Confidence
I played two rounds this weekend and during both my iron play was terrible. I'm having difficulty committing to my shots. I'm sure that problem is not something mechanical. It's caused by a lack of confidence.
The problem is strickly with irons from the turf. When I'm able to put the ball on a tee my ball striking is solid whether it be an iron or a wood.
But with iron shots from the grass, while I'm able to visualize the shot, I don't "feel" it like I should before the swing. So during the swing I tighten up. The result is usually a topped or a thinned shot. On those reare occasions when I am able to stay loose, I swing easy - too easy - and come up short.
This is in sharp contrast to my experience on the practice range. At the range I'm able to strike the irons with confidence.
I'm been here before though so I know how to resolve this. It's mental, but the mental hurdle can only be jumped by developing enough confidence in my shot that I don't tighten up on the course. That will take more practice followed by success on the course to solidify my confidence.
posted by p2h @ 4:55 PM
2 Comments:
RE: Irons: Range good, course bad.
Recently I took my daughter to play golf with me, and I had her do a few exercises beforehand. I got out some 20-penny nails and had her drive them into the base of my shed with a sledgehammer, and did a few variations with various hammers and nails.
One year as I was prepping for my biggest tournament, I put a bulletin inside my front door: "A golfer is nothing more than a workman with his tools." This image is as potent for me as the exercise is valuable, for a number of reasons.
Because of its weight, the sledgehammer demands efficiency of the swing motion, and encourages the use of the larger muscles, downplays the finesse muscles. If you swing incorrectly with it, it literally hurts you.
It also exaggerates the slinky rhythm that produces the best golf swing. This "take it back in one piece" adage is not really a perfect way, there are momentum issues that you ignore when you use a lightweight hammer like a 7-iron, and just simply overpower its inertia in ordre to produce a swing many of whose params are forced to zero. with the slinky rhythm, the mass of the clubhead is your instructor, your caddy. If you can feel the club's life, its inertia and momentum, on the way back, then you have a greater feel for that momentum as it rushes toward transfer to the rubber rock.
I have too much notion of magic about a golf swing. Sure, magic is involved in the choice of motions in the swing, but as far as steel hitting that rubber rock, it's still 50% physics and 50% luck, zero magic. So when I stance up to an iron shot, if I think of my club as a tool, and truly think of the golf ball as the head of a nail I'm driving into the wall, it directs my body in a very constructive way.
What carpenter comes home and cries "I missed so many nails today, I need to find a new technique, got to figure out what I'm doing wrong"?
I played two rounds of golf this weekend, myself, and I was just ecstatic to be able to hit the irons well again after a long drought. Biggest thing that got me back on track was a pal who told me my lower body is too active in the swing. What a great thing to hear! because his advice sort of cut me loose to swing the way I LIKE to swing, the way that's natural to me. For so long, I've been trying to implement a whole array of things that are typified by Pennock's "marry your right hip to your right elbow..."
Saturday I got into a bunker on EVERY shot I hit, and it was wonderful, because I long ago committed to "arm-swinging" in the fairway bunkers. This approach yields the maximum accuracy getting the clubhead onto the ball and hitting just the right amount of sand. What is sacrified is maximum power, but who needs maximum power from 134, 112, 157, etc?
Lately I have been working on adding more wrist crossover to my iron swing, and the over-consciousness of that change has hurt my iron play in the learning period. It is becoming more habitual now.
So, wrist roll practice, and sledgehammer rehearsal of the Carnoustie swing, and suddenly I'm hitting 5 or 6 really solid iron shots in a round. Life is good. But what does this have to do with range vs course?
On the range, your visual focus is much more down there on the ball than it is out there on the field. I know I am far more patient about lifting up to see the results of my swing on the range. It's all I can do during a round to keep from following the ball down the fairway with my swing, that's why I lunge so badly. That ball is precious, for its stroke content.
On the range, balls are cheap.
You said you know how to find your way out of the current problem, so this comment isnt really about you at all, is it? ;) Still, you and I and every other golfer hit so much better if we get our minds OFF of the green or the fairway as our target...that BALL is the target. You associate the out-there target with a direction, and a distance, then forget it. Associate some very local facts (clump of grass, sledgehammer metaphor, etc) with the local target of the ball, and hit IT.
This separation of out-there target from the swing is the biggest difference between range and course.
Super color scheme, I like it! Good job. Go on.
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