For any golfer who wants to play great golf
Posts tagged Muscle memory
Review: Vharness
Aug 27th
The Vharness is a swing trainer with the goal of teaching anyone to swing like a pro. The Vharness is endorsed by Rocco Mediate, who I think is a brilliant spokesperson for this product because of how well heconnects with average golfers. He looks like a guy in your foursome. But of course he has tremendous game. His performance at Torrey Pines in the US Open made him a household name. He plays what seems to be off the shelf game improvement clubs. He doesn’t have the fluid easy motion of a Fred Couples, or the power of JB Holmes or Bubba Watson. These reasons though make him ideal as a representative of this product because he, of all tour players, looks the most like an average Joe, and almost everybody can relate to him.
So does the Vharness achieve it’s lofty goal of teaching anyone to swing like a pro? No, but it is an excellent swing trainer, and if used effectively especially with some guidance from an instructor it can really help the average golfer to feel their swing better. Frankly I don’t think there is a single device that can teach anyone to swing like a pro. Swinging like a pro requires coordination, talent, strength and flexibility. Provided you have those things, with a good instructor and dedication you can learn to swing like a pro. What I did find is that the Vharness can enable you to not only create a better swing, but really feel what it feels to swing better.
I have a number of swing trainers in my collection, and they all fulfill different purposes. I’ve been using the Vharness for about a month. I wanted to give it a full test before I wrote about it. The Vharness is definitely different from my other swing trainers. It gives me feedback that I never got from anywhere else and really helped me to understand and feel my swing better. It almost acts as a sensation amplifier and you really feel what the club head, path and hands are doing.
Video showing Taly – eliminating the flip
Feb 2nd
I came across this video on YouTube and I wanted to share this. For those of you who read the review of the Taly Mind Set, I wanted to provide a real world scenario of how it used to help golfers improve their swings. In this video Lynn Blake, the famed TGM teacher (The Golfing Machine), has a clinic and each student has a Taly Mind Set. Take a look at how he teaches and what he teaches. It is simple but effective. Similar to the drill I talk about in the article on achieving left wrist supination.
Enjoy and of course let me know if you have any questions about this.
Review: Tour Striker Pro
Jan 9th
According to the website for the Tour Striker:
Finally! A simple training club that intuitively promotes the essentials of Tour quality club head to ball impact!
One percent of golfers strike golf balls correctly. The Tour Striker and Tour Striker Pro training clubs will intuitively help you understand leverage and how to apply the club head to the golf ball in the same manner as the best players in the world. You will gain command of the elusive skills required to compress a golf ball. Best of all, this is not a temporary solution!
Allow the creative golfer inside you to enjoy the game once and for all. You can learn how to have world-class impact conditions and strike golf balls purely, accurately and with great control.
Tour Striker Models
Winter Golf Practice – Get the most out of it
Dec 15th
So you live in colder part of the country. Maybe there’s snow on the ground, maybe there isn’t but the temperature outside doesn’t make you want to hit the golf course. And it’ll be a while before spring arrives and melts the snow. What do you do to improve your game.
Actually winter golf practice can be extremely productive. Imagine that spring time comes around and not only are you not rusty but you feel like you’re ready to play the best golf of your life. Here are the essentials you need to make this your best winter practice session.
1. A quality golf mat
Nothing is more frustrating than hitting golf balls off rock hard mats at the driving range. They don’t provide realistic feedback. They don’t allow you to hit down and through the ball. The tees may not be adjustable or they are those rubber tubes. Yech!,
Combining Training Aids for Maximum Results
Dec 11th
Sometimes training aids complement each other.
I found a really good combination this morning. The Pure Ball Striker (no review yet although one is planned) and the Orange Whip Trainer work great together.
The Pure Ball Striker is designed to help you feel the lag on the index finger of your bottom hand, in my case, the right hand. Normally when I practice with it, feeling the “lag pressure” is very subtle and it’s hard sometimes to really feel it.
Combining it with the Orange Whip Trainer basically magnified or amplified it for me. I could REALLY feel the lag pressure and it was awesome. It gives me a better idea of what to feel when I use the Pure Ball Striker by itself.
Let me know if you have any successful combinations of training aids.
Review: Orange Whip Trainer
Dec 2nd
Empty ad slot (#6)!
If you’ve been reading this blog for a while then you know that one of the things I was working on was having my actual swings look like my practice swings. I received a suggestion to try the Orange Whip Trainer because it helped other golfers with this issue.
