At my wit's end... (Shanks)

[mpeterson]

Hey Freddie (and anyone else who might have any ideas!),

I've been having a bear of a time to start the season - I've been shanking pretty much every club in my bag, from Driver on down on the course. I've had some really, really good range sessions as of late, but today when I went out there, I had nothing - shot 56 for 9 holes on a course that I'm usually low to mid 40s on. It's driving me nuts, to the point where I'm thinking I need to put the clubs away for a while, because I'm not having any fun out there, and I'm bringing down the folks I'm playing with (especially my wife...).

After I played, I went to the range to see if I could take a video to share, and of course I striped the ball straight down the range. I'm thinking it's a setup/tension (and mental, of course, once that first one sets in) thing. Right on the last hole, I hit a nice half wedge into the green, and I felt like I was standing a bit more upright, with my chin feeling a bit more up than it had been.

If it helps, here's some info on my "good" swings ball flights - I tend to hit a pretty straight ball with most of my clubs, with my miss being a push/fade out to the right. My driver - well, that's probably my most inconsistent club, but a miss is almost always going right for me.

I don't know if I'll be able to get out again in the next few days, but if I do, I'll have one of my playing partners video a few of my swings to start the day. I'm in the process of looking for a new pro to take lessons with as well - I'll update this thread on my progress, as this is something I've had on and off for the better part of the year.

Thanks in advance for any and all help, THP, and for providing me a place to vent my frustrations. You guys are the best.

 

[Trout Bum]

Man that's hard to go through buddy, you shold still take a video and let Freddie decipher it, he can probably still see where they're coming from even if you hit it well by your tendencies. Good luck mpeterson, I have been there as well, Freddie will get you dialed in.

 

[inthehole]

I have a hard time with shanks on chip and pitch shots - through much trial and error, I have found a fix (for me). I take my normal set up, then walk into it about 2 inches or so, which gets me much closer to the ball - it's much tougher to shank a ball if you're standing closer to it. Set up with the ball near the toe of the club, not in the sweet spot. Hope that helps ...

 

[Tadashi70]

I can tell you this, if you have push fades you may be coming from the inside too much. Leading with the hosel and not releasing the club. Keeping the club in front of you is paramount. The more inside you are upon delivery the more proned you will be to the shanks.

 

[Sully]

I'm no Freddie, but I am a past sufferer of the shanks and I know exactly how you feel. I had them for almost a month to begin the season, including om a trip to myrtle beach. I tried everything, read every tip on shanks and the they all say the same thing. The one thing that did help besides time, is making sure my fundementals were spot on. My grip may have been the main culprit in my shanks but finally after a month my ball stiking is back and better than ever. I feel your pain man but have patience. I wanted to give up the sticks after shanking for a month but just give it time and they'll go away.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[mpeterson]

Thanks everyone - it's good to know there's a light at the end of the tunnel. Reading the comments helped pick me up.

Freddie - that's something I'll look out for. The guy I worked with previously worked a lot on coming from the inside and trying to develop a draw, and I have overcooked that a bit in the past. I have a lesson tomorrow, and I will try to share video here tomorrow after. Fingers crossed.

 

[mpeterson]

Hey all - just wanted to send an update today. So, I had my lesson today - went to a new instructor based on input from a friend of mine. I went for an hour rather than a half, figuring there was a lot to work on.

He had me take a few swings (a few of which resulted in balls squirting off to the right). He immediately diagnosed one of the major issues I had resulting in the hosel rockets. My setup was a mess, and I'd been slowly introducing band-aids to make up for it over the winter. The big issue was that my shoulders were far too open to my body line at address - we worked on that first. It took a little while, and I kept going back to what felt "normal" to me, but eventually I started to stop seeing fades, and started seeing what looked like straight pushes. We went back to video, and saw that where I thought I was aligned to was not my target, so what I thought were pushes were actually pretty close to straight balls. He had me go back and forth between my old and new setup, and it was clear that this was at least one of the major causes of the balls out towards the heel.

The next issue we worked on was my grip - to compensate for the shoulder positioning, I'd moved to a quite weak right hand grip. He got me back to neutral, which felt a little strange at first, and resulted in some not-so-great swings (but still moving the ball forwards instead of sideways!). This actually took a bit longer to get used to. Once I got used to the new setup, I started making much better contact with the ball than I had in a long time. It was nice to hear the sound of good contact again!

While he didn't want me to work on too much, we did do some work on release - feeling like my right palm was facing down at impact. This actually took hold little more quickly than the other two changes, and I hit some nice baby draws for my last few shots. All in all, I'm very happy. I booked a set of three lessons over the next month or so to get these changes ingrained. When I got home, I went back and looked at my video from the instructor I was working with previously and compared it to what I saw today, and it's clear I was wide open in my last session as well. My old instructor had me working on myriad things during the swing, but never really spent time on my setup.

I don't expect to go out and shoot my handicap next time I'm out, but I feel like I can get around the course again, and to me, that's as good as anything right now. That's the thing about golf - it's my favorite thing to do, but boy have I been frustrated lately.