Screening

TPI Screening

Ever wondered why no matter how much your coach asks you to do, or feel something when you’re swinging, it’s nearly impossible to do? Well sometimes your body is not capable of achieving a movement and it is a fruitless task to even try.

David (1 handicap) will be put through a sequence of simple tests which are called a screen, to determine precisely a players range of movement.  This coupled with the video analysis of the swing and an injury history can give a coach a total overview of the player’s profile.  With correct structure the coach can send the player to either a fitness coach at a gym, or if the problem is medically serious to a doctor or sports physiotherapist. With focused information the physical condition is easily worked on with a far better chance of improvement.

In the test David did well but failed on one main area of the tests, the ankle dorsiflexion. Coupled with the information about an old football injury on the left ankle, it makes the video footage of the swing very easy to understand.

From the front view of Davids swing, the downswing towards the ball should start with the left hip pushing to the left, putting weight onto the left foot. David does not do this at all, due to the weakness in his left ankle, and instead of driving his weight onto his left foot, he spins without the sideways weight shift. Asking David if this is a common fault, he says yes and he has been trying to get rid of for a while (since spraining his ankle)

This is a problem where the pupil will go to a sports physiotherapist to give the pupil training and exercises to increase the strength and flexibility in his left ankle.

The Angry Bees!!

I had never heard the phrase "angry bees" before. But on holiday with my friend James it seemed a well used phrase by the time we came home. Standing over a shot and being very uncomfortable, due to feeling awkward, or mentally focusing solely on bad shots. James felt at times like the negative thoughts or feelings were like an angry swarm of bees getting louder and louder in his head before playing a shot. This was seemingly very debilitating and caused him to step away from shots on a number of occasions.

The main reason for a rock solid pre-shot routine, is to hopefully take the quality shots being hit in practice be taken onto the golf course. Poor golfers generally complain about practicing well but losing quality on the golf course. This will be fixed by practicing a pre-shot routine on the range, then repeating it on the course. A pre-shot routine can be a physical thing (picking an aiming point,practice swinging), a mental thing (visualising the shot, imagining what a good shot will feel like) or both.

The other reason for a pre-shot routine is to avoid thinking of negative things, previous poor shots played recently, imagining bad shots. A general feeling of dread when about to play a shot, can be paralysing. It can be a vicious circle, thinking bad will cause bad giving the player more ammunition for them to think about.

Build up the confidence slowly on the range, then take the pre-shot routine on the course, and slowly build up the confidence there too. Confidence is a fragile thing and solid practice on the range and golf course is the only way to build up it up. There are no short cuts. Try to build up your own routine, think positively and comit to the routine every time!

The joy of playing on your own!

It has been a long time, ten years to be exact. Only 9 holes but it felt like a totally new experience. Golf really is a solitary sport, and as I played this morning it became obvious that I had forgotten this over the last decade. Being on my own gave me the time to focus on my game, rather than participate in chit chat or coaching a pupil around the course. At first it felt a little selfish but as the holes went by I remembered more and more the joys of playing on my own.

In a team sport there is a sense of responsibility to your teamates, which is very different to golf. You only have yourself to blame for playing poorly, but in a more positive view, you can soley congratulate you yourself for excelling.

i am a firm believer that golfers play golf for many different reasons, wether it be for the exercise , challenge or the company. And I have rediscovered the joys I felt playing golf as a junior. So go back to a time you remember having fun and recreate the experiance!

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Important Make Up Of A Good Set Up

The most common problem I have seen at set up, is with golfers who have a comfortable starting position. From the very beginning of their golfing life, most players get into a comfortable set up position. And comfortable normally means its wrong. The majority of people spend all their lives standing up straight with their shoulders level, which is a mistake that can cause many poor shots.

Poor set up shoulders level!!

