Fundamentals

Stance

A consistent position helps develop a consistent swing. A square stance will encourage a square impact. Keep feet perfectly parallel to the target line. If you imagine standing on a train track your feet are against one rail the ball is next to the other. Develop a comfortable standing position with your feet directly below your shoulders with your toes slightly outward facing.

Position the ball 2-3 inches inside the left heel for most shots. If it is too far forward you will be more likely to slice.

Moving one foot slightly forward will enable either fade (outside to inside) or draw (inside to outside). Experiment with the shot direction on how much you move your foot.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do always check the position of the ball using your clubs aligned on the ground.

Do take your time to settle into your stance and get relaxed.

Do be consistent with your stance.

Grip

A good grip is the foundation of your golf swing, enabling greater control and reducing your tendency to slice. A good grip helps keep the club-head square at impact and stops the shaft from rotating in your hands.

The most popular grip used by professional golfers is the Vardon grip.

Place your little finger on the lower hand on the club (right hand for a right-handed player – known as the trailing hand) and place it between the index and middle finger on the top hand (known as the lead hand). The thumb of the lead-hand should fit in the lifeline of the trailing hand (the V). Look to get a relaxed and comfortable feel, a tight grip will hinder your swing. The V’s formed by the index finger and thumbs on both hands point between the chin and right shoulder. Turning hands anti-clockwise on the club shaft produces a weak grip, promoting a left-to-right flight of the ball (slice). Turning hands clockwise produces a strong grip, promoting a right-to-left flight of the ball (hook).

Do’s and Don’ts

Don’t grip the club too tightly

Do keep the rubber grips on your club handles in good condition. Worn grips cause problems by forcing you to hold the club too tightly.

Do get a feel for the grip by practising frequently gripping and re-gripping the club regularly.

Alignment

When you are practising, make sure your use you clubs as alignment. Lay one club on the ground parallel to the target line and another from toe to toe indicating the direction of your stance. To indicate the ball position, lay another club at 90deg’s to the target line extending backward from the ball toward your feet. Now check it all. When you are happy with the alignment you can a club across your shoulders, hips and thighs to check everything is aligned parallel to the target!

Do’s and Don’ts

Do check, check and check again, it will be invaluable to troubleshoot any problems.

Don’t leave the club between your feet longer than necessary but feel free to leave one club on the ground parallel to the target line during practice sessions.

Swing Path

To get a straight shot you require an inside to square i.e. hitting the ball squarely swing-path. An inside to outside swing-path encourages a hook, outside to inside swing-path a slice. Imagine a line extending through the ball to the target, your goal is a swing-path that starts on the inside striking the ball while moving slightly to the outside.

Also you can direct the ball with the club face – straight 90deg to the ball

Clubface open (>90deg) to ball encourages a slice or fade

Clubface closed (

Do’s and Don’ts

Do take some time and watch golfers practice. If you stand behind a practising golfer you can watch the variations in swing path and club face and see how it affects the shot, note the variations in swing path path and divot direction to see the shots produced..

Your pre shot routine

These tips may seem very time consuming at first but soon they will become second nature. When planning the shot ahead, look from behind the ball. Pick a target a few feet away (e.g. a leaf or divot) is easier and more accurate than aiming at 200 yards away. Stand about a foot behind where you will make your next shot and take a smooth practice swing or two focusing all your attention on the shot. Check the advice you have already learned above and build it into a routine, apply the thoughts and techniques in a particular order. Then and only then, take your final stance and start your shot. It is important to develop your own routine but make sure it is consistent for every shot, it enables the brain and muscles to develop memory.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do practice your pre-shot routine on the range you can ‘zone in’ without too many distractions. It is more difficult to develop when playing with other people or on the course.

Fault Fixing

Do’s and Don’ts

Do firstly identify the problem (whether it is slicing, hooking, lack of distance, etc).

Do verify the problem is there by asking another golfer to watch you take a few shots or video’ing yourself.

Don’t ignore it, it bad habits can be difficult to shake off over time.

Do find the cause of the problem. Start with the fundamentals of grip, stance, balance, alignment, etc. Take some shots changing each fundamental one at a time.

Do plan your course of action.

Do practice it again and again, repetition will help you build confidence.

Do try to give it enough time to fix.

Don’t be afraid of taking further advice.

Do look at the best golfer you are with and observe carefully. Check out for body position, stance, how high they lift the club and the motion used when they swing the club. Then apply it to your own game.

Golf swing

You really do need to have a handle on the fundamentals before you will be able to move to perfecting your swing. Although there is no such thing as a perfect swing, every golfer does it slightly differently. Once you have read the tips and advice, you need to put those techniques to work. Practice as often as you can until your you have found what works for you and best swing has become second nature. You can never practice too much!

