On Eliminating One Side of the Course

A lot of you can already understand the stuff in this submit, however a whole lot of weekend players don't. And due to the fact that this is critical on your approach if you want to lower your rating, I figured this changed into an amazing time to do a publish on it.

If you watch any of the instructional shows on Golf Channel, it won't be long before someone brings up "eliminating one side of the course." Sometimes they specifically mention eliminating the left side of the course; that's because most of the right-handed Tour pros have a problem with hooking the ball when they goof up. It doesn't really matter which side you eliminate... but as a general rule, you want to eliminate the one that gives you the most trouble!

Here's the reason, and it's one I bet you've had a few problem with: You're having hassle hitting the ball in the fairway, but you miss it all over the vicinity. Sometimes it goes within the left hard, from time to time it is going in the right rough... However the trick is which you in no way recognize which miss you will have THIS time. If you simply knew which manner the ball was going to head, you can aim so the ball had a higher chance of touchdown somewhere that you may play from.

That's the concept in the back of "casting off one facet of the direction." It's also in the back of the concept of getting a "move-to shot," which genuinely method that you could hit that shot and recognise wherein the ball goes to move, even whilst you're below plenty of stress and in all likelihood to make a screw up. A move-to shot might not be very quite and it could now not even fly as some distance as everyday... But at least the player is aware of he or she can be able to discover it and play it.

There are two ways to eliminate one side of the course, and both can work. You can either:

1. learn to control your bad shot, or
2. learn a foolproof way to hit the opposite shot.

That second one is what the Tour pros tend to try because they believe it's a more dependable strategy. They have trouble with hooking the ball, so they work hard to develop a foolproof fade. That's why you hear about so many pros working on "swinging left." As long as they can figure out a way to keep the clubface from closing at impact, they know the ball will fade. (And when they swing left but close the clubface unintentionally, they get what they call a "double cross.")

That's also why some players have sincerely unusual swings. For instance, Ben Hogan created what we name the "current swing" because he fought a duck hook so terrible he called it "the phobia of the field mice." Lee Trevino's swing advanced the identical way.

The first choice -- getting to know to manipulate your horrific shot -- may be an exciting opportunity. If your normal miss is a big slice and you could discover ways to control it, you may NEVER have to fear approximately the opposite aspect of the course. The trick will become gaining knowledge of to govern it in order that it is continually a fade and in no way a banana ball. You want a shot you could anticipate, one that you recognize will nearly usually be in play. If you can figure out a way to reduce your cutting-edge pass over to some thing applicable, you may have a reliable cross-to shot.

It's not the choice most players make, but I can think of one great player who did: Billy Casper. He won 3 majors (1959 & 1966 US Open, 1970 Masters) and 51 total PGA Tour wins (7th all time) with a big 50-yard hook.

Regardless of which route you decide to take, you have to learn why you hit the shots you hit and then you have to work out a way to get the ball to go the way you want. But the first thing you need to do is make sure you have good fundamentals:

• Check your grip. Make sure it's not too strong or too weak because that can cause hooks and slices even if everything else is correct.
• Make sure you have good alignment at address. The ball tends to go where you aim. And I'd be willing to guess that this is a more common problem than most players believe.
• Check that your ball position is consistent. Even the pros get careless with that sometimes.

And here's a good thing to try: Try hitting some balls with a full swing but don't try to knock the cover off the ball. (Think practice swing.) If you can hit it where you want it when you swing slower, then you're doing something wrong when you try to create more power. (That means it's not a setup problem. It's a movement problem.) And then maybe you can use your practice swing as a go-to shot!

You may need to spend some time with a teaching pro to learn how to do it. But like I said, eliminating one side of the course is an important part of your scoring strategy. It's worth taking some time to figure out how to do it.