ddetts' Swing Journey - 2020 Goals & Updated Swing Progress pg. 17

[ddetts]

> @ebrasmus21 said:

> I feel your pain on shoulder plane. If feels so weird trying to get steeper.

 

I'm the same, I already feel like I'm going really steep, but obviously I'm not. I guess I'm going to have to do a ton of reps & rehearsals holding an alignment stick along the club and getting it pointed more vertical and inside the ball on the takeaway.

 

Also Monte's shoulder rotation drill from D4D is something I need to do a lot of again.

[glk]

I know I know just what you need more advice. LOL.

Work on wrist hinge - by p2 you haven't really set them much and then when you do you get the shaft flat so that at p3 it is pointing well outside the ball. Need the old vertical wrist hinge and much earlier - you arm over run cause the flat shaft cause you to swing more around you than up so you lift to get the up - and it works against the steeper shoulder turn you are working on. And it gets your arms too deep which means they have to really go out a lot - goal is to have hands at the top be above your right foot heel - you are just slightly behind it - seen a lot worse but even having your hands just an inch or so less deep can make a huge difference.

Another option is the alignment stick drill and get it to point just outside you toes between p2-p3. When you get the wrist set more vertical combo'd with better pivot (left knee out toward toes, start with left shoulder going down, quiet arms, right hip back and up), to me, it feels like I'm pushing the club up with the left shoulder - not feeling of lift - when shoulder stops so do the arms.

By the way, you have pretty much Tyler's distance wedge motion going in your wedge swing - which is a good thing but not what I think you were trying to accomplish., Little lateral pressure shift, high right shoulder, extending of right arm in a cast pattern - delivers a bit of shaft lean and the bounce.

Face open at p6(so yes, need to work on having it closed at this point) so ,rotation stops and you end up facing the ball at impact with fairly square hips/shoulders - again works on distance wedges where you aren't trying to produce a lot of shaft lean and power. And actually I wouldn't change a lot with that distance wedge swing just maybe setup tweak so you are more on top of ball (sternum in front of ball, upper body slightly open), etc to get a bit less flip at the bottom. But it's not the swing you want when hitting full shots. I practice pretty much what you do when working on my finesse and distance wedges around the green and out to about 100 yards.

It's a different swing with different goals that a stock full swing. So ditto copperjeff on things, plus.

In a regular full swing the right shoulder has to work out and down more than you do (and on those distance wedges it still works out just not as much down) - a really good drill is to do single arm swings with only the right arm - have to have more side bend to get that shoulder down or you just extend and flip - start short and slow and work your way up. Martin Chuck has a video called don't run out of right arm - he doesn't do single arm but gets the idea across pretty well

Since this is golfwrx, feel free to ignore or just think about it a bit.

[ddetts]

> @glk said:

> I know I know just what you need more advice. LOL.

> Work on wrist hinge - by p2 you haven't really set them much and then when you do you get the shaft flat so that at p3 it is pointing well outside the ball. Need the old vertical wrist hinge and much earlier - you arm over run cause the flat shaft cause you to swing more around you than up so you lift to get the up - and it works against the steeper shoulder turn you are working on. And it gets your arms too deep which means they have to really go out a lot - goal is to have hands at the top be above your right foot heel - you are just slightly behind it - seen a lot worse but even having your hands just an inch or so less deep can make a huge difference.

>

> Another option is the alignment stick drill and get it to point just outside you toes between p2-p3. When you get the wrist set more vertical combo'd with better pivot (left knee out toward toes, start with left shoulder going down, quiet arms, right hip back and up), to me, it feels like I'm pushing the club up with the left shoulder - not feeling of lift - when shoulder stops so do the arms.

> By the way, you have pretty much Tyler's distance wedge motion going in your wedge swing - which is a good thing but not what I think you were trying to accomplish., Little lateral pressure shift, high right shoulder, extending of right arm in a cast pattern - delivers a bit of shaft lean and the bounce.

> Face open at p6(so yes, need to work on having it closed at this point) so ,rotation stops and you end up facing the ball at impact with fairly square hips/shoulders - again works on distance wedges where you aren't trying to produce a lot of shaft lean and power. And actually I wouldn't change a lot with that distance wedge swing just maybe setup tweak so you are more on top of ball (sternum in front of ball, upper body slightly open), etc to get a bit less flip at the bottom. But it's not the swing you want when hitting full shots. I practice pretty much what you do when working on my finesse and distance wedges around the green and out to about 100 yards.

> It's a different swing with different goals that a stock full swing. So ditto copperjeff on things, plus.

