Josh’s Tips & Tricks: No Look Shots

Intro

Hello golfers, welcome to this weeks tips & tricks. The weather is improving so hopefully you have had a chance to get on a course and implement what you have been working on. The season is fast approaching so we will be starting to take a closer look at on course tips very soon. This week we will be looking at a simple drill you can try to improve your clubface awareness and improve ball striking.

No Look Shots

Take a look at the following video and then we will look at what’s going on and how we can improve.

Video

One of the worst bits of advice I hear on the driving range is “keep your head down”. At some point your head has to come up to face the target and lots of the time this is the least of peoples worries when it comes to ball striking. If you are prone to thinning or topping shots your mates have inevitably told you that you “lifted your head up”. Losing your dynamic posture and lifting up the body could be a cause of this but there are many other causes.

If you are too active with the shoulders and try to hit from the top of the backswing with the arms there is a possibility that you will lean back and struggle to rotate the clubface through impact. This leads to the dreaded SLICE and the ball often spinning right of target losing distance. Waking up the forearms and therefore clubface rotation is one way to stop the ball spinning off to the right.

Drill

Put your feet closer together than normal. Pick a spot on the floor or a tee on the floor. Focus on keeping your head centred and rotate the body around the spine. Fully allow the clubface to rotate in the hands and allow the clubhead to overtake the hands through impact. Turn the hips freely away from the target and back towards the target. When you feel like you have some rhythm try hitting some shots. DO NOT look to see where the ball has gone and try to keep the chest facing towards the ball for as long as possible. You should start to see shots that spin more left, more regularly.

When you have improved the strike and direction start to create fuller shots and allow the right shoulder to pull your head through. It’s like “keeping your head down” but in a slightly different way.

Summary

During the golf swing we need to allow the body to turn and the clubface to rotate around the body. We like to keep the head centred and then fully rotate the body to face the target. Working on the timing of the release (turning of the clubface through impact) is one of the most important ways of controlling direction and flight of the golf ball.

If you slice the ball and would like me to help you fix it you can BOOK A LESSON HERE.

I’m looking forward to helping you prepare for the season.

See you soon!

Josh