Observation

Observe other players whether on the range, course or TV, you can always buy an instructional video. What are they doing that you are not?

Do’s and Don’ts

Do speak to other players, they will usually be happy to share some tips with you.

Do video tape golf on tv and watch them in slow motion.

The Mirror

Practice your own swing in a mirror or video yourself so you can see the differences between what you think you are doing and what you are actually doing, you may be surprised!

Do’s and Don’ts

Do check back on a regular basis to see if any bad habits have developed over time.

Head Position

Keep your head still and look straight at the ball. The position of your head should be straight in line with your spine, and your nose should be raised up a bit so that when you start to swing, your left shoulder fits under your chin. Don’t tuck your head into your chest as you will not be able to perform a proper swing.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do try to lean your body slightly forward to try to find the best place to keep your head so it doesn’t impede your swing but you can see the ball clearly.

Relax

A very basic step but crucial to your swing and your game in general, easier said than done I know, especially when tee-ing off with an audience. However, relaxing your muscles will enable your body to perform exactly as it needs to perform a great golf swing. When you have lined up your shot and taken your stance, systematically think about relaxing every muscle group in turn from your feet, lower legs, upper legs, lower back… all the way to your head. Continue this flexibility through your swing and it will work wonders.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do try on and off course techniques, consider cardio exercise, yoga or meditation.

Balance

Balance is very important through the whole duration of your swing, just like everything else it needs to be practiced. A good way to practice improving your balance is to get in the address position with your club (in stance with the club out in front behind the ball), relax your body and try holding it completely still for about 30 seconds (closing your eyes may help). Does it feel unbalanced like you have more weight on one foot or the other? Is one part of your body tighter or more tense than another? Adjust your balance accordingly so everything feels balanced.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do try slow practice swings to see if you get off-balance at any point during the swing.

Wrist Strength

The wrists play several roles the wrists in your golf swing, but the two most important are:

Controlling throughout the swing and with the proper clubface alignment.

Adding extra power at the point of impact.

You need to resist temptation to tighten your grip, so your wrists need to be strong to control the club throughout your swing. A simple exercise to improve wrist strength:

· Stand with a club at your side

· Lift the club up to 90deg by keeping your arm by your side, only using your wrist.

· You should feel the wrist and forearms taking the pressure, repeat 15-20 times as often as possible. Try longer clubs for more difficulty.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do try other gym based exercises to maximise your wrist, arm and torso strength.

Try reducing your backswing

There is a tendency for inexperienced players to have too long a backswing. You may lose accuracy or balance by swinging too far. Try varying your backswing from very short to very long to see what suits you best. Twist your shoulders until you feel tight, this should be the place to start, don’t rotate your hips to try to lift the club further. You can increase power by hinging your wrist up to 90deg to make them more flexible rather than keeping them locked. Keep it relaxed and you will notice the difference.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do experiment with different combinations of backswing and wrist flex.

Slow it down!

If you swing your arms too fast, your body can’t keep up, therefore you do not get the full power of your trunk and legs. You will also have difficulty keeping your club straight as it swings through impact.

Try this technique: hold the club at about waist height and swing the club, do it a few times and note how your body feels while doing it. As you swing, the club makes that sweet swishing sound, make a note of how it sounds. Now the challenge is to make the club swing faster, shift your body weight during the swing from the right leg to the left leg allowing your body to turn. By letting your arms swing freely you will notice the swishing sound is faster as you increase the speed of your body. Apply this now to your actual hitting swing, by increasing your trunk rotation but keeping your arms free.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do keep trying this until the swing becomes second nature.

Don’t think about putting power into the ball, this will only speed your arms up again. Just think about body rotation and shifting body weight your arms will follow your body through. The body is where the real power comes from.

Trying too hard – topping the ball

You really want to whack this next ball 100s of yards, but all you do is ‘top’ it and send it dribbling down the fairway. Why does this happen? It is usually one of two reasons. The first is down to poor stance (see above) because your body was not balanced when you assumed your stance position, leaning over too much. Your body instinctively tries to re-balance, raising up mid swing, your club comes down off the ground higher than you started, causing you to hit the top of the ball.

Another reason is because you set up with your arms extended, then bending your arms during the swing.

To stop this from happening, don’t try so hard, stop trying to get too much power in the shot. Focus on getting the ball in the air rather than power. If you get every ball airborne, rather than on the ground, you will be consistently hitting shots correctly, this will give you more confidence.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do try to get it up in the air before concentrating on extending the distance.

Do keep your arm extension the same throughout the swing.

