sb944 swing journal

Returning to golf a couple of months ago, bought a net and mat to hit into at home, which turned into a sim setup, which turned into a Skytrak and TGC. Haven't played a real course yet, but on the sim can shoot mid 80's on a decent round with a couple of rounds in the 70's. Swing has been pretty good so far, better than expected, but wanting to get it right before I set in the bad habits, so bought Monte's drive for dough video. I have gotten through it this morning, but already had 2 sessions working on the setup and backswing.

On this swing, I was trying:

* Get the backswing up a bit more, still looks a bit flat, but is much higher than it was

* Get the spine tilt. Had none of this before the video series

* Get the butt behind me more. I noticed on videos I have a tendency to thrust my pelvis at impact, looks bad

* Get the shoulder separation. I had been "lagging" them behind my body turn, but noticed that looks nothing like what a good player does

I can't say I was thrilled with my session. Most of my drives were only going 70% of the distance my fairly tame pre-Monte swing length. I had to get my persimmon out to see if it was a broken driver. I found my confidence here, hitting my longest drive with the persimmon, then went back to the other driver and got this swing on video.

Here is day 3:

* Monte at some point talked about getting another few degrees flex from the rear shoulder, and this added 10y to my drive consistently. Big win!

* I had the thought to really flip the hips through a lot more. Didn't add distance, but did feel better.

* I didn't think about getting my backswing up higher here, but did in the round later in the day. It looks very low to me here.

* I also gave up on a big hip bump here. I am not giving up on the idea, just I couldn't get the hip bump working yet without a massive slice. When I leave it out, I get a lot of straight long drives.

Played 18 on Chambers Bay later this day, basically using the same swing ideas as above. Was massively struggling with putter and chipping on front 9, took a lot of rewinds to try to work out tough greens, and still only managed +3 with rewinding bad shots. Also had some poor drives, irons were going very well. But on the back, shot even par without any rewinds. Driver, putter, chipping behaved very well to achieve this, but still thrilled to see my first even 9, even if it is sim, and even if it is in a practice round. Round shows as +3, but that's cheating due to rewinds.

Really happy with these results, another 10y:

* Keep hips much stiller

* Get hands/shoulder a lot more active

This one is a couple of days old, feel like a lot has changed since then :)

There is a lot that is changing before taking this video. A couple of weeks ago, I was getting a lot of lateral movements, hips moving way back, then moving way forward again. It's not that crazy a thought that contact got a lot better when quieting down the lateral movement.

I then had a couple of rough days, way more so when playing on a course, just left, right, left, right off the tee. No real reason for it, I was just trying the same things. In fact I will say during practice my contact and direction might have been improving, but found nothing positive on the course, especially since I have no real swing thoughts I can depend on.

I watched some parts of Drive for Dough again, and had a couple of things to try, no great progress, then went for a full round on the sim. Hit a tonne of fairways, easily the best I've driven in play so far. Irons not so much, wedges pretty nice, putter an absolute disaster, for 77. The big winner for the driver was a feeling that I need to keep the shoulders rotating more. In my practice I felt it in a practice swing, that I'd get my club through to a point, and that point wasn't far enough. I had the feeling extending right through the follow through, and started getting solid contact again. Only this time the same swing thought got me through the whole round. Couple of small tips I had:

* Irons were not striking well because I was forcing them down too quick. Giving driver and irons a brief pause made contact better for both clubs.

* Feeling of swinging shoulders through was trumped by feeling of shoulders through, plus club head through. It's hard to explain, but was hitting it well just trying to get shoulders right through, but then aiming for feeling of clubhead getting right through too gave me some nice contact

This swing was a little slicey, though really not hooky, making it far easier to plan a landing area, and visualise a shot. I'm hoping this swing holds up, it's a super easy swing thought.

Trying a one plane swing until I can properly get the feel for hitting it flat and still hit it hard, as any attempt to drop to a lower plane ends up losing 20% power. I got the power doing this, and the feel of the flatter swing, so win, win.

Read up a lot on early extension, it's potentially going to be a real pain to fully overcome, and I'm certain it's something I've had in my swing since I was a kid. I decided to keep away from the one plane, and just try to keep the butt back rather than thrust everything at the ball. But there is so much going on in the swing, I've had to not fully look at all the flaws I've introduced/reintroduced. That said, I'm pretty happy with the progress of the last couple of days:

had another couple of thoughts on EE, turns out it can be a reaction to poor components earlier, and the body being forced to adjust. had read about hands being too low, therefore body pushes out to keep hands high enough, so went about trying to staying higher in backswibg and transition. results of ball striking were really good, but EE did not go away.

Trying to eliminate EE. Still a while off. The basics of this session:

* Still have to feel like I'm getting backswing too upright to get to near the right spot

* Feel like the left shoulder is pushing right out

* Right knee not to straighten, leave it out longer, then snap it closed nearer to impact. The feeling is tha the right knee to butt angles stays quite constant

* Need to get club from inside more, but not by moving the body about, keep the head and shoulders stable if you do this

* Stand a little further from the ball

Had a sore right shoulder blade today, so reduced the swing down to 80% pressure... this worked quite nicely to be honest. I din't hit every shot perfect, but felt far more in control, and really only lost around 5-10% power, which isn't a big deal when you are more often in the fairway/green. I did need to really hit the middle of the club to get the results, but did so a lot more than usual.

