IT'S THE MOST WONDERFUL JOB IN THE WORLD!

Seasons greetings to you all and hope you have had a great Christmas and looking forward to the new year, quickly gathering thoughts about new years resolutions and how you can make 2017 a year to remember for all the right reasons.

As it is the season of goodwill I'd just like to share a story with you. Unfortunately it's not a swing tip to help your golf or a mindset technique to lower your scores on course.

As it's the time of year to be thankful for what we all have in life. Thankful for our families. Thankful for our friends. Thankful to all the people who help us throughout the year, whether it be doctors making us feel better or shop assistants who put a smile on our face that we remember.

I am thankful for a lot of things, but one element of my life I am very thankful for.......................................My career as a Golf Instructor. To teach golf for a living was always what I was destined to do ever since my dad took me to the local golf course at the age of 6. I got to a decent standard as a amateur but never excelled and won local tournaments as opposed to regional and national which was the stepping stone to the elite in the game. It was by the time I was 18 I had to make a choice. My dad passed away when I just turned 15 and, not wanting to let him down, took A levels as he wanted me to from 16 to 18. Unfortunately, to not much success due to the lack of effort I put into them, my fault completely but the motivation was never there to succeed in getting good grades. So my 18th year came and a job at the local course shop came up where I'd learned to play and I was up for it, it ticked all the boxes. Working in an environment that I had experience, knowledge and a bit of skill in. Working under a great coach, Neil McEwan, I learnt a lot about the swing and fed off Neil and his teaching. It fascinated me reading his folder of swings that he compiled and occasionally sneaking a look when he took his pupils into the video room to analyse their swings. I was hooked!

But the thing that hooked me the most........ he was helping people. He was helping put a smile on golfers faces when they hit the ball better. It was why they called on his services, to help them get over their own frustrations in this great game and he 'fixed' them, bringing a sense of relief in the knowledge that they weren't going mad and they can hit the ball as good as they once did or had the ability to give their friends a run for their money on the golf course. And this was mostly due to the influence of the coach, guiding them in the right direction, helping them learn about what worked and what didn't.

This was the clincher for me. I wanted a piece of the action. I wanted to be the one to help golfers of all levels and abilities play better as I knew myself how frustrating this game could be. I got as many golf books and dvd's as I could about the swing and the game (still do) and went about teaching the game I love to other people and share my knowledge to enable them to love the game.

There is no more satisfying sensation. Receiving a text or email saying 'thank you, I played my best ever round today'. Of course, I only help a small percentage of the way. It is up to the player themselves when they step onto the tee to put what we have done into action and trust it. It doesn't always happen, that's the nature of the game of golf, but when it does happen it creates a huge buzz for player and coach.

I'm thankful for my career, a life of teaching the game of golf to anyone who wants to learn. It certainly beats the 9 to 5 pressure packed grind.

And my new years resolution? To continue to learn and progress to maintain high standards to bring even more smiles to golfers at the end of every session.

DROWNING IN INFORMATION

As I sit here and write this blogpost, I am reviewing my year of coaching which has been overall a fantastic one. Things like what I did well and what do I need to improve to make me a better coach in 2017 are going through my mind.

I am extremely lucky in doing what I do and wake up everyday ecstatic in the fact that I am doing something that I absolutely love...... teaching people the game of golf and coaching them to enjoy the game more. The smile and satisfaction on a golfers face when they hit the sweet spot and see the ball heading high and straight is a sight to behold.

However, when a golfer hits a bad shot, as any human would do in whatever walk of life, they get upset. Information overload is what a player seeks in Golf to try and rectify a barren phase in their game, whether it be on the course or on the driving range.

With readily available information in our fingertips, YouTube and other such sites are places to go to rectify these bad habits and golf shots that make a scratch handicapper look as though they've just taken up the game.

However, BE WARNED ABOUT THE INFORMATION ON THERE!!!

It goes back to that adage...... don't believe everything you read (or see).

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Even Facebook are now realising the fact that there is so much useless and false information out there in their new drive to clamp out untrue news items.

Let me give you an example. You play a game of golf on Saturday. The previous week your game was tip top, couldn't put a foot wrong. You were hyped up for the monthly medal the next Saturday, confidence was brimming. Until the first tee! Bosh....... out of bounds! Bosh........ second in the same place, high right and slicing. And it continues throughout the game leading to an inevitable handicap rise.

That night you go home and type into YouTube search 'cure my slice' and 30,500 videos come on under that search subject. You choose the top one. You go through the 5 minute video, understand it, get excited for Sundays game to put it right....................but the same thing happens!!!

What happened? You were certain you found the answer, certain you performed the swing as you had to so why did it still go wrong?

Has this happened to you?

This is information overload. And information overload that is irrelevant for us!

The video might have been bang on correct but it might not have been the exact fix you needed to cure the rare slice you have. All it did was add conscious thought into your brain and the brain tried to process a lot in a short space of time during the swing...... never a good thing when you are trying to perform a consistent and fluid movement pattern that the golf swing is.

