Sunday, April 30, 2017

New Down Swing Technique - Updated 4/3/17

Update:  While the material in this original blog is correct, I found it difficult to do in competition.  Monday's and Tuesday's round were a struggle usually with the driver - what else is new?  I'm off to the range today to look for something that I can hold on to and attempt to repeat.  The best swing thoughts I've had are the "move away from the ball on the backswing and stay there on the down swing."  A little mirror work showed me that I'm not actually moving away from ball and when I stay "there" I'm managing to stay in place.  So this looks like a good starting place.  

My other issue, maybe related, is that I'm tearing up my hands with lots of callus and a couple of tendons in my right hand have developed bumps.  I still think I'm try to manipulate the club and not let it swing.  There are severely worn spots on the grips too.

Original post is below:

Contrary to recent posts where driver details were not included, I've not been able to hang on to improvement I'd seen with the club.

This is the only aspect of my game that is a problem right now.  I think this post sounds like a few others, even to me...

So what I sought to test today at the range were the following things:

  • Shoulder turn making sure the shoulders were vertical and not flat around the body.  Left shoulder hits chin on back swing.
  • The down swing is a rotation of the shoulders with little attempt to hit the ball or use the body.  I think the body is moving around and providing stability, but I'm not trying to be aggressive with it.
  • The down swing starts are a leisurely pace - the same speed I used to start the upswing.
  • No attempt to manipulate the club with the hands -- the club stays behind the hands and the release is pretty minimal with right hand seeming to push the club through the ball.

This all was doable and seemed to work pretty well.  Ball flight was reasonable and angular deviation was minimal.  How about distance, I hear you ask.  Yes, I wonder about that myself.  I'm willing to trade the consistency if I have to drop back a club or two.  But getting the driver off the tee to go out 200 straight will be an improvement.  I can play with that.


I wanted to update my review of the little plastic pieces that clip on to the golf club with the carry distance on them.  I've found that they do come off under normal use.  I've lost at least one.  Also I've rubbed the numbers off of one too.  But I seem to have done a good job of learning the distances and rarely check anymore.  If I were to judge this as learning aid, I can still endorse it. 

Saturday, April 22, 2017

Is it all about the Balance?

There is a golf stream on YouTube that discusses "reactive" golf.  He talked about what balance is, which he defined as the body's anticipation of a future action.

Who among us has not found ourselves falling forward or backward from a massive hit?  Usually the driver of course -- the swing is longer, the club longer and there is more momentum generated that has to be absorbed somewhere.

If you know where the swing is going to move you, you can brace and prepare for it.  Thus having a better platform to swat the ball and be in balance at the end of the effort.

The other stray thought that occurred to me today was this: take the sport of tennis.  The further you want to hit the ball, the harder you swing.  But golf with the different length of clubs does not fit this model.  Which makes some of the earlier sports habits not useful for the golf swing.


Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Last Trip Out

On Fridays I've been laying with some of my older golf buddies and they like to play from the forward tees.

This is fine with me; I leave the driver in the bag for most of the holes.

I managed to get to one under par with the difficult 9th to go.  Hit an ok tee shot, but left the next short from the rough with minor tree trouble.

I hit it a bit thin and came up short.  That followed by a too short pitch - a common problem that day, and a missed putt for an even par 36.  It would have been nice to make the turn under par.  I've done  it before, but it was decades ago.

The back nine was nothing spectacular, two over 38, though after a few more thin shots I started to get my lower body moving more aggressively.  That helped with balance and the strike.  I like that action along with a longer back swing.  I may drop away from the experimentation and work on getting more consistent.  Of course there are just a couple of things I saw on YouTube...

I was hitting them fairly close on occasion and made 3 birdies for the day.  That's 7 for the last two rounds.  I'm not used to that.  Makes it easier to come back from the odd error.

I've got a day off from the course tomorrow.  There is a bathroom ceiling that needs a touchup, but I may make it to the range.

My new custom putter has come in and I'm anxious to give it a trial.  It feels good, the new length and lie seem to be very comfortable.

Monday, April 17, 2017

Thoughts and the quest for another GUP

I had a couple of thoughts I wanted to try today. 

I noticed when chipping the other day, that I was not syncing up the hand positions with the shoulder positions.  It seemed to me that my hands would run ahead of the shoulders.  I think this leads to a weak hitting position and the tendency to flip the wrists.

I was trying to correct that today.  An interesting feeling that comes from being synced up is that the swing feels very slow.  The swing starts very slowly and it's easy to maintain balance.  The hands are slowly brought into the hitting area.  It all seems so slow.  The ball speed seems to be normal.  But it's a strange feeling when there is always an interest in a longer ball.

I found this very hard to do.  It was raining and coolish and I had multiple layers of jackets on, but still it did not seem doable by me.

I went back to the one thing that seemed to work well, which is to move off the ball on the backswing and then stay there during the swing.

I managed to shoot the back nine in one under par.  Nines under par are pretty rare for me.  However after a slow start with the earlier techniques, I needed 3 birdies to get under par.  I hit a couple within a couple of feet and made a 12 footer on 18.

I've got tee times for the next couple of days, so we shall see how this plays out.



Tuesday, April 11, 2017

Another Tuesday

My play has a tendency to get better as the week goes along.  Since I usually go to the driving range on the weekend, it would suggest that range visits are not the best way to prepare to play!

I've been watching a lot of Mike Malaska videos on Youtube.  He stresses that the hands have to be coming in close to the legs on the downswing and not heading towards the ball as others have taught.

