To become a consistently good or even improved player (key word consistent), you have to posses a good short game. It doesn’t matter who your are, there are going to be times (even days) when you aren’t hitting the greens… hello short game!

Believe me… it is within one’s short game, where by improving it, you can quickly and easily shave numerous strokes off your golf game.

For this time around I want to work with you on developing some touch with your various clubs. In the past I’ve mentioned how important it is for your short game to get the ball on the green and get it rolling toward the hole as soon as possible. The purpose of this next drill is to get you an understanding of the flight and roll characteristics of each of your clubs.

From just off the green and varying distances, pick out a landing spot on the green. You could even stick a tee into the practice green to mark your spot.

Next, with varying clubs, work to chip or pitch your golf ball to hit your landing spot. The idea here is to not only begin to learn the various ball flights of each club, but to also understand the roll characteristics of the ball after it hits the green. Again, we aren’t trying to necessarily get the ball to the pin…

we want to hit the landing spot and learn what the ball does (or doesn’t do from there).

In doing this practice drill you’ll soon begin to get a feel for what each club will do. This will develop your ‘touch’ around the green and it will get those of you who have become locked in to using the same club around the green no matter what the circumstance off of that bad habit as well.

You will also develop a very good sense of what your favorite club to use is under what type of circumstance the shot demands…

and under pressure you’ll confidently know that this club is indeed the club for the job at hand.

A side note hear is that once you have practiced this drill for a while and your understanding and comfort level is good, begin to challenge yourself further by deteriorating your lies a bit.

Remember, on the course you won’t always get a nice cushy lie to work with so once you begin to groove your short chips and pitches, then you’ll want to add some degree of difficulty with less than perfect lies to your practice routine.

I debated with myself as to where to include this in our lessons.

Certainly much could be discussed later on in this course.

However, I wanted to at least pause for a moment at this point and discuss golf swing fixes in the context to what we have learned thus far.

If you haven’t taken a look at the 9 rules of ball flight, you’ll want to do that before reading ahead here.

For the purpose of our discussion here on golf swing help, I want to go over with you how to get your golf swing back on track in the early stages of your learning curve.

First and foremost if you begin to struggle with your swing and the results thereof, take a step back and review your grip, stance and alignment, and what your swing path is doing. Especially early on, reviewing these golf swing elements along with revisiting your practice drills will get you back on track.

Probably the biggest hurdle for golfers at this level to get over is the ‘patience with one’s self’ hurdle. When you’re fist learning it is incredibly important to give yourself time and stick to the concepts and drills outlined.

Along with the patience factor, there is the confidence factor. Anytime you are learning a new physical skill, the mechanics of it are going to feel awkward and funny (as in strange). This will hold doubly true if you are trying also to correct some bad habits in your swing that have, over time, become a part of your golf swing. The difficult aspect about the golf swing for all of us is that one gets to experience the results of their efforts immediately; and if they’re a bit on the ugly side it gets to your confidence.

A great many problems that have people working on golf swing fixes stem from a loss of confidence in their swing. Getting back to some basics and repetitively working on drills will do much to get your confidence back. Whether it’s solving problems or first learning the golf swing, solving problems can be a lot like losing weight; in that it sure seems a lot easier putting the extra .lbs on than it does taking them off. The point being, don’t expect immediate results. Once you determine the problem and learn the fix, you’ll need time, patience, and practice to right the ship.

If you feel as though you aren’t making headway, don’t just haphazardly look for a fix for your golf swing trying this and that. This is not a solution and will only make your frustration level rise, your confidence drop, and your interest in the game evaporate.

Don’t allow this to happen.

Simply get some golf swing help from your local golf professional. Everyone working to improve their game (at all levels) takes occasional lessons.

In summary, do some self diagnostics on your swing, get back to basics, apply them through repetitive drills and practice drills, but if you get stuck trying to fix your golf swing then seek additional help.

We all do the same, and so should you.

Teaching the mechanics of a good golf swing to someone with a bad golf swing is a challenging task. Of course, we know that a bad golf swing will result in a bad golfer, but how do you get to a better golf swing?

This is a question that I would ask myself as I would take an initial look at someone who had come to me for help. After a while, and witnessing many bad golf swings, I began to realize that these golf swings (or lack thereof) did have some things in common.

Basically almost all bad golfers and their subsequent swings have some basic similarities. These are deficiencies in their grip – their stance or set up – their posture – and their weight shift during the swing.

If you want to improve your golf game, you have to improve your golf swing. And to improve your golf swing your have understand the aforementioned areas.

The interesting thing that we as teachers often times do is to go over the grip, stance, posture, and the weight shift. Then we have the golfer take a couple practice swings with all this new information, and drop a golf ball down and look for the results. This is fascinating.

The game of golf is so focused on end results.

Where did the golf ball go after I hit it? I’ve done this when working with someone… I would venture that we as instructors all have. A curious technique to be sure. We see the practice swing knowing that it’s … well not too good, but yet we still want to hit the golf ball (I guess only to verify that it is indeed a bad golf swing).

The point here is that once you initially get with someone to help you understand the various parts and aspects of the golf swing, then take a step back (from the golf ball) and work on the swing. Work on the muscles that execute the parts of the swing. Get comfortable with gripping the club, your stance, your posture. Swing the clubs over, and over, and over, without the hitting the ball.

Work to where you can just sweep the top of the grass or the practice mat over and over with a consistently executed golf swing. Once the grip, stance, posture, and weigh shifting through the swing become second nature, only then introduce the striking of the golf ball. Then get back with your instructor and have them evaluate your progress on the golf swing, not the results at this point.

A bad golf swing is going to produce bad golf shots. Work on your swing first and the shots will follow.

Many professional and teaching professional would argue that a good reliable and consistent golf swing is built from the ground up.

Jack Nicklaus being one.

An interesting mind set that we humans have when it comes to achieving longer golf drives is that we must accelerate our hands faster or have our hand and forearms accelerate the golf club faster in order to gain more club head speed and distance.

With the golf swing, nothing could be further from the truth.

So without, gaining greater acceleration on the club head, how does one gain greater distance on their golf drives you ask? Well, it’s not that you don’t have to increase your club head speed; it’s that you don’t accomplish this by ‘firing’ the club head at the golf ball with your hands. Yet, this is probably the one biggest peccadillo of average golfers.

Your legs are unquestionably stronger than your hands and arms. And if you will learn to properly use the strength of your legs in unison with the proper turn of your hips and shoulders to propel your golf shot you’ll see distance and accuracy that you never thought you had.

And did I mention consistency.

Proper footwork and the use of your legs creating a grounded foundation for the hip and shoulder rotation results in torque or stored energy, that when simply released at the proper time will create more club head speed naturally and a more repeatable golf swing for more consistent golf shots.

If you’ll notice, to this point, nowhere in our discussion on this tip for golf have I even alluded to doing anything with your hand or arm speed to generate more club head speed.

This is not by accident.

Creating stored energy and releasing it at the proper moment just before impact is a result of proper footwork and body turn. The resulting paths and actions that the arms and hands take during the golf swing are a result not an action.

Glad you’re still with me!

Up next let’s take a look at some detail as to how the lower body works in the golf swing with Tips For Golf – The Backswing!