chris_284

I think casting is a problem that afects 99% of golfers, maybe even higher. Rarely does the average player exhibit anything close to tour quality lag. I'm recently trying to get some lag in my swing, and went to the range yesterday working only on 1/2 and 3/4 shots. Here's a picture of my 'old' vs 'new' (with some lag and less casting) swing. Old swing left, new swing right. Video at the end for reference. Orange is the clubhead during the backswing, and green is the clubhead during the downswing. You can clearly see the cast vs the lag. However, when you look at the two green swing arcs... the one on the left is a much more wide sweeping arc. Naturally it will come to the ball not as steep. On the right, the release point of the clubhead is much later... so naturally the clubhead is going to come into the ball much steeper. At the range on my 1/2 and 3/4 shots I was taking massive divots. Huge pork chops after the ball. My clubhead was caked in mud every shot. Can anyone out there with lag in their swing tell me what they do to 'combat' the extra steep angle coming into the ball. It's such a change for me since I'm so used to casting and coming in not so steep. Video for reference:

#1 Tiger Woods 273 (-15) #2 Phil Mickelson 276 (-11) #3 Luke Donald 276 (-11)

Despite how good Rory is playing right now, the favorite has to be Tiger. Tiger willed himself to T4's finishes the last 2 years when he had the game equivalent of Charles Barkley. He's contended in 7 of the last 7 Masters, despite some terrible (relative to Tiger standards) golf since the US Open at Torrey Pines So, he can will himself into a top 5 with absolutely no game. What do you think he can do with with some great game. Driving not seen since 2000 (maybe ever), precise iron shots, all 9 trajectories, and some great putting (especially on the fast greens at API Sunday which will be like Augusta). He's now moved from top 4-5 into 1 going into Sunday/the back nine Sunday. With his will and his new found game, that's enough to make him the favorite right now. While Rory is playing amazing for not only his age, but anyone at any age, he's been doing it in the wake of Tiger's 3 year downfall. Tiger has simply not been around. I could sit here and make a case as to why Rory should be the favorite to crush the field. And he likely is... minus one person. You know Tiger is going to be there on the back nine Sunday. If Rory is to win, it's no longer the regular faces of the field he's been accustomed to seeing that he'll have to beat. It's Tiger Woods. A Tiger Woods he's never even seen yet. A Tiger Woods who's been on another 10 Major winless streak like back in 03-04. I could make a case for either guy winning this week. If Tiger isn't there Sunday, I think Rory is absolutely the favorite. But if Tiger is there... there is no way Rory can compete. Here is where I may differ from some. If it came down to a Sunday, final group pairing of Tiger vs Rory... I would set the point spread at a 6.5 shot difference for Tiger. Playing with Tiger on a Sunday final pairing when he's ON is a whole 'nother ball game. The API was great on Sunday. Despite that Graeme was KILLING GIR's up until Sunday, he didn't bring a great iron game. The full swing shots that he needed to hit weren't there. The full swing that requires such great fine tune movement/timing/tempo. When the nerves creep in a bit, that's the first to go. The full swing. G-Mac had beaten Tiger before, but the nerves were still there. He had to make putts of 53, 45, and 23 to even stay within a respectable 5 strokes of Tiger at tournaments end. When nerves creep in, the full swing is the first to go. His iron play just wasn't accurate Sunday. If it comes down to Rory and Tiger Sunday, Rory's full swing won't hold up. Look at the Honda. Tiger was 9 strokes back, and sitll never really in it even after posting a 62. And Rory's full swing got rattled. On ~15, he pushed a terrible 140 yard iron shot way long and right into deep rough. He also ended up in 2 bunkers on approach shots coming in, and hit 4 iron off the tee on 18. Like Harvey Penick would say... bunkers are no longer a hazard in golf. Pro's even aim at them during fast and tough greens conditions because they know they have a better chance getting up and down from them sometimes. They are so finely manicured and well kept now. Penick's words, not mine. While hearing the roars, Rory hit 3/4 terrible approach shots coming down the stretch. While his short game and putting may stay with him Sunday at Augusta if he plays with Tiger, the full swing will be gone. And when you miss at Augusta by 2-3 yards you're dead in the water. Rory has done everything he's done in a near Tiger-less golf world. If he had to go face to face with him in a showdown... there is no way the results would be pretty. Just like guys need to get there and lose before they win (or win again for a long time). Rory NEEDED to lose last year on Sunday, to win the US Open. Kyle Stanley needed to learn to lose this year, to go out and win the next week. David Toms needed to lose last year's players to come out and win again the following week. Tiger needed to lose the Abu Dhabi (and you could argue ATT pebble) to the Win the API this year. Tiger's will puts him already into the top 5 as evidenced in the past 2 years. His new found game puts him into first going into Sunday (possibly by more than just 1 stroke). And his confidence coming off a win are the floodgates opening. The confidence propels him to go 39/41 for wins when holding the 54 hole lead.

