Perform Better Golf Blog

The No Backswing Golf Swing. What the heck? I thought the Stack and Tilt Golf Swing was the new, whiz bang golf method taking the golf community by storm. Is golf now getting like dieting? There’s a “new way” every week.

This no backswing approach is one that’s been used as a golf drill by golf instruction professionals for years, so it’s kind of comical this is the new craze in golf swing improvement.

It has a lot of merits to consider. The short backswing makes your transition and sequence of motion in the downswing much easier. It enhances solid ball contact which maximizes distance; so what you think you might lose from backswing coil, you gain in ball/clubface contact.

Unfortunately the negative is the golf swing requires a take-away. This no backswing golf swing removes that, so you might have a difficult time carrying over from the drill to can actual swing from address.

This may or may not be an issue, but I think doing the No Backswing Golf Swing is worth a shot. Who knows…you may dramatically improve your golf swing consistency and mechanics.

Golf instruction is becoming high tec to say the least. To get a video of your swing is one of the most helpful things you can do to really take a look at the “root cause” of your swing faults and mishits. So once you get this video of your golf swing, what should you do next?

You have several options to take the next step. You can book a couple of lessons from a golf professional to work on what you saw on the video. You can go out on your own and purchase a golf instruction book at your local bookstore, or you can get a golf swing instruction video to learn in the privacy of your own home, without stepping foot outside your front door.

Don’t waste your money on a video or book that does not help you with your particular need. There is a lot of garbage out there, and it is imperative you stay focused on your “end goal”, which is different and unique for every golfer out there.

I am a firm believer in finding out the “cause” of your swing fault, and not just looking for a band aide to quickly fix it (because band aide fixes aren’t long term). Getting that initial video of your golf swing is the first start, then diagnosing what mechanically is happening, then finally locating the cause of it.

The last thing is to find is a resource like our Full Golf Swing DVD that will help you correct any mechanical inefficiency and get you on the path to better, more enjoyable golf.

With this approach, you’ll be shocked at how easy and quickly you can fix a swing fault forever! No more struggling on the course. You’re just a short way from playing your best golf!

Want a great golf gift for your loved one, co-worker, even your boss?

I have come across what I know to be the most effective power golf swing trainer to hit the market in a LONG time, that will definitely increase your power and more importantly your driving distance.

Take a look below at how I use this everyday, and can outdrive anyone in my foursome easily.

This is the Perfect Connextion Power Golf Swing Trainer available at Perform Better Golf!

Golf instruction just got a lot easier. Taking golf lessons is critical, but if you don’t have the correct feeling for a connected golf swing, you’ll struggle indefinitely. This swing trainer gives you “instant feel.”

Senior golfers struggle with golf swing mechanics due to declining physical abilities. You have 2 choices. Improve your physical abilities with golf-specific conditioning, or use effective swing trainers like this one to quickly see improvement. The combination of both is best!

Golfers need to understand feel, and feel is learned, not taught!

For any holiday,  Christmas, Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day, and Birthday’s, this is a great golf gift!

Learning how to be better at golf is a lifelong mission for most of us. Peaks and valleys is commonplace. We all are addicted to the challenge of hitting a good shot, and once in a while hitting one that keeps us “coming back”.

Below is a list of golf improvement approaches that you can use independently or in combination to learn how to play better golf:

Golf Instruction

The golf swing requires certain movements that are not very natural, so golf swing instruction should be at the top of your list, especially if you’re a beginning golfer. Learning the fundamentals of golf is something every golfer needs and struggles with even as you improve.

Golf instruction can be through private one-on-one golf lessons. Group lessons (which are less expensive). Online instruction is becoming more and more popular. Golf instruction books. And golf instruction DVDs is another great alternative, that is much less costlier than private lessons.

Golf-Specific Fitness

I’m making this number 2 on the list, but easily could be a tie with number one, as many golfers, especially senior golfers have physical limitations that will not enable them to apply what they learn in their golf lessons, making improvement nearly impossible.

I am a firm believer that you are only capable of what your body can do in golf. In simpler terms, your body is keeping you from a better game. How many times have you told yourself you need a bigger backswing? Come on…be honest! What you are indirectly telling yourself, is your body can’t make a bigger backswing, and I’m telling you the ONLY way to improve it is with golf-specific stretching exercises specific to your backswing.

If you’re looking for longer drives, you need to improve your core strength and flexibility. This is the engine to your golf swing. When I talk about fitness, I’m not talking about going to a gym, and spending 2 grueling hours a day. I’m talking about doing, easy, fun and effective exercises right in your home with minimal equipment.

All you need is an exercise ball, exercise tubing (w/handles) and hand weights. That’s your entire golf fitness “in-home” gym. For under $50 you can have your own golf fitness gym, and start seeing results quickly.

