Your golf swing must be fluid and natural in order to help you break 80 consistently. If you combine the fear of hitting bad shots with poor swing mechanics, you are headed for trouble on the course. Your golf swing must be fluid and natural to maintain good scores. If you read further, I will provide you with five drills to develop a fluid golf swing.
One way to increase your swing’s fluidity is to “borrow” feelings and moves from other activities. These moves and feelings, which are more familiar to you because you’ve used them hundreds of times before, take your mind off thinking about your mechanics. That, in turn, can help improve your ballstriking and boost accuracy and distance.
Below are five golf drills on familiar moves and feelings that you can borrow from other sports to create a more natural and fluid swing:
1. Unbalanced at address — If you’re too rigid at address, you’ll tense up your whole body, which throws your balance off, robs you of power, and lowers accuracy. To improve your balance, think about setting up like a linebacker in a football game. His back is straight, his chin is up, his knees are flexed, and his weight evenly distributed over the balls of his feet. He’s poised to move dynamically—with nothing tense or static. That’s you at address.
2. Failing to load your right side — When you fail to load your right side, you become a short hitter. To eliminate this fault, do what pitchers do in baseball. They lean back and shift all of their weight back before throwing. Yet, they remain centered and balanced. They also brace their back knee to accept the transfer of weight before shifting it forward, generating maximum velocity on the pitch.
3. Inconsistent ballstriking — If you tuck your back elbow into your side at the top or let it fly outward, you’ll hit slices, hooks, and weak shots. Instead, copy the motion of a quarterback throwing a football. He bends his elbow a full 90-degrees, keeps his forearm parallel to his spine, and sets his bicep perpendicular to his forearms. He also has his right elbow cocked back—not jammed into his side or flying outward.
4. Hitting irons fat —If you hit irons fat, you could be hanging back on your right side at impact. That means your upper body is leaning away from the target in your finish. The result: You hit the ground before you hit the ball. Instead, mimic the motion of a hockey player taking a slap shot. He shifts all his weight to the target-side foot before firing away. You need to do the same thing when hitting irons.
Coming over the top — This swing flaw creates a slice. When you come over the top, you’re hitting the outside of the ball not the inside of it. Instead, copy a hitter’s motion in baseball. He uses his lower body to pull his upper body thru the swing with help from his left knee. As the pitch nears the plate, a right-handed hitter allows his left knee to rotate toward the mound. The left leg then straightens like a “posts” while the hitter whips his hands and his bat through the strike zone. This effort is a good way to rid yourself of a slice.
Using familiar feelings and motions developed while playing other sports can dramatically improve your golf swing. You want a swing that’s fluid and natural. Plus, you want to get rid of any swing thoughts focusing on your mechanics. Do both these things and you’ll create a swing that helps you not only break 80 consistently, but also chop strokes off your golf handicap.
