For any golfer who wants to play great golf
Posts tagged Practice
Review: Powerchute
Dec 28th
Powerchute
For the past month I’ve worked with a swing trainer called the Powerchute. I’ve given it an extensive test and the results are in.
What is the Powerchute?
It’s a swing training aid that aims to increase clubhead speed and lag, and improve timing and lag. In addition it strengthens the fast twitch muscles.
Tour Striker gets me back on track
Sep 13th
If you’ve played golf with me in the past month you would have known that my ball striking has put me in a bit of a slump. My distance control was off, and my shots were coming up short.
In a few minutes the Tour Striker brought my ball striking back. An hour and half and two buckets of balls later, I’m feeling much better about my ball striking. The difference is dramatic.
Sadly, before this session I was having trouble hitting my 8 iron 150 yards. It was extremely frustrating. This afternoon, my 8 iron was a much more respectable 165-170 average carry, with several carrying 175-180. Now that’s what I’m talking about.
I knew I was on the right track when I started to hit what some low bullets with the Tour Striker. These bullets went no higher than about 30 feet, but they carried about 200 yards. The Tour Striker pro that I use is the equivalent of an 8 iron, so that’s some serious contact. In an earlier conversation I had with Martin Chuck, the inventor of the Tour Striker, he assured me that when I’m hitting those low bullets, it means I’m very close to excellent contact, just millimeters away from perfection. He’s right.
My new favorite practice putting game – Split Nines
Aug 10th
If you want to add some pressure to your putting practice to make it feel a bit more like what you’ll feel on the golf course then try this game.
The game is split into two halves, your front nine and your back nine. On your front 9, each putt is like you’ve hit the in regulation. Every putt made is a birdie, every putt missed leaves a par putt (you must putt in, 3 putting does count as a bogey).
On your back nine, these are your greens missed in regulation. Every putt is for par. Miss and your next putt is for bogey.
So, on the front nine, you want to get as quickly and as far under par as you can. Be sure to mix in 3 shorter putts (4-6 ft), 3 medium putts (6 – 12ft) and 3 longer putts (more than 12 feet) in each nine.
PGA Tour: Tee-to-green key to Donald’s rise
Jun 1st
Interesting article with an in-depth look at Luke Donald’s stats. With Luke Donald ranking low on the driving distance category you would have expected him to rank higher in accuracy, given that his low ranking in distance would put him at a disadvantage on approaches from the rough.
I’ve always considered myself a decent iron player, but I’ve made a concerted effort as well to improve my accuracy off the tee. I’ve noticed an improvement in my scores from that. Here’s what Luke had to say about his improvement in this area.
Tour Striker – Day 12 – Confidence Building
May 7th
Over the past 12 days working with the tour striker I’ve seen a significant improvement in my ball striking. For a while and before re-acquainting myself with the TS my distance control was inconsistent.
I’m now much more consistent with my distance control and my I’ve added about 15 yards with each iron.
I’ve found that not only is the TS a great practice tool, but it is also a fantastic way to check your ballstriking.
The Tour Striker helps with consistency
Twelve days ago I was very inconsistent with the TS. If you take a look at the last few posts you’ll see me talk about the inconsistencies. Yesterday on the range my strikes with the TS really surprised me. Not only did the ball fly high and far and straight but it just felt great.
I’ve been working on the on practicing with each hand separately and wow is that a challenging drill. It’s really good though. I’m very pleased with progress I’m making with the Tour Striker.
Tour Striker – Day 3 of 30 – a plan comes into focus
Apr 27th
This morning I headed to the driving range early. Got there around 6:50 am, got set up and hit balls into the foggy morning.
I was encouraged by my practice session on Monday evening. This morning it was a slightly different story. I hit a couple of toppers which right away told me that I had too little shaft lean. When I corrected that I hit a number of low flat stingers. The balls took off low, stayed lower than 30 yards high and carried about 175 yards into the fog. They felt solid.
I decided to reach out to Martin Chuck, the inventor of the Tour Striker to tell him about this month long test with his product as well as to get some advice on how best to take advantage of the time.
