Monitor your Ball Position

All too often people are working on the correct thing but not getting better primarily because the ball is in the wrong spot. You may be working on educating your hands or improving your pivot but the ball position is off and you would miss ball if you didn’t make the wrong or incorrect move to get the ball airborne.
Practice with clubs or sticks on teh ground to monitor ball position. It is essential and you never see a Tour Player practicing with out these aids.
For irons the ball needs to be 1 club head inside left foot. This will allow the ball to be struck right before the low point.

A ball that is too far back causes pivot stall and club head throw away.
A ball that is too far forward gets shoulders and hip out of alignment plus can lead to lateral movement and or an incorrect swing plane.
Check your ball position and monitor to allow the work your doing to pay off.

Tip to improve your forward swing pivot

A Dewsweeper writes in and wants to know what is a good tip to help them turn through the ball better?
Too often people fee like they are turning but all too often if find they are stalling out with their turn or turning around their back leg rather than turning through onto their front foot.

One of the things that’s interesting with having the Swing Catalyst at my teaching facility at Santa Rosa Golf and BEach Club is that it shows where the center of gravity is during the swing. The majority of all mid to upper handicap players leave that center back over their rear or right foot at impact. The key is to get the center of gravity moving forward to pull the club through the ball. Try and make your sternum go forward and around

I like this visual 3 balls in triangle out in front and left of your left foot a few paces
Get your chest to turn forward and through towards the triangle of balls. Try this visual and see if you don't start hitting more solid iron shots.

Hit better in between wedge shots

Cleveland golf tip of the week
Dewsweeper writes in that they have trouble with in between wedge shots do I have any suggestions?
First I would suggest better planning off the tee or lay up shot. Look to hit the ball to specific full shot distances. Often times the right tee club is not the driver as a well struck tee shot can leave you too close tot he green.

For the unavoidable in betweeners use one of these two options.
First choke down on the club and make a full swing and at full speed. You will need to test on your own to get distance travelled with a choked shot. Practice choking a half inch and an inch see how much distance this takes off. This is the easiest way to hit in between distances.
Second is to make full motion golf swing but take speed off with less arm speed. This is more difficult and for the more advance player.

Once you know these distances(best to use a device) you can change speed, choke and size of back swing to hit different yardages.
Write these distance down. Now you need to practice hitting shots to towels on the ground of your driving range laid out at specific distances and learn to hit the balls and land them on these towels. the you will have better distance control over your scoring clubs.

Get More Out of the Work You put In

A college player that I teach and I were talking recently about her frustration over how hard she works and practices but how little her golf swing is changing towards the changes she is trying to make. She is one of the hardest practicers I know and dedicates a tremendous amount of time to hitting balls and working on short game. Her difficulty is with feeling the difference between her old swing and the new one when she is hitting balls and on the course. In fact when she is honest she probably really doesn't feel much of any difference. We needed to find a way to get her to feel the difference and feel the changes.

Here is what we did and her play is improving and she is starting to get paid dividends from her intense practice sessions. Practice the first 1/3 to ½ of practice time at half or 1/3 of full speed. The full motion shots at a slower speed allow her to accomplish a few things. The swing happens at a slow enough speed that she can monitor the movements and do them much more mechanically correct. Secondly the slow lotion repetitions allow her to actually create a feel and awareness of how the correct motion feels which allows her to differentiate between her old swing an her developing new one.

This new routine has allowed her to make the changes quicker and more permanent. Her hard work is paying off and her scores are coming down. She is getting more effective use of her practice time. This will work for your game too!

Help Reading Greens

People often struggle reading because they have poor aim and speed control. All too often golfers don’t get the ball started on the line that they think they are aimed at. Golfers often also have poor speed control which makes it difficult to become consistent with reading the lines and breaks on the green. In order to become better at reading greens first improve your aim and speed control. Work on each separately and independently.
Practice lining up stripe on ball so you get aimed correct as well as practice short putts on a carpenters chalkline. These are the two best and quickest ways to improve your alignment and aim in putting.

Next is focus on speed in your practice. If your speed gets consistent you will start seeing the line better. Practice hitting different length putts trying to get the ball close to the edge of the fringe with out touching it. This drill will help create a better feel for speed and touch on the green.

Other tips to improve green reading are to look at green while approaching it. it is often easier to see the slopes and breaks of a green from a distance rather than when you are on the green.

Look to see where the low point is and where water runs off. Looking for drainage lines can help you see where gravity will pull your rolling golf ball. The way the green drains is the way the ball will break and roll

Pay attention to grain. Shiny grass is with grain and the putt will be faster. Dark grass is against the grain and the putt will be slower.