Shallowing the club

[Barking_Mad]

What worked for you? After years of not doing it, but making good contact more often than not, Im trying hard to get the club into a shwlloer position, but its proving hard. I've tried lots of drills, with some success, but as usual, what fdeels like shallow is actually still really steep and I just cant keep those hands and shoulders from coming forward early. Often what is shallower also feels like a lot of manipulation and this makes me edgy.

Ill be off for some lessons soon, but what worked for you?

 

[Golfnut1957]

For me the best drill I have encountered is one that Justin Rose advocates.

He suggests that you swing back as normal but then while imagining that you are keeping your back to the target you actually start the swing with just the arms. You would think that the club would swing outside but what actually happens is the club drops down, then as the body rotates, as it must in order to strike the ball, the club head follows on a shallower, inside path.

I'll see if I can find the original video of this.

 

[spongebob59]

Andrew Rice

 

[BiMGuy]

You’ll need to be flexible and be able to rotate the upper and lower body separately

 

[bobmac]

Don't do it.
You'll never completely fix the steeper downswing and will ruin your game for years.
Let the swing go where it wants to go and don't mess with something that isn't broken.

 

[Hobbit]

I’m with Bobmac on this one. If you’ve been playing for years, you’ll really struggle to change it. The swing you have, by your own admission, makes good contact. I had been playing for nearly 30yrs, and was off 4, when I went for a full revamp from a well known tour coach. Total disaster! Handicap went up by 2.5, and I was losing at least 2 balls per round. After the thick end of a year, lots of lessons and range time, I decided to go back to the old swing. Back to 4, and often shooting either side of that.

Unless you think you can realistically achieve the holy grail, leave it alone and learn to enjoy what you’ve got.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Cheers for the replies. It's my driver where it shows the most. I'm either in a narrow slot where I can hit it well and it's a real weapon, but it's so easy to just be over the top and then I'm in all sorts of trouble with massive slices and hooks and I've no idea which will turn up. Probably contributing to me not breaking 80.

I tried drills to have the club fall behind me, and to be fair I made really good consistent contact, but I feel it's way too timing based. I'll have a dabble and see how it goes....

 

[Deleted member 25172]

Cheers for the replies. It's my driver where it shows the most. I'm either in a narrow slot where I can hit it well and it's a real weapon, but it's so easy to just be over the top and then I'm in all sorts of trouble with massive slices and hooks and I've no idea which will turn up. Probably contributing me from scoring below 80.

I tried drills to have the club fall behind me, and to be fair I made really good consistent contact, but I feel it's way too timing based. I'll have a dabble and see how it goes....

If you find anything that works for the driver, please do let me know. As with you - when I hit it well it's a real weapon as I'm a relatively long hitter. The issue? I only have 2 modes, which are "well" or "reload". Nothing in between. I've probably got a 150+ yard dispersals zone as I miss left and right in equal measure. I haven't had my driver in the bag for the last month now as there just isn't any point.

Have hit 100s, or probably even 1,000s of drives on the range this year, but I cannot find anything that seem to help. Pretty frustrating.

 

[Barking_Mad]

I'll go try the Justin Rose drill. I tried in the house and it felt quite good. Other issue is my quick tempo which doesn't help in transition.

 

[bobmac]

Your problem involves an out to in swing and a clubface that varies in direction at impact probably caused by a dodgy grip.

The easy cure doesn't touch the swing, so it is a bit of a cheat.

Fix the grip so the club face is consistently square to the swing path.
You should then be hitting pulls left all day.
Then simply aim right.
Aim right, let the swing go where it wants and with a consistently square club face, the ball will fly straight

Proof...

The old boy below is doing exactly what I'm saying.
The tall tree is the target.

 

[SwingsitlikeHogan]

Just to confirm what others have said. Making a significant change to a long established swing is VERY difficult. I have changed my swing path from v strong in2out to out2in, but it has taken me a long and difficult two years with (for me) a load of time on the range as well as playing. And even now if I do not take care and am too lackadaisical I can instantly revert with usually horrid results. Only attempt such a major change if you are in utter despair as I was.

And to stress - if you do try and change things do not try and do it by trying to do what you think you have to do - you will almost certainly be trying the wrong thing and things will get worse. Only make significant change under professional guidance and with understanding that it could take a long time, with serious blows along the way.

In the first instance I’d suggest as others have suggested, looking to adjust simple things around the shot you want to play that will accommodate your issue.