I have just finished reading a book called 'Content Inc' by Joe Pullizzi and in it he talks about the relevant content that experts in their field must put out there and it got me thinking there is a heck of a lot of content out there but not all relevant to you and your needs.

Don't get me wrong. I think there is a huge demand and need for items such as YouTube videos and blogs to help us get better. But please don't desperately search for the absolute fix of all fixes when you're golf is not going so well. Choose your content wisely and spread it out over time so you develop knowledge over years as opposed to cramming the entire physiology of the golf swing in one night before the monthly medal and expect to go out and play your best.

Below is a list of Golf pro's I believe have the best content out there currently. Seek them out, learn from them, question them even:

- Mark Crossfield. He hasn't got 200,000+ subscribers on YouTube for nothing.

- Andrew Rice. Fantastic coach who keeps all aspects of the game very simple

- Adam Young. Superb young coach who has written the best selling golf book (The Practice Manual) this past couple of years. Seek out his blogs and read his book (and then re-read it).

- Michael Hebron. A veteran coach who has committed his time to the process of the brain and the way humans learn new skills. Written numerous books that need to be read by any golfer of any ability.

In my mind, there are many more out there, too many to list, but these are the most relevant for you, the club golfer out there wanting to get better.

Learn from them as they are the experts in their field. Don't take everything as gospel, especially when it comes to your own game. But this is what is so good about their content....... it's relevant to the majority of golfers. Not just a 'one size fixes all' mentality, a true learning curve about how to get better at this game we love.

HOW TO LOVE GOLF IN THE WINTER!

Let's face it, how many of you play golf in the winter and how many of you relegate your clubs to the garage for 6 months? Golf is deemed a summer game, and rightfully so in many respects. The smell of fresh cut grass, bone dry fairways and greens that run true are more possible during favourable summer conditions where there is little need for a skin tight layer with large mittens ensuring your hands don't get drenched or gain frost bite.

But I am here to tell you that you will get a HUGE amount of benefit from continuing to play during the winter months which will help you kick start your golfing season in 2017 as opposed to waiting until July to find your golf swing again after a hefty lay off only to realise half the season has already gone and passed you by.

If you ensure you are wearing the correct clothing, the benefits you will gain from continuing to hit balls during the winter period is substantial.

It was Nick Faldo who once said he practises on Christmas Day because he can gain an advantage over his competition by doing so as no one else will be hitting balls on December the 25th! I'm not suggesting you put down your beers and leave the Turkey in the oven to do that but feel free to do so.

Here are my top tips to get you out and motivated to want to practise during the winter season:

- GO TO THE RANGE WITH FRIENDS. This is a fairly obvious point but one I feel is the most important. We need that motivation to want to get out and practise when the weathers cold. We get home from work after a long and cold day, feel the warmth of the heating and decide it's a better option than hitting balls alone which feels like a chore. It definitely wont feel like a chore when you are having fun and competing with your mates on the driving range. Hit balls to a target, closest to the pin/target, who can hit it further, who hits the lowest shot, who hits the highest shot and so on. Compete with each other, offer advice and, most of all, have fun with the interaction. You will soon get warmed up with the interaction and fun you will have by testing each others skills.

- TEST YOURSELF. No, this is not a self examination as such, this is competing with yourself. If your friends can't make it to the range then challenge yourself........... hit it low with a short iron, high with a long iron, curve the ball, test the contact using foot spray on the club to see where you make contact. Plenty of ways to enhance your motivation and increase skill set as opposed to aimlessly hitting balls to the wide area the driving range is situated.

- TAKE A LESSON OR TWO AND WORK ON YOUR SWING. Admit it, you've had a good season and you were too scared to take a lesson because you felt it would make you a worse golfer and therefore break your pattern of good Golf? Don't panic, you aren't the only one to think like that, and that's why taking a lesson or two during the winter period is a good thing. There is a powerful theory out there that you have to get worse before you get better. This is not strictly true. Yes, sometimes it does happen, as soon as we make a swing change the results can become massively variable owing to the differing demands put on the club and body positions and therefore the sequencing of the swing can be lost......... but only for a matter of a few shots. This is why I ALWAYS say to players, whenever they make a change to NOT WORRY ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS TO THE BALL. The result of the golf shot should not be the issue to begin with when making a change. The main focal point should be the process of making that change and what we have been told to do to try and improve the ball flight. And that is why changing an element of the swing during the winter time is the best period to do so. Why? Because we have less of a care about the results during the winter. There are far fewer (if any) competitions and golf on the course is rare, so we are less concerned about the results and therefore more likely to be able to embed the changes to our swing. WE ARE FAR LESS LIKELY TO COMMIT TO A SWING CHANGE IF WE ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE INITIAL RESULTING BALL FLIGHT.

A good pro will ensure it takes no more than a dozen balls to enable that ball flight to be better but your role of a golfer to help implement these changes must be to accept the initial ball flight, because if you try and correct that flight, all hell will break loose and the shots can then go anywhere!

Try these tips when winter golfing. As long as you have all the layers on you need you will have a lot of fun out there.