Other than that, just keeping the backswing high, keeping away from the ball more than I think I should, and keeping the hips as low as I can. Still a hint of EE here, but rapidly disappearing as I get other components right.

I hope to build power from this 80% swing, so might keep this as my default swing, and work at just getting shoulders out once I have this speed down nicely.

Much of the same today. Hitting the ball really well, might just be on a little run, having only 4 holes above par (golf sim) at Stonebridge for 77. I can still see massive EE problems here, but it's hard to want to work on it when you have driver on a string, long and straight without effort. I'm going to ride this train a little longer, and when it bottoms out, I'll likely be looking at fixing the EE.

Keeping it mostly the same, but went more aggressive at impact.

Also tried a right handed 7i, to see if I have EE right handed.

Much of the same today. Hitting the ball really well, might just be on a little run, having only 4 holes above par (golf sim) at Stonebridge for 77. I can still see massive EE problems here, but it's hard to want to work on it when you have driver on a string, long and straight without effort. I'm going to ride this train a little longer, and when it bottoms out, I'll likely be looking at fixing the EE.

 

[media=]

[/media]

This video looks so much better than your first one in August! I only have one recommended change... and its a big one. Your hips are a full foot behind your front foot at your finish. This suggests to me that you need to shift your weight much farther forward before you begin your down swing. If you do, I think you'll find it's much more comfortable and that you'll be able to finish more like top players. See Adam Scott:

Thanks el macho, noted. The problem always comes when I try to mess with move forward, zipper away etc in transition. I'm talking weak feeling, 15% power loss, more dispersion. It's possibly something I need to work harder on.

Which brings me to the next point. I stumbled into Jim Waldron swing illusion. It makes sense and is easy to implement for backswing, but as he says is only a small part of the golf swing. I went to his site to funds out more, and came across a mental/training audio, which I bought and have listened to twice. I like the content, so now I'm thinking do I abandon Monte tips for a Waldron technical course? In researching that question someone said first read the first ten pages of the swing illusion thread, so I did. A few more light bulb moments. The big ones for me are the arms don't actively work in the downswing, and that many high handicappers have a flinch moment through impact. To my mind they may actually work together to cause harm.

The flinch is interesting. In almost every sport I've played, I've had this intense build up of mental pressure before delivery, followed by a small black out, followed by getting back in contact with the follow through again. If you don't get this, it's similar to fully lit room during preparation, followed by a dimming during the backswing, then the room goes black at around transition and the lights come back on fully after impact. Waldron says we need to be mentally aware throughout the swing, makes perfect sense to me, but not something I've experienced.

So I now have the goal of working the flinch out of my swing. This means getting to the point of committing swing tips to sub conscious, not actively thinking about swing tips before a swing. To do that means fully committing to moves. To do that means practicing effectively, which also means working on just one thing at a time. This is going to be very hard for me, I'm currently thinking 5+ tips before every swing, and try new ones most sessions. Before committing to any more training modules, videos, books, lessons, I have identified two big ticket items to start with, and in the mean time I aim to work on getting in touch with mental images and with feel.

First up though is my backswing, and in particular my hips. Every 2nd session I quieten my hips, then I go back to big lateral move, probably trying for power. Far more powerful players than me don't do it however! My goal is to quieten these in my sub conscious. To do that I aim to work on slow motion with mirror, half paced and full paced until it feels second nature. All the time stopping to understand different feels, and being critical of each attempt in practice. I don't know how long, but the real trick is to not rush things and expect instant results.

Videos are normal swing first, followed by my idea of the Waldrom no arm pressure swing 2nd. No arm is 10 pct shorter and feels worse, but I can see if I get everything else in place, this will be 2nd nature.

[media=]

[media=]

It's been liberating only focusing on one thing. Firstly, I think it's going to have huge consequences on swing changes, just do it and do it and do it until you know it.

A little about the process so far. The backswing is relatively easy to do in front of a mirror, because you can stop at various times. You can also kill two birds with one stone. For example, if the arms are not quite lifting you focus on that, but if the hips are going too far left, you can also focus on that. I get it to the top, check the mirror, flip around and check DTL. Inevitably, something is not quite right. Like my hips didn't move, my arms are extended, DTL looks magic, but caddy view shows I'm reversing my tilt! I try to capture that feeling, this is what it feels like to reverse tilt. I have also started taking a lot of visual shots. When I look towards the ball, my right shoulder almost comes over my left foot from my view, which means I'm extending back, not reverse tilt. If I can't see my feet, I'm leaning too much towards the ball (target line), keep it back a bit. It's actually a lot harder to repeat than I thought. Feel is tough at the moment, I'm starting to try, but this is maybe one thing too many to attempt right now.

