UberDave's Swing evolution and plan for progress

UberDave223 · March 22, 2013

a. Check your upper-arm connection on your back swing. It seems that your left arm comes away from your body slightly going back. (Though its hard to tell for sure with the speed of the video and the dark clothing you are wearing.

I don't think this is a problem, if anything, I sometimes "feel" TOO connected in the upper left arm in the backswing, I can swing pretty regularly with a tee in the armpit without it falling out. Could be the video/clothes (I have four layers on), I will be conscious of checking it though. I am trying to figure out the proper amount of "up and down" the arms move which may have made me disconnect my triangle (by not moving that left arm with the chest and staying with it). This was after watching this video:

b. You don't quite get over to your front foot on the downswing, so your left foot tends to "spin out". That can cause you some impact problems. You might want to consider either toeing your left foot out some, or narrowing your stance.

c. Your body pivot slows down EVER so slightly right before impact, rather than continuing to rotate your body aggressively through the shot. Which causes your arms to want to release past the body just a bit...and can cause some directional problems. I'm betting this is related to the spinning out of your front foot, and that it isn't as stable a platform to rotate on as it should be. Or to....

d. That your club face might be slightly open at the top. Your grip seems to be neutral at address, but you are also slightly cupping your left wrist at the top. The combination of which usually results in an open face at the top of the swing. So you might have developed that little pre-impact slowing down of your body rotation in an effort to help get the clubface closed. You might want to work at either strengthening your grip slightly, or to get rid of that wrist cupping.

I toe out my left foot to about 11:00, I will try putting it about 10:30, but I think the swaying off the ball/reverse pivot and open clubface at top like you surmised are more at fault here.
I actually used to have a much stronger grip, but I've been trying to use a little more neutral grip. I will go back to a little stronger grip as well as I think I could set my hands maybe an inch towards the target in my address position. A more straight back/outside takeaway should also help this problem, right?

From Monte:

As far as flexibility, you over rotate,, a sign of some flexibility issues. You start to come out of your posture and reverse tilt at the top. Theses issues are masked because you work your arms inside off the ball and your left knee bends a lot and makes you work out over your toes and increases your bend toward the ball and when you start to come out of it, you end up in the same spot. The reverse tilt at the top is masked by your initial lateral move off the ball with the hips and upper body.

If you eliminated the lateral hip sway off the ball and bend out toward the ball initially, you wouldn't be able to rotate as far as you do without coming way out of your posture.

The lateral hip motion off the ball hurts your ability to shift into your left side making you steep on the downswing. These are the things that need to be worked on.

Monte, if I understand correctly, I need to COIL more on my right side, not allowing my hips to move laterally away from the target. Add some spine tilt away from the target. Take the club back less inside, and don't overrate (so my "feel" will probably be 3/4 swings). I should also have the weight more on the inside of my right foot but back towards the heel instead of my toes (in the backswing)?

Found what seems to be good "checks" I can do on camera/in mirror to ingrain positions:
www.majorgolflesson.com/correcting-the-reverse-pivot/

Drills:

Put alignment sticks in the ground an inch or so outside of each hip, "turn in the barrel" without hitting the alignment sticks (maybe ok to touch the one on left [target] side but shouldn't go through it)
Put a small towel or golf ball under the outside of your rear foot (nearer the heel)
Feet together drills - I love this drill, seems like any time my swing gets off, if I do a few feet together drills and just get the rhythm and balance back it's at least not horrible. Seems to help correct SO many flaws. I do Monte's rhythm drill with feet together.
Put a tee at least 12" back from the ball (along the target line) and make sure the club passes over the tee. To be honest, it just feels so unnatural to take the club so far out and like I have to disconnect my left arm especially (and weight goes over toes even more on the back leg) to achieve this, and in my mind, the swing goes in-square-in so it's very hard to feel "natural" taking the club back on what "feels" to be a different plane than the club will return to the ball on!

Now for the actual swing video:

kellygreen · March 22, 2013

1. You may not be disconnecting. As we both mentioned, the clothing you were wearing makes it hard to tell. I was concerned about it because you backswing in on the flatter end of what is allowable...even for a body swing...and people often wind up under the plane like that because they let their left arm wander away from their trunk and then roll their arms and the club behind them.

