Journey to Break 85

[Hawk]

You know I was at a similar crossroads awhile back before I went to golftec. I was taking a series of lessons at another place and kinda felt like I was spinning my wheels with just bandaid fixes. Finally decided to drop some coin, get serious and invest in myself. Turns out that was the added emphasis I needed to put me on the right track, not where I want to be yet, but I'm progressing each time out.

--
tapatalk

I'm at a point now where I feel like a better short game could make me a pretty solid mid-80's golfer, but I honestly don't see where I could improve upon that with where I'm at right now. Nothing wrong with that for many people, but I just can't shake the desire to get better, so I figure this is my best bet.

I was going to kick this one up yesterday! Glad to see that Hawk. I'm holding off on lessons until around Jan, I should know where I'll be for a bit at least then.

I think they're great, I just dont know about some of the costs of the golf tec. It's hard for me to go indoors and then do the same outside. I'm going to talk to the Callaway guy who fit me because he just seemed like an awesome person to take lessons from. Can't wait to follow Hawk!

Thanks buddy. I'm cool with indoors mainly because I won't have the pressure of being on the course if I'm making any bigger changes.

 

[KellyBo]

I'm excited for you Hawk! Can't wait to hear more as you progress.

 

[yorkem]

Been awhile since I posted here. Nothing long and drawn out tonight.

The owner of the sim/LM facility here is a PGA professional. Talked to some guys that take lessons from him and I'm going for it. He showed me his whole set up today. I think it's going to be a pretty major change, so I'm committing to 10 hours, which should come in around 18 lessons. We get along really well and I'm excited. Starting after the holiday. I'm hoping it's going to be what takes me to the next level.

Awesome to see you are doing this. I am starting at least another series of lessons after the new year too. It souds like we are working on the same thing, which is really cool. I just want to be a more consistent ball striker. I feel like I can drop my handicap a whole bunch faster by doing that, than anything else.

 

[Hawk]

Consistency is the big thing for me. I struggle to put strings of good shots together. Good drive followed by poor approach or vice versa. I move way too much in my swing.

 

[Ole Gray]

Good luck Hawk and you can do it buddy. A good golf coach that you can relate to is worth his/her weight in gold! I will be signing up again for a set of lessons beginning in the Spring of 2012. I get a 4 pack of lessons and work on my painful areas with my coach.

 

[yorkem]

Consistency is the big thing for me. I struggle to put strings of good shots together. Good drive followed by poor approach or vice versa. I move way too much in my swing.

I dip, and I know I do it, and the result is catching everything fat. Big thing for me is I went through a full tear down to the grip swing change this year so I am hoping I can get with my coach, and it will now be minor tweaks to get me where I want to go.

 

[Hawk]

I just feel like I'm not really efficient and that means I have to make a big move to get power, which leads to inconsistency. I'm excited. I always like learning things.

 

[mikedean441]

good luck with the lessons Hawk, keep us posted on the progress!

 

[Tmex]

I've finally gone back to my consistent range sessions and man has it helped. Even just a small bucket 4-5 days a week is better than 2 days with large buckets.

I will never stray from the Speedsleeve, alternate every two balls routine again!

I'm also looking for a place for lessons. I'm about 75% sure I'm going back to Callaway Performance Center because I really got along with the fitter there and I love the pricing.

 

[Hawk]

I wish I could do that on a consistent basis. I think going to CPC is a great idea from how highly you talked about the guy there. I think rapport is a huge thing when it comes to lessons!

 

[yorkem]

I've finally gone back to my consistent range sessions and man has it helped. Even just a small bucket 4-5 days a week is better than 2 days with large buckets.

I will never stray from the Speedsleeve, alternate every two balls routine again!

I'm also looking for a place for lessons. I'm about 75% sure I'm going back to Callaway Performance Center because I really got along with the fitter there and I love the pricing.

That's aswesome buddy! I too have strayed lately, but because I hurt my back. Haven't touched a club in 3 sweeks because of it, but it is just aboout healed up. I have some lessons set up, so pain or not I will be hitting balls again soon. BTW, what is the Speedsleeve, alternate every 2 balls routine?

 

[SethO]

I make a lot of swing in my house and this really helps me groove any swing changes because I only focus on body positions. This can cause paralysis by analysis, but it helps me relax over the ball and it helps me get reps with a swing change.

