"5 Minutes Daily" Practice Challenge (February 2016)

[Dave325]

Spent the day at Golf Evolution in Erie. Worked on everything from full swing to chipping, pitching and putting. Lots of great instruction and a lot of practice ahead for me. It was a fantastic day and glad I made the trip. I am really looking forward getting to work these elements and drills. I have never hit so many balls in a single day. It was awesome. If you ever thought about going to Erie and getting some quality instruction.... I highly recommend it. It was the best golf experience I've ever had.

[adam3553]

27 minutes ago, Dave325 said:

Spent the day at Golf Evolution in Erie. Worked on everything from full swing to chipping, pitching and putting. Lots of great instruction and a lot of practice ahead for me. It was a fantastic day and glad I made the trip. I am really looking forward getting to work these elements and drills. I have never hit so many balls in a single day. It was awesome. If you ever thought about going to Erie and getting some quality instruction.... I highly recommend it. It was the best golf experience I've ever had.

Thats awesome! Id love to do that some day. I dont live too far away either.

[Dave325]

11 hours ago, adam3553 said:

Thats awesome! Id love to do that some day. I dont live too far away either.

Yes, you are a lot closer. I went through your area,Mansfield, on my way there. I would think you should be able to make the trip in under three hours. Make the trip.... You'll be glad you did.

[Lihu]

Pretty sore, horrible range session. I hit my ping i25 pwr55 stiff like crap. Lot steaming low shots  that carried 185-220 and rolled to the fence. . .as I was contemplating quitting golf, my kids came out of their lesson and my son wanted to try out my driver. He hit lower drives that pretty much did the same thing. I tried his driver Titleist 910D2 with Diamana 72 stiff shaft, and hit a high hot drive that landed close to the fence. Don't have any idea why my ping goes far and high in warm weather but not cold? My son said my swing speed is slower in the cold???

Anyway, I'm going to get his driver, I can get one for $80 in the used bin at Roger Dunn.

 

[MiddleTees]

Short yoga stretches, backswing drill hitting into net in barn. This is the routine I want to take to the range. See what happens. 

[adam3553]

Went to the range this afternoon. I continued where I left off yesterday. I focused on my takeaway and also worked on getting my weight into my right side in the backswing. I took the whole centered pivot a little too far and during my last lesson I found out at the top of my backswing I had 90% of my weight on my left foot even though it felt like 40%.

[Dave325]

Travel day today back from Erie. Spent some time taking notes remembering everything from yesterday. Ended up with three pages filled with notes and drills. Kind of sore today from all the swinging... Or maybe it was due to falling on the ice with clubs outside the hotel, so did some visualization of the drills and technical specifics. Gave the muscles a break today and jumped in the jacuzzi for a little muscle therapy. Planning on hitting the big time tomorrow.

[the fish]

I played a practice round with a few of my coworkers today.

[MiddleTees]

Short yoga routine to stretch and range session. Stuck to backswing drill. Session comments: try to focus on positions during backswing drill and not result when hitting ball. 

[boogielicious]

Range today in 50F weather. Worked on the driver for a bit making some adjustments to the settings. Then did some random club practice. Finished with partial wedge shots with my PW and 56. 

[adam3553]

Range work today. Worked on my takeaway making sure the hands go in and clubhead goes out. I also worked on getting my weight into my right side in the backswing. Golf season is really close. It was 61* today!!

[Dave325]

It was in the mid-60s today, but just a bit windy. Spent three hours at the range. Took my notebook and went through each of my drills. Divided up a jumbo bucket into sections to run through all drills.

1. Backswing drills - 3 good backswings. If the third is good, then hit it.

2. Downswing drills - First, weight forward (hip bump). Then, full swing... Bump, bump, swing.

3. Work on driver positioning and driver... Backswing.... Backswing. Backswing and hit the ball.

4. repeated #1 and #2 with a different iron and hybrid.

5. Game situation - Driver/hybrid/iron (alternate) with backswing and downswing.

6. Held back the last 10 balls and took them to the open area behind the range to work on pitching. Key points here are keeping shaft straight at address, weight on front foot (right knee toward left leg). Wrist hinge back swing (butt of club making very little movement). Downswing - Lett the club head fall, and swing around the left leg / hip turn. Facing the target at follow through. Practiced different distances.