WHO WANTS TO SEE THEIR GOLF SWING?

The sheer beauty of any movement, whether it be swinging a golf club, running, throwing or any other physical movement pattern, is that we can't see what we're doing or how we are doing it. If we did try and see what we were doing in our everyday movement you would see a lot of people walking down the street with their heads down bumping into people (that happens anyway when we are looking at our phones but that's a slightly different point).

We have been told numerous times that to hit the perfect golf shot we need to get into the perfect positions. The Golf Machine, the golf coaches 'bible', breaks the swing down into 10 different segments. Granted, these are important for a coach and player to know, but to be aware of them during the swing is an extremely difficult skill and almost impossible when we consider the speed from the start of the downswing to impact.

In my experience in the game of golf I have even seen players look at the top of the backswing during their full swinging motion to see where they are in regards to the right or wrong position! It doesn't come highly recommended but they could still strike the golf ball very well despite this slight idiosyncrasy.

To enable players, whatever level they may be, to learn about their own swing is crucial, and that's why in 99% of the lessons I do I use the GASP video analysis with a high speed Casio exilim camera from down the line and the front to gain access to all areas to see why bad shots are caused. and, importantly, help the golfer understand reasons for errant shots to help them self diagnose.

JB Holmes demonstrating the 'not-so straight' left arm.

But I do always ask the question to the golfer, especially if it's a player who has never seen their swing on video before, what good things do they see in their swing! This is an alien concept to a lot of people as golfers tend to have a perception that a coach will rip them apart and completely overhaul their swing which is absolutely not true........ and if it was you need to go and find yourself another coach!

Yes, there are always going to be elements of the swing that are going to need improving to help the player get better, but if you can hit the ball and not miss it there are always going to be some very good parts to the action.

My point of this article?

With a mountain of access to video recorders in this day and age, take the time when you're next on the driving range to film your swing. But here's the catch!!!!

You are only allowed to watch it back if you point out the GOOD things that occur in your swing and not the BAD things! It might be your set up you find good, take-away, grip, top of swing, follow through............ anything you can see that makes you say 'wow, I didn't know I did that'. You don't even need to know much about the swing itself, it is your perception and the purpose of this drill is to give you a more positive perception of your action.

The human mind is designed to think negatively, thus golfers when they are about to see their swing for the first time have an element of trepidation. They think it's going to be shocking with a mass of positions that are incorrect. In over 15 years of teaching I think I have heard five players say they don't like their own swing or can see a lot wrong when they do actually see it.

Take some time to focus on the good things and not the bad. Yes, we all want to improve but improvement in the game of golf is not going to take place if we are constantly FIXING every swing that we make. Trust me, there are going to be plenty of things to appreciate in your swing, make the time and effort to see these positives.

Contact is Crucial!

Golf is a tad frustrating at times. One minute we can be playing the best golf of our lives, the next minute it goes completely wrong and we hit a shot of disastrous proportions that costs us our place at the top of the podium in the monthly medal and fail to reduce our handicap when we were all set up for a huge reduction.

Ever wondered why this is?

Of course you have, we wouldn't be human otherwise. Our curious brain tries to define and focus as to why we might have hit that shank/thin/fat (delete as appropriate). The mind gets clouded up with the potential areas of our swing that were the prime cause of the shot that costs us golfing glory and stains our near perfect scorecard. The problem with this is though there are hundreds upon hundreds of reasons in the swing that a certain bad shot could have happened. On the course though, we only have one chance to put it right which limits our options of correction and, usually, our hunches turn out to be either wrong or we just don't fully commit to the shot in hand, leading to more disasters as opposed to fixing the issue.

'How do we avoid such disasters though'? I hear you scream into your browser!

If I had one definitive answer I would be the golfing oracle. Unfortunately there isn't one specific answer as we are all different. Some swing thoughts that work well with one person will work the opposite with another golfer.

There is, however, something we can do to help, and this goes out to a large majority of you who don't practice (yes you, I see you out there just on the course and not hitting any shots on your local driving range).

The majority of poor shots are caused by ONE issue(yes, just one). And it is the simplest of all elements to correct as we don't have to think to much about it to correct and is fairly obvious when we've done it well or not performed it as well as we could.

Its called CONTACT. In my definition, it's simply where the ball has contacted the face of the club. It's either toe of the club, heel (hosel), top, bottom (leading edge) or centre and these have a HUGE influence on the distance and the direction that the golf balls travels. But it is also the simplest way of improving your golf if you get it right!

The first step, however, is to discover WHERE on the face you are striking the ball. For example, I have seen many a golfer hit the ball very low to the right consistently, disaster shots which are otherwise known as a shank, a shot where the ball is striking the hosel of the golf club. But when I ask the player where they feel they contacted the ball, more often than not they are not 100% sure and it's a guess.

Have some fun with some contact stickers or..........................................

So why will it help a golfer to know and understand where the ball is coming out of the face to help improve these bad shots?

