Intermediate Golfer’s Guide
Alignment to better golf.
Alignment plays a pivotal role in the fundamentals of your golf swing. An incorrect alignment will force you to swing out of your normal swing mechanics and that is why many golfers struggle on the golf course as there isn’t any guide for you to align to. So, what do I mean by guide? Most of the range mats are square and most golfers have no idea where they want to hit the ball to.
You can try this with your friends at the range. Ask them where are they aiming? Most will tell you straight. So, where is straight? Probably where the range mat is aligned to?
Now, imagine getting into a car that hasn’t had its alignment done for many years. Due to the extensive use and countless encounter with potholes, the alignment wouldn’t be great and when driving it, both your hands have to be on the wheel fighting it to steer to the direction that you want to go. Any carelessness of letting go of the steering wheel will result in the car ending up in the ditch.
It’s the same with golf. Incorrect alignment on certain shots will cause your ball to stray and this is probably the number 1 cause of inconsistency.
Varying your targets during practice.
So, you have practiced hard at the range and ready to bring your ‘A’ game to the course. On the tee box, you hit your drive out of bounds. Your provisional shot was just a mediocre shot just to keep it in play. The next shot lands in the water and so on and so forth. I’m sure many of us experienced this and feel like golf isn’t your thing.
Let me tell you something, it isn’t your fault nor was that you didn’t practiced enough. It’s just that you have been practicing incorrectly. If you are not working on your swing, there is no reason for you just to hit it straight. But then again, straight is where your hitting mat is facing. Not much thought is given on your practice thus the unfavorable result on the course.
The thing about swinging away towards a particular direction, our body get accustom to it. If you hit a couple of stray shots, you will most likely hit many more towards your ‘direction’ because our body has adapted to it. You then go on this non-analytical mode when hitting golf balls as most of it are on-target saved for a few mishits (fat and thin shots).
By hitting toward varying targets, you will ‘learn’ how to adapt to different direction and align properly to it. You will also be analytical on what causes the ball to stray away from your intended target. With this higher consciousness, you will slowly grasp and be able to adapt and swing more efficiently towards your intended target.
A few mishits are not detrimental to your scores but the lost strokes to the O.B, hazards and bushes are what quickly adds on to the scorecard.
Have a look at how your practice session should be.
Don’t Swing It Harder and Faster to Increase Distance.
You are most likely thinking that I’m uttering gibberish. Well, most likely when you are swinging faster, harder and more violently, you will most likely not find the clubface and that will cause you to lose distance.
Take a look at the image and most of the time, casual golfers are teeing up too low. That makes you hit down on your drives and yes, that increases spin. Increasing spin to a certain extend for your irons will be ideal to stop it quicker but the are so many factors that could affect the outcome.
Most likely when you tee it up higher, you will hit it on a positive attack angle. Positive number in degrees on the launch monitor will mean that your clubhead is hitting up on the ball.
You might have heard of Spin Loft and that will be more for the advance golfers but what I have prepared is simpler for you to understand and I don’t need to complicate matter and use jargons to make me sound smart. My wish is just to make every golfer understand the game and able to play it better and at the same time enjoying it more.
Stop swinging it faster to hit it further.
How many times we have heard that to increase distance we need to swing it faster or hit it harder. Well, there is some truth to it but only if you find the clubface or to be precise, the center of the clubface where the hot spot or sweet spot is.
Being the weekend golfer or someone who does not practice that much, do you think you will be able to strike the ball consistently on the club face with added club speed that is beyond your normal capability?
So, let’s swing within our capability and focus on striking the ball in the middle of the clubface to maximize ball speed and have consistent carry distance and tighter dispersion.
No Foresight Sports GC Quad to provide face contact point?
How to stop Early Extension
With videos and golf swing information being so accessible online, golfers are inundated with so much information that we have probably heard from some golf instructors or golf gurus to use our lower body on the downswing.
Although the term, utilizing our lower body is somewhat correct, most of us do not realize that the movement is not just ‘spinning’ your hip left of the target (for right hand golfers).
When our mind analyze a movement and perform the action without any instruction, it reacts differently. That is why when we want to utilize our lower body to initiate the swing, our hips will move closer to the ball causing us to lose posture and robbing us of power and direction.
Solid Shots
Hit more solid shots!
I’m sure most of you have experienced striking the ball fat and your shot ends up 50 yards short of the green.
This exercise is to get you to strike the ball more solidly and in the video, I simulate it by tossing the balls in my hands ahead (yellow tee) of ball that I would like to strike. Focusing on the correct point of release will get you to hit more shots that will end up closer to your intended target.
Sequencing
What is sequencing? Sequencing basically refers to the order that the body moves during a golf swing.
I will not touch on the entire swing but to focus at the top of the swing and down to impact and follow through.
Most of us have heard that we should start the downswing with the lower body and many of us might not know how it should be done nor the correct mechanics to start the downswing with the lower body.
I’m inviting you to try this simple exercise and if you can do it, you probably have good sequencing but if you are unable to hit it after a few attempts, I would suggest that you visit your local golf professional. Playing crap golf can be frustrating and investing in new equipment will only provide a temporary fix.
What every golfers should be looking at is to swing efficiently that requires less effort and increase playability by keeping the ball in play plus avoiding injury with incorrect technique.
Subscribe to us for notifications and website updates.
We use cookies to improve your experience and to help us understand how you use our site. Please refer to our cookie notice and privacy policy for more information regarding cookies and other third-party tracking that may be enabled.
Follow us.
© 2021 AGI