When looking at a Justin Rose, my main things to fix in the backswing are:

* Rotate hips naturally, should be pointing at the ball, not horizontal to the ground

* Extend everything back, so arms should feel like they are reaching out quite a lot (without going crazy)

* Don't let hips slide back, nor head, these two should be anchored

A couple of days of this made some huge differences. My distances with a driver are definitely up another 10y. I am now quite easily getting over 260y without a good strike, and a good straight strike is 275y+, and with no great deal of effort in transition either. Also had a 310y drive in TGC with a downhill hole, which felt amazing. Got a few over 160mph ball speed. On the downside, my direction has changed a lot. I was a strong fade/slice sort of guy with an occasional pull hook. I was working with that, and occasionally lost it too far to the slice, but often enough drifted it right edge to centre. Now I suddenly have a pull hook. I managed to get a few straighter in TGC, and hit some really nice strikes, but it was very hard to aim, as the pull hook came out a lot when I didn't need it. Snuck in an 80, could have been a lot better, or in fact a lot worse, as the pull hook really disappeared at some point.

The liberating part was I didn't care if I hooked it (to a degree). I'm working on backswing, when I get that right, then I'll start trying to cure the next thing, and at that point I hope to get more control over whatever poor shot I'm playing at the time.

Working hard on backswing. While I've given myself time to ingrain things, I honestly thought it would be easier than this. My main threat is the hips sliding back and forward, relying on timing for a good strike. In slow motion this looks good, but try and lace a long drive the slide is definitely there. I had to feel like my hips were locked in place to get what I was aiming for, very unnatural. Hit a lot of balls trying to see what feels right, and videos right. I'm also working on my wrists and arms on the backswing. It won't be in this video, but will get working on it this week. Setup even though this isn't doing anything about early extension yet, I feel it's important to keep working on this for a while.

Had a few more mini breakthroughs today. I can't shake the idea of the arm swing illusion, and how important that our swing is working properly in 3 dimensions, not just looks great from back, and even potentially from side also. It's hard to explain, but every few swings has me thinking about some very subtle changes to what I'm doing, and since it hasn't been discussed at the micro level I'm thinking, I don't really know whether it's good or bad. Here are some ideas I did have today about the backswing roughly in order of time I had the idea:

* Like ASI, do the hands end up behind your head (I mean further away from the target line)? It seems obvious, every pros swing does, it ends up way behind the back of the head. Only, if my intention was to just get arm back to say 9 o clock, and the rest happens automatically, should my intention to keep them as close as possible to the target line on the way up? It's not far off looking at some videos, so I'll keep an eye on this.

* With Monte's 9 to 3 drill in mind, I had some swings like this, as I believe it probably is an amazing way to sync the body. In fact, I went from losing only about 10% with pretty solid ball strike (direction a little iffy), to actually hitting a couple longer, including a 240y hybrid that usually goes around 220 if crushed!

* Tried some full swings with driver after with mixed success. I was employing all my backswing tips as well as I could, then I had the idea to just do nothing with the arms, back or forward. Compared to normal, it felt like I left all tension out of the arms, and got some real sync with the body. Distance stayed very solid, and direction was great too. Very small sample, so might be down to luck, but while my arms probably did a lot more than I give them credit for, it felt like I just let them ride the body turn from start to finish of swing. It felt great.

Feel a bit indifferent tonight. Can still see a few lingering long term issues in my backswing, but struck it nice tonight. Rather than feeling like a full swing, this feels like a 50%, but you can see it goes more like 90% my previous swing. Results are just as long, if not longer however, so I'm not complaining. But the real clue there is change does not feel subtle, it feels ridiculously different, yet the video does not lie, it's marginal:

Backswing is my primary concern still, but had a little muck around with some other ideas with transition and hitting today.

As is obvious to me, when I do these other things, a few bad habits in the backswing. In a way it's a good litmus test, because if you are focusing on the transition, the backswing reverts back to sub conscious, and it's not all bad:

* Pretty happy with the plane I'm getting into now, I can feel this plane, I don't need to visualise this

* Still get too much lateral movement, look at the hips, or even more obvious in head. I hold it there, so contact was actually very clean, but it means my weight must not be getting to the front foot until after impact

* The left elbow seems in a better position than it is sometimes. I had the swing thought to not use the left hand at all on backswing. It seems when the left starts grabbing the club more, the elbow flares right out.

* Feeling pretty good about the connection between the body and arms going back

On the downswing, I was mucking about here, and tried a few things I'd been learning recently. I had a great half swing drill going. I'd address the ball with the ball striking pose, eg right shoulder way up, left way down, secondary tilt etc. Rotate back half way, rotate forward. Could get 275y drives with this, which felt ridiculous. However, I couldn't get that pose in a full swing, it pretty much faded off to 240-260y drives, obviously missing a bunch of ball striking elements the half swing had.

This final swing I had was a half measure, but felt solid and repeatable, as I want to hit a course this week, and need to find some sort of realistic swing to take there. The swing thought is mainly just rotate a wide and strong arc with the left side, and don't focus the attention just on the downswing, but still rotating the same pace to finish, and my weight does get more to the ball by the end. Seemed like an easy swing thought, and was producing 280y plus drives, including these two.

