players do various things.  Something that comes to mind are the regular variants on how do you play this shot, or what do you play from this yardage type threads.  For a long time I've played every shot < 90 yards with my 60˚ cause I need all the practice time I can get for my full swing and didn't want to dedicate tons of practice time to dialing in a whole range of clubs for the same short game distance.  I struggled in the 50-75 yard range for a long time.  I've actually gotten pretty confident with these shots now, but my left/right accuracy with a pitch shot is still definitely better than with the more partial regular swing type shot I'll hit from 65 yards with my 60˚.  So just this morning, based on an idea I got from a post by another regular member in a how do you play 50-80 yard shots thread, I started practicing taking my default longish range pitch shot swing (goes 40-45 yards with my 60˚) with my PW and 9i.  A couple more practice sessions and suddenly I'll have a whole new option from 60-70 yards when the green setup allows for more roll out.

[14ledo81]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shindig

What's a good regularity of update videos? I plan to update, at least text-wise with what's going on, every 2-3 range trips at the very least, but how often should a new video come up? When it's becoming more comfortable is my guess, but I figured i'd ask.

I know that when I sign up for evolvr this summer, that's four videos per month -- if I'm hitting the range 2-3 times per week, would a video update in the "my swing" thread be appropriate at that interval too?

There is no real rule.  I go on little binges where I don't upload anything for a few months, and then I post several over the course of a couple of weeks.  I only submit to Evolvr when I feel like I'm stuck, or feel like I'm ready for the next step.  Lately, it's usually the former, and it's only about one per month.  In the meantime, if I video something, I might just post it here for posterity.  Not all of my videos are posted with the goal of getting feedback (since I'm getting that through Evolvr anyway), it's more of just a journal.

Quote:

Originally Posted by iacas

Also, post somewhere else. We understand if the ability to get a "free" analysis of sorts is what drew you to the site, but there are a LOT more other threads in which you can post, share your opinions, tell us about yourself, etc. The upside for you? The more friendly you are, and the more people get to know you, the more they'll want to help you out. Several of our long-time members have a "following" in their "My Swing" threads with people cheering them on, helping them out, and watching their progress. You get more help from people who consider you a "friend" than someone who just showed up and wants some free tips.

I just wanted to quote this piece for emphasis.

Rats...  Does this mean I may as well not bother starting a swing thread????

[Ernest Jones]

Rats...  Does this mean I may as well not bother starting a swing thread????

I'll be your friend.

[Golfingdad]

Rats...  Does this mean I may as well not bother starting a swing thread????

Wait ... what???

I'll be your friend.

Me too!!!!

[14ledo81]

Sweet. All jokes aside. I am going to try to put up a net in my backyard this summer and start working with a camera. I will try to start a thread.

[mpb1472]

I'm Mike from CT. In the midst of a long cold winter this site has been a wealth of good knowledge and assistance. Look forward to making new friends. Thanks.

[Ernest Jones]

I'm Mike from CT. In the midst of a long cold winter this site has been a wealth of good knowledge and assistance. Look forward to making new friends. Thanks.

Hi Mike! 33 posts in 3 years? Post a little more often so we can get to know you, hop in, the water's fine.

[mpb1472]

I most certainly will.

[FooFader]

I've just started up again on my swing thread. The first few posts are a bit all over the place but just started up with evolvr and i'm now going to be updating my swing thread as and when i have things i want to document. I like the idea that the thread can serve as a bit of a diary or journal of sorts for me. Obviously some free advice would be nice but as mentioned above thats what ive got evolvr for. The Thread is more for me to share my journey with others and have a bit of a chat about my progress along the way.

In regards to other people's swing threads, if had a read through a handful of them. There is certainly a lot of goof stuff in there; some good teaching/advice from Erik and Mike as well as reflections and advice from the thread owners. The progress i've seen in other people' threads is probably my biggest inspiration for starting my own and starting up with evolvr. Hopefully i time i shall get to know everyone who's active in the my swing forum and can become a small part of the community established over there

[Innercity Mini]

I didn't know about this service-very generous!

Kind Regards,

Patrick

[Lihu]

I didn't know about this service-very generous!

Kind Regards,

Patrick

Just the tip of the iceberg, browse this site and you will find a lot of helpful golfing tips.

Post your swing, and someone will attempt to help your swing.

[Innercity Mini]

Just the tip of the iceberg, browse this site and you will find a lot of helpful golfing tips.

Post your swing, and someone will attempt to help your swing.

I'm waiting until my knee stops swelling! lol!

[mvmac]

Originally Posted by iacas

Details

First, if you haven't already, provide as much detail as possible. Share detail about your recent history, any past lessons you've had, any physical limitations you may have, the works. The more detailed information you can give us, the better.

And if you're currently working with an instructor, please say so in the first post. Just gives us more info to help you or post something like "Hi, keep up the good work".

http://thesandtrap.com/t/82292/my-swing-mikelowry5#post_1147997