Golf is played with the hands at different levels on the golf club, the left hand being higher than the right (for right handed golfers) , and with both arms fairly straight this means that the shoulders can't be level. To allow the arms to be straight with both hands separate on the club, the correct technique is to tilt the spine away from the target. This can feel very awkward for someone who is not used to it. Although to get into the wrong shoulder level position, a player will have to tilt the spine toward the target. This incorrect starting position generally feels more comfortable

Correct tilting spine set up




This is quite an easy correction for a player to check, just a quick look into a mirror, (face on) can give the player enough feedback to create a good set up position time after time.

Make Sure of the Short Putt



Pupils and myself included, often find short putts a little frustrating. For such a short shot it can sometimes involve a huge amount of mental activity, which it really shouldn't. There are a couple of things that should happen when practicing to get better at short putts. The first is to practice what your coach has told you to after a lesson. The sad fact is that 95% of all putting lessons end up with the pupil not practicing anything like the drills or routines that they were shown in the lesson. So to put it bluntly, do what you were told. The second and most important is to make your practice evolve to leave you with a very very simple thought process which can easily repeated. Not a 30 point checklist for each putt, this can never lead to a smooth repeatable stroke.

Here are a few very simple drills you can do that will make you short putting much better.

1.  Aim straight, this sounds obvious, but the majority of players do not. You can put a line on the ball, and putt between two clubs laid on the ground






Aiming Sticks



Line on the top of the ball

 2.  Next you can pose at the end of the stroke with the club face is still pointing at the target
3. You can on short putts keep focused on the ground under the ball until you hear the ball drop in



Head cover, backswing length control



4. For the control of distance it is important you have an accelerating stroke, which means having a shorter backswing than follow through. This will mean the ball will always get to the hole, leaving you to focus on the line of the putt. You can put a head cover behind to control the length.

Hope this helps!!





Having an on Course lesson

Due to time constraints from the pupil and the coach, it isn't always possible to spend any time on the golf course. This is an invaluable experience for the pupil and coach alike. Just in the last few days i have coached some new pupils that have had many lessons, all of them based on a driving range. Having asked a few more questions, I found that the majority of their lessons had taken place on a mat rather than grass.

They both had issues with their game that had not been fixed, even with the lessons they had previously. Within the lesson both pupils felt they hit the ball better and had understood the swing changes that the coach wanted. As soon as they went on the course the old swing complaints came back. This happened time and time again and no matter how much they tried to change, the problem was still happening on the course.

So luckily for my new pupils we were able to immediately go onto the course, taking the video camera with me to take very valuable footage, to show the pupils when we got back from the course. When we got in from the course what we saw on the video shocked the pupils hugely.

Both pupils were fine on the range standing on a mat, but given the open space of the course, were aiming their bodies (feet,hips,shoulders) nowhere near the target. This meant that their swings would have to make an adjustment to hit the ball toward the target. I asked the pupils if they had ever had a lesson on aiming, or had been given any tips on how to aim properly. They both said no, and that the aiming issues they both had never been picked up on the driving range. Which isn't surprising as the squareness of the range mat and the fixed targets make it easy to aim correctly.

Great Body Alignment

After explaining the ball to target line (imaginary line from the ball to the target) and the parallel lines of the feet, hips and shoulders, I coached them to pick an intermediate point. This is a spot about 1 yard in front of the ball that is between the ball and the target. You must be standing behind the ball to pick the spot, not after you have taken your address position. Then you must place your feet,hips and shoulders parallel to the ball/ intermediate line.

We then went back to the golf course how well the changes would be executed on the course.

The Art of Using a Lofted Club!!

Many of my pupils get very confused when using a lofted club around the greens. The pupil generally has very little belief or trust that they have a club that will help them get the ball airborne.

This will normally produce a swing that is called a scoop or flick, which will mean the club will either hit the ground before the ball or not get underneath and thin/skull the ball a long way past the flag!! Does this sound like you?If it does then this question may prove critical in your understanding of how to play this shot correctly.

Think about when your club makes contact with the ball, can you visualise it............?
Is the clubhead lifting away from the ground or descending toward the ground at impact?

