How to Fix Coming Over the Top with the Drill

Saturday, December 28, 2013

Coming over the top or hitting from the top is a common mistake for a beginner or high handicapper. When you come over the top, you will cut across the ball and pull it or slice the ball. You won't hit it very far with this type of swing at all. I see this move among low handicappers as well. If you don't hit your longer club such as utilities, fairy woods and driver well, you might be coming over the top. If you come over the top, you might be forced to hit a slice, pull, fat shot, shank and so on.

 

The Drill to Fix it

Here is a drill to fix you problem. But before trying this drill, change your grip to a stronger grip. Rotate both of your hands toward right until you see 3 knuckles of your left hand at address.

 

Have someone help you for this drill.

1. Ask your friend to hold the old shaft or club horizontally about 15 inches off the ground.
2. Try to swing a club so that the clubhead goes under the shaft that your friend is holding.

As you swing through, try to watch the clubhead going under the old shaft that your friend is holding. This will help you not slide toward left on the downswing and keep your head back through impact. You don't have to hit the ball with this drill. Just take 20 practice swings. Do 5 sets. If you wear a watch on your left hand, make sure that your watch will face toward the ground through impact. This will help you hit the ball long and straight.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/how-to-fix-hitting-over-the-top.htm

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How to Choose Proper Shaft Flex

The shaft flex can influence your ball flight.

 

How will it Influence Your Shots

 

Flex is not stiff enough for you:

If the shaft flex is too soft for you, the shots will go too high. You will also hook it or block it to the right with this type of shaft.

 

Flex is too stiff

Golfers tend to slice the ball with the flex that is too stiff for them. It makes it harder to increase clubhead speed, so they might try to overswing to compensate.

 

Generally, if you have faster clubhead speed, you should use stiff shaft rather than regular shaft. But it really depends on your swing type. Jack Nicklaus had a fast clubhead speed but didn't like extra stiff shaft. He said he never was able to play well with extra stiff shaft. When he won the US open, he was using that is between stiff and regular flex. He said if the shaft is too stiff, you couldn't feel the clubhead and would start to swing only with his arms and hands. Of course, the technology is a lot different nowadays, but we can learn a lot from it. If you pick a regular shaft, you might feel like you admitted having slower swing speed than other golfers.

 

But by choosing the correct shaft flex, you might gain more cluhead speed. I don't prefer the shaft that's too stiff for me either. Like Jack Nicklaus said, the flex that's too stiff will not let me feel the weight of my clubhead. So I try to avoid having shaft that's too stiff for me.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/how-to-choose-shaft-flex.htm

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Control Distance by Controlling Arm Speed

It may sound hard to control arm speed and control distance that you hit with each iron. Tiger Woods sometimes practices hitting different clubs to the same distance. First, he picks 150-yard marker as his target. For him, it's a hard 9-iron. So he hits balls with his 9-iron to the target. Next, he uses 8-iron and hits it to the same target (150-yard marker). He works up to his 2-iron hitting balls to the same target. He said this drill is good for controlling distance by controlling arm speed.

 

With this drill, you should take the club to the top with each club and hit balls. You just habe to slow down your swing speed. You don't have to use 150-yard marker. You can use 120-yard or 100-yard marker as your target for this drill. I sometimes practice hitting the driver to 100-yard marker. This is also a very good drill. You are going to swing real slow to hit your driver. By swinging real slow, you will feel your clubhead and clubface during the swing. This drill will help you when you are not hitting it on the sweet spot.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/same-distance-different-club.htm

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Inside-out and Outside-in Golf Swing

You may already know that if your golf swing is outside-in, you will hit a weak slice to the right. If you have outside-in swing, it means you are cutting across the ball. This will put slice spin on the ball. On the other hand, if your clubhead approaches the ball from the inside the target line,  your swing is either inside-in or insdie-out. Ideally, you want to swing inside-in for straighter shots.