Download Part 2 of this report – Short Game and Putting Tips at http://winning-golf-tips.freehostia.com

If like most golfers who enjoy the game you can’t quite figure out how to improve your game enough to achieve a respectable score then maybe you should consider instructional golf videos as a means of help.

Instructional golf videos are a valuable resource that can show you the necessary golf techniques, tips and lessons that you need to improve your swing and help to lower your score. Most video guides show a real life golfer who not only illustrates the techniques in detail but also speaks you through the steps and highlights the pitfalls and potential problems you may encounter. The best guides use high definition video that not only shows the techniques in super clarity but also enable you to freeze frams and use slow motion playback to the best effect.

Whenever I have tried to improve my golf swing I have always had the best success by using instructional videos Its not unusual to find golf videos on a wide range of techniques, but equally you can find videos that concentrate on a single aspect of your game. I have always found, however, no matter what the video concentrates on that I can improve my golf swing to a certain degree by their use.

Golf is one of my great passions, but my there is always some aspect of my game that needs work. Like most golfers, the more I play the better I get, but there is still always somoe part of my game that I need to improve. I personally love the game of golf and I try to play a round whenever I get a chance, but that doesnt mean to say that my game is anywhere near perfect. Fortunately I was shown a golf swing video some time ago and after several viewing I had a marked improvement in my gane – often by as many as 3 shots.

So, if you always seem to be saying ‘what can I do to improve my golf swing’ then I can personally recommend that you get a good instructional golf video to help you.

One of the best ways to get better at your golfing skills, is to hire the training of a pro-golf trainer. If you’re anything like me, you’re a “do it on my own” king of person. But this is in many cases the wrong approach. A pro golfer can give you specific instruction and exercises that will help you improve a lot faster that you will on your own. It will also be a lot less painful.

So getting a golf pro to rain and instruct you on your golf swing is a great idea. Now, how do you go about finding just the right golf instructor?

There are a number of ways to do that. You can go to golf shops and look at ads or ask the shop keeper and other people who come to the shop. Another way is to go the country club or golf course and ask around. Don’t just go for the first instructor you meet, but examine a few of them. Try to watch them as they give lessons to other students, and than ask yourself – is this an instructor I would like to work with?

When hiring a golf instructor, it’s important you take a few lessons with them and ask yourself – do I have good communication with this gold pro? If you feel there remains a communication gap between two of you, there is no harm in parting ways and looking for a new gold instructor. Even your current pro may be able to make a recommendation if you just explain to him/her your difficulties in a polite and respectful manner.

When you do find a good instructor you want to work with, don’t make the mistake of thinking that you can have the perfect swing in just a few sessions. It takes a lot more than that to improve your game significantly. Every student has his/her own pace, and golf techniques take time to learn, and even more time to perfect. Always listen to your gold trainer, and don’t waste your and his time by neglecting to implement his instructions. Your instructor will also recommend additional practice time, and you will be wise to listed to this advice and take advantage of this.

If your gold pro does a good job, there is no harm in giving them a nice tip or bonus. It’s worthwhile to keep in mind that golf pro’s take much pride in their work and profession. They also have a lot of passion to the game and if you show similar passion and respect their skill, you will get a lot in return.

Golf is one of those sports that grab you from the very first time you play. There are actually very few outdoor activities out there which allow you to engage in some competitive fun with your friends. Furthermore, I’ve never heard anyone say that they’ve become tired or bored of playing golf. Whether golf is your life long passion or a recent fling, getting some good golf instruction will only make the sport more exciting. The best way to get useful golf tips from experts is to go online and find a website that you can relate to. Cameron Strachan’s golf blog is the perfect place to get golf swing instruction from someone who knows everything about this sport.

If you’re feeling frustrated about your golf swing not being very consistent you’re definitely in need of some golf swing instruction. Getting great tips from people who’ve already been there and are now playing a great game of golf is the best way of improving your handicap. The first thing you’ll probably hear from anyone passionate about golf is that practice makes perfect. Obviously, playing golf three times a year with your buddies from work won’t lead to you becoming a golf superstar – or at least someone who can play a fairly consistent game. At cameronsgolfblog.com you can get great golf instruction and useful tips to improve your game.

When aiming to improve your golf swing there are a few basics that you need to remember at all times. The first thing on your golf swing instruction calendar – and probably the one you’ll tend to overlook – is getting a reasonable warm up. A good idea is to start using the wedge and then to work your way up to the clubs when you feel comfortable. Relax your grip and your shoulders and remember that striking the ball with power is not half as important as precision. Although you probably know plenty about golf technique, when you’re on the course all that matters is how you play the game. Try a more relaxed approached and you’ll have a better understanding of the areas where you need some extra golf instruction.   