If you are in the vast majority of poor players with a lofted club, you probably feel the club should lift at impact, to help the ball into the air. This will cause unfortunately, very few well struck shots, and poor shots will  include hitting the ground before the ball (if the club is lifting, it has to be lower than the ball before impact, causing heavy shots). Or opposite to that, the thinned or skulled shot across the green.

The club should be descending toward the ground, impacting the ground after the ball. This may be a strange concept for the poorer player, but all shots that you have seen played well with a divot, the club has removed turf after the club has hit the ball. The club should hit the ball first then into the ground. This downward blow makes the ball roll up the clubface creating backspin.

The best practice to do before a shot is to rehearse your shot next to the ball, and using the ball as a marker, try to hit the ground at a point after the ball. This may be difficult if you are not used to it, but keep trying as it is the way to mastering the lofted clubs.(see pic above)

Golfers who suffer from poor alignment!

Golfers generally don't know it but most suffer with an alignment failure when playing golf. They don't notice mainly because the swing that they have, has learned over time to compensate for this problem. This does prove that two wrongs can sometimes be right!!

The main issue with golfers will be inconsistancy, and this is where the first problem will occur, even before the player has swung.

A good player will align their shoulders, hips and feet parallel with the target. Most golfers who align incorrectly, will not have these lined up.

Right handed                                Left handed

Normally a right handed golfer will have open shoulders (pointing them to the left) which will help the player swing the club in that direction at impact, causing Slices and Pulls. With irons, which the player will use the most, it will generally result in a pull (ball going straight to the left). This will simply be compenated by the player aiming their feet to the right, which will help point the players shoulders more to the target. Making the ball go straighter.

This is not a good combination as longer clubs create more sidespin and will slice the ball, but because of the alignment change the ball will start straight and slice a long way to the right.

The fix i adopt is to make the player pitch with an open feet alignment, and make sure their shoulders are pointing parallel to the target. This is the opposite alignment than they had before, this method is not just a drill to help them feel the position of their shoulders but is a very good way to pitch the ball as well.

The last thing I do is to get the player to stand behind every shot and pick something on the ground just infront of the ball that is in line with the target, then aim at that when they set up to the ball. This may feel very strange, because they have spent some time aiming the wrong way, but the player must trust the spot as it is correct!!

Overswing?

After coaching this morning, I have seen for what seems like the 1000th time an overswing that is very very disruptive to the players swing. Often the pupil is totally unaware that they are swinging as far back as they are. Even with the use of video sometimes  a player is unconvinced that he is actually swinging that far back.
The most often thing I have heard from coaches is to try to get the player to swing shorter. This almost never works as the player is unaware of the length of their swing in the first place.Even if the player manages to do a few short swings, soon after they will be happily swinging just as long as they were before. Thinking that they are still executing the short swing their coach taught them.

I find the best results for change (assuming that its not a body positioning problem, ie hips sway or reverse spine angle) the best way is for the pupil to start their downswing with their hips before the club has got anywhere near the overswing position. This will give them a feeling that there is no pause at the top of the backswing, but a smooth transition into the downswing. The hips drive towards the target will make it impossible for the player to overswing.

In effect the player has not got too long a backswing, but starts their downswing from the wrong position!!

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Flair golf versus Overthinking!

After playing 18 holes with my friends yesterday, I found that you can have two totally different mental approaches! The first is what I will call "the natural way" which consists of visualising the shot, then playing it, with little or no technique based thought. This allows the player to freely execute shots, with very little tension. I believe this must happen for maximising a players ability on the golf course.
The second is a player who has had a lesson, practiced on the range and has had some success whilst practicing. Though not enough practice to make the swing change instinctive. This will make the play on the golf course to concious and not allow the player any freedom. The large danger though is that the player may play a few good shots, and then believe that the many swing thoughts he has will make him play well. Making the player more and more concious about his game. The complete opposite of the first example!

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