injury

Would that I were you and couldn't slice. But since I can't keep it on the same fairway maybe I can help heh. Don't you mean moving ball backwards in the stance, so you don't have time to square up the club before impact? Could give you the rundown of things my instructor has me working on to quit slicing into the next county and you can do the opposite...relax grip so I don't lock out arms, ball more forward to give a chance for the clubface to close, get weight back to front better (had me doing front foot only hitting drills, maybe you could try hitting off your back foot). Then of course open up to the taget. My real doozy drives (go out 150-200 then about 75 yards dead sideways and look like they may keep turning to make a u turn back to me) feel like if I had a samari sword from the top of the backsing I'd slice the inside third of the ball with the club, leading with the hosel kind of feel but makes contact with the face instead of a shank. If you can figure out how to do it, maybe I can figure out how to reliably STOP doing it.

What helped me and gave me an aha moment in the bunker was watching an old playing lesson from the pros where one of the old pros discussed how and why Gene Sarazen devised the first sand wedge by putting a bunch of solder on the bottom of a clubhead. Can't find that clip but the description of the function is pretty adequate here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9fGIYXj7BU Imagine you are in the road hole bunker maybe a foot or two from the face, how do you pick it clean and get it to go pretty much straight verticle. As you lay that club open to get the loft you need you increase your chance of blading the ball (if said club had no bounce or you weren't bothering to use the club the way it was designed). The bounce allows the clubhead to surf through without digging in and still present an extremely open face under the ball where it needs to be. It's not the most efficient use of power for horizontal distance but you don't need distance in a greenside bunker. You'll find a lot of times you just don't have enough ball to pick clean, or you have a real high lip but a real short green to work with so you need some force but it needs to be more up than out. By using the bounce the sand can help cusion that force so you don't go flying across off the green now chipping back to your nemesis bunker. And it's also a way to swing that all you have to figure out is how much or little sand to take for the distances you need and then are pretty much using the same shot no matter the lie. Helping my wife with this it seemed to work better to tell her to put the sand that's under the ball on the green, rather than trying the dig down in the sand method. Now if the sand is wet and hard and ball is sitting up, yeah you'll usually be better off if you can pick it clean since it isn't playing like real sand and the club will really be slowed down or the bounce has a tendency to bounce off that kind surface.

start writing down the good things that happen. Our psychology is such we remember the bad much easier than the good, it's a defense mechanism. However opening the thread I expected to read stuff like clubheads coming off, sticking it to 2 feet and the wind blowing it off the green into a water hazard, approach shot landing in the hole and bouncing out. Stuff like that I consider bad luck issues. Odd bounce in the water I ask myself why did I give the water a chance to be in play. If I hit a tree limb why didn't I play under, over, short, or around it. When I sit down and analyze and be honest with myself I can usually find exactly where I could have eliminated the "bad breaks" I've gotten from being any kind of real factor.

This kind of goes along with something Tom Watson was talking about on a Golf Channel Show. He was stating only when you are playing your absolute best do you get anywhere close to playing to pin point targets. Most of the time it's more of a zone you want to hit through, he used football goalposts for a visual. When you are playing horrible you want to wide the goal posts (wider cone) as you improve you start to narrow those goal posts (narrow cone).

funny. I was just watching a chipping video on youtube last night where the instructor used shanking on purpose as a way to figure out how not to shank.

Martin Hall...I was trying to find that guys name and those videos two weeks ago to look at the hinge one. Searched everything I could for hinges on youtube and the golf channels website. Thanks Jefffan

I think you understand, and that helped enlighten something for me I think. I was envisioning the circle at address, but it should really be "drawn" at impact with weight getting the most forward at driver impact correct? thus the circle as it was would be centered on where the weight is.