OK, big week! Had a break up the coast with the family, lots of surf and sun, and also managed a bit of golf, real golf, as in I actually played golf for the first time in 9 years. It all started with taking 5 clubs down on holiday, Dr/4 Hy/7i/SW/Pt. Everyone was chilling to a kids movie after several activities, so I got the pass to hit a local range, which was grass. It was however the inside of a horsetrack, so the turf was very wet underneath due to earlier rain. The experience was intense for me, and included a bunch of these feelings (compared with indoor sim):

* It was very windy, and more than anything, I felt a lot of outside factors were invading my usual swing space, like "do I need to hold my arms stiffer due to the wind"

* I was initally scared of fatting a couple of wedge warmups, but was really happy with the iron/hybrid from the wet deck in general, which was a relief as hitting off a mat may hide my inability to hit it pure. But this was pretty good

* Direction was awful. I'd slam slice one, then pull hook the next, then hit it dead straight. And I wasn't trying swing thoughts, so this was just a completely undependable two direction miss

* The ball flight when it did go straight was beyond my belief, 100% pro like

* Was hoping to guage some distances, but a) couldn't really see where things landed on this flat landscape b) didn't see half my driver shots c) because of rain, range was moved 70m forward, so even 7i didn't seem too far from 250 sign, so no idea how far I was hitting it.

My overall feeling was positive on ball striking, very worried on direction control.

I then had the same opportunity and played 9 the next day, my first in about 9 years. Went to the closest course for a twilight rate, it's a nicely maintained short course. I tried to latch onto a group, but the guy wouldn't have me, so forced me in between him and the group of 3 about 2 holes up. With nothing to really play for, I hit 2 balls in the first 2 holes, basically my warmup. Was hitting it OK, couldn't reach the 1st par3 with a 7i, and hybrid might have gone into houses, so came up short. Nice drive on 2nd, everything going right (pull). This lasted 7 holes, couldn't get a straight drive. Also, was short holes and massive dog legs, so ended up having to hit 7i/hybrid off the tee, and still went the wrong side for the leg and long into trees. Highlight was chipping funnily enough. I was 20m right on every green (including aiming 10m left), but chipped it on the green each time, and had a few decent chances at par, which I missed. Nailed a 7i approach right at the pin for a par on 7 in front of a crowd as the 3 in front asked me to play through. 9 was into the wind and uphill short par 5. Teed up 2 balls to get real life driver distances, but OB'd one right, and the other hit trees and bounced back to 230y out. Nailed that with a 4 hybrid, very uphill decent breeze, looked amazing, and landed short on the fringe, and couldn't roll up. Dropped a ball 160y out for my 7i (1980 blade 7i) and it looked amazing, even got a friendly kick at the pin. Only when I got up there, the ball was not to be seen. Even looked in the hole, but apparently it flew the green, so basically went 180y, into a pretty stiff breeze, way uphill. Finished with a birdie or double bogey depending on how you look at it, but basically played bogey golf, due to some decent chipping and a couple of nice shots. I was a little disappointed overall, but in retrospect, had to use my 7i for about a 60m range of approaches, had no course knowledge (would aim driver at green on some dog legs if I played it again), and was hitting it poor unrelated to playing in real life.

Next day, same opp, this time went to the championship course, hitting off blue tees, about a 3600y front nine. Again tried to latch onto a player to play with, but he wouldn't. I hit with him watching, but didn't see it and got "wow you hit that hard". Me: "where is it?" Him:"still coming down, middle of the fairway. I'm definitely not playing with you now." OK, pumped! I doubted him for a little while as I didn't see it, but there it was about 65 out, 315y drive with a decent breeze behind, very slight uphill. Didn't par. Next tee I still felt a bit unwarm, and saw a group ahead, so hit two balls, didn't see either shot. One was at the base of a tree, about 260y, put my 7i on the green, lost the other...until walking up near the green, and there it is. It was a 350y hole, directly into a stiff breeze, and it was only about 50-60y short, so something like 290y into a stiff wind. How stiff? My wife tried to take a walk with my kids, and they called me for a pickup, as they couldn't bare walking back into that wind! Next hole was the same thing. I saw this one, power fade, it just kept going and going, eventually also settled 290y into the wind, flat as flat course. The rest of day was a bit average. Hit two balls all day, didn't really keep score, but bogey golf would be kind. I kept missing way way right unexpectedly, with the occasional normal slice. Every hole had at least a couple of great shots and a couple of shockers. Hit two more drives downwind well on the same hole, finishing about 305y and 320y.

Overall, was happy to see 300y for the first time in my life, and stoked about almost hitting that into the wind two holes in a row. Chipping was tough, but lies were way worse on this course, and I had no experience. Also had several sub 90y shots that I chunked, so plenty of real life shot making work to fix that. Micro highlight, had two bunker shots and nailed them both, including a fried egg.