2. You also appeared to be wearing tennis shoes rather than golf shoes, so poor traction may have played a part as well. But having unstable front foot as you try to rotate through the ball will cause all kinds of mis-hits. So make sure you are getting back to your front foot with your transition, AND that your front hip and leg are flexible enough to accept the pressure and still let you rotate through. Because if your foot isn't flared out enough for your body's capabilities, you will either spin out or "come up out of the shot" as ways of relieving the pressure and getting through the motion without injuring yourself.

3. If you used to play with a stronger grip, going back to that would be the first thing I would do. It would encourage you to rotate more aggressively through the ball in the hitting zone (because you can now fully release the club with your body rotation), and would probably fix that open clubface at the top of your swing as well. A stronger grip will also let you (if you need to) flare your left foot out more before you start leaving the face open at impact and hitting a cut.

UberDave223 · March 22, 2013

[quote name='kellygreen' timestamp='1363976511' post='6665539']
1. You may not be disconnecting. As we both mentioned, the clothing you were wearing makes it hard to tell. I was concerned about it because you backswing in on the flatter end of what is allowable...even for a body swing...and people often wind up under the plane like that because they let their left arm wander away from their trunk and then roll their arms and the club behind them.

2. You also appeared to be wearing tennis shoes rather than golf shoes, so poor traction may have played a part as well. But having unstable front foot as you try to rotate through the ball will cause all kinds of mis-hits. So make sure you are getting back to your front foot with your transition, AND that your front hip and leg are flexible enough to accept the pressure and still let you rotate through. Because if your foot isn't flared out enough for your body's capabilities, you will either spin out or "come up out of the shot" as ways of relieving the pressure and getting through the motion without injuring yourself.

3. If you used to play with a stronger grip, going back to that would be the first thing I would do. It would encourage you to rotate more aggressively through the ball in the hitting zone (because you can now fully release the club with your body rotation), and would probably fix that open clubface at the top of your swing as well. A stronger grip will also let you (if you need to) flare your left foot out more before you start leaving the face open at impact and hitting a cut.
[/quote]

Great stuff!

1. will monitor this left arm but not TOO concerned right now but would this be because I'm not properly lifting my arms UP (see the video I posted) as I rotate into my backswing? I hate text sometimes, it's very hard to be sure I understand exactly what you mean by "let their left arm wander away from their trunk and then roll their arms and the club behind them." I definitely think I sometimes "roll the arms and club behind" me but... Maybe I should table this entire part until I can upload new videos with less clothes on (don't worry, I won't take it TOO far) haha
2. Yea, I just wanted to get out and record a few, should have put the golf shoes on. I'm going to flare out the foot another little bit and make sure I have spikes on.
3. Also will go back to the stronger grip. I recently read Manuel de la Torre's book and Jimmy ballard's books (I like the appeal of the "simpler" golf swings and perhaps the fact they are not quite as "conventional") and was trying to see how the swing worked with a neutral grip. Not too bad and the one range session I did it was ok, but definitely noticed as I got into the longer irons the neutral grip accentuated my cut (HOW DID YOU KNOW THAT'S MY SHOT! Hah!)

I do play a very reliable fade, and then have a pretty good short game, but I need a little more distance with my drives/wood/long irons (not for ego, just because now that I'm in single digit handicap I have to play in A flights in tournaments, which hit from the tips - I'm having to hit a 3-5 iron for my second shot on a par 4 sometimes then rely on my short game to save par usually), as well as cut out my miss (either a straight slice where it starts straight then just takes off crazily to the right) or the hard pull/pull fade. I'm also trying to be able to hit the damn draw when I HAVE to. I will play my shot all day long perfectly happy, but there will be those couple shots a round where I would have to give up a stroke (or not even be able to hit) without being able to play that draw. End of last year and the two range sessions this year I was actually able to hit a few nice small draws, but can't seem to do it with my driver or 3w.

I did just upgrade my old TM Burner (08 or 09 I think, bargain bin at GG a few years ago) and my wife bought me the Titleist 913D3 driver (got a full 1 hour fitting and everything by a local pro on flightscope). Was able to gain over 5y (almost 10yards!) with the exact same swing, plus cut down the dispersion to the right by a good 10 yards on average, so the equipment will definitely help!