 

How the Clubhead Path affects the Distance

Taylor Made once tested golfers to see how their clubheads approach the ball at impact. They found out that most of golfers' clubheads were coming into impact about 11 degrees out to in. This means most amateurs are cutting across the ball. If your swing was perfectly inside to in, that's neutral or 0 degree. On the other hand, most of tour players' swing path was neutral to 3 degrees inside coming into impact. This means tour pros are swinging from inside-in or a bit inside-out. Golf laboratories Inc. used the robot to see how the swing path affected distance and other aspects. They programmed the robot to swing from inside-in (0 degree), inside-out (9 degrees in to out) and outside-in (9 degrees out to in).

 

Here are the results.

• Ball Speed. Not much difference in ball speed.
• Launch angle. The more you swing from the inside, the higher the launch angle.
• Backspin. Outside-in path had the largest number of backspin per degree of launch angle.
• Distance. Inside-out swing path produced more distance than other types of swing path such as inside-in or outside-in. But there were not so much difference between inside-out path and inside-in path. In terms of distance, the shot with inside-out swing went 40 yards farther than the shot with outside-in swing. So by swinging from outside, you could easily lose 40 yards on your drives.

To hit it far with your driver, you want to increase the launch angle and limit the number of backspin. However, the robot was programmed to swing 9 degrees from inside to out. So you don't want to swing extremely from inside. If  you do, you will hit lots of push shots.

 

Hitting lots of Pust Shots?

You might read golf tips on the magazine about hitting it from the inside and try them on the course. And you end up hitting lots of push shots and push-slice. You may wonder why this happens. If you are hitting and try to swing from inside-out, you will end up hitting push slice for sure. The ball flight is not only determined by the swing path or the path of the clubhead through impact. The clubface angle also affects the ball flight.

 

To hit a draw, you want to close your clubface in relation with the clubhead path. For example, if your swing path is inside-out the clubface is looking right of the target at impact, you will hit a push shot.

 

In this case, you want to have your clubface looking at the target to hit the shot that starts right of the target and come back to the target. So if you try to fix your swing path, you need to pay attention to the things such as grip, posture, alignment and ball position that affect the clubface angle at impact as well.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/inside-out-outside-in.htm

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What to think during the Golf Swing

Some golfers think about keeping their head down. Others think about shifting their weight on the backswing. I get this kind of question from the readers of this site once in a while. Ideally, I would like to just hit the ball without thinking during my golf swing. When you are in the zone, this may become easy. However, it's really hard to swing your golf club without thinking. Most golfers have some king of swing thoughts to think about during the swing. But you certainly don't want to think too much during the swing. If you have more than 2 swing thoughts you should narrow it down to 1.

 

I have 3 patterns. But I don't use more than 2 images or swing thoughts. Here the images or swing thoughts I use.

 

1. Image of hitting it in the middle of the clubface

When I swing, I usually try to re-create the image of the best shot I hit in my mind. When I'm successful of forming that image, I usually hit a good shot. Especially on the downswing, I try to focus on that image. You can also focus on the feeling of solid impact or sound of solid contact with the ball as you swing down.

 

2. Clubface Angle

 On the downswing, I try to focus on the clubface angle. Especially at impact, I try hard to direct my attention to the clubface angle.

 

3. Clubhead path

When I'm hitting specail type of shots like a draw or fade, I focus on the clubhead path. I may align my feet right of target and swing along my feet line to hit a draw. In this case, I focus on the clubhead path and avoid my  tendency to swing to the target (from outside in this case).

 

One of the things I try to avoid thinking about during my swing is the swing mechanics. For instance, I don't think about keeping my right knee flex during my swing. I may work on keeping my right knee flex in practice. But I don't think about it while hitting the actual shot on the course.

 

I don't recommend having a swing thought that has nothing to do with the clubface (or clubface angle) at impact. I have  tested this for many years, but thinking about swing mechanics during the swing produced more bad shots than good shots. Even if it worked, it won't last a long time. But if you must think about swing mechanics, try to keep it down to 1.