Hope this isn't too confusing, hope people that know what I'm talking about will understand the question. Have a bit of a swing theory question based on something I was working on tonight. I recall seeing in the SnT videos months ago (was illustrated there), but also in other places around about hitting the back of the circle. Wish I could find an image of what I'm talking about but I imagine guys that study a lot of swing stuff know what I'm referring to. As I remember the illustration there was a smaller inner circle for the hands and a larger one for the club head. The illustration and usually the explanations was centered on the middle of the golfer's stance. My question is would a better idea of the outer circle not be necessarily centered on the stance but rather arcing from the impact position based on clublength thus in some positions actually have said outer circle center more forward or backwards? In working on getting my hands deeper with a driver I got into a discussion with a friend where he mentioned how that it didn't matter about deep hands much with say wedges as far as causing out to in swing paths. So sitting here pondering the why's and such of the golf swing I'm wondering if the reason for that not mattering is more related to the shorter length of say a wedge, or the fact that said outer circle with a longer club and ball position more forward would actually move the clubhead backswing area of the circle closer to the rear hip than if the center of the circle was in the middle of the stance.

I feel ya I fight it all the time. In my search I've learned there are about as many causes for slices as there are fixes for each one. Vid helps those guys that know how to breakdown the swing and spot flaws (I'm not one of them, I'm just a beginner trying to get better). But I know how frustrating not having some idea of something to try can be so I'll mention some things I've found lately. Push slice would be going away from you initially then slicing. If the ballflight is straight initially like you said I believe that would just be a good ole fashioned slice. Had the best session with my driver tonight after a friend worked with me on my takeaway. I'm a chronic push slicer and the the longer the club gets the worse it is. Apparently taking the hands back too straight and not enough in was causing me to come out to in, combined with an open club face = push slice. Once I got those hands in tonight surprise surprise I actually started pulling the ball at times. If I was to describe the feeling of me working on it I would say it was nearly the feeling of pulling the hands in almost 45 degrees to behind my back hips as they were working back about when the clubhead got to my back foot. Remember feel isn't real, but that's how it felt to me as I was doing it. http://thesandtrap.com/forum/entries...ands-Explained explains the concept. So you don't do what I did when I had first read about it months ago hands get deeps and draws the clubhead back, not the other way around. Per your initial concern about hands and body timing, lots of drills for that. Think of a pause at the top and starting down with the body. Feet together is good if you don't cheat, need to feel that space at the top as the club is changing directions where it's almost weightless and use that as a key to start from the feet up to pull it back through. My wife was struggling with same thing Sunday doing the 3 to 9 drill and I came up with a drill for her that got that body motion first idea through crystal clear but it takes 2 people. If you got someone with you take club back to 9 o'clock, have them hold the clubhead, then leaving your arms as the last to move pull that clubhead out of their hand starting from the legs up. I grabbed her club and said, "alright kick that front knee towards target and turn your hips", was the best iron contact she's had.

Ya that's the gist. Haven't read his book but saw the Dvds couple of months ago, and I've learned that some of the movies leave out some technical stuff covered in the books. In the movie 2 Plane was body more upright turning horizontally and arms lifting vetically then returning by coordinating timing of the body and the arms with what I believe he called a karate chop move of arms dropping. 1 plane was more bent over at about 45 degree hands, shoulders, arms etc starting and returning maintaining their respective planes more of a rotary style type of move and more body controlled. The vid of Ryan looks like a hybrid. Setup his back is in a 1 plane posture, arms setup like a 2 plane. Takeaway looks 2 plane, then after the loop he does at the top everything from there to impact looks like he was doing 1 plane. I had an instructor that spent a lot of time having me look at the toe in the top of the backswing. He was working towards having me do some hand adjustments in the the transition to fix it to what he thought was ideal. He moved away, but I'm fidning I'm having more consistant results with fixing the wrist issue in the initial takeaway and the grip that was causing that toe at the top to be wide open. If I get everything going back correctly from the start coming back down is almost automatic.

ya I tried towling them and my hand off works for about 1 swing which gets a bit repetitive on the range. I think I'll grab some wristbands today.

