My Swing (jkelley9)

[jkelley9]

I've been Playing Golf for: 1 year seriously (3-4 years ago I started but only played maybe 10 rounds total in those years?)
My current handicap index or average score is: 88-91
My typical ball flight is: Push fade
The shot I hate or the "miss" I'm trying to reduce/eliminate is: Anything really. Currently struggling with full wedge shots hitting them very fat or very thin.

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Videos: 

 

 

 

So I've shown 3 of my swings - Driver, 7i, and SW. I'm working with an instructor who's very good but he's the head coach at a local university and has very limited time for the next 3-4 weeks. I've completely changed my swing since working with my previous instructor for 15+ lessons. Simultaneously I'm working on the 5SK. 

Some concerns I have are:

1. My driver distance. Very poor compared to my physical build, I believe. I'm relatively athletic, have very good flexibility/mobility and good overall strength. I hit my drives on average 220y. If I hit it really well, up to 250y but that's usually from roll-out and maybe even downwind. But my average is pretty tight in the 215-225y range. 

2. My wedges are wildly inconsistent, constantly blading and hitting them super fat. This is my primary frustration when playing a round since I drop strokes the quickest.

3. For my iron play, I'm hitting the ball pretty well I feel, but my instructor thinks that with my more-athletic build that I should have a lot more release into the ball to generate speed (but with a flat left wrist of course) and should be drawing the ball as a stock shot. My stock shot is a pretty strong push fade and it's getting frustrating. Rather than play to my "shot zone," which is getting pretty darn consistent.. I would rather fix my shot path down to something that is not as strong. A weaker push fade or a baby fade would be fine but I'd preferably (at least my instructor thinks so) hit a baby draw. 

After reviewing my own videos, the main thing I can see is that my right arm looks pretty awkward on the down swing. I feel like it "looks" kind of weird. Is this true or is it just my perception?

I'm working really hard on my game now fellas (and ladies) so any critique you have, please bring it on! I'll add more videos to this thread as I continue my golf journey to lower scores. 

Thanks! 

[iacas]

Do you have a face-on swing? I would imagine it would reveal that you're not turning very much during your backswing.

[jkelley9]

Oh shoot. I forgot to go back and get the face-on shot. At the time the driving range was pretty packed so I couldn't. 

I should be able to get one tomorrow or Tuesday.

[Mike Boatright]

You have a good swing but are way to herky jerky before you hit the ball get rid of the pick up the club vertically move and either incorporate a waggle or don't 95% of pga tour pros hardly do it Iv'e eliminated it but if you must here is how to waggle.

 

 

Similar to the photo but more back and though not up and downish.

[disaster]

Personally, I think you are standing too far away from the ball and I also prefer a bit more upright position.

Especially your driver swing looks like it lacks a some shoulder turn (so what iacas said), and make up too much for it with the arms.

A drill that I sometimes do to keep the arms tight to the body and force the upper body to rotate is the following simple one: Take a towel, but it in both of your armpits and try to hit balls with that. Try obviously not to lose the towel before impact or (even better) before your finish.

[jkelley9]

Weird, it's not letting me quote for some reason...

@Mike Boatright yea I have always done that move and I don't know why. I do know that if I do a waggle, I seem to have very little control of the club head. I'm not sure if it's just that my wrists or forearms aren't as strong as they should be or what it could be. But the fluid waggle I see a lot of players have isn't what mine looks like. I think it may be more prevalent when I've played quite a bit and my left hand metacarpus feel bruised, that upward movement helps subside that pain. I think I'll try to go away from any movement entirely, as you suggested. 

@disaster I do feel the same way. I haven't met with my pro in a few weeks and he wanted me to stand further from that ball but I think I've gone and exaggerated that way too much. I made some swings on my indoor mat yesterday and tried to cut some of that distance out because from the videos... my shaft looks way leaned over. That can't be good? And I think you guys are totally on point with the driver swing as well as my swing in general when it comes to shoulder turn. Because I've changed my swing so dramatically, from a flat left arm and mostly-body controlled shot to more of an athletic release into the ball that I'm terrified of skulling the crap out of the ball so I keep reverting back to "muscling" the ball rather than gaining the good speed from a good shoulder turn and release. I really need to focus on letting my left shoulder turn under my chin and trusting the athleticism of the swing coupled with a good release. I'm cutting my swing speed way too much without a good shoulder turn... that's probably accounting a lot for my low distances.

