I had a free lesson

[sawtooth]

I had a free 20 minute golf lesson at the BMW PGA yesterday. It was rather enlightening. The pro watched as I hit some 7 irons and then showed me my swing on an Iphone. Although I was striking the ball quite well he pointed out a bit of an error and told me how to correct it.

My backswing was pretty good and he said that club position was pretty much text book at the half way stage. From there it should ideally go a little more vertical but added that it wasn't much to worry about. I know I am pretty flat in my backswing and always have been. Anyway my downswing is where he noticed a problem (and this is not news either - I've not had many lessons or pros look at my swing over the years but when they did they have invariably said the same thing. Excellent backswing, not so good on the downswing).

So he circled my hands at address and circled them again at the point when they return in the backswing. My hands were not in the same circle coming back down. Prognosis? A little over the top and arms a bit disconnected coming back down. He then put a glove or something similar under my right arm and told me to make some swings without the glove falling down at least until after impact position and a little further into my follow through. This glove was attached to a lanyard which I wore around my neck. TBH I did something similar with just a tea towel before but always found it difficult to get a good quality of strike doing it, however will persevere this time and give it a bit longer to get used to.

He then took more video with me wearing the lanyard and sure enough my hands came down passed through the same circle as they were in at address. Very interesting indeed.

Anyone else gone through this type of drill and has it paid dividends?

The thing is I cant be doing it wrong all of the time as I do hit a fair amount of draws. I don't think it would be possible to hit draws if I came OTT. Infact I have been struggling with pull hooks recently, straight pulls I would understand but how would I get draw spin coming over the top?!

My game has been on the slide with 6 consecutive .1s so hopefully this free bit of advice might be all that I need to get back some consistency. Fingers crossed.

 

[One Planer]

How's the grip?

How's the ball position?

 

[sawtooth]

How's the grip?

How's the ball position?

Pretty good I think, I tend to keep check on basics like grip, ball position, posture and alignment. Which is more the puzzling when an unwanted shot shape comes along from nowhere and is difficult to get rid of. I think the pro is onto something as he managed to demonstrate a dramatic difference in hand position at address to impact position - before and after.

I have no idea how the drill translates into shots yet because I was only hitting into a net and not for very long either.

 

[fundy]

sounds like someone who knows what they are talking about identified a fault, showed you a drill to fix it, which you proved then worked

for me id go away and use this drill for a handful of practise session then film my swing again

 

[the_coach]

The thing is I cant be doing it wrong all of the time as I do hit a fair amount of draws. I don't think it would be possible to hit draws if I came OTT. Infact I have been struggling with pull hooks recently, straight pulls I would understand but how would I get draw spin coming over the top?!

speaking to this particular point

if the draws are coming from a swing path (swing direction through impact) that's over say +3º - in to out so more around say +5º +6º - which maybes real possible if the swing motion with upper body tilts back some with the arms firing out aways from the body - which fits the description of the hands & circle + trail arm tad disconnect

the drill with the glove is keeping the arms/club a ways more in front of the body - as opposed to being behind stuck a tad maybes - so a feeling of coming OTT is real likely a good ways to go - it will feel massive but in reality the change would be minimal & bring the 'path' back towards neutral this with face angle control relative to path means the results would be more likely to be a tad more 'consistent'

remember to hit a draw the path has to be a tad more rightfield than where the face angle is looking so path os +2º with face angle of +1.5º relative to 0º target line or path of +1º face +0.75º is still goin to produce small draw flights

if you study a large number of tour pro swings looking at the hand path & handle 'plane' on the backswing then the hand path & handle 'plane' of the top half of the downswing you'd probably be surprised that in a 2d slow-mo vid a whole bunch give the impression of an OTT swing motion - but not a whole bunch of them actually are real OTT
though some are yep who have a major 'fade game' & produce their fades that ways (as opposed to the ways say a DJ hits a fade)

vid here speaking to a similar point

[video=youtube;ijD66IjAu1w]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijD66IjAu1w[/video]

 

[sawtooth]

Thanks coach much appreciated.