You imagine trying to hammer a nail into a piece of wood but you keep hitting your thumb! Do you, to avoid hitting your thumb, think about how your hammer arm is moving (direction, angle etc) or do you focus your mind on the hammer head hitting the nail head? I hope for the sake of your thumb it is the latter and you'll focus on your tools as opposed to what movements your body is making.

It's the same in Golf. If we focus on our tools (the club and ball which are external factors) as opposed to our body positions (internal factors) it makes it a lot easier to correct poor shots.

Back to contact and the relevance of it in Golf. We are looking to make an already complicated game easier. Why would we want to make a difficult and already complicated sport more complicated?

To improve in the game of golf, this is by far the most important point. We are not looking for consistency as consistency is unachievable. If it was achievable the best in the world would shoot 54 every time they go out. The goal to improve in the game is to MAKE OUR BAD SHOTS BETTER!

Read that again please.

The best in the world hit less disastrous shots. Yes, they hit shots that many of us could only dream of but their bad shots are barely in the rough or, when they miss a green, they still have a chance of getting the ball up and down.

I would estimate that 85% of bad shots are caused by poor contact, whether it be a loss of distance or greater dispersion of accuracy.

Yes, poor contact can be caused by a swing fault, but as stated before, there are hundreds of swing faults it could be. By recognising where we are hitting the ball out of the face we can use our instinctive movement patterns to get back to as centred an impact and efficient impact as we can. As I like to say............ subconscious competence.........understanding the task without thinking about it.

Fat or thin, too high or too low?........ Change the low point!

We've all felt it....... the realisation at impact when we either thin the ball or catch a farms worth of turf behind the ball. The instant feedback we get sends shivers up our spines in just the thought of this happening because the sensation is awful. The vibration we get through the shaft of the golf club when we thin it that travels at the speed of light into our hands is horrific (especially on a cold winters day....... the fingers tingle for a while after). And when we catch the turf before the ball, we look up knowing the golf ball has travelled half the distance it should've done.

Both awful shots that happen to even the best of players. But why does it happen?

Quite simply, the club does not meet it's LOW POINT at the correct area.

What do I mean by low point?

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A lot of golfers would describe the lowest point of the golf club (iron) would come into contact with the ground about 2-3 inches ahead of the golf ball to compress the ball as well as they could, thus avoiding fat and thin shots. Not necessarily. The low point differs for alllevels of golfers. For some, the low point might need to be before the ball with an iron hitting upwards!

As a general rule of thumb, a slower swing speed should be hitting more upwards (low point on the ball or just before) and a higher swing speed should be just in front of the ball. It is dependent on where maximum compression occurs in your golf swing.

One of my favourite drills to discover this is to grab a tin of marker paint (or similar), spray a line 90 degrees to your target (see below). Place the golf balls on that line and see where your club is striking the ground is relation to that line and the ball. In the many times I have done this drill there has been a lot of shocked golfers discover where their club is coming into contact with the ground.

                             <<<<<<     TARGET THIS WAY    <<<<<<<<<<< 

The idea is to strike a few golf balls from that line, take a note of YOUR ideal ball flight and check where your club struck the ground to produce your ideal and satisfactory ball flight. It might be your better off with barely scraping the surface of the line to produce your best shots. It could be that you take fairly hefty divots just in front of the line to produce your best shots.

This is a great game of self discovery which leads to tremendous satisfaction, knowing the reasons you have hit either good shots or bad shots due to where the club is reaching it's low point in the arc of the swing. A crucial element in helping you contact the ball better and aiding the predictability of your ball flight.

There's no such word as can't!

‘I can’t make the change’. ‘I can’t hole a putt for love nor money’. ‘I can’t hit the ball like I used to’. There are very good reasons for using the word ‘can’t’ and the majority of them initiate from the brain!

Our brain rules our body. Whatever our brain tells our body to do, it does it. The problems come when our brain doesn’t like something we’ve been asked to do. For example, grip changes are always difficult. If I thought a player had a weak grip which was causing the club face to open, I would try and manoeuvre the hands over to the right of the handle to make a stronger position, squaring or even closing the face slightly. However, our brain could reject the idea of changing the position of the hands. The brain can sense the hands have changed position and therefore we tell ourselves it’s uncomfortable because it is out of the ordinary, we’re out of our comfort zone as it’s a feeling we’re not used to. As a result, the hands and wrists stiffen and the brain rejects the idea of the new grip, forcing the hands back to their original position because the brain has said ‘I can’t get into this new position’!

I can bet your bottom dollar that if you stood up straight, let your arms hang down and I asked you to turn your hands to the right you could easily do it. So why doesn’t the same happen when you’re holding a golf club in your hands? It feels like we’re squeezing the living daylights out of the club!

Purely because it feels out of the ordinary and we convince ourselves that this isn’t the correct way because it doesn’t ‘feel’ right. It doesn’t matter if you’re paying £500 for a lesson with one of the worlds best instructors to tell us this information, we won’t do it if we don’t feel it’s right. The only way to convince yourself is to hit balls and hit balls well. And then still even taking it onto the course we find tricky and keep saying to ourselves we can’t do this because we want the safety net of comfort behind us which means going back to the old way of doing things and getting the same old results.

