So I'm studying my Bobby Clampett impact zone. Makes sense and I do think there is something to this idea. (The basic point being, the lowest part of the swing -- deepest part of the divot -- is supposed to be 4 inches ahead of the ball.)
I'm working on this with chipping and 50 yard pitches with a lob wedge, and getting it down pretty well -- at least I'm hitting the ball before the ground, and my swing is bottoming out past the ball. It does give a nice solid contact and make the ball jump off the clubface. So far, so good.
But I move onto full swings and really struggle. My swing just totally wants to bottom out a couple of inches in front of the ball. Which means I hit the ball with a slightly ascending blow, resulting in lots of thin shots, etc. Not good. Now I am starting to understand that it has been ever thus -- this has been a problem in my swing for a long time. So I think I'm onto something here.
But having identified the objective (move swing bottom forward a few inches from where it is now), I'm struggling to achieve it on full swings. According to Clampett this should all happen pretty automatically if you lag the club properly. I'm trying to do that (I have also long sufferred from the evil of casting) but it's not helping, at least not consistently. Getting a full swing to bottom 4 inches ahead of the ball seems almost physically impossible for me. A good crisp contact with a 7 iron, trying to lag it as much as I can and with a good tempo swing, will bottom out maybe 2 inches ahead of the ball. And when I do feel like I've achieved a good lag on a swing, I'm very often going through the ball with a wide-open clubface, leading to a huge push-slice.
Can anyone provide me with some preliminary diagnosis here? Clampett seems to think this stuff fixes itself automatically, which I am not finding. Thanks!