[jkelley9]

Okay so I was able to get to the range after work today and have front-facing shots of my driver and 7i swing.

 

 

[disaster]

2 minor things I see immediately: You have a very strong grip. Personally, I'm not a big fan of that. And your ball position with the driver is way too central. Try to tee it up more towards your left foot.

[jkelley9]

4 hours ago, disaster said:

2 minor things I see immediately: You have a very strong grip. Personally, I'm not a big fan of that. And your ball position with the driver is way too central. Try to tee it up more towards your left foot.

Yea after I looked at the video before I uploaded it I noticed the same thing. I was trying to put it farther back because I didn't want it too far past my left heel but I think my perception was incorrect when addressing the ball. But that's good, because now looking at it on video it's obvious my perception was wrong and I should be moving it a little farther forward which will make it a lot less constricting. I was feeling like it was uncomfortably far back during those swings but thought it was in the "correct" place. 

I've really been struggling with making my grip a little weaker. You're right, it's way strong but that's actually weaker than is even comfortably for me lol. I constantly focus on the grip and keep sliding into stronger grip. I really need to just focus on weakening that grip a little and get the feel of the club that way, but it's just so different of a feel for me that it's difficult. I'll try to hit the range again today and work on that though.

[jkelley9]

Yesterday at the range I tried my darndest to do an appropriate waggle, or none at all. I could not for the life of me get comfortable in my setup with either option. Had to go back to doing my weird club lifting thing, although I tried to be less pronounced with it. Is this really something I should be concerned about, or is it just weird? I'll bring it up with my pro in the next couple weeks during our next lesson. 

I moved the ball forward for my drives and it helped a lot. A lot better contact, although I was pulling the ball more often. Which I guess is to be expected, so I'll just need to work on that now. I think if I can get a little more of my weight forward, which is something I wasn't doing very well with the drive to begin with, it will line them out more. 

It was a good range session. I hit 42 balls and only hit:

25 very good shots (for me) (10 6i, 10 driver, 5 SW)

2 fat (6i, basically the first couple shots because I have some pain in my left hand metacarpus)

4 thin (2 6i, 2 SW)

10 pulls (8 driver, 2 6i) - most of these would definitely be playable, left rough

2 pushes (6i) - both were definitely playable, right rough

0 chunks

0 tops

I'm tracking this now, so that range sessions are more qualitative rather than just an emotional judgement.  

[jkelley9]

I probably need another lesson from my pro soon. I cannot shake this weird pre-shot routine where I lift the club, as well as a few other swing things. I'm hitting the ball so well (like, very well), but: 

I can't shake the strong grip. I'm trying my hardest to change this but it's astronomically a different swing feel and much more unreliable for me.

I'm starting to lose my good club release form where the club comes around smoothly rather than a "toward the target push" feel where my belt buckle is at or towards (or past) the target and my shoulders are parallel to the ground, standing comfortably upright, with my weight having shifted to the outside of my left foot. I'm getting more of a cocked shoulder and my weight more on my front left (think pinky toe) and losing my balance more forward (towards the target) rather than the outside left sole. I think I'm using too many muscles again and need to trust the swing path and release. I forced myself to do this and the feel came back but the ball striking decreased. Still think I need to move towards that swing thought though. Maybe a step back two make a couple forward.

[jkelley9]

So I've realized while watching some of my videos that my head seems to be more still, but it seems to be too low in my swing. My shoulders are dipping under and around it and it but it looks more like a scrunched and strained motion. Does anyone have any tips on keeping a steady head but not looking like this? I imagine it's robbing power and club face control?

[jkelley9]

Update: I took some more video today of my swing. I think my swing has improved a good deal, especially through all of my irons. I'm currently having trouble with my driver that has been plaguing my rounds. Some days it's decent, some days it just blows. 