Trust is a key word. Trust the new action learned on the range and trust the new action when you take it onto the course. You CAN do it!

Why Golf is the greatest sport on Earth!

This is a blog I've been wanting to compile for a while now. With the Olympics behind us it was certainly one to remember for a number of reasons, especially for Team GB. It was a also a very memorable one for Golf and 'our man' Justin Rose, the first Olympic Gold medallist in Golf since Canada's George Lyon in the 1904 games. Without doubt, this has put golf more on the map with a wider audience, bringing the game to more people who have never even held a club before.

The purpose of this blog is to give my opinion to those who play and those who don't play as to why they should either continue to play for the rest of their lives or to take up the game they once thought would never be on their radar to even contemplate trying:

- You can make golf as expensive or as cheap as you like with regards to equipment and places you play.

- You burn around 1200 calories for 18 holes

- It's a great chance to socialise and meet new people and/or spend time with the people you know and love

- Every golf course you play is different and brings a whole new challenge....... variety is the spice of life

-  You can play at any age and improve at any age

- It is a constant challenge which tests all of our abilities both physically and mentally

- It is the only sport where our playing partners and opponents give us advice to help us play better (doesn't always work but its the thought that counts)

- You can't hit a ball further in any other sport

- The satisfaction you get when you find the sweet spot of the club is like nothing else

- You can get very close up to the elite players of the game when you visit a tournament

- The conduct of golfers is exemplary with a shake of the hand after every round. whether you win or lose

- You can make it as simple as you want or as complicated as you want

- It's an individual game, you can't blame anyone else but yourself

- The scenery on a golf course is stunning. Even if the round isn't going well you can always take in your surroundings

- You can do a lot of business on the course

- You can walk the same fairways as the elite players

- the Ryder Cup is the most exciting event on the sporting calendar

- Purchasing a set of new clubs give you that 'fuzzy, warm' feeling

- Beating your previous personal best score is a remarkable accomplishment that makes us smile on our way home from the course

- Anyone can beat 'old man par' thanks to the handicap system

- Anyone can putt as well as the pro's

- No matter what level of player or coach, you will never stop learning more about the game that you didn't know

If you play, continue to play and try to improve, whatever age you are. If you have never picked up a club, I urge you to try it. You won't look back and you will be hooked on the greatest sport on Planet Earth!

Is there really a 'Magic Move' in Golf?

As many experienced players know all too well, golf is a very individualistic game. No two players, whether they be elite or beginners swing the club the same way. Their aesthetics are wholly different and vary a fair amount. They do, however, get back to impact all the same way (cue yawns and shouts of 'I've heard this before'). I do emphasise this point a lot during my lessons as golfers tend to perceive that the prettiest swing will provide the prettiest results. I'm not trying to make and develop the prettiest swing in the world when coaching, I'm here to develop the most effective way of getting the club back down to the ball as often as we possibly can.

However, in the age of information and copious amounts written on the game of golf, I see these sorts of headlines a lot on YouTube, golf improvement websites and golf magazines:

'CURE YOUR SLICE FOREVER'

'STOP SHANKING FOR GOOD'

.....but my ultimate favourite is this one..........

'GOLFS MAGIC MOVE TO HELP YOU PLAY YOUR BEST EVERYTIME'

I will give it it's dues, it is a very eye catching headline with the word 'magic' as the main hub of the phrase, sparking elements in our mind of Harry Potter style magic, turning our golf club into a wand and teleporting our ball towards the target in a simplistic flash of time, thus decreasing our handicap like we have never dreamed of before!

Now back to reality! I apologise for bursting many a golfers bubble here but there is no such thing as one 'Magic move' for all parties! It is a pure piece of marketing to capture our imaginations and lead us onto a false journey of the golf of our dreams. 

The reality is that everyone has their OWN magic move in golf. There is not just one of these magic moves that propel us to golfing stardom. Some golfers take the club steep and get back to the ball well, some take the club back shallow and get the job done. See Freddie Couples, Jim Furyk, Monty et al.

Now don't get me wrong, there are ways to swing the golf club back and through to help you gain better and more improved contact on the golf ball. I've seen many a golfer shank the ball as the player has either taken the club too far 'around' themselves on the way back and I've seen golfers shank it as they've taken the club too steep.