The Orange Whip Trainer is, according to the manufacturer:
The Orange Whip is the ultimate golf swing trainer and fitness tool for today’s golfer and athlete. It is versatile, dynamic and the most effective swing aid on the market. Consistent use of the Orange Whip will improve your golf swing and provide an essential core-muscle workout. The elegant design combines a counter-weighting system and flexible shaft that work together to promote the natural golf swing motion unique to each individual. The Orange Whip will help you find your ideal swing plane, create “tour pro” lag, achieve perfect sequence of motion, and promote balance that’s supported from the ground up. Your strength, flexibility, and swing speed will increase, and your shot-making will become more accurate and consistent.
Applying Fearless Golf
Nov 13th
How difficult is it to play Fearless Golf?
In ordinary situations, on your favorite course, on your favorite hole, with your favorite club, and with ideal weather it’s probably not that hard. But what happens when you are in a tournament, or there is some money riding on a putt, or you’re on the 16th hole needing pars in that last two holes to beat your best score. Is it easy then to play fearless golf? Probably not.
I think playing fearless golf requires awareness. You must become aware of when the fear mechanism is triggered and act accordingly. Too often we get caught up in the moment and instead of taking a moment to gather ourselves we push through, for whatever reasons we have. Usually we end up with a bad result, a hooked or sliced shot, a shot OB or into the hazard, or a stubbed chip, or a weak or overly strong putt.
I set out this morning to play Fearless Golf in difficult conditions on my home course (temperature in the upper 40s, wind blowing around 30 MPH, with a threat of rain on the way). You would think that in these conditions it would be difficult to play fearless golf. What’s the wind going to do to my shots? How much shorter will the ball fly in the cold? What are the greens going to be like? Will my hands be too cold to get any real feel putting or chipping?
I noticed the fear response came up a number of times. I pictured a drive being taken by a slice wind way right OB. At that point I had a choice. What do I do about it? I didn’t want to just hit then because I had a really ugly picture in my head. I told my self “You’re playing fearless golf, you’ve hit this drive great before lots of times.” I would then picture my ball flight as I wanted, relaxed by body, and especially my hands, and swung with confidence. I hit it down the middle in ideal position.
Simulator up and running
Oct 19th
So I finally setup the simulator. This will be my practice “facility” for the winter. I will get actual rounds on course when the weather cooperates.
The nice thing about the simulator is that it tells me a few keys stats about my swing. It tells me the swing path (inside out, straight or outside in and by how many degrees). It also tells me whether the club face is square at impact or how many degrees closed or open it is, and it tells me my club head speed at impact.
In my practice session today I have confirmed through hard numbers that indeeed the over the top move is basically history. 9 out of 10 swings where either coming in straight or from the inside. 10 percent were coming in from the outside but only by 3 degrees, which is not too bad at all.
The one thing I did notice consistently which bugged me is that on 8 out of 10 swings my club face was open. Most of the time it was open less than 8 degrees (which is still too much), but every once in a while I’d get one open 12 degrees or more. Really annoyed me. On a 160 yard shot, 12 degrees open face will send the ball 12 yards right of target. This is something I will definitely work on. I want the club head coming in square, or maybe even a degree or two closed through impact, with an inside out swing.
Ben Hogan helping with the OTT issue
Oct 1st
Today I had a very good ball striking and ended up hitting a lot of greens. Here’s what I did that I believe made a huge difference.
In “5 Lessons” Ben Hogan writes about keeping the left arm tight to the chest on the downswing.
So I started playing around with this. How tight do I keep it there? What’s the best way to do that?
One of the reasons I thought to do this was that I noticed on my OTT actual swings that the arms begin racing towards the ball. And I thought, hmm, if I keep my left arm tight to the chest as long as possible, then the arms can’t race ahead.
Today’s round
Sep 30th
Today I had an intersting round. I started off on the first hole with a tee shot that almost went OB, left me with a 180 yd shot to the green, hit a five iron to about 12 feet and sank the putt for birdie.
I proceeded to have a bit of an up and down day with my ball striking, but my putting was pretty good. I only needed 29 putts today, and I sank several 10 -15 foot putts to save par.
I had a few shots where I really felt that I was able to match my actual swing with my practice swing, and on those I hit the ball as pure as winter snow. Throughout the round, after hitting each shot I would rate it on a scale of 1 to 5, to how closely the actual swing matched the practice swing, with 1 being the most different and 5 being an exact match. I had my fair share of 1s and 2s, but I noticed that anything at 3 or above was always a good shot. On the 7th hole, I had a 145 yards to a back pin, with a slight uphill lie in the rough behind a bunker, and an elevated green. I took my practice swing with an 8-iron, and it felt just right. I was able to match the swing perfectly, and ended up 4 feet from the cup for birdie, and I sank the putt.
On a few holes early in the back 9 I got a bit out of synch and it showed. I sprayed some shots and got very frustrated for about 3 holes.
