Shorter Swing Causing Slice?

[eugekhan]

Hi everyone first time poster.

I've struggled with shortening my swing in hopes of gaining more consistency. When shortening my swing, here are my swing thoughts:

• Wider swing with hands pushed away from the head at the top - i found that my arms would get behind my torso instead of in front of my body
• Try to avoid my trail arm from collapsing, or try to keep the trail arm angle at 90 degrees at the top - i found that my trail arms bends far past 90 degrees
• Try to make my arms more upright/vertical on the takeaway rather than around my body and flat - it's not quite Matt Kuchar but it's a relatively flat swing

So trying this, I've managed to shorten my swing with my irons to the point where its more or less parallel at the top. I can hit the ball with pretty good consistency now but it's still a work in progress.

The issue is with my driver and 3 wood. I found that trying to shorten my swing this way causes a pretty big slice and/or a pull. I've tried everything from trying a very strong grip, bowing my wrist, trying to swing from more inside to out but no luck. I can hit it straighter when I go back to my old swing where my arms are well behind my torso and my arms and club are on a flatter plane. Issue is when I swing this way, it causes a pretty substantial overswing which is generally seen as a consistency killer.  I want to shorten my swing, get my hands higher, away from my head, and ultimately at parallel at the top but it's doing much more harm than good at this point. Any suggestions?

FYI I'm a mid single digit (4-7) handicapper with a 110+ mph club head speed with my driver. 

[Piz]

Welcome.  My advice is this: stop thinking about what you are doing and pay attention, instead, to what you are doing to the ball.  You cannot slice without creating side spin.  No matter where your elbow is, or how your wrists are aligned, the only way to slice is to spin the ball sideways.  If you want to cure your slice you will have to pay more attention to what you are doing to the ball.  It is both that simple...and that complicated.  But...(and it is a big Kardasian butt) the only way to stop doing what you are doing is to do something else.  You have the ability to behave differently.

[Phil McGleno]

You probably do not give yourself time to tip back and unhinge and get the club back a little from the inside.

[eugekhan]

@Phil McGleno thanks for the tip. just for clarification, by tip back, do you mean to hang back a bit and wait for the arms to come down (ie. arms feel like they're winning the race)? 

 

@Piz thanks. makes sense. reason i'm trying to change my swing is because i hit a plateau and want to improve. my irons were the issue, not so much my driver/woods. now it's the opposite. 

[Phil McGleno]

7 minutes ago, eugekhan said:

@Phil McGleno@Piz thanks for the tip. just for clarification, by tip back, do you mean to hang back a bit and wait for the arms to come down (ie. arms feel like they're winning the race)?

I mean that if a golfer feels the club tipping out-They often tip back and unhinge the club to try to keep it coming from the inside a little bit.

Do you have a Member Swing thread-You should if not. With two posts probably not?

[klineka]

On 10/20/2018 at 9:47 PM, eugekhan said:

The issue is with my driver and 3 wood. I found that trying to shorten my swing this way causes a pretty big slice and/or a pull.

Shortening the swing doesnt cause a slice or a pull, having an out to in swing path causes both of those ball flights and the difference is on the slice your clubface is open to that out to in path, and on a pull, your club face matches the path.

Here is a good image that shows what I am talking about

 

I've struggled with the slice before too, and I know I was swinging out to in based on the direction of my divots. There are tons of YouTube videos about how to get an in to out swing path, but one drill that helped me the most was placing another golf ball about 3 or so inches behind and to the right of the ball I want to hit. (Think like 4 or 5 o clock on a clock for the second ball, and the ball you are trying to hit is in the middle of the clock face) In order to hit just the ball thats in the middle of the clockface, you have to come either from the inside or neutral with the club path. 

When I started doing this I had to feel like I was bringing the club path so far from the inside, what felt like a club path that was going from 8 o clock to 2 o clock was in reality pretty neutral based on the divot patterns and video of my swing. You will likely need to over exaggerate to get the results you want. Remember, feel isnt real. 

Edited October 23, 2018 by klineka

[Carl3]

I have found that if I don’t get a decent shoulder turn it can lead to a pulled shot or more often a fade of varying degrees of severity. Perhaps your abbreviated swing involves not getting your lead shoulder under your chin as in getting a decent turn? I find that this causes me to be a little over the top.

Edited October 23, 2018 by Carl3

[Lihu]

I’m wondering if there’s some kind of compensation we do to “get the same swing speed” or something like that that causes pulled or OTT shots?

Just curious?

[eugekhan]

thank you all very much for the input!

just as an update, i made a discovery that helped cure my slice (for the time being)

with my shorter swing, i tried to feel like i was keeping my torso/shoulders in a closed position throughout my downswing and feel like my arms were winning the race. this resulted in a much straighter ball flight and even a bit of a draw

i noticed that my shorter swing would cause my torso/shoulder position to be out of sync with my arms. specifically, my torso/shoulders would be way ahead of my arms at around impact ie. spin out

this makes sense because with a longer swing, you will need to make a much larger torso/shoulders movement to get your arms and body synced up and in a 'square' position

keeping my torso/shoulders more quiet and feeling like it i was in a closed position on the downswing helped me sync up my torso/shoulders and arms which allowed me to hit the ball more from the inside