Anyone have a solution for sweaty grips being slippery in the summer? I've tried cleaning with detergent/warm water and scrubbing them real good with a pad. Clubs were purchased new in September. I sweat alot and about an hour on the range in the Texas sun and a glove is like a wet washrag. Called it quits today when I made a swing with the 5 iron and it fell completely out of my hands. Some have mentioned pine tar bat the seems like it would be a bit messy, just looking for other ideas.

ya it was a combination it started with the "awesome deal" and I mentioned it, then he went on about how he finally is outdriving his son. Which I think at most any rate would be psychological or a better matched shaft stiffness that happened to be in one of these clubs. I suppose at least if one of the fakes bust he has an idea of why instead of blaming Callaway (one of the other drivers he bought at the same time) etc.

I think that's what my friend was talking about, since he mentioned the adjustable head at the same time.

If a friend, through the course of a conversation, mentioned he bought clubs from a site you knew or suspected to be counterfeit would you mention it to him or keep it to yourself? Was on the phone with a friend when he told me about some awesome driver deals he got through a site called linkch*n*.com (name alone sent alarms off in my head), and the other deal he got through s*n*golf.com (seen reviews on those guys selling fakes). I mentioned the counterfeits and he seemed kind of deflated by the end of the conversation, made me wonder if I shouldn't have brought it up at all. Interesting side note one that he got from linkch*n*.com was an R9. He went to make an adjustment and some screw came all the way out (never used one myself so going by his description). He sent it in to Taylormade and the replaced it with a brand new driver. Are the counterfeits getting to the point they are fooling manufacturers?

2nd that. I love my Acer XKs (2009 Golf Digest Value Bag Irons)

I just think back to summer marching band and after that the Air Force. Put my legs in marching mode and I'm gtg. Game has it right. You could also get a piece of string while you got 3 feet measured out. Put a heel at 0, toe of other foot at a yard and then tie a length of string between your ankles so you can't make your stride too far, then walk around for a bit to get the feel.

most courses have pro's, most ranges have either a pro or a stack of business cards with instructors. price varies depending on where you are at, experience of the teacher etc. My neck of the woods (Rural E. Texas) a former PGA tour player at my course is $40 for 1/2 hour, $60 for an hour, $250 for a 5 pack of 1 hour lessons. The actual "head pro" is $40, $50, $225. If one of the younger guys is giving lessons it's cheaper as well. I don't know the quality of instruction, but if I lived in a bigger city I'd probably be tempted to check the local community colleges as I recall seeing a course listing and begining golf was one of them.

For me just about any tip since I tend to take instruction very literal and overdo it. Though another big thing is some are completely contradictory, which I'm sure is from different swing methods but they aren't always defined so you have to figure out if it's something that even applies to you. Grip. The ideas of laying it across a certain part of the fingers discounts how long someones fingers are, relationship of size of fingers to hands and a bunch of others. Yet all but 1 video, book, tip, instructor, picture that I've seen describes it pretty much the same with just varying on how tight you should or should not hold it. It wasn't till I saw a video of where/how to apply pressure with the tips of my fingers did I feel that control you are supposed to feel throughout the swing. Til then it looked like all the pictures but I was getting horrible calloses and still not feeling real secure with it. Weight shift gave me problems just due to the sheer numbers of ideas/methods. I think the worst for me though is the wrist cock. Since depending where I do it in the backswing (and different tips/videos have different recommendations on when where and how fast) I get completely different results. For instance if I start doing it at takeaway I'll cock back in the direction away from target which actually puts the clubhead way behind me at 9 o'clock and usually leads to a really fanned open face at the top of the backswing. Been working on getting a good turn to 9 o'clock then cocking up from there and it seems to be helping a lot...this week.