7. Finished up with hitting these balls (and some others left behind) with the full swing pitching and A wedges. I am loving the new swing changes. Wedge hits were more consistent than the past with solid contact.

8. Went to the practice green to work on the chipping mechanics. Swing from the shoulders, arms straight and clubhead down on follow through. Practiced at different distances.

9. Finished up with putting drills. Working on a fast tempo for the backswing and smooth transition into the stroke. Focused on doing the same distance of backswing and follow through stroke. Set a tee at the ball placement and a couple coins for the furthest point of backswing and follow through. Worked on this at various distance from the hole. Also worked at aligning the putter head first and then taking stance. Finished up with a clock drill at 3 foots and random distance from 20 - 40 feet. I usually do this with ten balls and try to end up with no three putts. This is the first time I made all balls without any three putts. So, I can already see an improvement in my distance control.

It was a very productive and fun day at the range. Sorry for the lengthy post... Just a bit excited about the new stuff. Practice now got really fun, and with real purpose. (Thanks, Erik).

[Lihu]

On 2/27/2016 at 10:10 AM, Lihu said:

Pretty sore, horrible range session. I hit my ping i25 pwr55 stiff like crap. Lot steaming low shots  that carried 185-220 and rolled to the fence. . .as I was contemplating quitting golf, my kids came out of their lesson and my son wanted to try out my driver. He hit lower drives that pretty much did the same thing. I tried his driver Titleist 910D2 with Diamana 72 stiff shaft, and hit a high hot drive that landed close to the fence. Don't have any idea why my ping goes far and high in warm weather but not cold? My son said my swing speed is slower in the cold???

Anyway, I'm going to get his driver, I can get one for $80 in the used bin at Roger Dunn.

Put together a "Franken-Driver" using the leftover parts purchased making my son's driver a Titleist 10.5 D910D2 Diamana 72 Stiff. Although I hit his driver really well, I wondered what if I took the 9.5 degree 910D2 head and his old Kaili Regular 65gm Mid flex shaft? The result was a very forgiving driver, and all the drives went nice and high. My Ping i25 PWR55 Stiff on the other hand felt too light and I still hit some low shots, and only about 3/4 of the shots were "usable". Using this Frankendriver, I drove the leading edge of the 6th green from the blue tees in the white tee positions at Altadena just practicing.

I'm going to use it for a week on the course to see where it goes. Although I get more distance with my son's Diamana Stiff 10.5 and it is only about $80 in the used bin, this one is free. . .

 

Did about 2 hours of short game chipping. Had a 4 shot streak going with my 6i and 5i on Altadena's really rough grass, got maybe 33% decent shots on the longer club off the deck shots. It would be a minor miracle if I ever get to 50% good shots there.

[the fish]

Worked on my backswing, keeping the shaft laid off. I've noticed my backswing is starting to get longer, which gets me close to coming over the line, and causing my right elbow to retract behind my shirt seam. Concentrated on making a slightly shorter backswing.

[iacas]

Last day for those looking to earn the 5 minute award for February! Finish strong!

If you feel you've earned the February award, call it out in bold when you make your post today.

[Lihu]

Mirror work shortening my backswing.

Got in all days in February, actually made some progress this month.

Over two months my average score went down 1.4 strokes, not sure what changed exactly. Getting closer to the greens. Putting and short game skills need to catch up a bit, my near green approach type of bogeys and doubles really need to stop.

[boogielicious]

Mirror work at the gym before my workout. Focused on getting the hands out more from A4 to 5 and flattening the shaft. Also worked a bit on tempo with a relaxed drop from A4 to 5 and accelerating through A7 to A8. 

[MiddleTees]

Short yoga routine to stretch, medicine ball routine and backswing drill at gym then on to driving range. Hit a large bucket while doing a modified backswing drill. ( no mirrors). Starting in slow motion to hit all my positions and then increasing tempo. Also got out my regular set of clubs and hit through bag hitting each club through series of swing types.