My 8 iron swing.

I have been playing golf for a few years now, and just really inconsistent sometimes. I'll occasionally have spurts where I hit thin shots and lately some shanks sprinkled in. Not to mention hooks. Please help. The video is of an 8 iron where I felt pretty good with my swing. Shot an 82 this day but I hit some drivers ob and shanked a short iron ob. The day before that, I shot a 96 on the same course and it felt like I completely lost my swing. Any advice would be appreciated.

Looks like your right arm collapses at the top of your backswing and bends more than 90 degrees. Feel like you keep your right arm straight the entire backswing. It just a feeling..you won’t actually do it.

Looks a little “armsy” and could probably use more shoulder turn

You’re restricting your hip turn and over bending the right arm as a result. Your pressure is actually in the left heel at the top you’re resticting the turn so much.

Let the left heel come off the ground, left knee should work out toward the ball and that will free up the hip turn and get you more in balance. Feel like you have little to no bend in right elbow so you can maintain some width.

Looks handsy to me. Your shoulder turn stops somewhat abruptly but your backswing continues via your hands/wrists. It would seems more natural if you either shortened your back swing or increased your shoulder turn. I guess what I’m saying is that the length of your back swing seems disproportionate to your shoulder turn.

Pretty deep backswing with an 8-iron, for most irons actually. That doesnt mean you should change but you might seek out face-on video of good ball strikers and see what they are doing. I think Tiger has some clinic video on YouTube where he demonstrates a few shots with an 8.

Thanks for feedback guys.

Here’s tiger with an 8 iron at the top of the backswing. This is as far he goes for a normal swing with that club. From YouTube 2014 footage.

I shortened by backswing with irons and lost maybe a couple yards average, but gained a lot of accuracy. Also found that I tend to set up to the ball with a closed stance. Changing that with alignment rods and video for feedback helped a ton. My GIR improved and that makes the game more fun.

I knew my swing in general was long, but I felt like I made it work most of the time. The only thing is that I can be even, or under on occasions, thru 9-10 holes and everything goes to crap. Or it can go to crap as soon as I step onto the first tee box and stay that way for the whole round. Frustrating game. I'm going to hit the range and work on it.

All great advice. I’ve found that although longer backswings may work for some, it’s too difficult to maintain consistency and in the short time you have during your downswing, I find myself making too many mental adjustments that throw my timing off.

You're restricting your hip turn and over bending the right arm as a result. Your pressure is actually in the left heel at the top you're resticting the turn so much.

 

Let the left heel come off the ground, left knee should work out toward the ball and that will free up the hip turn and get you more in balance. Feel like you have little to no bend in right elbow so you can maintain some width.

Wondering if a little more "slouch" in his address position would help as well with these things you list? He seems very rigid and too focused on "perfect" posture to properly rotate and allow his body to do so freely.

Training aids aren't a solution for everything, but you would benefit from the Swing Extender aid. It will get you comfortable with the feeling of a 90 degree (maximum) right arm bend. Relatively cheap and you won't look like Tin Cup using it at the range.

I agree with Monte, allow your left heel to come off the ground at the top of the backswing. At the moment your downswing starts with your shoulders which means the pressure shift is happening late and out of sequencing.

The first move of the downswing is planting your left heel on the ground - as it comes down your shoulders will naturally drop a little and turn in response, allowing you to turn right through the ball.

Practice with your feet narrow/close together so ball is in between them. This will give you the feeling that you want of the pressure turning in and up your right hip then down and up through the left. Impossible to hit it anything other than long and straight doing that. Once comfortable, widen the stance and use your left heel as the trigger.

Lower body super quiet, ie limited hip turn n hence Club head got a little inside after the takeaway n right elbow looks slightly disconnected from there. Wonder how far you hit your 8i?

I would just relax hands wrists and forearm a bit more, get the right elbow reconnected by turning your hip a little more and work on transition.

Yeah. I tried to working on getting more hip turn and getting my left heel of the ground and it seems tough with a club in my hand. The weird thing is without a club, I feel like I am accomplishing a great back swing. Put the club in my hand and a ball there and I do exactly like in the video. Just going to take some work. I would say that when I’m hitting my irons good, it would be my 155 to 160 club. I usually feel pretty comfortable with that range.

I knew my swing in general was long, but I felt like I made it work most of the time. The only thing is that I can be even, or under on occasions, thru 9-10 holes and everything goes to crap. Or it can go to crap as soon as I step onto the first tee box and stay that way for the whole round. Frustrating game. I'm going to hit the range and work on it.

going to crap at the turn doesn’t sound like a range issue. I have the same problem from time to time and usually comes from too much mental manufacturing. I think plotting and strategy are essential for most golfers, but for some like me, it’s easy to fall by the wayside, one direction or the other. Something I came up with that has helped, is to separate thinking and addressing. Thinking should be done before you address the ball. To help that happen, as I step up, I imagine a large bubble being created around me and it’s filled with Tom Petty (Free Fallin’ or Into the Great Wide Open). Nothing can happen inside the bubble except for Petty and a good swing. Sometimes I forget about making a bubble though. Eh, I’m human, Ohmagurd!