Ballstriking Struggles, Downswing Too Steep?

I recently got back into golf. My ballstriking has been very inconsistent since I started practicing again. Fat shots, low heel shots, and a big left miss are the main problems I’m dealing with. The first DTL is a normal swing, and the second DTL is a swing using a headcover to try to fix my path and flatten/shallow my downswing. Usually I am pretty good at self diagnosing, but I can’t figure it out this time.

Any comments, tips, or feedback would be much appreciated.

7 Irons DTL:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOeMX7kNjDE7 Iron Face-On:

Compress down the right leg in transition as a drill to get a feel for it. Your right foot is coming off the ground rather quickly because you're sliding ahead leaving the arms behind. It's your sequence that's causing a slight pull down . Good swing though!

Thank you both for the feedback, I will try to work on both of those things.

Lol,, hilarious reading people’s advice. You got a solid swing, go see a decent pro or take an online lesson. You shouldn’t be working on getting more shallow though, you have all shallow misses and path looks pretty in to out. Get rid of that headcover drill too

What qualifies as a decent pro? Someone with PGA attached to their names? 30 years experience as a plus handicap gives me the credentials I need. His hips are sliding causing a stuck position at p6. It's not rocket science.

Lane. I'd like to see your swing. I'm not being sarcastic . I really want to see it.

You have a capable swing, and I say this humbly but there's body angles and geometry issues. Left side too high throughout transition and down swing. There's a lack of hip turn on coil up and generous slide coming back, things that lead to crashing right side into impact instead of turning, rotating through it. The trail knee kicks target bound too early try flexing it towards target line. Roll & rotate foot pressure instead of throwing it one side to other. Do seek Pro advice, but much of issues has little to do with the arms and hands. To my eyes, a general theme of a body parts rotating on better paths is area of focus.

I'll agree and disagree,lol.

Arms & hands are crucial to get correct. Is OP's? Could be better imo, would like to see trail forearm more in alignment with spine at the top, but is it the major issue? Maybe not getting lead off of chest is the bigger one. But if the geometry and path of shoulder plane goes off as it does, is that bad hands? Or is that neglecting that lead side drops and goes low instead of rising immediately.? Or is that because the combo of hip turn and trail knee kick has OP sliding laterally causing the both to happen? It's inter-dependent and chicken & egg. One can have hands of Hogan, if you don't have the body to match, what good is it? Hands can only go where body creates the path for them to go. They might be the Conductor but the rest is the Symphony.

Lane, I’ve read a couple of your posts that are similar in nature. I understand what you’re getting at, but unclear as to what you are actually suggesting As potential remedies as ive just seen vagueness (hands must do opposite of what they’re intended to, swing is counter-intuitive, etc).

I definitely think there is something to what you are saying as I think “hit impulse” is a very real thing. I understand from previous instruction that certain feels or intents can control and change a lot of the mechanics that precede a given feel or intent.

And I have thought about this and “shutting off the hands” but when I’ve tried in the past, the arms shut off as well. If I take a swing with that intent, backswing is very laid off (almost horizontal) and downswing is like 2 wet noodles flailing from the shoulders.

So I think it would be more helpful and productive to everyone here if you went into more detail about your philosophy regarding the hands but specifically about how one can apply it. I’m with you on the “why” but very unclear about the “how”

That was helpful - one of the things I am currently working on to avoid “pulling the handle” in transition is to keep the hands where they are and feel that exact resistance you mention in the left lat (Gankas described a very similar drill/feel in instruction I had).

The tough part for me is, even as that has improved my overall sequence, the right hand and hit impulse will still eventually take over and kick the shaft out early for me. So right now although it’s improved, my move is not great, but just less bad.

I fully understand that there is major re-work of neuropathways I need to develop and this isn’t something that happens overnight or with a bucket of balls. Just always looking for ideas on the “how” so I can shut the hands off but without shutting the arms down with them.

The biggest misconception of golf swing is that it is hand-eye, it is hand-body-eye. Hands can do everything correct, but they cannot perform to task if the body is dunce stupid. I'm a well seasoned machinist & tool maker, played drums for 15 years before that. Have plenty of hand-eye, more than most. After 25 years of playing body was still dunce stupid. When I actually broke down what was flawed down to the joint level, I actually got somewhere.

There's a reason only a few percentage of golfers routinely break 80 and solid biological & neurological reasons why the vast majority of them did in fact take up the game in their youth and formative years. If one, takes this up in adulthood, you have a less than a 1% to be scratch. That's a generous stat too. Simple answer as to why, you're body stupid and condemned by biology with inability to fix it with good'ol "hand-eye". Played with a guy, who shot under his age, told me he took up game at 25 had 1 lesson. The Pro walked away after 10 minutes, told him "not to change a thing". I met a 1%-er. Btw, his P6 was perfect. I was not blessed like him, most are not either, but, (big but here) you gain understanding of principles that all superior swings possess, then work and work and patiently stay with it, you definitely can do much much better. Maybe not 1%-er great but the hope does live on and the quality of suckage goes way up while your chasing scratch dreams.

Swing seems okay, could path be your issue? Try different setups and vary your setup a bit. Try stuff out. I’m sure you’ll figure it out.

Like someone else said, we all get the shanks.

I thought this could be worth sharing (probably not). My driver swing has a completely different feel than my iron swing, and I mean that entirely separate from the fact that it’s a different club that generally gets swung on a slightly different plane. I’m not sure if it looks any different, but it produces almost a baby fade, which I can never hit with my irons.

I’ll leave any nitpicking of that swing to others with more knowledge. All I can say is you do a lot of things right so you have a nice foundation for any changes you will work on incorporating.

for him, IMO, his swing looks decently solid. He needs someone to just look at his ballflight misses and make adjustments based on that, an instructor who is good with some sort of launch monitor to see his path etc. might help to make those minor adjustments.

Not surprised that you find more comfort in long clubs. The shoulder plane to club length ratio is better suited for current swing. Trouble begins when that ratio gets too out of whack. For you it's with shorter clubs, right? Btw, I currently have the opposite problem. Developing a swing that properly works with wedge and driver means among many things developing a consistent "chest to ball" disposition with every club. If you go after that simple key, chest opens to sky on back swing, chest closes down to ball line on down swing and opens up to sky/target on follow through and in some semblance perpendicular to spine angle, some of the greater faults of swing will slowly adjust to make that happen. Managing chest inclination is a simple key to reorganizing a complex, multi-faceted move. It will even change lower body movement. Padraig Harrington talked about this on GC some time ago and it re-directed my efforts to getting the basic geometry of swing truer to good physics. In short this has been what my input here has been about. You have solid footing to raise the floor of suckage and expand your envelope of goodness. Good luck.

Club should work more out in front of you at the start of the downswing while hands should work down and in. You start the downswing well but don't quite allow the club to release in front of you, holding it off instead. Allow the club to continue working in front of you.

Here's a video from Mike Malaska that explains it a little bit: