Beginner golfer feeling like I'm going backwards after lessons

Hello people,

Just thought I'd post and see if others had similar experiences to me. I've been playing for about 3 months, Was hitting the ball ok and decided to book some lessons before I got bad habits. After my first lesson my instructor changed my stance completely, it felt real alien and uncomfortable at fist but by the end of the lesson I was hitting it decent. I've been played a few times since the lesson and feel like I've gone backwards with the new stance. Is it a case of perseverance and riding it out? I've got a lesson next week. Thanks in advance

For the most part yes. Any swing change will probably feel awkward at first. It’s smart of you to take lessons right out of the gate, as like you said, you don’t want to ingrain any bad habits.

At your next lesson, ask the instructor this very question.

Good luck, and welcome to golf!

Stick with it. Most people need a solid 3 years to build a foundational swing. Getting started is the hardest part. You'll want to quit, drink, take drugs and you will get frustrated and angry.

Don't. Just keep working.

welcome to the game.

Thanks for the reply, yeah it's awkward and I'm hitting some awful shots. It does click every now and again and I hit it well. I know Rome wasn't built in a day so it's a case of practice practice practice. I will continue with my lessons and I'll quiz the instructor on what to do next. Just wanted to see if it was a common thing to regress after lessons

I've been playing 25 years and even the slightest of grip changes feel strange. Setting up to the ball, posture, alignment etc. are important fundamentals. Keep at it, it'll click more often than not a few years down the line!

How often do you practice between lessons and what is your practice routine ?

As others have said, feel free to ask him the purpose of the stance change and why your old stance was "wrong." Likely because it was a big compensation for something else but understanding why will help you accept the change. And, in general, you will likely take small steps back every now and then. The golf swing is a matching system so you can hit the ball somewhat towards the target. As a beginner, and if you're not a natural so to speak, you probably have built a bunch of weird compensations that allow you to do that but that are very hard to repeat consistently, which is why you'll hit one great shot and then four bad ones. And, finally, as others have said, any change is going to feel "alien" at first. If it doesn't, that means you're just doing your old swing again. You need to get used to that. If you just go back to your old stuff then you might as well stop taking lessons from this person (because you're essentially saying you don't trust what they're telling you) or realize that you're throwing your money away.

The one hard part to accept from lessons is the results may or may not improve immediately. The point of lessons is to change how you move, how the results change from there are dependent on how big of a change you are trying to make and how much work you put in. You've only been golfing for 3 months, for the most part you've just figured out how to get the club back to the ball, so it's way to early for regression to even be a thing

Read the second post in this thread:https://forums.golfwrx.com/discussion/1840437/a-question-for-the-teachers#latest

Yea, I was just about to post about that thread that dbdors linked.

Problem is, it's impossible to say whether you're "on the right path" or not. A really good teacher can make changes and they will feel awkward, you'll take two steps forward then one (or one and a half) steps back, go up and down but eventually make solid progress (probably you won't even notice it). OTOH, a bad teacher can make changes and they will feel awkward, you'll take a step forward and two steps back, regress and become frustrated. It's all about whether or not you trust the teacher. How did you come by him/her? Recommendation? Reputation of some sort? If you were referred by one or more players who have a good game and who told you this is the teacher to learn from then don't let all your frustrations stop you. Keep at it, it WILL get better.

Good Luck.

This is true but if he's a very beginner and not a natural out of the gate, it's probably safe to say he has several "macro" issues that just about any instructor is going to try to change.

This is the best advice you're going to get. If you don't change now, which is a great time given that you've only just started golf, the alternative is to get comfortable with bad habits which makes them much harder to change. I spent 10 years with a pretty terrible swing before I tried to really make some fundamental changes, and trust me I wish I'd gotten lessons and addressed them much sooner.

Welcome to WRX Mikey!

Its called golf..... get used to the up and downs even if decades later you're a pro winning tourneys you're still gonna experience the same up and downs.... some understand this and have fun flowing with golf others cry, whine, and pee their pants..... welcome to the ride!

Yes swing changes are brutal and feel horrible until you engrain them which can take days, weeks months... The problem with golf is that nothing really makes sense to the average person unfamiliar with what a technically decent swing is. Your homegrown swing will only get you so far, and eventually if you keep up the game you will seek improvement and be right back where you are now. You are not alone. Everyone struggles with various deglf what you are experiencing.

What clubs do you play? Try HB Turbo irons. Calms the mind and it works.

Let's see. You're a 3 month beginner, recently took your first lesson and joined WRX two weeks ago to question the process?

Lol. If you stick around here, you're doomed. Go back to your instructor, ask for forgiveness and get back to work. Give us an update a year from now.

Oh buddy you don’t even know. Welcome to the journey. I’ve been playing for a while as many others and you will be always fixing something in your swing. Now depending on how good you want to be, it might be a small price to pay to establish a strong foundation for your swing versus picking up bad habits or techniques and having that swing flaw affecting you from improving in the long run.

You can hit the ball decently with all kinds of inefficient movements that you may want to change later when you get better and start asking a lot more from your swing. If you think changes are hard now when playing for 3 months, try making a change after you've been doing the same thing for decades.

It looks like you're doing everything right so far. You've started playing golf, you're making contact with the ball, and you're getting professional coaching early. Congrats!

I'm currently a 6 or 7 handicap golfer and I still question the lesson regression some days. They key is to focus on if you learnt something about your swing, the golf swing or your body, just one small thing per day. If you have done that, you're moving forward. Golf isn't like other sports where most things come naturally. Golf mostly after a lesson works the exact opposite to how you thought about it. Think of golf like a music lesson, each lesson you get just a tiny touch better of understanding the overall sense of music