You hit the ball where you look. Eyeline

[Acooke2434]

To me it's been one of those "Hogan concepts" that presets a little bit of hip rotation and helps keep things closed/not spinning out during the swing. But it's ever so slightly... I never try to over do it.

[Rbsiedsc]

Tried this on the range after practicing feels in the house along with my swing work with my coach. It was amazing. My miss is usually toe hooks and today it was high baby fades on to the target. Thanks @MonteScheinblum

[dodgyman]

Been working on this since early this month. In the "Tiger's guide to swing improvement" I'm def in between step 4 and 5. Yesterday's round I only hit 15% of GIR, but I swear at least 5 of those misses was a fade that that hit the edge of the green and rolled off. For someone who's been aiming 3-5 yards right on every hole, having to aim left is almost psychologically impossible. I can still revert quite easily, so def still have the dreaded 2 way miss, but one hole yesterday, with a pond on the right I aimed left and hit a cut that landed right on line.

 

Baby steps.... but this is great stuff. 

 

I too am left-eye dominant. I wonder how much that eye dominance is the cause of these issues.

[Obee]

On 2/22/2024 at 7:59 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

Worse is the small, but ignorant section of the golf community that scoffs at the idea that a swing change should feel weird and not perform at an elite level immediately.  Can’t help those.  I assume they think a diet and exercise program should shed 20 pounds in one day.😜  

And some people think they they are going to "diet and exercise" their way from 4 to +2. 

Those people crack me up, too.

[Acooke2434]

So from a face on view, are you trying to pretty much point your chin down toward the ground? That would seem to be to be the only way to get that line across your eyes pointing straight ahead like the target line.  And then if yes, that would also ring true for the longer clubs where you're naturally a little more tilted away from the target?

 

 

[SlyFrog]

On 2/22/2024 at 9:59 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

This is such a huge concept from arguably the most skilled and one of the hardest workers of all time.  It is such an important concept to buy into if you want to improve.

 

There is dissension across golf and on this forum that changes that don’t show immediate improvement are snake oil.

 

Yes, a good lesson will definitely improve what the swing looks like (step 2), there will be improvement on random shots and there will be improvements with the LM and 3D numbers, but it takes time for these steps to play out.

 

Many people are shocked that steps 3 and 4 exist.  I hear, “This feels weird,” all day every day.  Golfers that were hitting it fat will hit a thin shot after 3 great strikes and be appalled with themselves.  
 

I spend all day talking people off the ledge that they aren’t robots….lol

 

Worse is the small, but ignorant section of the golf community that scoffs at the idea that a swing change should feel weird and not perform at an elite level immediately.  Can’t help those.  I assume they think a diet and exercise program should shed 20 pounds in one day.😜  

 

This makes absolute sense. Speaking for myself, philosophically, I think the reason for this is that we often aren't sure whether the change really is a good change.

 

There is so much golf advice out there, and a lot of it is frankly somewhat contradictory. If I absolutely knew that a piece of advice was going to make my swing better, I'd practice that thing into the ground through 10,000 bad results until it eventually kicked in and started causing improved results.

 

But the issue is, so many things that people try, it turns out that the actual change itself wasn't a good change. It wasn't part of the defect that was causing problems.

 

That just leads to a lot of self doubt and confusion over making changes in general, I think, and is part of what leads to people giving them up when they start getting bad results - they don't know that the change itself is the right change to make.

 

There is a lot of trust required, even when you're a high handicap player, in terms of knowing what changes to make. You have to have faith that the change you're making is actually a good change, and no one wants to spend weeks and months working on something, only to find out it was actually causing even more problems.

Edited February 25 by SlyFrog

[MonteScheinblum]

16 minutes ago, SlyFrog said:

 

This makes absolute sense. Speaking for myself, philosophically, I think the reason for this is that we often aren't sure whether the change really is a good change.

 

There is so much golf advice out there, and a lot of it is frankly somewhat contradictory. If I absolutely knew that a piece of advice was going to make my swing better, I'd practice that thing into the ground through 10,000 bad results until it eventually kicked in and started causing improved results.

 

But the issue is, so many things that people try, it turns out that the actual change itself wasn't a good change. It wasn't part of the defect that was causing problems.

 

That just leads to a lot of self doubt and confusion over making changes in general, I think, and is part of what leads to people giving them up when they start getting bad results - they don't know that the change itself is the right change to make.

 

There is a lot of trust required, even when you're a high handicap player, in terms of knowing what changes to make. You have to have faith that the change you're making is actually a good change, and no one wants to spend weeks and months working on something, only to find out it was actually causing even more problems.