If you need guidance on your golf fitness program, take a look at my Effortless Golf Swing Training System.

Golf Swing Training Aids

Another great option that can be very effective for specific swing faults is a golf swing training aid. There is a lot of garbage out there, and a few good pieces. The goal of any training aid is to ultimately make your swing better, but more specifically to help you correct YOUR personal swing fault.

This swing fault may be any number of them, such as a slice, top, thin, chunk, hook, pop up or any other ugly mishit that we all hate. There is only ONE training aid I think so highly of that I offer it on my site. The hinged golf club is an absolute gem of a training aid.

This club gives you INSTANT feedback as to the mistake you’re making in your golf swing. Whether it be a jerky takeaway, or an off plane swing, the hinge will break to show you it’s incorrect. Whether your tempo is off, or your swing plane, this training aid will get you corrected making a near perfect golf swing in no time!

I’ll be back later today, to finish this post, so stay tuned!

I just got done watching The Golf Channel’s Playing Lessons With The Pro’s. They had JB Holmes on it, so since I’m a big believer in the advantages of power in your golf swing, I watched it (Tivo of course).

Look at his address position above. A really strong grip with his left hand turned over the top of the club quite a bit. Also, notice his ball position. Off his left foot instead of the heel. This could be the camera angle, but I’ll bet it’s pretty accurate.

What I see immediately in his swing (this is with a golf driver) is the minimal wrist cock at the top of his golf swing. So many teaching pro’s advocate a full wrist cock for maximum power, but he’s proving them wrong isn’t he.

But…what he does do is a FULL shoulder turn with a restricted hip turn creating maximum torque in his core area. This is the engine to his golf swing, and creates a tremendous amount of golf swing speed.

Notice on the way down, JB has a tremendous rotation of his lower body. His teaching pro on the show mentioned this is his power in his golf swing. The aggressive move of his lower body starting his downswing. He mentioned on the show, he feels like he pull’s down from the top. No wrist release (casting) of the club.

Please take note, it is not a slide of his lower body, but a rotation. He quickly follows his hips with his core, chest and shoulders aggressively turning through impact.

One thing he mentioned that I thought was interesting, was his “hands getting ahead of the ball” even with a driver. I had never heard of that before. He says it gives him that whipping effect very late in the swing maximizing his clubhead speed through the ball and not before it. He also, said it delofts his clubs making the ball fly lower and run after ground contact.

I find it interesting to see all the different golf swings on tour and how any of us can find a tour player to emulate with our particular body structure.

If you are not a full wrist cock kind of golfer, JB Holmes might be a swing you’ll want to try.

The full golf swing is something that should be a major focus for any golfer at any level. If you can’t make a repetitive swing that holds up for 18 holes, you’re in for a long round that ends up in frustration and unhappiness.

My personal golf instructor has agreed to provide some valuable golf swing tips right from his Golf Swing System that I’ve personally used to add 15 yards on my drives, and lower my score by 5 strokes, and I was a single digit already.

There are so many components to a good swing, that many golfers get overwhelmed and frustrated, never to improve. This golf swing system I’m talking about is simple, effective, easy-to-implement, and better yet…I’ve used it personally with awesome results.

I spent the past 10 years looking for a golf professional who could help me with my game. Thousands of dollars later, I finally found MY PRO! Not only has Bobby helped my golf swing immensely, he REALLY cares about me. I have NEVER met a golf instructor with SO much passion and care.

Have you ever been obsessed with getting a divot in golf swing? I used to struggle to get a divot even with my sand wedge until I finally realized you “hit down on it” to not only get a divot, but to make the ball spin and hold on the green.

Golf Divot

Creating a divot means you are hitting the ball first, then the ground. A divot before the ball is called a “fat shot”, which is something you want to try to avoid at all cost. A fat shot loses a tremendous amount of distance.

On the other hand, hitting the ball then taking a divot in your golf swing is something the professionals do on every golf swing they take. In order to do this, your hands have to be ahead of your clubhead at impact, which creates a descending blow on the ball. The most common problem is golfers try to lift the ball in the air and the clubhead gets ahead of your hands causing thin or bladed shots.

Your ball position can also play a role in where you contact it at the bottom of your golf swing. If it’s too far back, it’s hard to have room to rotate after impact. If it’s too far foward, you end up sliding laterally to get to the ball and hit it.

The ideal divot is about the size of a dollar bill and is only a half inch deep. Deeper divots mean you are coming down too steep onto the ball.

The moment of truth in golf - impact position! It really doesn’t matter what you do unless you get back to impact with a square clubface. I was watching the Natalie Gulbis show on The Golf Channel, and some guy asked her what the most important thing in the golf swing was, and that is exactly what she said. “Square impact!”