And yes, there is a 'correct' biomechanical way of getting club on ball with square face more of the time and more efficiently. See Pete Cowan's 'The Spiral Staircase' below which is the closest analogy (in my opinion) of the most efficient and sequenced way the body moves in the golf swing:

FROM THE TOP OF THE BACKSWING YOU INITIATE THE DOWNSWING BY SIMPLY REVERSING THE PROCESS FROM THE GROUND UP:

RIGHT ANKLE TO LEFT FOOT

RIGHT SHIN TO LEFT ANKLE

RIGHT KNEE TO LEFT SHIN

RIGHT THIGH TO LEFT KNEE

NOW FROM HERE YOUR BODY STARTS TO OPEN UP AS THE COIL MOVES UP AND AROUND YOUR BODY:

RIGHT HIP TO LEFT ABS

RIGHT ABS TO LEFT CHEST

RIGHT CHEST TO LEFT

SHOULDER

RIGHT SHOULDER…

Be warned, however, because if you are consciously aware of these movements during the swing, you will not become a better ball striker. Far from it, your swing will feel mechanical and therefore lacking everything from power to precision. Use this purely for informative purposes, DO NOT TRY ON THE COURSE! Feel free to get a sensation for it at home, practice area, supermarket, wherever you like, just not on the course in the middle of a round.

This is by far the best way of describing a 'Magic Move' in golf, but my point to this article......... Go and find a PGA Professional who can prescribe YOUR magic move. Not anyone else's move.... YOUR MOVE, to help you play better golf and enjoy the game more, whatever your move may be.

'The Flight of the ball tells it all'

Ok, so some of you golf geeks out there will have heard this quote before from the legend that is Mr John Jacobs. A true legend of the game who played to a high standard, coached to a (very) high standard, a founder of the European Tour and was captain of the European Ryder Cup teams in 1979 and 1981. Many a coach hangs by his every word, and rightfully so.

For me, his most famous quote is the one in the headline though. It is quite possibly the most important phrase in golfing folklore. It is the difference between scratch golfers and tour players. It's the difference between high handicaps and low handicaps..... it Is that vital! For you to reach your potential, you HAVE to know how your ball flight is created. It's that simple. You CANNOT reach your potential by simply trying to contort your body into the various positions you think it has to be. You cannot reach your potential by simply adhering to every piece of advice your playing partners tell you to improve your swing. They might indeed help you swing it more like Ernie Els, but will it improve YOUR BALL FLIGHT.

This is what this game is all about. It is not a game of who swings the club the sexiest (although can be admired in many a golfing circle), it is not a game of who can keep their head down the longest (we will come to this in a minute), and its not a game of who can hit the ball the furthest (although, again, admired by many a player).

It is all about what your ball does. The ball has no clue whether you're 10 years old or 90 years old. It doesn't know what your handicap is or whether you're a beginner or not. Your game is wholly influenced by where your golf ball travels.

Now, lets come onto the famous phrase I mentioned earlier that a lot swear by to aid their golfing improvement and send them into elite stardom on the golf course...... keep your head down (or another version is keep your eye on the ball)! It is quite possibly the WORST phrase ever to be used and has hindered far more golfers than it has helped (cue the gasps from readers who have given this advice out to all and sundry to help them play better). I taught nearly 2000 lessons last year, all golfers of various abilities, ages, physical abilities who came to me with a range of issues such as  topping the ball, shanking, fatting, thinning and more. As you can see, many differing array of shots here. And can you guess how many of these bad shots were caused by their head lifting up or taking their eyes off the ball? NONE! None at all. Zero. Not one bad shot was caused by taking their eye off the ball. They were all caused by various other issues, commonly the club being out of position at impact but not due to their original theory of their head potentially looking away from the ball.

For some reason it seems that this phrase has grown like a fungus. Everyone has got hold of it and taken it for gospel as though it is the most important aspect to better golf. It couldn't be further from the truth. In my opinion, this phrase originated and taken very much out of context when a lot of golf instruction books from decades ago encouraged you to keep your head still. As still as can be! This, again, has been proven to be a (slight) falsification as there has to be a little movement of the head during the swing. Not many people have the ability to rotate their body and keep their head in the same place. Still, this is very different from attempting to keep your eye on the ball. Even in other sports you hear it. Footballs a classic. 'He hit it in row z because he didn't keep his eye on the ball'. Nonsense......... he's hit it into row z because his centre of gravity was way behind the ball, striking the ball on the upswing, increasing launch angle and therefore height on the ball.

Please do not tell anyone you are trying to improve (especially beginners) to keep their head down or eye on the ball. It is extremely destructive and will lead to more bad things than good.

Anyway, back to the original post and it's importance.

Whenever I ask a golfer how they are doing and how they feel their golf is going to try and get some feedback into their thoughts and processes they go through, the large majority I would say talk about their golf as to what they are doing in their swing. 'I'm not keeping left arm straight' or 'I'm not turning enough' are very common responses. But the fact is, how do we KNOW we aren't doing these things we think we are meant to be doing? We can't see ourselves swing and maybe get the odd piece of feedback from playing partners to back up our theories. But feel and real are two very different things and therefore it is extremely difficult (but not impossible) to feel exactly what is hindering our best golf in our swings.

So how on earth are we meant to know how to correct our bad shots when we are out on the course if we aren't entirely sure what is happening in our golf swing? 'THE FLIGHT OF THE BALL TELLS IT ALL'. The flight of the ball will tell us exactly what the CLUB is doing. Please note I did say what the 'club' is doing and not the swing. Golfers tend to bypass what the club does and delve straight into the swing. Let me ask you this..................... how do you change a lightbulb? Do you think about simply screwing the bulb in place or do you think about your wrist/forearm rotation and pressure you're holding the bulb with to get it in? If your answer is the latter one, please reassess how you change a lightbulb!