The best golf players in the world are extremely consistent. Improving game consistency is probably the number one reason why people look for golf swing instruction. If you want your game to improve it’s very important that you try to address your shots with equal consistency. Take your time to get into perfect swinging position and make sure you feel comfortable with the club you’re using. Having good control over your backswing is also critical to making a good shot. Avoid forcing your backswing and don’t bring your club too far. Follow the ball through smoothly and maintain your head down at all times. If you’re looking for some down to earth golf instruction, check out Cameron Strachan’s golf blog.

Golf may be a lot of fun but it is also a highly complex sport. However, if you follow some simple golf swing instruction you’ll soon see be able to see that your game has improved. These days you can easily find tips from expert golfers on the web. At cameronsgolfblog.com you’ll get all the best golf lessons, tips and tricks regardless of your game level.

Professional golfers on the PGA Tour understand the connection between golf swing mechanics and the body. The most notable players in the world have regimented golf fitness programs they adhere religiously too. The benefits of such programs have been well documented in the media. Press clippings from Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, and Phil Mickelson all refer to golf fitness exercises being a component of their regular practice schedule.

The amateur can learn a lot from the pros. They can learn the importance the body has in relation to the golf swing, how golf swing mechanics and the body are intertwined, and improvement in the golf game requires the implementation of a golf fitness program.

Where most amateurs get “off-track” with their golf fitness training is the components and exercises incorporated in such a program. Golf fitness programs are quite different then “general” fitness or “weight training” programs. A golf fitness program is designed to develop the golfer’s body around the golf swing. In order for this to occur certain parameters and exercises are required in such a program.

First and foremost the amateur golfer must understand the connection between the golf swing and body. The golf swing is a complex series of biomechanical movements execute by the golfer. In order for the golfer to execute the biomechanics of the golf swing correctly. It is necessary for the golfer to have certain physical parameters well developed.

These physical parameters are flexibility, balance, muscular strength, muscular endurance, and muscular power. High levels of flexibility, balance, strength, endurance, and power are required to execute the golf swing correctly. Often times the amateur golfer is not flexible enough, strong enough, or powerful enough to execute the golf swing correctly.

This results in the golfer developing compensation patterns in their golf swing. The result being poor shots and high scores on the golf course. Bottom line is a physical foundation of flexibility, balance, strength, endurance, and power is required to develop an efficient golf swing. If the amateur golfer is lacking in anyone of these categories the foundation upon which the golf swing is being built will be insufficient.

Once the amateur golfer understands the connection between the golf swing and the body it is necessary to implement a golf fitness program, A golf fitness program is different than “traditional” training programs in such this type of program develops the body around the golf swing.

A golf fitness program trains the body to the positions, movements, and requirements of the golf swing. A golf fitness program is not concern about “beach muscles” or how one looks in the mirror. Rather a golf fitness program has the primary goal of improving the scores on the golf course and play of the golfer.

This type of improvement is a result of using exercise to develop the physical parameters of the body relative to the golf swing. A golf fitness program will include flexibility exercises, balance drills, muscular strength exercise, endurance training modalities, and power drills. Exercises from all of these categories are included in a comprehensive golf fitness program.

Understand the exercises and drills within each of these categories are not necessarily traditional type of exercises. For example, flexibility exercises for golf are less concerned about touching your toes, and more concerned about completing a full shoulder turn. Flexibility exercises for golf are geared towards developing the flexibility within your body to execute the components of the golf swing correctly.

The same can be said about every other category of exercise and drill incorporated in a golf fitness program. The balance drills in a golf fitness program are designed to improve the golfer’s balance capacities relative to the golf swing. Power exercises in a golf fitness program are designed to improve clubhead speed. Where as power drills in other programs may be geared towards improving how fast you run.

Once the amateur golfer understands the connection between the golf swing and body, the elements of the body needing development relative to the golf swing, and the components of a golf fitness program. The final component of understanding is golf fitness training order.

Often times the amateur golfer desires more power (i.e. clubhead speed) in their golf swing. As a result they perform only exercises to enhance the power components within their body. What the amateur golfer fails to realize is developing golf strength, endurance, or power is useless if they do not have the flexibility or balance capacities to execute the golf swing. Developing the body for the golf swing requires the amateur golfer to follow a specific order relative to their training programs.

It is necessary for the amateur golfer to first develop their flexibility for the golf swing. Secondly proceed to increasing their balance capacities in relation to the golf swing. Continue the process with developing strength and endurance for the golf swing. Completing the process with power drills to enhance clubhead speed. This guarantees the effort placed within a golf fitness program will enhance the golfer’s swing. It becomes a simple process once the golfer is educated on the relationship between the golf swing and the body. The benefits a golf fitness program has upon the golfer’s swing, and how to implement golf fitness exercises correctly.

Sean Cochran