 

[ddec]

I've finally gone back to my consistent range sessions and man has it helped. Even just a small bucket 4-5 days a week is better than 2 days with large buckets.

I will never stray from the Speedsleeve, alternate every two balls routine again!

I'm also looking for a place for lessons. I'm about 75% sure I'm going back to Callaway Performance Center because I really got along with the fitter there and I love the pricing.

that's funny because all you did was complain after your fittings haha
keep up the good work dude

 

[Tmex]

That's aswesome buddy! I too have strayed lately, but because I hurt my back. Haven't touched a club in 3 sweeks because of it, but it is just aboout healed up. I have some lessons set up, so pain or not I will be hitting balls again soon. BTW, what is the Speedsleeve, alternate every 2 balls routine?

Thats good dude! I hate back injuries and they're never fun. EVER. Basically, I just make sure that I'm alternating clubs every two balls. Sometimes Ill run through my entire bag, other times I'll focus on 5 clubs or so for the bucket. It usually just depends if I go large or small bucket. Small bucket is usually just 5 clubs, alternate clubs every 2 balls and I have 1 wedge I just drill a couple shots. Large bucket I have more of an opportunity to go through my bag but still I save at least 30 balls on a large bucket for wedges. usually. I throw the speedsleeve in there every 6 balls or so. I have it on an old nike 4i, it just helps me stay in tempo and for the most part, on plane.

I wish I could do that on a consistent basis. I think going to CPC is a great idea from how highly you talked about the guy there. I think rapport is a huge thing when it comes to lessons!

I think so too dude. I used to hate going to lessons when i was a kid because the instructor wasn't my speed lol.

I make a lot of swing in my house and this really helps me groove any swing changes because I only focus on body positions. This can cause paralysis by analysis, but it helps me relax over the ball and it helps me get reps with a swing change.

I could see that dude. I have trouble because I have no idea where my body should be. Unless I've felt it there, if that makes sense. I hope to get to that point one day.

 

[Tmex]

that's funny because all you did was complain after your fittings haha
keep up the good work dude

Lol. Then I realized it was my swing hahahaha. But really I mainly complained about Golf Galaxy... grrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

[yorkem]

Thats good dude! I hate back injuries and they're never fun. EVER. Basically, I just make sure that I'm alternating clubs every two balls. Sometimes Ill run through my entire bag, other times I'll focus on 5 clubs or so for the bucket. It usually just depends if I go large or small bucket. Small bucket is usually just 5 clubs, alternate clubs every 2 balls and I have 1 wedge I just drill a couple shots. Large bucket I have more of an opportunity to go through my bag but still I save at least 30 balls on a large bucket for wedges. usually. I throw the speedsleeve in there every 6 balls or so. I have it on an old nike 4i, it just helps me stay in tempo and for the most part, on plane.

That's an intreresting drill, but I could see the benefits of it. Maybe I will give it a try. Thanks for the info buddy.

 

[Tmex]

That's an intreresting drill, but I could see the benefits of it. Maybe I will give it a try. Thanks for the info buddy.

NP! Have to thank TC. He really opened my eyes. It's like how often, on the course, do we hit the same club 10x in a row? Or until we hit a good one?

 

[yorkem]

NP! Have to thank TC. He really opened my eyes. It's like how often, on the course, do we hit the same club 10x in a row? Or until we hit a good one?

Gotta take a lot of discipline though. I can't imagine taking two swings with a club and hitting them both poorly, and then going to another club while on the range. I get the benefit of it, but it would be hard to do.

 

[Tmex]

Gotta take a lot of discipline though. I can't imagine taking two swings with a club and hitting them both poorly, and then going to another club while on the range. I get the benefit of it, but it would be hard to do.

Extremely hard my friend. honestly, when is started it took a lot to buy into it. But after the first time or two on the course, it just made sense. You have to be able to pick yourself up after a bad shot and it really helps ingrain that on the range.

 

[Rusty]

I just wanted to jump in here and wish you guys a lot of luck in working towards your goals. Winter is a great time to just work on your swing indoors. The lack of ball flight feedback can actually be seen as a positive, since you can just focus on what you're trying to accomplish in the swing without getting discouraged from seeing bad shots. Luckily, I live in the South and usually only get trapped indoors for a week to 10 days before I can at least get to the range. I am also fortunate that I have a HUGE master bathroom in which I can swing a club without fear of hitting anything, I have mirrors on three walls to see my swing from different angles, and the lines between the tiles give me perfectly parallel toe and target lines!