> In a regular full swing the right shoulder has to work out and down more than you do (and on those distance wedges it still works out just not as much down) - a really good drill is to do single arm swings with only the right arm - have to have more side bend to get that shoulder down or you just extend and flip - start short and slow and work your way up. Martin Chuck has a video called don't run out of right arm - he doesn't do single arm but gets the idea across pretty well

> Since this is golfwrx, feel free to ignore or just think about it a bit.

 

Good stuff right here, going to play around with a few of the drills from the AMG video on feeling that more vertical takeaway.

[ddetts]

@glk thanks again for these links. The one feeling/drill in the AMG video where they discuss the feeling of the left hand pushing down and right hand pulling up really resonated. The hinging at a 45° angle piece was good to.

[ddetts]

It's club championship time! I tee off tomorrow around 8am for the first round of our club championship.

 

I've been playing a bit too erratic lately to have any real high hopes, so I'm setting some realistic goals. Driving has actually been pretty good the last few weeks, but iron play has suffered with trying to make changes. My short game has been pretty solid again lately, which is good because I'll probably have to lean on it if I expect to do well. I'll probably be in the first flight.

**Quantitative Goals**

* Shoot 80 or better

* No 3 putts

* No doubles (or worse)

* 7/13 fairways

* 9/18 greens

 

**Qualitative goals**

* Stay focused on only the current shot, not dwelling on prior shots regardless of outcome. Give every shot the focus it deserves regardless of how the round progresses

* Have a positive attitude with confidence and belief in myself

* Don't play golf swing on the course, accept what I've got that day after warming up on the range

* Trust my reads on putts and only worry about rolling it over my start line

* Remember that it's only a game, which I pay to play and am not getting paid to play and thus I should enjoy my time outdoors with friends.

[rich_s2]

those bottom goals are spot on. Don't let those top goals creep in during the round, they will take care of themselves. If you get a really good round going, remember what got you there and just focus on those bottom goals and let the score take care of itself. Can't wait to hear how it goes! The only thing I would add it to create a perception in your brain that feels like everything is perfect. Lie, weather, playing partners, pace of play, yardage etc. Its all PERFECT

[ddetts]

A nice light rain on this beautiful morning, can't wait to tee off.

 

[oldpalchamp]

Play well!

[ddetts]

Overall, I'm pleased. I had low expectations but I did a phenomenal job of managing my game and staying in the moment for each shot. I really didn't hit it great, but overall it was decent.

 

I shot a 79 (+9), which couldn't have been worse. This was the ultimate "what could've been" round. Went +2 on the front, including a missed 3 ft uphill birdie putt and a downhill 3 foot to save par. Felt like I should've been even easily.

 

Limped in on the back at +7. Bogeyed 10 after a wedge pulled off the front and I hit a poor chip.

On the next par 5 (hole14) , hit an awful high wipey push with driver into right hazard. Should've been a driving iron or 3w hole anyway, so this was really the only bad club selection. Hit a great wedge for my 4th to have like 15 feet to save par but I 3 jacked it.

Hole 16, par 3 partially over water. I had 165 to a front pin with some breeze at the back so hit 7. Must have been a lot more breeze because I flew the green (about 185), but it was my purest struck shot of the day.

Hole 18, hit a great 2i and left with 133 in to back pin. It's into the wind so I pull 9i and proceed to hit my worst shot of the day. Heavy, pull and left into the rocks surrounding the pond. Can't get up up down and finish with double.

 

The mistakes on 14 and 18 were very uncharacteristic misses for me. I'm still pleased though, after 3 years I've shot two rounds in the 70s and for the first time ever a tournament round in the 70s. I'm really proud of the mental game, how I visualized shots, how I calmed myself, how my pre-shot routine was consistent and meaningful.

 

Who knows, after the front maybe a bit of fear of going low set in and I was just trying to get it in. I don't feel like I was purposely doing that buy perhaps subconsciously.

[Schnee]

Good shooting! How was the course setup? I know ours they stretch the tees and get the greens like lightning. How long did it play?

[ddetts]

> @Schnee said:

> Good shooting! How was the course setup? I know ours they stretch the tees and get the greens like lightning. How long did it play?

 

It rained from about 45 minutes before my tee time until I played the first three holes. There was like a 5% chance according to the weather late last night. The greens were still pretty fast, despite the rain so that tells me without the moisture they would've been very fast and the crew got them quick. They honestly can't speed them up too much out there because some have severe undulations and things would get ridiculous in a hurry.

 

Tees were mostly back (they play blues, not the tips except for championship flight) except a few holes that had far back tucked or front tucked sucker pins. I'd guess yardage was maybe 6300-6400 which is just a touch stretched from the scorecard yardage for blue. I normally play the tips, which are only 6700 yards, but it's a tough rated course (par 70, 72.2/132) so that allowed me to club down on a few tee shots.