If you look at Tiger Woods impact below, you’ll see that his hands are ahead of the clubhead and he is compressing the golf ball. I got this off YouTube so it’s not a really good picture, but you can see what I’m talking about.

Impact position is different with your driver as you need to sweep the club into the ball, not hit down on it with your hands ahead like with this iron shot above. But with most, if not all your irons, and even hybrid clubs, you should have your hands ahead at impact.

Head

Your head should not slide laterally towards the target during the downswing. Tiger’s head actually is further back at impact than when it was at address. This takes a tremendous amount of core strength  and flexibility, and most golfers (especially senior golfers) don’t work on their core, and could not achieve this position with the head.

Shoulders

Here’s a secret golf tip Ernie El’s gives about the shoulders in the golf swing. At the start of your downswing, get the left shoulder moving away from your chin as soon as possible. Look at how far Tigers chin is from his left shoulder at impact. A flaw I currently have is not clearing my hips, and getting “jammed up” at impact, and you’ll see my chin is still quite close to my left shoulder. I am working on getting those shoulders to clear through at impact.

Hips

Your hips are definitely starting to clear at impact. The are aggressively rotating to the left to get out of the way for the club to freely swing at optimum speed through impact and beyone. I have a swing fault where my hips don’t clear as much as they should, and I fight and grind through impact. I am working on golf swing drills as we speak to correct this.

Knees

You can see how Tigers right knee has really “kicked in” towards the golf ball, and his left knee is starting to straighten (but not lock). You know you’ve rotated your hips if that right knee is more kicked in that when it was at address. Your knees will show you a lot if you ever get on video.

Feet

The feet believe-it-or-not play a key role at impact. The weight in the feet has changed from address to impact, and the right foot is really starting to “kick in” resulting in the right knee kicking in as mention above. The downswing should start from the ground up, and the first move is with the right foot pushing off. Now don’t think this is a lateral push, but more of a rotational one. The left foot has more weight on it at impact.

I truly believe impact is EVERYTHING in golf, and if you don’t get it right, you’ll be one heck-of-a frustrated golfer for a long time.

After all these years of struggling to take my game to the next level (low single digit) I had a HUGE revelation yesterday, so of course I ran to the range to try it. Wow! This could truly change my game forever. Let me explain, and maybe it can help you with your golf swing.

I have been a student of the golf swing for over 15 years now, and have studied every inch of the swing. I own every instruction book ever written, and I have golf swing sequences of all the greats in the game.

I am a VERY analytical person, so I tend to “over-analyze” everything, which for golf is not typically a good thing.

Well…one flaw I had in my studies of the swing was to try to mimic the downswing from the front angle. So looking straight into the mirror. I found out yesterday that it has been misleading me for ALL these years! You see…the golf swing is NOT just a down movement, but more importantly an “around” movement. The golf swing is a BIG continuous circle around your body.

The HUGE mistake I was making was focusing on “coming down” and not around! This was an epiphany for me. This down motion all these years was not allowing me to clear my hips and swing to the left after impact. I would come down steep on the ball, my left shoulder (and hips) would get jammed up, making me come up at impact, then I would just muscle it through to “hit” the ball not swing through.

And another very exciting thing is I hit the ball a LONG way with that BIG technique flaw. Once I’m able to FREELY swing around my body, I can confidently predict my drives will be over 330 yards, as I now drive it 300 quite a bit of the time.

You can bet one thing for sure!

I’ll be banging balls for the next few days ingraining this AROUND feeling. In fact, yesterday after I had this epiphany, I went out and hit 100 balls with my wedge and it was AMAZING! It was working. It was such a different feeling for me after all these years swinging the OTHER way.

I am SO EXCITED about this and I hope you can take something away from this as well.

The journey continues!

Your golf swing transition is one of the MOST important aspects of your golf swing. Many golfers (including me sometimes) get this wrong. The sequence of motion that occurs from the top of your backswing going into the downswing is critical to maximizing optimal golf swing power and distance.

As seen in the picture above with Ben Hogan, you can see a big emphasis on the lower body from the top. I don’t really like the angle of his shoulders in the second picture, or his right elbow so “stuck” to his right side, but I think you get the idea.
Many golf swing faults like over the top (slice), casting and a “hit” mentality are a result of an improper transition from the top of your golf swing.

One very important move is the transfer of weight from the right side at the top to approximately center very quickly. This is nearly a 50/50 balance of weight at this point. As you can see with hogan, there is not a big lateral slide of the hips from the top, but a little bump and then an aggressive rotation of the left hip to get out of the way so the right side can fire as hard as it wants coming into impact.

This golf swing transition move is one I work on daily in front of a mirror, and still have a hard time doing it correctly on the course.