Totally get it.  Here’s the irony.  The advice out there isn’t as contradictory as you think.  There are two camps.  The ones that know what they’re talking about and the ones that don’t.  Hard part is figuring out which camp someone is in.

 

There are a few guys on Instagram now that are gaining popularity.  They communicate very well and sound like they know what they’re talking about, but 75% of what they say is awful   One of them I don’t think plays golf at all considering some of the stuff he says, but to a 15 handicap struggling, they make perfect sense.

 

When it comes to the group that actually knows what their talking about, advice being contradictory can be an illusion.  I’ll give you an example.  Someone who follows me on instagram commented on one of the videos that it was contradictory to one I had posted previously.  They weren’t, just a different perspective.  
 

The moral to the story is find out if someone actually knows what they’re talking about and follow them and take lessons from them.  

Edited February 25 by MonteScheinblum

[Soloman1]

On 1/15/2024 at 4:57 PM, iacas said:

Yeah, both GEARS and the Foresight software report "out to in" and stuff like that. Drives me (mildly) nuts. So much wordier than a - or a + sign.

 

sounds too much like math. the horror.

at least it isn’t metric.

[Acooke2434]

Messed around with this feel at the range and I liked it. The benefit I got from it... I was someone who literally posted on this forum "how do I know when my backswing is over?" Well, when I keep that head and eyeline locked in parallel with the target line, I get a very clear idea of when my shoulders cannot rotate any longer.  Can't cheat extra rotation with some extra head tilt that would get the eyeline thrown off.

[betarhoalphadelta]

I posted the "before" upthread, and managed to get to the range yesterday and get a few filmed swings for the "after". 

 

I'm still swaying too much off the ball to the trail side, but that huge tilt of the head to the trail side isn't there--maybe a much smaller one still exists, but it's not anywhere near as severe. 

 

Contact is much improved (fewer toe-side misses) and the big sweeping hook ballflight is VERY rare now. 

 

 

 

[Obee]

1 hour ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

I posted the "before" upthread, and managed to get to the range yesterday and get a few filmed swings for the "after". 

 

I'm still swaying too much off the ball to the trail side, but that huge tilt of the head to the trail side isn't there--maybe a much smaller one still exists, but it's not anywhere near as severe. 

 

Contact is much improved (fewer toe-side misses) and the big sweeping hook ballflight is VERY rare now. 

 

 

 

Nice action! Well done!

What do you play to these days?

[MonteScheinblum]

2 hours ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

I posted the "before" upthread, and managed to get to the range yesterday and get a few filmed swings for the "after". 

 

I'm still swaying too much off the ball to the trail side, but that huge tilt of the head to the trail side isn't there--maybe a much smaller one still exists, but it's not anywhere near as severe. 

 

Contact is much improved (fewer toe-side misses) and the big sweeping hook ballflight is VERY rare now. 

 

 

 

Better for sure

[Nickb333]

On 2/25/2024 at 2:17 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

Totally get it.  Here’s the irony.  The advice out there isn’t as contradictory as you think.  There are two camps.  The ones that know what they’re talking about and the ones that don’t.  Hard part is figuring out which camp someone is in.

 

There are a few guys on Instagram now that are gaining popularity.  They communicate very well and sound like they know what they’re talking about, but 75% of what they say is awful   One of them I don’t think plays golf at all considering some of the stuff he says, but to a 15 handicap struggling, they make perfect sense.

 

When it comes to the group that actually knows what their talking about, advice being contradictory can be an illusion.  I’ll give you an example.  Someone who follows me on instagram commented on one of the videos that it was contradictory to one I had posted previously.  They weren’t, just a different perspective.  
 

The moral to the story is find out if someone actually knows what they’re talking about and follow them and take lessons from them.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect
 

Dunning Kruger perhaps? 

[betarhoalphadelta]

14 hours ago, Obee said:

Nice action! Well done!

What do you play to these days?

 

Let's not get into that right now 😉

 

After my last two rounds, some scores fell off and I'm at a 23.3. This change is cleaning up some of my long game issues, but my short game is abysmal. Monte gave me stuff to work on for the short game, but while the eye line change was immediate, that stuff is correcting 30+ years of improper motion... 

[dodgyman]

A quick update on my progress with this in the off chance it's valuable for others.

 

As a reminder, I've been in perpetual 5-9 in to out range for months/years and have been focusing on swing direction with my coach of late. What I noticed was that just eye line itself was not nearly as consistent/magical as OP. On the other hand things we've been working on, left shoulder staying down earlier in my downswing, etc... was also very slow to non-existent progress. It was the two together that was the big change, with the adjustment of eye line I feel my shoulders can move the way I'm trying to in drills.