My point to this article................... To improve your golf you need to learn and understand what your bad shot ball flight is, whether it starts right of target and curves further right, starts at the target and curves left, starts left and curves to the right of target and so on, because these can give you the feedback you need to discover what's happening.

My dad always told me when I first started to play the game that 'the ball doesn't lie'. When you were 7 years old you didn't always believe what your dad told you so at the time I was a non-believer in that phrase. How wrong was I!

The club has the biggest influence as stated at the beginning of this article. No two ways about it. But I can hear what you're shouting at your phone or laptop reading this now........ 'the club is influenced by the swing and what YOU tell the club to do'!

And yes, you would be absolutely right. But let me ask you this........... how many things can go wrong in the swing when a bad shot occurs? A LOT! How many things can go wrong with the club when a bad shot occurs? 4.......... clubface open, clubface closed, path of club is out to in too much, path of club is in to out too much. How much easier is it to diagnose a club flaw as opposed to a biomechanical/technical swing flaw? Answer..... A LOT EASIER!

I will leave you with this diagram below. It is a diagram of what the club is doing to influence what the ball does. This should be the holy grail and told to every golfer on the planet because golf is a heck of a lot easier when you are thinking more about what the golf club is doing as opposed to what the body is doing.

View fullsize

Please promise me one thing when you next go to the range or go for a round on course....... when you hit a poor shot (which is inevitable in this game), think about what your golf club did to influence the ball flight and not what your body did to influence it. You will be a lot less frustrated.... trust me!

Trackman and the Philosophers Swing

A lot has been written about Trackman of late. The haters gonna continue to hate (not mentioning any names………..Brandel Chamblee) and the lovers are still gonna love what Trackman can provide to all sorts of golfers. The detail is immense and continues to innovate to become an even better launch monitor to help us all.

As a coach who does a lot of work with Trackman in teaching and as a specialist Callaway custom fitter, I see a lot of benefits to the famous Orange box……….. as long as the person uses it correctly as opposed to distributing every single piece of information Trackman has to give (and that’s a lot)

Trackman has single handedly changed the way golf is taught, simply by proving ball flight laws to be not quite as they seemed (‘path bends it, face sends it’ as it now is compared to ‘face bends it, path sends it’ as it used to be). It has proved that the balls starting direction is majorly influenced by the face angle and the curvature is caused by the path that the sweetspot travels. Revolutionary!

It has also provided the golfer with much needed information about the angle the clubhead arrives at the golf ball, defining the correct angle that a specific club should approach the ball at to help the quality of the contact the club makes with the ground, vital in consistent ball striking.

Trackman has also provided us with information about exactly how far we hit the ball. Yes, many launch monitors can do this, but to the degree of accuracy of Trackman?

So if there are all these benefits to the Orange box, why has it got so many people not even considering parting with a single pound/dollar/euro to purchase?

The argument is golf (as in any sport, but more so this great game), has to be instinctive to reach your potential in achieving what you can, whether it be to break 100 or to achieve a top 50 in the world rankings. And the argument is that Trackman takes away our instinctive abilities and forces us into consciously improving our positions to ensure our spin axis tilt doesn’t go beyond 2 degrees left or right consistently, our swing direction stays fairly neutral and our dynamic loft with a 6 iron remains constant. Forever monitoring and persistent evaluation on every shot is not exactly condusive togood golf.

However, the key to using Trackman to its full potential, helping you perform to your best ability not only technically but mentally as well is discovered in research conducted by Dr Gabriele Wulf of the University of Nevada. Her research focused on 2 keys areas of learning…… internal focus V external focus. Internal focus is placing attention on the areas of the body movements during the golf swing, generally the way coaches have taught since Golf began. The external focus, however, is the way that many a good golf coach is adamant in teaching. The external focus in golf are our ‘tools’, our club and our ball. To get the best out of any golfer, for short and long term gain, learning about what our club and ball are doing is crucial, as opposed to focusing on the movement of the body where it becomes a very conscious, robotic move in any change we make to seek out improved ball striking.

This is where Trackman comes in. Trackman takes measurements of our external factors, it hasn’t got a clue (or even cares) where the body is positioned in the swing. And any coach worth their salt will discuss with their clients what the CLUB is doing to influence the ball flight. The player can therefore then subconsciously do what they need to do by simply applying focus to the external factors and not the ‘mechanics’ of the body movement thanks to the information that Trackman provides to improve their shots. By recognising what the ball is doing (remember, ‘The flight of the balls tells it all’……… John Jacobs), we can correct it fairly easily without having to consciously think about where our hands are or where our elbows are at certain points in the golf swing. Trackman can tell you what the club is doing to influence the ball. Go and see a PGA Pro who has Trackman (or any other launch monitor) and get them (if they don’t already) to explain your club/ball relationship and how, by making adjustments to those external factors, will help you and your game

Distance - is it underestimated?