Finally, back to the virtual range today, and was extremely pleased to still see this relatively new snap hook. Why? If it's just my swing, it can be fixed. If it only appears in real life, my sim setup is useless. What's more, I couldn't easily fix it mucking around with things a little, but did fix it in play in the TGC sim tour. Was about 3 holes in, when I realised my hips weren't laterally an issue, but perhaps they were rotating too early and aggressive. This really stopped the pull and the hook, and as I realised that my confidence grew, and I started aiming perfectly for a fade and hitting it, getting good striking, and at the pin. I hit my best sim round of +3 for a 75. I also had a huge moment with the putter. I was seeing a lot of inconsistent take away, and realised my putter head wasn't under my eyes, so moved it further away from my body, and the "plane" was miles better, and everything felt amazing with the putter all of the sudden. This was unfortunately found after 3 terrible 3 putts, and with a couple of horrible chips, I could have easily hit par today.

Next up is getting real life to below bogey golf, which I aim to work on either tomorrow or next weekend, need to keep the momentum up. All going well, will aim to get a handicap this year.

Video is me with my snap hook swing on the range, followed by my corrected swing on one of the TGC tour holes. Will still be focusing on better backswing mechanics over the next few weeks (slow progress), before turning my attention to transition issues:

No video today, in fact no real swing changes, just played a bunch, so logging the results.

Firstly, played again, my local. I've driven past this course 10,000 times, and never played it, 5 minute walk from home. I was excited to finally play it, and had a perfect opportunity after hours of re-organizing the garage left me in credit for down time. This time it was 1 ball, with another player also playing 1 ball, so a proper scored 9. The course was medium length, with a 450y par 4 into the wind, but also a couple of 330y par 4's and 130-150ish par 3's, so not a monster, but not tiny, well maintained. Hit +6, which I'm very pleased with, even if it could have been a lot better. Remembering that yesterday I'd fought my big go right weakness, I used skytrak to warm up before I left for the course, and found my lovely fade in tact, so headed down after only about 20 hits. And it stuck on course too, hitting it mostly solid and where I wanted on the first 6 holes. I managed to chunk a couple of small wedge shots, 3 putt etc to make sure I was still +3, but I was mostly happy that again my skytrak game doesn't struggle to make it to course, and montes chipping drill is amazing on course, almost chipping in twice using it. Then the wait. We had waited a bit all day for the group ahead, quite a bit more at 6. But 7/8/9 were massive waits. 7 I hit two crazy bad shots, which still occasionally happen, but just felt like they wouldn't today, each was after a 10 minute wait. Was lucky to double after an 8 foot putt. Par 3 next, 20 minute wait, pulled it miles right, had 40y left, and hit the pin, but didn't drop but 3 foot putt. Last was a 495y par 5, but big downhill/wind to start. Probably only 175y left (no distance markers on this course ???) after a nice hit, but was left with no sight of the green and a huge forest in front, so tried to punch it left with a draw (which I have no idea how to do), but got a slice... bogey, for a +6 overall. Happy with the score, and it's 100% real off the competition tees. No dramas, happy enough with that, especially with some of the really bad chunked 50y wedges, a lot of potential in this round. To be honest, this is a couple of minutes door to door from my house, or could walk my bag up there, but I doubt I'll ever play it again the wait was so ridiculous on the final 3-4 holes.

Came back a bit hyped, and had 1 day to finish my TGC tournament, so went on to play a sim 18, and got my first ever even par round, on a fairly easy course. Similar to the first round, and my real life, just rarely hitting that pull hook, mostly getting my fade, or overdoing it. Also chipped and putted fairly well overall.

I've put my swing issues to the back for now, but that will change again tomorrow, it's time to start focusing on the setup/backswing again. I have no confidence that my transition starts from the same place each time and sometimes it works out, but sometimes it goes nowhere near where I think it will. There is a lot to fix, but my big issues are still not getting high enough, not keeping my tilt, and also wrist c0ck.

Back to the grind tonight. Still a lot of backswing work to do. The following video was taken after about 1.5 hours of backswing work. I'd take the club back 10 times analysing things, then I'd hit a ball, often with a video. Some things stood out. My hits were still getting a lot of head movement back especially, even though the hips are not moving as much, so I fixed that. I've been meaning to work on wrist c0ck, so working on that. The last small change came by feel more than by instruction. I figured my head had to move from the target just a little at address, but then I did the opposite with the hands and pushed then to the target a little. Felt a little weird, but backswing then felt way more connected, and I really felt like this coupled with the wrists gave a feeling that I could just throw the club through impact rather than guiding it. OK, not to that extreme, but I felt freer when approaching the ball.

Was tossing up between another grind fest, or a round on TGC tour, chose the tour and crushed it, 70 (-1), lowest score, first sub par score. I wouldn't say I got away from my backswing swing thoughts, but it was minitmal, and at some point I was getting a visual of the shots in my head more clearly, not the act of hitting. Though I will say, it's 100% easier to do that when the shots are coming off the middle of the club and straight.

This is more than working for me right now, may as well do it for all shots I currently play, as all of my game is going well right now (on the sim at least).