 

Last week I was in 2.0-4.0 land, today's session every shot except 2 were all in -1.5-2. I feel like eyeline was this one missing piece in unblocking progress, and I'm just looking forward to ingraining it.

[YouDaHamHider]

On 2/25/2024 at 10:17 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

Totally get it.  Here’s the irony.  The advice out there isn’t as contradictory as you think.  There are two camps.  The ones that know what they’re talking about and the ones that don’t.  Hard part is figuring out which camp someone is in.

 

There are a few guys on Instagram now that are gaining popularity.  They communicate very well and sound like they know what they’re talking about, but 75% of what they say is awful   One of them I don’t think plays golf at all considering some of the stuff he says, but to a 15 handicap struggling, they make perfect sense.

 

When it comes to the group that actually knows what their talking about, advice being contradictory can be an illusion.  I’ll give you an example.  Someone who follows me on instagram commented on one of the videos that it was contradictory to one I had posted previously.  They weren’t, just a different perspective.  
 

The moral to the story is find out if someone actually knows what they’re talking about and follow them and take lessons from them.  

I'm super curious which Instagram coach you think might not even play! 😂😂

[Nickb333]

On 1/12/2024 at 9:27 PM, Nickb333 said:

Without really understanding what’s going on here, I’ll bump this thread up anyway. 
 

I hit the sim today and focused mostly on eye alignment. Something I’ve never even considered before. 
 

The results were pretty amazing. After my normal square setup, I adjusted my eye line to be parallel.(never in 40+ years have I noticed or adjusted my eye line) Then I did a slight head turn rear down the line. ( based on the left eye dominant suggestions above)

 

With those two small changes, I didn’t hit a single bad hook and only a couple crappy slices. Overall everything started much straighter than any practice session I remember. 
 

The kicker is this. My takeaway felt natural. At no time did I feel the need to fix it. I was able to load up and swing away without the feeling I would yank it left or drive it into the ground. 
 

Crazy. Hope it works next time. 
 

Thanks Monte. 
 

 

Bump to follow up some results. 
 

Somehow I messed everything up. I thought I was lining up square. Including eye line. However, my over the top recently got out of control. Nothing I did was changing the club path from out to in when I swung over 70%.

 

So, I exaggerated my eye line. Cranked my left eye (lead eye) up and right. Bingo. 
 

Pretty sure I’m on the right track but here’s the question. 
 

Does eye line affect angle of attack in addition to club path? 

[MonteScheinblum]

Yes

[Nickb333]

14 minutes ago, MonteScheinblum said:

Yes

Thank you! That was my experience. Just wanted to be sure I wasn’t chasing a demon. 
 

It sure felt good today. Can’t thank you enough for this thread. 
 

👍

[TheDeanAbides]

On 1/12/2024 at 8:54 PM, betarhoalphadelta said:

There were no pressure plates in use. I do have a sway problem off the ball and then a late shift back into the lead side. Monte said that this change might have a positive effect there as there's usually a relationship. Reminds my of my earlier years in martial arts: "where the head goes, the body will follow." So working on this might have a benefit, which I'll be checkpointing regularly on video as I work through this. But he also gave me some points on better hip movement and how to get there if I don't see meaningful improvement in the sway already. 

 

But he made a comment about a 25 cap, and I told him I'm a 22 which he didn't realize, and he just about fell over in disbelief based on what he saw in the full swing. I told him about my short game woes (my most recent round was a 92 with no penalty strokes, but I think I lost at least 8-9 strokes due to short game. I'm abysmal. So we got into the short game stuff (which I had intended to ask him about anyway) and he immediately saw why I'm a 22 and fixing that was a bigger priority than the sway lol. So we worked mostly on that for most of the remainder of the hour (to great effect).  And we spent a short amount on putting, which I'm sure unsurprisingly to Monte, I had some of the same faults putting that were ruining my chipping/pitching stroke. 

 

I must admit that I've often scratched my head and wondered how you could be a 22 with that swing. Then I remember what my putting was like, and realised that there are many ways to be crap! 

[TheDeanAbides]

I haven't read all of this thread, but what occurs to me is that this tilting away habit could have something to do with another insidious habit that golfers who work hard on their swings pick up. That being following the clubhead in the backswing. Have you found any correlation between the two, @MonteScheinblum?

[MonteScheinblum]

6 hours ago, TheDeanAbides said:

I haven't read all of this thread, but what occurs to me is that this tilting away habit could have something to do with another insidious habit that golfers who work hard on their swings pick up. That being following the clubhead in the backswing. Have you found any correlation between the two, @MonteScheinblum?

Big time