Saving you time and money by experimenting and reflecting! An update on the week's progress and activities.... and a Big Question!
Big Question?
Do you collect data/stats on your golf game?
Feels
My feeling this week is one of realisation and determination.
Following my lesson last week, I realised how much there is to do. How much improvement is required to get to my target. How far away I am. This realisation initially, had me disappointed and a little deflated. I went into the lesson with a positive feeling about my game. I felt on the cusp of a good round, following a few near misses in the previous weeks. Having spent some time reflecting, I now feel more determined to improve and continue.
I am on the right path!
The Lesson
My lesson was such an enjoyable experience. It was challenging but it was great. It provided many opportunities to ask questions and learn. I really struggled to apply the learning during the lesson. I only managed to hit one shot with the technique I was trying to learn and that the coach had given me to work on.
The lesson started with a conversation about my game and answering some questions. I shared my strokes gained data and suggested that I needed to work on my approach play/irons. I was asked to hit 5 shots with a 7 iron. There was a camera behind me (down the line) and a camera facing me (image below). Trackman was also used, to get some club data on my swing. I hit 5 shots all pretty straight and towards the target.
The coach waited for me to look at him and said, 'we need to talk...' with a blend of sarcasm and expertise.
He went on to share my data and explain all of the concepts. The main ones were club path (mine was 5.6 degrees left) and angle of attack (mine was 2.4 degrees down). For more information on these concepts visit the link below. Adam explains the concepts in simple terms.
3 Things That Guarantee Better Golf - Adam Young Golf
From the shots I hit and the data recorded, he could tell me my misses and correctly predicted that I suffer from either a pull or weak fade. Bang on!
The interesting bit came when he talked through my video. He explained that I open the clubface with my hands in the backswing (rather than turning my shoulders) and as a result, the only way to 'rescue' the shot and get it starting anywhere near the target, is to early extend the body, lean back a little and let the club head pass my hands. This leads to a 'flippy' motion and leads to me basically spinning around my trail leg.
He said I am using my hands to swing the club rather than my bigger muscles. He had me throw a golf ball (in a baseball pitching motion) as far down the range as I could. I instantly used my bigger muscles, shifted my weight onto my front foot and turned hard left with a lag in my arm. I tutted.
He shared an anecdote about Paul Casey too - he had a shaky week with his irons leading up to a major and his coach had him throw balls and clubs down the range for a week. He performed incredibly well at the major and commented that it was one of his best tournaments of iron play.
Something to consider when warming up is to throw a few balls and activate my inner 'athlete' to get the body moving naturally and smoothly, prior to picking a club up.
He asked what my grip pressure was out of 10. I answered 'around a 7'. He smiled, 'everyone says 7'. He went on to explain why having an overly firm grip is detrimental to releasing the club. He also explained the purpose of having a glove on, is to allow the grip pressure to be lower.
Hitting more shots
The next step was hitting some shots with 2 feelings. The first one was a grip pressure of a 3 or a 4 out of 10. The second one was turning hard left, both onto my lead leg and my shoulders turning left and opening up at impact.
This led to some horror strikes. I couldn't do both things at the same time. When I felt like I was turning hard left I forced the club. I felt like I hadn't swung a golf club before and had no idea where the clubface was. When I gripped lightly, I flicked the club, as I had done previously. I was a little frustrated.
This continued for around 10 shots or so. Then I got one! It felt completely different to any golf shot I had ever hit. Much lower than my normal flight. There was no curve. The coach visited the Trackman data on that shot. My path was 0.2 degrees left. My angle of attack was down 4.5 degrees and the dynamic loft had reduced by 7 degrees. This was the feeling I need to bottle up and hold onto when trying to embed the changes to the swing. I stood there for a few seconds trying to absorb the feeling. It didn't last long but it did encourage me.
Keep an eye out on my YouTube channel for the video, for those interested in seeing the data and associated video. Subscribe at the link below.
Practice
Following the lesson, two things happened. I realised that I had been ingraining some poor technique and bad habits for the last 5 weeks. This left me a little deflated. It also motivated me, as now I can work on my swing based on some expert advice. I am optimistic.
Secondly, it has given my practice a more technical feel than I would usually like. My usual game-based approach and practices structured around self-organisation may suffer for a while.
My plan is to include a 'technical' element at the start of each round that aims to embed the 2 'feelings' from the lesson. 3-4/10 for grip pressure and turning onto my left leg then opening up hard to the left. I can mix that with some drills (line drill/towel drill/strike change/draws and fades).
I dedicated some time to my wedge game this week. A simple setup with the idea being to explore my patterns/tendencies following the tweaks to my technique. The session looked like this;
Set a target at 100 yards (a line works really well if you can safely practice near one)
Hit 8-10 shots at your target
Record your left and right misses/dispersion
Repeat for an allocated amount of balls (more is better, maybe across multiple sessions)
I repeated my 8 balls 5 more times (40 balls total). My balance looked like this:
Left 25
Right 15
I have recorded this and can hopefully use this to my advantage when picking my targets from around 100 yards.
An example - a pin tucked on the left with a bunker left of the green will make me aim more for the right middle of the green. I may end up with a 'good' result if my tendency to be left comes into play, if not I am safely on the green and not suffering from being in a bunker or danger. Simple but effective, when prioritising greens in regulation.
Reflective Questions
How do you balance practising your swing with practising golf?
How do you know you are on the right path with your golf?
Do you monitor your tendencies with different shots?
How do you pick your targets?
Next week
Lesson data and practice sessions
Thanks for reading!
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