Driver and irons:

* Make sure bottom hand is under the grip a little, so strong grip

* In stance, don't let body/head fall too close to the ball, feel like I'm standing up a little more at address

* Address with head behind the hands a little, and the longer clubs behind the ball for sure

* Also make sure all of this has the club head very lightly on the ground, club will come in for clean contact, but if it's firmly resting on the ground can end up fat

* The backswing is start with the body rotation, hinge the wrists. With wrist hinge, and hands starting in front of me, it feels like it's all very tight to me, even half way through backswing, rather than feeling like the hands and club are now behind

* Downswing is holding the hinge while rotating, and at some point the club/hands automatically release

* Look at the flag for result (JK)

Chips:

* Essentially watch Montes chipping video for the technical, but it's letting the club face swing through and use the bounce

* One thing I'd add here (that was probably in Montes video) is I start to feel like I'm motioning to look towards target. So rather than a pendulum swing where my club goes back, the face falls forward, hits bounce and flips through, as the clubs falling I start to rotate a little toward target to give a tiny amount of acceleration

* All the while keeping the head still!

Putting:

* Revers hands, trigger finger of both hands down shaft opposing each other

* Gentle grip

* Big win for me, stand further from the ball. I was too close and couldn't get a decent back and through, but if I give myself space, path, feel, confidence etc is amazing. This worked really well for my first real round too, I made 2-3 really good putts.

* Don't make short backswing, make a slightly longer one, and be a little more than gentle on the way back

I'm very interested to see how the current form holds, and also interested to see just how much of the above I still have in a few weeks/months/years.

Followed up my 70 with an even first 8, still hitting it well for the most part, with a few really poor shots sneaking in. However, went +10 for the last 10, including water twice, behind trees, chipping and putting worse, finished with a +9 for the tournament, which is still high up at the moment, but a big let down. A couple of sessions since, and it's obvious I was on a streak, have hit it very well, but not nearly on a string like that, and can't seem to remove the pull hook from appearing now and then. I'm finding it too difficult to resist working on transition movements, and I know my backswing is not perfect yet. I will say this, my hands and shoulders look to me to get into a decent spot. My wrist c0ck doesn't happen at all unless I'm drilling it, but it doesn't eliminate strong straight shots.

I was playing around with a couple of theories, one from here, one from the previous attempt at golf. The first was the feel of a club comes from the sweet spot of the club, not the shaft your arms are attached to. So if you imagine swinging the hosel at the centre of the ball, you actually end up swinging the sweet spot at it. It makes sense, and in trying I found the results to be true. However, when I don't think about this, I'm getting a tonne of sweet spot contact, so doesn't seem worth that much to me at this point.

Second was old Lag advice to use the core to rotate through the ball. I didn't really get to try this much, but seemed a little less important at this stage than backswing or transition. However, the idea was to squeeze the legs together hard, something he claimed I could do well. Maybe I'll come back to this later.

Transition is funny, I know what to do, but whenever I try it, it ends up mucking up my rhythm and it goes weak. If I don't try to do a proper bump my shots go really solid. Also, while I'm looking at transition, to get what Monte is preaching, I've identified there are 3 big moves I need to master:

* First and secondary tilt. First is a matter of setup, so I just have to focus on that every session. Second is really going to come from a proper tilt, whether it's Monte's way, my current way or some other.

* Get arms in front. The arms end up behind the body a bit, whether you like ASI idea or not, so need to get back in front again before contact. Monte says to lead with the arms. I struggle to attempt this. I got a few really spot on when just trying to unhinge the arms in their triangle, but lost it quickly. But looking at my videos,

* Bump. As stated, I struggle to find any timing with this, but I need a stock bump feel that works well.

Video shows completely no swing thought swings at the end of this session. My only thoughts were keep it smooth. First 2 went right rough or slightly worse depending on course. For interest I tried to throw the kitchen sink at the last one, and got 292y and straight, which is rare for me on Skytrak range, yet to hit a 300y, but I did get a 298y yesterday too.

Since the post where I was hitting the ball really well, I've gone on decent streaks of solid ball striking, definitely on a big uptrend, and think I added another link to my swing. I keep looking at my early extension swing, and keep thinking there is something wrong with my rear knee, and hip rotation compared with the pros. I'm then reading this article:

http://www.golfwrx.com/472540/do-taller-golfers-have-an-advantage/

It goes through pretty much all my issues right now. Not a lot of answers mind you, just that tall people suck at these things in general.

The new link comes in point number 3, excessive knee drive, leading to arched finish, leading to sore back, which I'm starting to notice too. I've mucked around with not driving my knee towards the ball, and instead leaning it towards target. It's pretty much leads to the zipper away bump from Monte, but just explained in a way that allows me to find the goto feel without compromising power. I have yet to properly record it on video yet to see if it further eliminates my early extension issues, but it feels very promising, and I feel I have control plus power with this move.

