June 2011 Archives

I love for my students to practice the short game. Two-thirds of the shots you play in a round of golf will be less than a full swing. Based on this, if lowering your score is a goal, you should be splitting your practice time accordingly. If you were to average a small sample of rounds, you will find that 40% of your shots are with the putter, 33% are full swings and the remaining 27% would be made up of chips, pitches, bunker shots, etc.

When you are practicing chipping, please keep this in mind. You should break your practice into two categories. The first would be mechanics. When you are working on mechanics you should not be chipping to a target. Just make sure you are hitting it solid and crisp.

The second phase of practice should be working on touch and feel. This is where I see people practicing poorly. If you are standing along side the green with a pile of balls and chip ball after ball to the same target, you are doing nothing to work on your feel. This would be the equivalent of a hitter in baseball only taking batting practice from a tee instead of live pitching.

When you are practicing to improve feel, be sure never to hit the same chip shot twice in a row. Chip to different targets, chip from different lies, use different clubs. When you play golf your chips shots will always be unique. 

Practice like you play. Dedicate the proper amount of time to putting and chipping. When working on the short game, don't fool yourself into thinking you have great touch because you can dial in feel after hitting the same chip a few times.

There has historically been some bad advice handed out to golfers over the years.  A lot of these tend to come from fellow golf friends that are commenting on what they see in your swing. 

One of the common phrases I hear is "take it back low and slow."  This is horrible advice to give anyone.  If the club moves away from the ball in a slow and deliberate manner a few bad things are going to happen.
1. The hands will end up controlling the golf club.  Because the club has no momentum, the hands will have to lift the golf club.
2. The players brain will sense that no energy has been created. This will often result in a violent move from the top of the swing.

There needs to be some energy in the backswing.  If the torso rotates with some speed, the golf club will have momentum to swing to the top and absolve the arms and hands from lifting.

For anyone who wants to see what I am referring to, watch Rory McIlroy swing a golf club.  The backswing has enough pace that he can let the club swing to the top while he is at the same time preparing to make an explosive move into the forward swing.

Forget low and slow, create enough energy with the body so the club can swing.

"If you love what you do, you never work a day in your life."

I am very fortunate to be a living example of this phrase for the past 23 years. I started teaching and coaching others to play golf right after graduating college and have loved every minute of it.

I am excited that I have been granted the opportunity to write a golf instruction blog for CTGolfer.com. I have known Bob Samek for years and am happy to be working with him again. 

During my time as a coach I have had the opportunity to assist in thousands of golfers improve their games. Many are recreational players, some are competitive at the club level and others are highly competitive at the national level. I enjoy teaching players of all abilities. It makes for an interesting career when one day can consist of a junior golf clinic, a class for women beginners, a few lessons with some high handicappers and couple sessions with tournament players getting ready to play Division I college golf!

During my time as a teacher and coach I have studied diligently to learn not only the mechanics of the golf swing, but also how to best relay those findings to my students. Along the way I have earned the following certifications and memberships:

• Class A PGA of America member
• AMF Instructor Division member
• Golf Digest's "Best Teachers in Connecticut"
• Golf Magazine's "Top Teachers in America"
• CT Section PGA Teacher of the Year
• Titleist Performance Institute Certified Golf Fitness Professional
• K-Vest 3-D Motion Analysis Level 2 certification

Each week I will post a new article that will give you some insight on how to make your golf game more enjoyable. Some posts will be more relevant to beginning golfers while others will be of more interest to the better players.

Lastly, I think of a blog as a forum for discussion. I will look forward to your comments as well as suggestions for future topics.