While I've got many flaws in my swing, I'm trying to only work on one thing right now. I like to think that I've completely 'changed swings' recently, and am having trouble with my 'new swing'. I went out to the range yesterday with the intention of working on my swing plane only. Even if I shanked myself right off the range. I know I can cast the club at the top of my downswing if needed and hit the ball straight, but that is my old swing and I want to do away with it. So, I was working on bringing the club down from the inside [Video 1&2 below]. But I can't seem to get the correct feeling of the vertical drop on the downswing, and bringing the clubhead to the 'inside of the ball'. The two on the left here are me, both within the last few days. The left maybe 4 days ago, and the middle is from yesterday. You can see on the far left, the shaft is basically even with the lead arm. The middle, it's a bit better as the shaft is 'between/intersecting' my two arms. Tiger is on the right, with the shaft of the club even with his trail arm[Video 3]. I'm not trying to 'get my clubshaft even with my trail arm', but I am trying to keep the clubhead inside my hands at this position. The clubhead is currently getting outside my hands. Can anyone describe this feeling to me? Is it a) my address is more upright than it should be and should be more 'athetlic' b) my right hand is not retaining it's cupping and is releasing the club early due to hit impulse. c) something else? --------------------- I've been working on various things right now (such as prematurely lifting my right foot - before the hip turn needs to legitimately pull it up). As well as working on having my hip turn bring my arms down as opposed to me moving my arms as the first part of my downswing, although in this video I still begin to move my arms shortly after the DS is initiated [Video 4 below on the right]. However, I can only do one thing at once and want to get this first. Any ideas, drills, or explanations of feeling for the proper vertical drop and delivering the club from the inside? ---------------------- References: Video 1: Video 2: Video 3: Video 4:

Do you find opening the face of their wedges on the full swing shots leads to thin shots at all, or catching the ball with the leading edge at all? My wedges already have quite some bounce to them, for every degree i open the face, that adds another degree of bounce.

I think I'm going to try this. Anything 80 and in for me is a feel shot with LW, and I'm pretty good at it now that I've played a bunch of times on the year. I need the distances between full swing wedge shots, and I think this will be it. I see an inch takes off 10-15 yards for you on that club. Can you get less? My current wedges are only 15-20 yards difference, so I'd like to find a 7-10 yard modification swing.

I'm currently happy with the wedges that I have in my bag, and the distances I get with them on the full swing. PW 47 130y GW 52 115y SW 56 100y LW 60 80y Yesterday my third shot on a par 5 was exactly 90 yards from the middle of the green, right where the flag was. I cursed myself as I knew I was looking at being either 10 yards further with my 100y 56*, or 10 yards short with my 80y 60*. A 30+ foot birdie putt is not an opportunity. I then remember my friend has a 58*. I know it will be perfect. I borrow it, and hit it exactly pin high, 4 feet left for an easy straight putt birdie. Obviously this is illegal, but it has me thinking. I know to start shooting lower scores now I need to start giving myself more birdie opportunities, and to do so I need to be able to hit my wedges different distances. On my home course, I find myself between 80-120 probably between 6-10 times (6 if I were to go for all the par 5's in 2, 10 if I lay up). This shot yesterday made me realize I need to learn how to hit my wedges ever so slightly different distances to fill in the slight holes, so I'm not dead when I'm 90 yards out. I hear some people choke down, but I've never felt comfortable with that seeing as how my clubs need a 1/2" plug as is, and I feel uncomfortable choking down on an already short club like a wedge. What do you guys do? Put the ball back in your stance and deloft the club? What can you expect with this in terms of distance differences, trajectory, and spin? Or do you keep the ball where it is, but start with your wrists ahead of the ball to get the same effect? Or do you do something completely different all together? Choke down? Thanks

Awesome replies! Thanks mvmac and uttexas for your recent replies. I'm going to work on this in the next week and look into evolvr when I get back from my golf trip this weekend. I'll work on this stuff and video my swing some more to see what I'm improving.