So TGC tour round was both good and bad, I guess as usual. The good, my iron play was red hot, like it was during my round of 70 last week. Stiffed a few 160y+ iron shots, with many other only 8-20 feet from various spots, including an eagle attempt. While putting was good, felt like I missed a bunch of these by a whisker, could have had a massive amount of birdies if a few fell. Driving was a little less perfect. If you were at the range it would look good for the most part, but I just can't get that one way shot like I can the irons, so if I aim left side I can get a fade, right side I can get a draw, and this leads to a lot of near miss fairways. But more concerning is the pull draw, essentially a hook, which shows up more than I'd like. The round was a 80 (+10), where +8 of that was an island par 3, where my first carried 25y past the back of the green (wrong club), 2nd drifted and missed left, 3rd went 10y past the back of the green still, and the final one barely made it on a mis hit, and then I took another 4-5 shots to get it in. Feel I could have had another great day without that hole, but happy enough with this.

Hope to get to video tonight, to see if the new knee feel is resulting in less early extension, and in fact a proper bump.

Made a move away from easy today. Didn't work too well for TGC tour, miles off this time after winning 2 tournaments in a row. I'd happily keep my swing from last week, but there is still a lot of early extension, so I want to get at least closer to a non EE swing. I had the real idea to start fixing it this week, which is part backswing/part transition. Backswing, is making sure my front arm (right arm for a leftie) doesn't get pinned to the chest. Give it room. This is a really good feel for me. I can see I still raise up toward the end, but get much more in line with how I think my backswing should finish doing this. The rest then feels foreign, as you'd expect. I spent a bunch of time trying to find something, but from a more positive position, I can basically rotate through low, and catch good contact. The 2 swing feels I had here were keep right arm off chest a bit going back, and keep the space, and the arms going before hips flip out. Good for a lazy 290y on skytrak, which I figure is a bit more again. Didn't see these on TGC tour BTW, a couple of feels came to me the next shot after the tournament finished, but still had probably 30 shots after, and next to none weren't very straight and well struck:

Made some big plays at getting a better long term swing today. I will say, after a lot of hits, nothing really hurting, and probably had a best practice in terms of ball striking and direction. This is different to last week "hot irons", this is more a best average, and driver was working well. That means a lot of really good ball striking, but not absolute crazy good, just good solid boring, closer to pin...etc. But what rarely appeared was a hole breaker shot. Yes it still happens on driver, but WAY less tonight than last night.

I'll go back a step. Had an afternoon off, so found myself at a golf shop. I've been to one previously to replace my old blades, but the idea came unstuck when I hit my old blades well the next session... Well I was googling stuff, and somehow found about one of the few modern clubs I've spent time with the Cobra King Pro, given I'd borrowed it a few times at the local range. I always thought of it as a big bulky and black (BBB) version of what I hit, but just went straight with no real effort. But when I brought the name up at the shop today, they said it's the smallest hardest to hit club they sell! Anyway, I somehow found about the Fly Z Pro, and found so many positive reviews on golfwrx, so googled it, and found a 2nd hand set for sale 4-PW, good condition and cheap. Positives are it's more forgiving than my setup, without going too far down the big cavity design. It's also a stiff and heavy shaft, S300. So I'm negotiating on that, and find myself at a golf shop, seeing every club I've read up on recently, and pretty much every shaft. The guy is supposed to sell full club fitting, but instantly takes away graphite and light steel without me paying for a fitting, saying my only options should be stiff/x and heavy shaft. I am hitting a Taylormade 750 with KBS 130. No monitor, but can't mis hit it. So I'm starting to think this is a good combo for me. Had a Tilteist AP2 with S300 there too, and it doesn't work for me. Feels lower launch (admittedly into a net without monitoring), and get a few more chunky. But we are talking $AU300ish 2nd hand vs $1500ish new!!!!

So more importantly, swing today. My overall thoughts are space. If something is pinned, un pin it would be my goal. It feels good. It doesn't eliminate EE however, I'm starting to feel I am EE and will not get super good due to this disability. However, it was still my best. A lot of swing thoughts going on. Going back it's right arm unpinned, and at some point, right shoulder lower, as I look at videos and see my shoulders pointing almost horizontal to the ground. But the results of that look magic to me on video, so I think I'm on the right track here finally. On transition, I've shifted my start thought to left shoulder, going aggresssively down at the ball. These two swing thoughts leave me a bit restricted, but way straighter and better overall contact. But when I tried to rip one, it worked well.

Video is very controlled in the first two swings, but then "hit it long" in the 3rd, which I hit 20y longer and dead straight.

Good win on TGC Tour this past week ?

Looks like a lot of progress!

Good win on TGC Tour this past week ��

 

Looks like a lot of progress!

Thanks, first round was like a rare day at golf. Hope to take some of the run good onto a real course soon, hopefully this week will start to get my real handicap going again.