[ebrasmus21]

Good job DD. Nice playing.

[oldpalchamp]

You Da Man!! Nice competitive round.

[ddetts]

> @ebrasmus21 said:

> Good job DD. Nice playing.

 

Thanks! Really could've been a special round for me without the two terrible swings. Just have to go lower tomorrow and I know I can because I had probably my C+ swing today.

[rich_s2]

Great job!!! So exciting, finish strong mentally and let the score be what it is. Enjoy the experience and let us know how it went!!

[Justmuckit]

Good job, Derek. You're going low(er) tomorrow!

[rich_s2]

I got a feeling ol DD has a great day today

[ddetts]

> @"rich s" said:

> I got a feeling ol DD has a great day today

 

Appreciate the support. Faltered a bit today, shooting 84 (+5/+9). Putter was mostly ice cold today, just got nothing to drop. Had two poor moments where I was a bit hot and not in the shot.

 

Winner of my flight went 76-76, so I would've had to shoot 73 today which would've been my lowest round ever.

 

My swing was even more off than yesterday, which put a lot of pressure on the short game. I just keep getting stuck between good swing patterns and old reversion. A lot of weak shots that didn't have any power to them today.

[ddetts]

After taking some time to digest the weekend and reflect on my game, here's a quick recap of things.

 

**Round 1**

7/13 Farwaiys 8/18 GIRs 34 putts; this included three 3-putts and two double bogeys. Both double bogeys included penalty shots

 

**Round 2**

8/13 Fairways 5/18 GIRs 36 putts; this included two 3-putts and four double bogeys. 3/4 of those doubles were caused by sloppy short game and not penalty strokes.

 

In both days it was really a tale of two 9s. I played considerable better on the first 9 both days - +7 combined on the front 9 and +16 combined on the back; fairways 8/12 front 9 & 7/14 back 9; GIRs 11/18 front 9 & 2/18 back 9; putts 35 front 9 & 35 back 9. Maybe fatigue had something to do with it.

 

My swing was a quite a bit better on day 1 vs day 2, even though it was a bit off I was still hitting close to normal distances and not that far offline. Day 2 something was just off almost right from the start. I was hitting weak high cuts, and could never really get the good feelings I had from day 1 back. I feel like I'm probably a 2-4 handicap in the short game and a 12-14 handicap on my full swing.

 

General observations:

* My full swing and ball striking in general still have a long way to go if I want to significantly improve. My driving was not spectacular, despite a pretty number of fairways hit and it wasn't as long as Im used to either. But I had 8 drives in the fairway where I failed to hit the green, and I am positive those were all 7i or less except for one 5i.

* Being so inconsistent with the full swing puts a ton of pressure on the short game, and not hitting many greens doesn't give many opportunities to score.

* I thought I was putting pretty well as of late, but with 13 of 36 GIRs (an abysmal 36%) I would need to have a lot less than 35.5 putts per round. The difficult thing here is they play the greens fairly slow all year, and they're fired up once or twice a year. It's a pretty extreme increase in speed, and then the breaks get amplified like crazy and it's really hard to talk yourself into playing a ton more break on putts you have hit to many times. Day 1 I had 3 good birdie looks inside 10 feet and converted none of them.

* All 3 of my playing partners hit it better than I did from tee to green, including a gentleman probably pushing 55-60 who hit it very solid. That's the one thing I have noticed with players close to or better than my handicap, they have a solid and consistent strike and they're hitting lots of greens. It's usually a wayward drive or a tough up and down where they are dropping a shot or two.

 

Definitely time to get another lesson and see what's going on. I'm sure it's a lot of the same problems that I had before this season, but would be nice to get a check up.

[MountainGoat]

> @ddetts said:

> Definitely time to get another lesson and see what's going on. I'm sure it's a lot of the same problems that I had before this season, but would be nice to get a check up.

 

Assess your progress since your initial post a year ago.

[ddetts]

> @MountainGoat said:

> > @ddetts said:

> > Definitely time to get another lesson and see what's going on. I'm sure it's a lot of the same problems that I had before this season, but would be nice to get a check up.

>

> Assess your progress since your initial post a year ago.

 

>> @ddetts said:

>> Game has gradually got worse over the last 6-7 years ago. Now my short game and being really good at managing misses is pretty much all that is keeping me from shooting in the 90s. I have major inconsistency issues - I hit balls all over the face (sometimes off the grooves on the toe), topped shots from time to time, etc. I pretty much can't hit my 3 wood off the deck and I've tried a few different ones over the last two years. I play terrible in the wind because my shots go nowhere which I can only assume is due to excessive spin cause by my swing faults.