I had heard about S&T; in the past thrown around but I never really knew what is was. After watching a video on YouTube, I got the idea of it and tried it yesterday at the range. I liked it. This morning I watched the first DVD of S&T; by Bennett and Plummer, and went back to the range again. I really like it. I find it to be much more like my swing was before my lessons this year from a pro. Over the past few years, I've always had my weight more forward at the top of my back swing. This year after some lessons with the pro, I've started shifting more to the back at the top of the back swing. I put a video of this new swing below. Today out of 90+ balls I think I hit 6 fades (not very pronounced either). All the rest were either draws or pronounced hooks. My 9, P, 52, 56 were all dead straight. My 7 was a considerable draw. Once I got down to the 5 and 3 is when I hit the few fades. The others were a mixture of ever so slightly fat (still decent distance tho), straight, and a few draws. My Driver was a mixture of dead straight and ever so slight pulls. T he left is my swing from last week, the right is of today with me attempting the basics of S&T.; Divots with 7 iron - Ball placed on line between 2 tees I'm unsure as to why the inconsistency in ball flights in between different clubs. I know very little of S&T; so maybe someone can school me here. I'm wondering if it was ball placement in my stance. Does this change off what has oft been taught? My 7 iron ball placement is just in front of center. My 3-5 iron placement is just inside the left foot. I'm thinking the few fades I hit with those clubs was a combination of the ball being closer to the target in my stance, and I didn't shift enough weight forward which caused me to cut across the ball. Does this sound right? I'm trying to reason it out in my head. I felt on the swings where I really had my weight come through and forward on the downswing were the ones that went straight, or were a baby draw. Anyway, anyone have anything to comment on or suggest with this 'new' swing as I begin working towards proper S&T;?

I want to re-hash this topic to ask a question about the Driver. Does this apply to all clubs in your bag? I was getting the forward weight shift down yesterday at the course, and it was causing some awful driver swings. On two occasions I made divots with my driver about a foot ahead of where it was teed up after duffing the ball.

Does anyone have a good visualization to think of when practicing proper release? I thought I was doing particularly well this day at the range (and relative to beforehand, I likely was), but in comparing this photo to that of Anthony Kim, the difference is huge. You can see my gloves left hand above my right wrist, where as with Kim his hand is well below his right. What is a good drill, or what's a feeling/visualization to have, to practice getting that right wrist completely over?

One place in my city has this. It's a 18 hole par 3 course, that has a rounded driving range. 60% of it is mats that are set up year round, the other 40% is grass tees. The buckets for the grass tees are an extra dollar. I never go there though, I go to a driving range that has grass only.

Last year, my consistent ball flight was a slice. I've worked on that for the past 6 years, and have begun to hit draw. Which has turned into a nasty hook sometimes. To correct the slice I was swinging the from (7 o'clock to 1 o'clock [imagine setting your feet aim line at address from 6 to 12 oclock], and trying to close the club face and 'stay down through the ball'. This was leading to larger and larger draws. Which I was fine with to be honest. I knew why I was doing it. I wanted to learn how to hit it, so I was familiar with the both the fade and the draw. Because of this I feel I have these shots in my bags. I made a beautiful draw other day from 170 yards out in the left rough. The green wasn't visible around some trees at the front, and I hit a nice draw around the trees, onto the green, and ran it up towards the hole. Today was a huge breakthru for me at the range. Nothing could go wrong. I grabbed my 3,5,7,9,PW,SW and basically grabbed clubs at random and hit 1-2 shots and then switched. I introduced a pre-shot routine today which I've never had, and it really did wonders for me. It calmed me down and gave me a smooth consistent tempo which lead to great consistent ball flight. It seems like with my 3-5 irons, I hit with a slight fade. Nothing to complain about really, but I would like to straighten it out. I believe it's up in my stance enough and that's not the cause of the fade. I think it's more of me not staying down through the ball after contact with these clubs. ??? My 6-8 Iron, I hit pretty dead straight, with a tendency to hit a slight draw. My 3-8 divots are already dead at the target. My 9-SW is a different story. For some reason with these clubs, my divot is 50/50 dead straight on target, and outside in. My results are usually on target or ever so slightly left. My outside in plane swing, I fade the ball back on target. It's not very outside in either. Nothing to complain about. My dead straight divots/plane produces a straight ball flight. Those are my tendencies. I think what you are saying about letting the club drop, and not using my hands at the beginning of the downswing will help me stay down and thru the ball. I think this will cure the slight fades I'm hitting with my longer irons.

Here is my most recent video of an outing to the range. It's 6 weeks into the season and improving my swing, and this is now my 4th video I think. Any comments from what you guys can see would be greatly appreciated. It looks like I'm still bringing it on the inside on my backswing, but nowhere near as bad as before.

Here's a video of my swing which I forgot to post earlier. This first one is of Apr 22 This next video is a side by side. The left is May 4, right is May 19. Here's a picture of address and the top of the back swing from Apr 22, and May 19. I just stood up and went through a practice swing and I don't think its as bad as I think. I just want some clarification so I don't create a bad habit. I feel like what I'm doing now is 60 back, 40 front at the top of the backswing. I would say I feel like 55 front, 45 back at address as sean mentions. 4 weeks ago I think I was probably the same at address, 70 front 30 back at the top of the backswing (as opposed to 40 front 60 back now)