Remember the laser in the club butt to illuminate the path and how the path was supposed to be heading to the ball or just inside it?  Mike would suggest that ain't the way to do it.

I have real interesting wear marks on my grips and I've struggled to understand why I tear them up.  I had a 3 wood where I had gone through the grip to expose the metal shaft.  One pro I was taking lessons from remarked that he had never seen such a thing. Sadly he never thought to fix or explain it.
I believe this is from a strong adjustment as the swing enters the hitting area.


I'm on the 14th tee and I'm goofing off as the round has been a series of hit, walk, wait and repeat.  I try to bring the club/hands back to address position and very close to the legs on the down swing.  This seems to be easy to do with the irons, but when I tried to do it in slow motion with the driver, it was hitting 6 inches before the ball position.  However, it seems that as the speed went up that the low point of the swing moved forward.

I've always been confused about how the club steps out and where the room comes to do that as the arm plane and the club plan diverge on the down swing.  It has to step out to get to the ball.

So I'm playing with this and since I don't have a great scoring round going, I give it a try.  It seemed to work pretty well.  I got a real nice snap sound when I hit a hybrid into a long par 3. 

The next hole, I topped the drive, but other shots on the hole were solidly struck.  Then a short par 4 with a 3 wood and it was as solid a shot as I'd hit all day.  Just felt solid and long.

The 18th, a 500 yard par 5, a 3 wood from the fairway, and a delicious 6 iron put me in birdie range.  The shots were just solid and straight and everything a golfer dreams of.  It also feels that I'm not manipulating anything to hit the ball,  My grips are probably thanking me. 

On a minor note, a rare eagle today on the front nine.  I holed an 8 iron from 130.  The group in front of us saw it hop twice and go down.  The pin was back behind a trap and I couldn't see it finish.  I've not had one for a few years.

Saturday, April 8, 2017

Putter Mods

I returned to Golf Mart today and ordered a custom See More putter.  No additional charge for this and I keep the putter I bought until the new one comes in.

I wanted another half inch in length, which brings it to 35.5 inches.  A bit long for these days, but I understand that 37 inch putters were not unusual a few years ago.

I also ordered the shaft to be 2 degrees flat.  Which will lower the toe a bit.  When I stub it, I want to stub across the full head!

The putter has a nice chrome, polished bottom on it and looks to be impervious to dings and nicks.

The one thing I don't like about the putter is the velcro closing on the head cover.  What a pain since I didn't want to open/close it while others were putting.  They make magnetic ones, and the order requested one of those.


I had 3 birdies and only one three putt the last round out.  Made a couple up and downs too.  It was a tough scoring round as my back was hurting on every shot, but managed to scramble through with a three over 75, which is a good round for me.

New putter is expected in a couple of weeks.

Wednesday, April 5, 2017

The Details and a Boring Round

So I've been working on a couple of swing thoughts, mostly for the long ball.

Mostly I've been able to wack it well if I stay behind the ball and not slide during the swing.

With the long ball in some form of order, I found putting was a issue.  I believe that my alignment and aiming of the implement was my big problem.

Yesterday I wandered over to the local Golf Mart and played with the clubs they had and wound up with a Seemore FPG Milled putter.  I had seen these talked about on youtube and they looked interesting.

This has a number of technological aspects to it:
  • The putter is balanced at the 70 degree swing path
  • There is an alignment marker on it that forces you to setup consistently
  • There are milled groves on the face 

Some details:  The putter is not faced balanced, but when you suspend it to the swing angle the face stays on line.  Thus swings that are off line are somewhat self correcting.  Oh you can twist it horribly and man handle it, but if one is gentle, the putter will strive to get back on line.

The putter is close to a center shaft and behind the shaft is a large red dot.  The putter shaft down by the face is a black material.  What you do is line up the putter to the target by a normal alignment line and then hold the putter so the red dots is covered by the shaft.  Now everything is locked into a consistent position.

Face grooves are supposed to roll the ball better. 

Basically, align to the target hide the red dot and then move it back and forward.  If you do this with a small arc, the red dot will stay hidden and the ball will go where it is aimed. 

Now, how about that round, I hear you say.

It was pretty boring.  I parred the first 11 holes, took a bogey with a crappy chip, parred a few more, three putted the 16th and then parred in. 

I had a couple of up and downs, but other than a 12 footer on the first hole, nothing was too challenging.  I had a bunch of birdie putts, but was not able to convert.  Nothing was real close.  No real problems with two putting.  I was hitting them close for the most part.  The one 3 putt, I was above the hole on a fast down hiller and I left it quite short to start with.  Hit a good second putt, but the break was not what I played for.


I had more problems with irons going further than expected.  I'm hitting them better and they are going beyond their calibrated distances.

It will still be a struggle to keep the new swing thoughts active.  It was a slow round today, lots of hit, walk, wait. 

Here is a link to the putter:  http://www.seemore.com/putters/fgp-original-rh.html

Mine is milled, not sure about this one.  But, so far, so good.

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Catching Up

The changes I've managed to incorporate have worked quite well.  I'm very happy.

However I have the usual problem of keeping the old swing actions buried.  Dave Pelz suggested that 20,000 repetitions would be required to ingrain this. 

I've been held back with recent scoring with my putting.  I tried a 35th Anniversary Ping Putter that I had acquired along the way.  It makes the ping but I have a tendancy to close the face on it  The face is quite long I had problems with it.  It was also less powerful than my Musty putter and longer putts and generally coming up short was a problem.

So I kind of splurged and bought a new putter today.  I'm playing tomorrow and I'll pass on the details tomorrow.

Stay tuned!