My driver miss is a low pull power fade / slice. Usually I can still find it in play (deep rough maybe) and sometimes it's just fine because I aim a little left and it ends up in the first cut rough on the right or something. They'er only going about 210-220 yards right now. Also, every now and then I (still) completely duff the ball. Like the ball doesn't even go 40 yards.

My driver is a TM R1 configured @ neutral face and 10 degrees of loft. I have a heavier weight in the toe (I think 10g) and a lighter on in the heel position (I think 1g).

I'm 5' 7" and have had the stock shaft cut down by about 3/4". Shaft is stiff flex.

I have poor club face control. Always have. I have ball marks typically all over the face of my driver. 

 

Video:

I took video today of trying to make a fix. I'm trying to get a more in-to-out swing (not over the top, which is what a LOT of my divots show me I'm doing on all my clubs). I was also trying to turn down my wrists so that my left hand glove loo is facing the target instead of facing up... leading to more of a draw of the golf ball (close face relative to impact, in-to-out swing path). Looking at my own video, it looks like I'm not making a full back swing. I think out of fear of losing control of the face.

I believe my typical miss is that I'm allowing my body to rotate much faster than my arms, and I'm not turning down my left wrist which is resulting in a wide open face at contact. 

Thoughts?

SW:

7-iron:

Driver:

Thanks!

Edited July 26, 2016 by jkelley9

[MrFlipper]

44 minutes ago, jkelley9 said:

Update: I took some more video today of my swing. I think my swing has improved a good deal, especially through all of my irons. I'm currently having trouble with my driver that has been plaguing my rounds. Some days it's decent, some days it just blows. 

My driver miss is a low pull power fade / slice. Usually I can still find it in play (deep rough maybe) and sometimes it's just fine because I aim a little left and it ends up in the first cut rough on the right or something. They'er only going about 210-220 yards right now. Also, every now and then I (still) completely duff the ball. Like the ball doesn't even go 40 yards.

My driver is a TM R1 configured @ neutral face and 10 degrees of loft. I have a heavier weight in the toe (I think 10g) and a lighter on in the heel position (I think 1g).

I'm 5' 7" and have had the stock shaft cut down by about 3/4". Shaft is stiff flex.

I have poor club face control. Always have. I have ball marks typically all over the face of my driver. 

 

I'm sure not in any position to comment on your swing, but the highlighted above stuck out to me. Weighting in the toe increases the tendency to slice. Would you not take better advantage of the weighting potential by putting the biggest weight in the heel and the smallest weight in the toe? And additionally maybe try a slight draw face setting to straighten ball flight a little as well? I haven't had an R1 but the weighting principles apply across all drivers. If you fight a slice you sure wouldn't want to set up your club to increase your slice tendency.

Just a thought. Good luck with your continued improvement!

[jkelley9]

20 minutes ago, MrFlipper said:

I'm sure not in any position to comment on your swing, but the highlighted above stuck out to me. Weighting in the toe increases the tendency to slice. Would you not take better advantage of the weighting potential by putting the biggest weight in the heel and the smallest weight in the toe? And additionally maybe try a slight draw face setting to straighten ball flight a little as well? I haven't had an R1 but the weighting principles apply across all drivers. If you fight a slice you sure wouldn't want to set up your club to increase your slice tendency.

Just a thought. Good luck with your continued improvement!

I also had this same thought about a month back. I asked my instructor and he said he wouldn't worry about it (probably because he was thinking "get your effing swing right first, you can't fix BAD" lol) and said that it's actually probably in the correct configuration to aid in a slice miss in that the weights are there to prevent the cogwheel effect (inducing the side spin). So with the weight at the toe, if I hit the heel it should move back farther than the toe on impact and have less slice spin. I think I have that right, maybe I'm loony. 

[jkelley9]

Brief update: 

I'm still shooting about ~85-89 on easy courses. Albeit I'm doing so with a worse swing. I've noticed that I'm letting my arms lag WAYYY behind and I'm no turning the club over at all. So my shots are a quite severe pull slice with a VERY over-the-top swing. My divots look absolutely ridiculous. They point about 20-25 degrees LEFT of my target line. Maybe even worse than that. When I look at my divots I think "how can I POSSIBLY be getting the ball to go anywhere near where I want to go with a divot like that???"