I'm pretty new to this forum, but wanted to let y'all know I am a total hack who actually got his handicap down to single digits for the first time this year. I've been playing golf for 31 years now. My dedication to the game comes and goes. I have had lessons from some well-known and award winning teaching pros, and from some total idiots. I have gone through stretches where I play to about a 12 handicap, but those stretches rarely last longer than a few months. For most of my 31 years of playing my full swing was a collection of mishits with the occasional lucky hit, while a solid short game kept my scores from getting too ridiculous.

I had a little time away from the game, and a year ago breaking 90 was out of the question for me. I played a competitive round with some Fraternity brothers last February and shot a 95......and that was with some generous scorekeeping on a couple of holes that I had no chance of winning.

My game totally changed when I found Charlie King at Reynolds Plantation in Oconee, Georgia. You can look him up; he has a subscription website with a week-by-week plan for overhauling your game and some really great indoor drills. I'm not pimping his website -- it worked wonders for me, but that doesn't mean it would address the problems in your personal swing. I also went down to Reynolds Plantation for a 1 day clinic that included 9 holes of on course instruction. The live instruction is really what pushed me over the top toward being a decent little golfer.

The biggest thing Charlie King's staff taught me was the proper way to make contact with the ball. Amazingly, I had never learned this, even though I had paid big money for lessons from some well known teaching pros. I had always heard you need to hit down on the ball, and have your hands ahead of the ball at impact, but I never really understood how to accomplish that. I THOUGHT I understood it, but until I was able to experience it I didn't really know what it meant. Charlie changed my game just by saying "flat left wrist, bent right wrist at impact". My whole life, I think I had been trying to hinge my wrists through impact, when you really need to be resisting that. This is essentially the same thing you learn from using the Tour Striker training aid.

Once you have the proper impact position and feel down, the rest of the swing just falls into place. If you are compressing the ball at impact, even your poor swings yield a result you can work with. Charlie's theory is that you can allow a lot of individuality in the swing, from the backswing all the way down to about the 9 o'clock position on your downswing....but at that point all the good golfers have very similar swings. I had a lot of swaying motion in my backswing -- which wouldn't be too bad if I was getting back into position on my downswing -- but since I couldn't correct for it we made my swing more stable. Granted, I have had 30 years of trying to perfect my shoulder turn and weight shift, so those parts of swing come easy for me and a less experienced golfer may still need to work on those things a lot. But it has been such a relief to not worry so much about where the club is at 4 or 5 different positions in my swing and just focus on my downswing.

I wound up posting a lot more than I meant to. I really just wanted to wish everyone good luck. Don't try to improve on your own; you need at least a little professional input, and these days that input HAS to include video analysis (I am shocked at the number of teaching pros who still don't use video). I do not trust pros who want your swing to look just like some tour player, and who try to analyze every little angle of your swing -- that stuff is great for maximizing your potential, but if you're struggling to make pure contact then a smooth one-piece take away is the least of your concerns. You should see noticeable improvement after just a couple of weeks, or its time to find a new teacher.

 

[yorkem]

Thanks for that post Rusty. There are a few of us in this thread that are really working hard towards this goal being a consistently reachable plateau, and it is good to hear someone that has accomplished this so quickly with some help.

 

[Tmex]

Thanks for that post Rusty. There are a few of us in this thread that are really working hard towards this goal being a consistently reachable plateau, and it is good to hear someone that has accomplished this so quickly with some help.

Agreed! A pro is unvaluable!

 

[Hawk]

Thanks for the well-wishes, Rusty. Some good advice in there!

I was going to write a long winded summary of my year, but lost ambition.

The short version is: I shot under 85 a few times on a shorter course and a low of 86 from 6,300 yards. I didn't really set out with the number 85 in mind this year, but this thread was a great place to share the journey with you guys. I made some big improvements, but most of all, I feel like I really learned a great deal this year. Next year will be fun and I can't wait to get started on the preparation for it.

 

[Tmex]

Hell yes Hawk! I started hitting flopshots yesterday. I felt like Phil Mickelson.

 

[Hawk]

I flopped over a tree the other day! I didn't feel like Phil, but I was really happy I didn't hit the tree and have to try again haha