 

[Barking_Mad]

So before I played this afternoon l tried the 'wall drill' in the hitting net, with the feeling my club was travelling along and down a wall that was running behind me.

Hit about 20 balls going very slowly to the top, pausing and then hitting the ball at 50%. It was a really good feel as it gave me a great sense of direction the clubhead had to travel on and kept my back to target without that actually being the feel. Some of the others focusing on shoulder, hands, side bend etc were just useless to me as I had no idea where the club head was supposed to be.

Took it on the course and it worked really well, especially with driver. It also slowed my tempo down as the only swing thought was to keep it on the wall. This stopped me hitting with my hands from the top of the swing.

Shot 84, (with a 7 on a par 3, nothing due to the drill, just take away stuff I've been working on). Pretty buzzing actually as it felt really powerful without having to go after it. That extra distance the club goes during the downs makes the difference. I'll go record it at some point to see how different it looks.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Just to confirm what others have said. Making a significant change to a long established swing is VERY difficult. I have changed my swing path from v strong in2out to out2in, but it has taken me a long and difficult two years with (for me) a load of time on the range as well as playing. And even now if I do not take care and am too lackadaisical I can instantly revert with usually horrid results. Only attempt such a major change if you are in utter despair as I was.

And to stress - if you do try and change things do not try and do it by trying to do what you think you have to do - you will almost certainly be trying the wrong thing and things will get worse. Only make significant change under professional guidance and with understanding that it could take a long time, with serious blows along the way.

In the first instance I’d suggest as others have suggested, looking to adjust simple things around the shot you want to play that will accommodate your issue.

Yeah, I've spent an ungodly embarrassing amount of time recently changing my stance, takeaway and backswing (too tall, whippy on the inside and across the line at the top). So far so good and I don't think the wall drill would have worked had my original backswing been in operation.

 

[SteveW86]

Was working a bit on this today, with some good results. I’m a person who likes to see the numbers off a monitor so I can relate those to what I’m feeling. Going into the lesson I thought my bad shots were being caused by a path too out to in, but in reality it was just a wide open club face. Worked on set up a bit as my shoulder line was too open, and just have to fully commit to the shot to make sure I close the face.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Appreciate the warnings about the dangers of changing swing dramatically. I just felt that if I'm going to get to single digits (currently 14, but have been 12 recently) I can't do it with my current swing as with driver it's just too inconsistent due to being over the top. Some days I'll get away with it, others not. After weeks of trying drills I really felt the wall one clicked with me, so fingers crossed

BTW Adam Porzak's live lessons with amateurs and college golfers are top drawer stuff.

 

[Barking_Mad]

If you find anything that works for the driver, please do let me know. As with you - when I hit it well it's a real weapon as I'm a relatively long hitter. The issue? I only have 2 modes, which are "well" or "reload". Nothing in between. I've probably got a 150+ yard dispersals zone as I miss left and right in equal measure. I haven't had my driver in the bag for the last month now as there just isn't any point.

Have hit 100s, or probably even 1,000s of drives on the range this year, but I cannot find anything that seem to help. Pretty frustrating.

The Andrew Rice drill was the one for me. Once I could feel the direction the club head was supposed to go (basically on a line parallel to the target but behind and away from me, my body followed.

 

[bobmac]

The problem with ALL these drills is it takes 100% concentration to get it right.
So when the aim is fixed and the grip is fixed and the swingpath is fixed, the ball flies straight.

But....what if some other problem sneaks in...say for example you start swaying.
You start concentrating on not swaying and what happens to the swing path? the out to in swing appears again and your OOB left.

 

[Barking_Mad]

The problem with ALL these drills is it takes 100% concentration to get it right.
So when the aim is fixed and the grip is fixed and the swingpath is fixed, the ball flies straight.

But....what if some other problem sneaks in...say for example you start swaying.
You start concentrating on not swaying and what happens to the swing path? the out to in swing appears again and your OOB left.

Stuff like that happens with my normal swing It takes practice sure, probably lots of it given you've got to override muscle memory, but I played a decent amount of cricket so I feel Im ok at getting a decent contact.

 

[bobmac]

Stuff like that happens with my normal swing It takes practice sure, probably lots of it given you've got to override muscle memory, but I played a decent amount of cricket so I feel Im ok at getting a decent contact.

I hope you work it out

 

[Barking_Mad]

I hope you work it out

Cheers. If only I'd not seen my swing on video about 6 weeks ago I'd have saved myself the bother!