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I take lessons regularly and get my swing filmed every time. I've really struggled with the driver/woods for a long time, but excel with my irons - including long irons. That being said, I found a lot of success with my woods by taking a very strong grip, especially with the trailing/right hand, but it brings a timing aspect in when trying to get the club face where I need it and brought over nasty hooks to my irons. In my lesson last night my coach and I decided to scratch the grip and go back to a neutral grip. This brought back awesome draws with my irons with the distance I want to see, but also brought back the trouble with my driver.
I say my miss with the driver/woods is a slice, but it really isn't. It's a push-fade, but goes far enough right that it's unplayable (and it's unintentional) so I call it a slice. It starts 20 yards right of target and then fades right (depending on face angle and wind conditions) anywhere from 5-20 yards further right. Occasionally I get a straight push. So we decided to really focus on where the swing was breaking down using video and found something that sort of surprised me. According to my coach, set up is great and my follow through is great (I hit all the positions he wants to see throughout the swing). On the back swing when the shaft is parallel to the ground my club face is usually square to slightly closed. At the top of my swing I get the same picture - you can see the club face/grooves and its close to being in line/parallel with my lead arm. On the down swing the shaft passes through my right/trail bicep area like the coach wants, and when the shaft is parallel to the ground the shaft is inline or just inside of my hands. I am without a doubt hitting in-to-out and within a reasonable number/degree to my target line. From front on my ball position shows that I'm still making contact with the club moving in-to-out - as opposed to being far enough forward that I'm coming back in on my swing arc essentially hitting out-to-in.
So, the break down, confirmed by video, is somewhere between the top of my back swing and getting the shaft back parallel to the ground. When I return the shaft to parallel my club face is open. Despite being square to closed in that same position on the back swing, and at the top of the back swing. My coach said the difference probably has to do with the weight of the club because the weight of an iron club face is closer to inline with the shaft and the weight of the driver extends behind the shaft/body in the downswing and gravity wants to pull it back and down (so if you held the club with the shaft parallel to the ground and the face square and loosed your grip so that the shaft would spin, the clubs weight distribution and gravity would have it twist in your hands backwards, opening the face in the process.
So this knowledge is great and all, but how do I keep the club face square from the top of the back swing to impact. It's really frustrating that it requires no swing thought with the irons to accomplish, but does with the driver/woods. All other aspects of the swing being the same, it still requires a different swing for me to accomplish. I tried thinking about/holding a flat lead/left wrist throughout the entire swing, and had some success with that, but that is different from what I'm doing with my irons to accomplish the same ball flight (and that ball flight is consistent with the irons without thinking about holding a flat left wrist).
Is there some other swing thought I should be thinking? Or should I consider lowering the swing weight of the driver/woods (if possible) to get it more inline with my 3 iron? It's an SLDR, so would maybe moving the adjustable weight more to draw (and closer to the shaft) help with this?
I'm very open to suggestions at this point.
I say my miss with the driver/woods is a slice, but it really isn't. It's a push-fade, but goes far enough right that it's unplayable (and it's unintentional) so I call it a slice. It starts 20 yards right of target and then fades right (depending on face angle and wind conditions) anywhere from 5-20 yards further right. Occasionally I get a straight push. So we decided to really focus on where the swing was breaking down using video and found something that sort of surprised me. According to my coach, set up is great and my follow through is great (I hit all the positions he wants to see throughout the swing). On the back swing when the shaft is parallel to the ground my club face is usually square to slightly closed. At the top of my swing I get the same picture - you can see the club face/grooves and its close to being in line/parallel with my lead arm. On the down swing the shaft passes through my right/trail bicep area like the coach wants, and when the shaft is parallel to the ground the shaft is inline or just inside of my hands. I am without a doubt hitting in-to-out and within a reasonable number/degree to my target line. From front on my ball position shows that I'm still making contact with the club moving in-to-out - as opposed to being far enough forward that I'm coming back in on my swing arc essentially hitting out-to-in.
So, the break down, confirmed by video, is somewhere between the top of my back swing and getting the shaft back parallel to the ground. When I return the shaft to parallel my club face is open. Despite being square to closed in that same position on the back swing, and at the top of the back swing. My coach said the difference probably has to do with the weight of the club because the weight of an iron club face is closer to inline with the shaft and the weight of the driver extends behind the shaft/body in the downswing and gravity wants to pull it back and down (so if you held the club with the shaft parallel to the ground and the face square and loosed your grip so that the shaft would spin, the clubs weight distribution and gravity would have it twist in your hands backwards, opening the face in the process.
So this knowledge is great and all, but how do I keep the club face square from the top of the back swing to impact. It's really frustrating that it requires no swing thought with the irons to accomplish, but does with the driver/woods. All other aspects of the swing being the same, it still requires a different swing for me to accomplish. I tried thinking about/holding a flat lead/left wrist throughout the entire swing, and had some success with that, but that is different from what I'm doing with my irons to accomplish the same ball flight (and that ball flight is consistent with the irons without thinking about holding a flat left wrist).
Is there some other swing thought I should be thinking? Or should I consider lowering the swing weight of the driver/woods (if possible) to get it more inline with my 3 iron? It's an SLDR, so would maybe moving the adjustable weight more to draw (and closer to the shaft) help with this?
I'm very open to suggestions at this point.