>>

>>

>>

>> My main miss is left, mostly straight pulls and pull draws with the occasional block (having a two way miss is fun!).

>> Issues identified at clinic

>>

>> * Grip is too weak, and mostly the right hand grip getting on top of the club. Need to really strengthen right hand grip - this has been very hard for me

>>

>> * The weak grip was causing me to cup/extend left wrist in the downswing

>>

>> * Backswing is too long, and arms overrun after shoulders stop

 

Progress has been made, just not as much as I would've hoped.

* Right hand grip is stronger, although it still takes constant monitoring to make sure it doesn't creep back on top of the shaft

* I am not extending lead wrist any more on the downswing, but could use getting a touch more flexion

* Backswing is shorter, but still not as short as it needs to be. This has also been tough

 

I'm not hitting pulls near as often now, but that's definitely what I revert to when the pressure is on or things aren't going well. I still struggle with 3w off the deck and still don't play well into the wind.

 

On the flip side, I haven't shot higher than probably 86 or 87 this year. In previous years, I probably would've had a handful of rounds at or just above 90. I've gotten better at scoring, avoiding big damage and playing for my misses. My short game has actually gotten better overall, mostly due to techniques and advice from Monte in the clinic and frmo Use The Bounce 2.0. I used to be an awful bunker player, and just scared any time I hit into one. I would either blade it wayyy long or to avoid that hit way heavy and dump it in the bunker for a 2nd attempt. I can't recall the last time I did that, and have actually hit a good percentage of my bunker shots inside 10 feet. Yesterday I had a downhill bunker lie with about 20 feet to the pin, hitting toward a pond just off the green. I hit a great shot that just ran about 10 feet by - of course I didn't make the putt to get up and down, but it was a great bunker shot.

[ddetts]

Well, it was bound to happen. The streak of downward trending handicap stopped today. I had a low combined score with a differential of like 2.5 that was keeping my index a bit lower than it probably should be from last year drop off and went back up to a 7.1. Despite a few recent 79s, I'm just not scoring low enough to keep that index moving downward.

 

The good news - I got another lesson back from Monte and have some things to work on. Some new and simple things related to setup that I can hopefully clean up quickly. And some old/persistent things that I'm not making enough progress on.

[ddetts]

Went and did some work today, specifically using a smart ball trying to focus on shorter backswing and more right wrist extension. I need to do a lot of work with the smart ball as I really felt it helped feel certain things and maintain arm structure.

 

[ebrasmus21]

I went back and watched the FO swing in post #164.

 

It looks like your swing is still about the same length my man. Is it feeling shorter?

[ddetts]

> @ebrasmus21 said:

> I went back and watched the FO swing in post #164.

>

> It looks like your swing is still about the same length my man. Is it feeling shorter?

 

Well, bad habits die hard and my swing had gotten long again. Not much difference from #164 when I was starting to make progress during winter and hitting into a net. But shorter than what I sent Monte a week ago for my lesson.

[ebrasmus21]

> @ddetts said:

> > @ebrasmus21 said:

> > I went back and watched the FO swing in post #164.

> >

> > It looks like your swing is still about the same length my man. Is it feeling shorter?

>

> Well, bad habits die hard and my swing had gotten long again. Not much difference from #164 when I was starting to make progress during winter and hitting into a net. But shorter than what I sent Monte a week ago for my lesson.

 

I hate this game.

[ddetts]

> @ebrasmus21 said:

> > @ddetts said:

> > > @ebrasmus21 said:

> > > I went back and watched the FO swing in post #164.

> > >

> > > It looks like your swing is still about the same length my man. Is it feeling shorter?

> >

> > Well, bad habits die hard and my swing had gotten long again. Not much difference from #164 when I was starting to make progress during winter and hitting into a net. But shorter than what I sent Monte a week ago for my lesson.

>

> I hate this game.

 

Yes, I feel that way often too. It is certainly a humbling game at times.

[rich_s2]

It’s a crazy game. Keep plugging away dude

[Rohlio]

> @ddetts said:

> Went and did some work today, specifically using a smart ball trying to focus on shorter backswing and more right wrist extension. I need to do a lot of work with the smart ball as I really felt it helped feel certain things and maintain arm structure.

>

>

 

If it was legal to play rounds with the smart ball I would never shoot over par again. Great training aide.

[ddetts]

> @Rohlio said:

> > @ddetts said:

> > Went and did some work today, specifically using a smart ball trying to focus on shorter backswing and more right wrist extension. I need to do a lot of work with the smart ball as I really felt it helped feel certain things and maintain arm structure.

> >

> >

>

> If it was legal to play rounds with the smart ball I would never shoot over par again. Great training aide.

 

I really need to start using it daily, even if just practice swings at home.