Also had a lesson with Monte. He pretty quickly spotted something mentioned on here by elmacho. I didn't ignore elmacho, but I didn't really fully get what to do either. Monte said left shoulder over right foot. The advice cleared up a couple of things where I wasn't sure what to put where, and was pretty easy to implement. This latest video shows 2 drives in TGC and you can finally see I'm starting to transfer weight through getting my leff shoulder (rear for a lefty) forward. Other things here, I'm still working hard on backswing. Instead of swing more upright, my swing thought is "give yourself room." When everything feels like it's getting pinned to your body, you are probabaly swinging back too flat. The other is straightening back a little. I still don't look "PGA" in this respect, but I do think it made me feel more stable. Finally, these swings feel far less "violent" to me. Like many, I've been trying to reach a magic mark, over 300y on Skytrak no wind or slope. No issues with that, but in trying a new move I relaxed the swing a bit, and the results were strong so I never really stepped it up again, and actually feel comfortable about it. Distance is down 10y on average for a well struck drive, but a well struck drive percentage is way up too, as well as accuracy. Also, it's a different transition, so I'm guessing distance will come back once I get the move correctly, hopefully even go up.

I hate posts like this... but... I think there is something wrong with my driver. I'm mucking round with irons, and little I do is causing much but solid and pretty straight. Pick up the driver and it's hook city + occasionall massive slice. Trying the same swing, again pull hook, again pull hook. Irons again, solid, baby fade, like 3-8y fade. Driver pull hook, pull hook, pull hook up to 280y max. Finally, I put the 3W on a tee, usually just hit it off the deck with sim. Baby fades and draws, upto 275y!!!! Driver again, pull hooks. 3W again baby fades and draws, actually more baby fades, but aim at most fairway centres, and it's always 255y+ and mostly still on fairway or just off. Also, even blade 2i was going in a beautiful shape, with the only time it wasn't was when I fatted it a couple of times, but that is a 210y+ club too, which is still miles better than 265y and 40y right. Will trial this all week, and if no answers come up, will have to take it into a shop to check out. Could be an ebay dud, though I feel like I've had really good nights with it in the past, so perhaps something happened since I've owned it.

As for swing, I noticed my efforts to get left shoulder forward was a little weak, so worked on that tonight. Also noticed I was getting into the old habit of shifting hips away from target. So pretty well fixed that tonight, just really need to be conscious about it still. As for left shoulder right foot, I took this one step further. I have a normal swing feel of pinching left rib to left hip to feel 2nd tilt, but I've come to realize I'm overdoing it, so have eliminated this feel. Also in doing so, just consciously keeping the right shoulder "under" the chin, or giving my chip more space. Results are better shoulder of right foot, and a really solid and consistent feeling swing tonight. Will try it all again tomorrow:

Had an eventful day. I decided to pay for a fitting, it was eye opening. With so few real golf outings, my experience is mainly on skytrak, which says I'm a decent hitter length wise, nothing spectacular. As an example, if I really crush a 7i at home, I'm registering around 155y, and sometimes I sit there dumb founded that this distance is all I have. Well the fitting got me trying all sorts of iron heads and shafts, and results are somewhat different. I wasn't hitting it well always, but still managed to average over 180m with a couple of the 6 irons, and not far off with one of the 7i. Even taking into account that some of these are massively strong, that's 200y with a 6i, with a reasonably tight dispersion left to right. I ended up being matched to:

Srixon 765 head (not the longest, but most accurate)

X100 shaft

0.5" long

1 degree upright (currently 4 degree flat)

Thicker grip, possibly mid size, but would try putting tape under normal grip

If you scale this down, it's 155y PW, so I have a huge problem below, there is still a lot of gaps, like 135, 115, 95, etc. Assuming a big par 4 is 440y, and I hit a driver well, I have no option for the iron set I just bought! Doesn't that sound crazy? If I look at my old set, it might be a solid persimmon driver and still a 4 or 5 iron. I'm not having a whinge, but if I'm hitting a 6i 200y, I really don't need a 5i right? I mean, if I butchered my drive on a 450y par 4 to the point where I have 215y left, how am I supposed to hit a 5i out of the rough on the green? More likely to hit a decent 6i short, and think of a chip to save par. I didn't walk out with a set, and probably need to sleep it over, it seems what I really need is 4 wedges before anything else.

While I was there I got talking about my driver woes. He doesn't like that I have a stiff driver, he wants to upgrade to X stiff. He also laughed at the weight combo in my M1. I said I don't have a tool, so he gave me one and gave me a combo to try. Well that worked superbly! I didn't lose my shots right, but I did mainly hit it straight, or left, which is where I like golf. I could easily feel the difference, and to be honest, even when I was crushing my irons, it's not as nice a feeling as seeing a long drive in the middle of a fairway. Funnily enough, my irons went to crap. I really couldn't hit the middle often today, and I wonder if it's the large difference between my old irons, and the 100+ modern irons I hit earlier today. I shot a really solid 74 in TGC, but really could have been in the 60's the way I was driving, and the way I've been hitting irons recently.

Swing wise, it wasn't a huge concern today, but I did find a couple of interesting swing feels that held up. I'm still "left should right foot" as Monte suggested, but there are 7000 ways to do that. I was starting to hit it bad during the round, and focused back on a balanced, steady backswing. More specific, keeping hip feel parallel to the ground going back, parallel through impact, whereas I used to pinch my right hip going back, left hip through impact. This move makes the golf swing feel easy, but there is still a lot of things that can go wrong, hence the 9i in the water on the last. Will take video another day.