It's better to have and not need than to need and not have. My having a firearm doesn't magicly turn a fistfight into a gun fight unless I choose to. On the other end It can however completely disolve a situation before it ever gets physical. So many illogical statements made out of pure fear and ignorance in this thread it would be funny if it wasn't so sad. A person with a gun in his bag is no more likely to shoot someone than he would be to smash a skull in with his 9 iron. The gun is a tool just like any other. Not all of us play or live in urban areas. My course is a 15-20 minute drive at best from the nearest law enforcement station. I don't worry about getting robbed on my course, but out here in the country rabid wildlife is a fact of life at times and I'd rather not come face to face with a rabid coyote, skunk etc while walking with just a golf club. If only we could be as non violent as the UK and other countries with a higher robbery per captia rate http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...ies-per-capita

I want to thank everyone for their responses. They go to the left, however I am a lefty (not sure if you noticed or I mentioned that). In the nastiest lose my head type swings, which thankfully are getting less and less, it's like swinging down with the hosel leading the way. Actually did some grip work today after watching what looked like a very good video on it (I'd link it but it's from another large golf forum and I don't know how mods here feel about that.). The reason I was making it weaker is because everyone would look at it and exclaim Geeze that's a strong grip. It evolved after reading several sources that said strengthening the grip would make it easier to get the clubface squared at impact, one of those little didn't help so went further and further. I had gotten to a point where the velcro flap on my glove was parallel to the target line at address and it didn't seem to make any difference. It actually seemed being that strong was leveraging against the other wrist preventing any kind of squaring the club at impact. According to all sources it was sound, matched up where everyone says on the fingers with the lined gloves, instructors said it was fine (they they recommended it might be too strong when it was at it's worst). Though what I think I've determined is my kind of odd sized hands for my frame had been disguising a structurally flawed grip. Fairly big guy, with smallish palms but real long skinny fingers. So things by the book were looking right from the outside but I don't think I was getting pressure on the right parts of the grip. I've struggled with that from day one (hence the instructor's front leg drill). I know in my head the correct order and feel, but I seem to find some new change every day that's minor where I'd have to say my body cheats in the weightshift more times than not. I tend to think it's mental as I get anxious to smack the cover off the ball in the transition so rarely get that upright 90% on lead leg finish I should have on a full swing. Some weight goes forward but not enough, or it goes mostly forward but back into the heel instead of the whole foot, hammer down one problem and when I leave the range found I've started doing another in its place. Worked on tempo and slowing down, tried pausing in the transition, humming a toon, several other tricks. I am getting to the point where I realize when I've just screwed it up but by that point the ball is long gone. That's probably my most frustrating thing, you know what you should have done but the body is not cooperating more times than not.

oh he told me the purpose of the drill. It was to get my weight forward because I was getting stuck on my back foot and I think he put it hit the ball with more authority without having to kill it. When I do it just right the ball almost whistles as it's fliying through the air getting the same distance with less effort. He didn't really go into the biomechanics of how it helped close my clubface but I've yet to see an instructor do that out on the range, and I tend to mess around with before and after feelings while I'm by myself to satisfy myself with the whys. Thanks again Hoger. I've been working on that lead arm connection and it seems to be helping alot. I'm still a bit unsure of the "proper" way of involving it in the take away and am looking for videos/articles reguarding it. If I keep it say attached to my pectoral in the takeaway it feels real restricting, vs say turning shoulder away while lifting arms and then waiting for it to reconnect if you will during the start of the downswing.

I prefer the frozen chocolate kind. Seriously though I think it rquires a certain mental ability. I did p90X for a while and ended up swapping the yoga with more cardio/plyo I just don't have the temperment for it as my mind is always racing no matter what. The reflection and breathing thats supposed to be with it just makes it worse and makes me antsy.

hrmm tried it and abandonded it. Looked like it was trying to overwrite the info here (handicap etc) with lines from my info page from FB. Handicap was showing Quotes and Interest, several of the other lines looked mismatched.

Have fun with it, and keep your eyes on your ball. I've done it once sliced a drive and someone took off with my ball...good luck chasing them down in the dark. When I played they had glow sticks at the teeboxes and one hanging on the flag and a disk in the bottom of the cups, no markers for doglegs or anything. I was glad I had someone with me that knew that course because you could look out and just see several glowing sticks and not know for certain which one was your green. We had flashlights and such but the rule stated you must turn them off when you take your swing. So line up with the light on, set up everything, then light off and swing. I did read a thread recently though about some of those brands of nite balls being much harder than a regular golfball and caving in a few fancy drivers. Has me paranoid if I ever get asked again I'll make sure to take my old driver/woods.