Fade, Draw or straight

[RGuk]

I think I find it hard to trust my natural swing, for the fear of badly slicing- Any tips out there?!

My personal belief is that unless you have a really bad plane you can work on curing the out to in path that dogs nearly all of us.

If you can work on staightening out your path at the range. Sure, the pulls and slices come back but at least you can start your game with some confidence.

Line up a club shaft (or something else to hand) outside the tee on the mat pointing 15-20 degrees to the right. Practice swinging down along that line without the ball, delaying the turning of your torso through the ball, as if deliberatley trying to start the ball well right. Repeat a few times until you are sure the path is definately out to in, stick a ball on the tee and recreate the same swing.

I had a bad pull a day before a big match and hit 200 at a tree 20 yds right of the 150 marker(with my alignment AT the flag). You must NOT quit, even when it starts to go straight. Complete the practice session challenging yourself to always swing in to out on the practice swings (3-4 per ball) and congratulate yourself if more than 6/10 balls start right....this means you are grooving a new path, which could last for 1/2 a round or permanently if you include this routine every practice session. 200 balls with 3-4 rep's is about 800-1000 swings NOT starting left. The next day I shot a 74 (off 10), still came nowhere near the prizes but fixed my pull for ages!!

Dave

 

[RGuk]

definately out to in, stick a ball on the tee and recreate the same swing.

THIS SHOULD READ IN TO OUT! sorry, damn time expired thing.

Why can I not edit/remove after such a short time....

Dave

 

[ianmc]

everyones different and what works well for some people may not work for others

 

[RGuk]

Agreed ianmc....

whatever MVP is talking about works for him, and that's good.

bottom line is most of us know if we are likely to get the face square or not and most good players (better than me) know what needs tweaking to get a different result.

If I want to hit a fade I have to stand well open and weaken my grip too, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone with a regular fade...no sireee!

Dave

 

[MVP]

The golf swing is so complex its incredible. Well done to all the teaching pros that can spot faults by eye. And then correct them. Theres only so much you can get out of books and work on yourself. I mean how important is alignment! Very important and thats usually whee i mess up. I know for a fact i cant pick different targets at the range because the mat puts my alignment off, so i have to move the mat square to the targt line too. When im on the course i have less problems, or maybe its just easier.

 

[RGuk]

Take a length of "something" (I have some electrical duct pipe) to the range and use this to aim at different flags.
Being able to align to that when you are on a square mat is quite a skill to perfect (I haven't managed it). It will help on the course too because some times the tee is skew-whif (the boxes) and you need to be able to "ignore" external influences.
I have a problem on 2 tees because they are not square to the line of the fairway and every time out I hit a bad one.
I hit it straightest off winter mats t.b.h. and this is because I know I'm squarely aligned.
The other day, we got to the 5th, it was my honour - I took off my glove, put my club down and moved the mat to aim at the tree (on the slight dog-leg) that everyone calls as the "aim". Unsurprisingly, all my 4 ball hit it at that tree rather than down the middle which is ok, but not a good as left!!

Dave