Why You Don't Hit The Ball

Advice For The Beginning Golfer

Let's be honest.  Right now you have a terrible swing.  Everything is wrong.  I am not writing this to make you feel bad or to build my ego.  We need to admit where we are so we can begin to move forward.

If you've read any of the golf magazines or started any how to book about golf, then you've already realized that just about everything you do is wrong.  Still do you understand all the slang, advice and corrective information?

Grip

The experts tell us to use one of two favored grips.  Both involve overlapping the fingers of the right and left hands.  We can place the little finger of the bottom hand over the index finger of the top hand or we can reverse the two fingers.  Whenever I do that my little finger is in pain for days afterward.  TRUTH!

Next we must put the club so far down in our fingers that our palm almost doesn't touch the club any more.  Did you ever wonder how anyone manages to hold onto the club as they swing?

Do you even know what they are talking about when they say a strong grip?  Does that mean lift weights?  Is a weak grip something for children and sissies?

By the way, in any other activity involving holding and swinging a stick at anything do you overlap your hands?  Baseball, hockey, swinging an ax, using a hoe?

Stance

Get you weight balanced on the balls of your feet.  Bend your knees slightly keeping your back straight and bend forward.  Keep your forward shoulder lower than your back shoulder.   Oh! And whatever you do don't move your head!  Huh!!??

Alignment

You are supposed to align your feet parallel to the target line.  Your ball starts out way over there and curves all the way across the fairway to some other place.  Does it really matter?  Wouldn't it be better to aim so the ball lands in play?

Ball Position

The ball should be a comfortable distance away from you allowing you to maintain all the correct stance conditions.  The ball should be somewhere between the big toe of your left foot and the big toe of your right foot.  Do you know where?

Take Away

The club comes away without breaking the wrists in a one piece motion.  At ninety degrees the toe of the club should point straight up and the shaft should be parallel to the target line.  At the top the shaft should again be parallel to the target line and the toe should point where?

Over The Top/Casting/Swing From The Outside

I am over the top right now, I am going fly casting for trout and I will definitely be outside.  What does all of this mean?

Slice/Draw

Tiger hits the ball on the back inside corner.  Humor me, I know that round balls don't have corners.  You hit it on the back outside corner.  That is about ½ inch difference on a ball that is a little over 1 inch.

I am so tired of this useless harping, that I am going to slice up my clubs with a hack saw!  Do I have to draw a picture, I am frustrated!

Bail Out

Where is the plane?  I am so out of here!  Okay, I added bail out, but there is a reason.

Follow Through

You should finish with your chest facing the target and almost all of your weight on your front foot.  The club should be all the way around you over your front shoulder. 

This is what I meant by bailing out.  You end up falling backwards because there is almost no weight on your front foot.  You look just like a person bailing out of an airplane.

The golf swing looks beautiful when somebody else does it, but you feel as likely to make it happen as you are to dance ballet or ice skate in the Olympics.  You think you enjoy this game, but every time you think about the swing you want to quit. Who has time to even hit the ball?

Please Don't Quit – There Is An Answer

If you are like many of us you came to golf from some other sport.  Unfortunately golf isn't like the other sports we are used to.  It is easy to see the ball and the swing and thing baseball or hockey.  Golf is much more like bowling, darts, or basketball. 

A baseball batter has a 90 degree arc between the foul lines and can make the ball land anywhere between the lines, even out of the park.  At the foul poles there are several hundred feet of space to land the ball in. 

We have two parallel lines that are roughly as far apart as first and second base.  Then we are expected to land the ball within a few feet of a target with each different club.

Remember I hit my 7 iron about 150 yards.  That is farther than most home runs travel in the major leagues.  My driver goes twice as far as most home runs and I still only have the distance from first to second base to land in.

Oh! And out of the park in this sport is a penalty stroke.  This is a different game.  Discard any thoughts that come from other sports.

You have to retrain your mind and your body how to play this game.  All those terms I mentioned before are all real and important.  Unfortunately, you can't learn how to put them all together in just a few minutes.

Like so many of us, you are not going to see the pro, so what are you going to do?

Well first of all, don't go out and spend several hundred dollars on brand new big name golf clubs.  You can butcher a shot with a $30 dollar club just as well as with a $300 club.  While you are learning put your money into training materials and aides.

Fortunately, there are several proven e-books, videos, and training aides out there.  What they require to make you more successful is your patience and diligent practice. 

Pick one book or video and one training aide.  Then follow the instructions with those items only.  Don't read something new in a golf magazine and suddenly switch.
Don't start listening to your golf buddies and their advice.  Have only one master and follow that plan.

Understand that you are going to work your swing out by changing one or two things at a time.  You won't add anything new until you've mastered the feel of these changes.  If you are like me that is the most comfortable way to learn something new, in small steps.

Depending on your practice and playing time, you are going to see improvement in steps over time.  The professionals didn't learn this game over night either.  Have patience and just enjoy playing a great game while you learn to play it better.

Please visit my web site to see my suggested books, videos, and training aides.

http://www.fix-my-slice.com/Links.html