Based on his suggestions I will be working on the following over the next 30 days. Read the rest of this entry »
Stop quitting on your putts
Apr 14th
One night while I was on a golf trip in Maryland a few weeks ago, I thought it would be fun to have some putting contests in the room. The carpet was probably rolling about a 10 so it wasn’t too quick. We played a version of leap frog and set the cup out about 12 feet away. The thing that quickly became clear was that it was hard to hit the putts short enough in the beginning to set you up for a good potential leap frog run. It took me some time but I finally figured out why that was.
What I’ve realized is that I was decelerating on those short putts and when you do that it becomes very difficult to have any consistency or to actually control the speed of your putts. Our minds don’t react well to deceleration. They can’t judge have quickly something is slowing down as well as they can judge how quickly something is speeding up. At least that’s true in my experience, although I’m sure there are some of you out there who will disagree and that’s fine.
For putting though you always want to be accelerating. One of the best ways to practice this is actually with short putts. It will really train in feel an in an amazing way.
As I worked with this technique last night, in a very short while I gained tremendous feel for distance. The main thing I did was to ensure that on every through-stroke you feel an acceleration compared to your back swing. Try this out, take some short putts and really focus on feeling the acceleration into the ball. You’ll start to get a lot more feel, and your putting will improve.
Feedback from the Technical Staff at Optishot
Apr 10th
Since I’ve seen that a number of people commenting in the Optishot review had some technical issues, I decided to ask the manufacturer for a response to their complaints. I have not had any significant issues with the optishot and in fact really like the product. Over the winter it provided me with a solid golf experience at home and allowed me to work on things in a a warm environment as the snow fell outside.
Here is what the technical folks at Optishot provided. I hope it helps anyone who is having some technical issues with their unit.
The best way for an individual to get technical support is to follow the link below, fill out the form and use it to ask questions. Then we will get back to them as quickly as we can.
http://support.dancindogg.com/reportissueHowever, inaccurate swing results is the most common cause of frustration. There are three possible parts to this issue, lighting in the room, Swing Pad integrity, and software adjustments.
Rickie Fowler – He gets it
Feb 25th
Watching Morning Drive this morning, I was in total agreement with the comments that Brandel Chamblee (@BrandelChamblee) made about Rickie Fowler.
“You understand the best way to play golf, this is my opinion, is to go out there and try to hit shots…You know,it’s the big lie to me, that you can go out there and swing perfectly. And I understand why guys do it. I mean literally they’re trying to play this game in the most organized fashion, there’s so much money out there, and if you can stay on tour a long time, you can get ridiculously rich. So what are you gonna do? You’re gonna work out, you’re gonna get a sports psychologist And you’re going to take all these lessons ’cause you want everything to be perfect. And Rickie’s like ‘No, I’m gonna go out and I’m gonna hit golf shots. I’m gonna hit it high, I’m gonna hit it low, I’m gonna draw it, fade it.’ And I know it’s because of the way he was taught the game. His teacher was very much into hitting golf shots. And that’s why he plays fast. Because he’s not out there thinking about a pre-shot routine, and he’s not out there thinking about swing mechanics. He’s out there thinking about golf shots.”
There’s a ton of wisdom in what Brandel said this morning. This is why Rickie is the future of golf. And I think he is going to stun us with what he is going to accomplish in his career.
How to make swing changes stick
Jan 12th
Recent experience has taught me that you need two things to make swing changes stick. Practice and time. Now while these may seem self evident there is more going on behind the scenes in the subconscious mind than meets the eye.
We’ve all heard the phrases “Practice makes perfect” and “Perfect practice makes perfect”. We all know that tour players have practiced all their lives to get the level they are at. The thing is that they are not always practicing the same things in the same way. They have built up enough skill level, that as they dial one thing in, they can work and address another part of the game.
What am I getting at?
As amateur golfers we don’t have the luxury to practice to practice like a tour player. In fact, for most of us, we rarely get to practice. I’ve tried to combat this by investing in some things that bring the practice home, and while that does address much of the problem, there is another part of practicing that has to be thought through as well.