 

I don't think too much during my golf swing, but I do pay lots of attention to my grip, ball positions, alignment and posture. And I do that during my routine before the shot. If you have to think about something when hitting shots, pay more attention to the things you can check before pulling the trigger. It will give you much better results.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/what-to-swing-during-golf-swing.htm

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How to Transfer Your Weight for More Solid Contact

When you compare amateurs and pros how they transfer their weight, you will realize that there is a big difference. Here is the date which came from the research done by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

 

Position                                                 Pros                                    Amateurs

Top of the swing (Back foot)                  90%                                        50%

Start of the Downswing (Front foot)      110%                                       65%

Impact (Both feet)                                  25%                                        50%

 

But amateurs only put 50% of their weight on their back foot. At the start of the backswing, pros shift most of their weight to the front foot. However, amateurs only shift 65% of their weight to their front foot. You caneasily guess which one will hit the ball further.

 

2 Drills to Learn the Weight Transfer

Generally speaking, with irons, most players can shift their weight to their back foot because the club is shorter. With a driver or fairway woods, because the club is much longer, lots of players fail to transfer their weight during the backswing.

 

2 Drills to Learn the Weight Transfer

Generally speaking, with irons, most players can shift their weight to their back foot because the club is shorter. With a driver or fairway woods, because the club is much longer, lots of players fail to transfer their weight during the backswing. Here are the 2 drills to fix your problems.

 

1. Irons

Take your 7-iron and set up to the ball. Next, I want you to raise your right heel off the ground at address. Hit balls with your right heel up through impact. This drill will teach you how you should transfer your weight to your front foot.

 

2. Driver

With your driver, set up the ball with your left heel off the ground. Now, swing back to the top. At the start of your downswing, put your left heel back on the ground and shift your weight at the same time. When hitting the ball, focus on the back of the ball. This will help you hit it more solid. With both drills, you should swing at 60% and focus on your weight trasfer instead of your clubhead speed. Some players will probably hit the ball much further with this drill than their full swing.

 

Reference:  http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/transfer-weight.htm

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Should You Keep Watching the Ball during the Golf Swing?

I often hear these golf swing advice "Keep your eyes on the ball."

 

This is the correct advice, but how should you watch the ball at address, during the backswing and downswing and impact?

 

Watching the Clubhead Go Back is a Terrible Habit

Some golfers watch the clubhead go back at the start of their backswing. But this is one of the worst habits you can have. They probably picked up this habit while checking  their golf swing positions. But if you do this, you will tend of bad things to the right during the backswing. This could cause all kinds of bad things to happen during your golf swing. It can cause reverse-pivot, swaying toward the target during the downswing, loss of distance, slice and much more.

 

If you have this bad habit, you should stop doing th at. Keep your  eyes on the ball during your backswing through impact. But I don't want you to keep your head still. Your head should rotate to the right as you turn back during the backswing. Because your head and your spine are connected, your head should naturally rotate to the right. But when I ask players to keep their eyes on the ball, they try to keep their head still in an effort to keep watching the golf ball.

 

Allow your head to rotate to the riht. You will feel like you are moving away from the ball because of that. But this is fine as long as you are not swaying to the right. If you find it hard to keep watching the ball during the backswing, try to see the ball with your left eye at the top of your swing. This will help you rotate your head to the right.

 

Which Part of the Ball do you see at Address?

Probably, most players see the top of the ball at address. But let's pretend that the ball is much bigger. If the ball was 5 feet in diameter, would you still try to see the top of it? You would try to see the right side of the ball where your clubface will contact with it. The golf ball is much smaller than that, but you should do the same thing and try to watch the right side of the ball where your clubface will contact with it at impact.

 

How about Impact?

Do you watch the ball at impact? Because the impact occurs in the blink of an eye, you can't actually see the ball at the  moment of impact. But some pros try to see the ball on their mind. They try to see the ball compressed against the clubface and then leave the clubface. I try to re-create the feeling of impact when the clubface perfectly catches the ball and the sound of impact in my mind especially during the downswing through impact.

 

Reference: http://www.golfsamurai.net/golfswing/watch-the-ball.htm

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