I noticed that I'm focusing on one of the 5SK, weight forward. And in doing so over time I've built a bad habit of gliding my hips way too far forward, basically a lazy man's weight shift. This opens my shoulders and with the arms lagging behind, my club face is wide open.

I'm working on a more relaxed grip, in-to-out swing which is an incredibly difficult movement for me right now because of the bad muscle memory I have developed. I'm also trying to establish confidence of turning the club over and allowing my left wrist to turn down during impact (before it was facing almost straight up... yea bad I know). 

My drives are so pathetic with my problem swing. With that pull slice I get maybe 210 yards on average. So playing from the men's tees I'm NEVER reaching par 5's in 2. Not even CLOSE.

Hopefully working on this will allow me to start hitting around 240 carry again with a straighter line and less severe misses.

Edited August 29, 2016 by jkelley9

[jkelley9]

Brief update:

I played a round yesterday telling myself that I know I have to work and make a swing change. My natural swing is becoming habitual and not only that, it's very tense and forced making me lose a lot of distance.

I announced to myself that I'd shoot a practice round of 9. Not going to keep score as I go forward and for every 1/2 to full shot I was going to make a concentrated effort to be loose in my arms and wrists and to bring the club into the impact zone in-to-out and to turn over my wrist. Literally telling myself "who cares if you skull one or two, or three; that would be a GOOD MISS for you." So I did.

The round got me back to my old feeling. I had a lot more energy by the end of the round, with this swing.

I hit a 264 yard drive at one point that I seriously thought was only going to go ~220. It didn't seem like it had a good look for a shot shape but it was a right to left ball flight so I was happy. I also didn't feel like I hit it flush, nor was I trying to hammer it. I just made an easy-breezy swing with the mindset that I JUST want a right-to-left ball flight and I don't care how far it goes. Got 264 yard out of it so I was stoked. I also had a chance to reach the green in 2 on that par 5. I hit a flush 2H but it landed about 10 ft left of the green in a bunker. Still pretty close for me. I NEVER reach par 5's in 2... with my crap 220 yard stock driver.

I was back up on the course so while I was only playing 1 ball, if I had a driver to go and and was waiting on a group, I'd grab my 8 or 9i and hit some balls well short of the next group and certainly not during their swing (usually they were chilling in the cart waiting for the next group to MOVEEEE). :)

When I added up all my 1st shots (my real "shot"), I shot an honest (but not in regulation) 41 (+3). Would have been my best freaking round. 

[jkelley9]

I've played a couple times since Friday and I'm starting to figure out where I need to focus my efforts. Largely, over the past few months, I seemed to be weaker all around in my game so I could pick anything to work on to try and improve. I haven't been tracking any hard stats other than GIR, nGIR, and putts per hole for a round since I've been more focused on enjoying being out and playing. I always told myself if I could be a bogey golfer that I would be happy, and that is still the case.

But Monday was a little different. While I've been having issues with driving (hitting only ~210-220 max yards) it's become widely apparent that my driving is a complete spray and pray. I feel utterly panicked and tight over the ball. It's horrendously uncomfortable whereas with any other iron, including a 4i, I can feel very comfortable. The driver feels like I have zero control over the club face. It feels like I cannot make a reliable swing path without being very tight and constricted in the swing. My shots are almost always pull slices. Sure, they're usually in play, but almost always in the deep right rough where I'm making a rescue shot. So so many times. 

So I went to the driving range after my round of 9 Monday and told myself I would envision the shot and just walk up to the ball and hit it. Not thinking about anything like posture, legs, ball placement, swing length, arm positions, face rotation. I just envisioned where I wanted the shot to start and end (some type of soft or even a hard draw) and just try to move the club in that fashion.

I smashed probably 40 drives. I hit maybe 3 misses.

I hit the driving range before my 9 holes that day too. My drives were terrible. 

So it's obvious that I'm completely choking over the ball when it counts. 

Not sure what to do from here. I never really like being anecdotal in my process but I'm wondering if going out to the course with my walk-up-and-hit approach would yield results at least in the short run. I know there's a resounding opinion that there is little "mental game" in golf. It's obvious I have a/some swing flaw(s).