Who wants their golf ball to go further??? (100% of hands reach to the sky)!!!

Distance is a great thing. The beauty of seeing the ball fly as high and as far as anyone can in your club is a very good feeling (not that I have experience in this). The constant 'ooos' and 'ahhhs' as your playing partners watch in admiration at your Callaway Chrome Soft flying 300+ yards.

But is it a crucial aspect to playing better golf and, more importantly, how do we get more of it?

First of all, distance is a vital aspect in reducing your scores. Recent research (Mark Broadie - Every Shot Counts) has shown that the probability of you shooting a lower score is strongly correlated with the distance that you can achieve. Now, this might not sound good to all you players who believe you don't hit the ball very far. But, I have some good news......... EVERYONE (yes, you) can achieve more distance, whether it be 5 yards or 50 yards, we can all achieve greater distance. And its not as hard as you think!

The foremost reason that golfers do not achieve the distance they are capable of is down to the quality of the contact made with the ball...... in other words an 'off-centre hit' will travel considerably less distance than a centred strike (a centred strike being the ball struck off the middle of the club or the 'sweet spot').

It doesn't matter if you swing the club as hard as you can, you will not reach your optimal distance if the ball is not struck out of the centre of the face of the club. That horrible 'clunky' feeling will ensue and you might also feel the golf club twisting in your hands as the club moves violently when the ball is struck on the outside of the face.

So what do we have to do to ensure we strike the middle more often to achieve greater distance?

There are a number of great drills out there to help you, but first we must know exactly where the ball is being struck off the clubface. To do this, we need a training aid that can be found at your local chemist or Sainsburys!!! (Cue bizarre, puzzled looks). Athletes foot powder (Daktarin spray powder to be exact) can be used to see exactly where your ball is being struck on the face. Simply spray the product on the face of the golf club, take your normal swing and strike the ball and 'voila', a mark will appear on the face to show you where the ball was struck. If its in the very centre of the face then happy days, keep on going and you are reaching optimal distance. If it's on the outside of the face then you have work to do. Simply (and more importantly INSTINCTIVELY) try and hit the ball out of the middle of the club. I don't want you to think about changing your swing to allow this to happen, I just want you to change the area the ball is being struck from, two very different things.

Test yourself. If you constantly strike the ball off the heel, try and strike it out of the toe and vice-versa. If you keep hitting it out of the middle see how many in a row you can hit out of the middle.

Golf is much more fun when you hit the ball in the area of the clubface you are supposed to!

Hope this helps.

Myth Busters - Left arm straight!

I love coaching Golf........ the different swings, the different people and the joy on peoples face when they hit a shot like they've never hit before. A huge satisfaction for player and coach alike.

I also love hearing what people have heard and read about the golf swing..... I'm educated every day. Especially when there's 14 million books been published about how to play golf, no one is going to read them all so I'm intrigued as to what golfers have seen and heard in attempts to help them reach the pinnacle of the game or their potential.

A classic 'swing fix' that always comes up is 'my left arm must be straight' (for a right handed golfer). But no one can give a valid reason for this to be a necessity! Which usually indicates it's another thing to tick off the list of unnecessary swing thoughts that clog up many a players mind and inhibiting their action.

The truth is that keeping your left arm straight is one of the worst things you can do? Why? Because if you try and keep the arm straight in the backswing, especially for players of an un-flexible nature, you risk adding tension into your body and connectors (arms) which causes all sorts of problems including topping and fatting the shot.

The club has to do the work during the golf swing action and if ever tension in the body is part of the equation, bad shots can occur in trying to manipulate the club back to the ball.

I encourage you not to think or try to keep the left arm straight and see how you get on without this destructive myth.

Early specialisation

Junior development in the game of golf......................A much written about subject with a lot of various opinions out there as to how is best to nurture the future of the game whether it be to develop the new Rory McIlroy or simply enjoy the game of golf to the best of their ability, helping them socially and physically in the long term.

I have heard and seen many parents almost desperately wanting their children to be the next 'big thing' for many a reason, but especially to enhance their pension pot! This can lead to only negative effects, including 'pushy parents', children rebelling, falling out of love with the game, pressure....... the list goes on in the quest of leading their little ones to the summit of the game when, realistically, the chance of that happening, no matter how much talent the child has, is less than winning the lottery twice in a lifetime (in other words, the odds are stacked against).

Kids have to learn to love the game, that's the bottom line, and they enjoy the game by not being pressured but by having fun, very little technical input and having very few rules, far fewer than the R and A 'bible' prints out. All that will come with their experience and development but they will never experience that if they don't love the game and give up before they turn into teenagers.

The children of the future need not one sport to play, not two sports, they need a wide range of sports to be able to play. Research has shown that development stems from not just playing and dedicating themselves to one sport, development and improvement and enjoyment come from participation in a range of sports, not just spending 6 hours a day bashing balls on the driving range.

There is plenty of reading on this subject, especially from PGA Professional Adrian Cafaro, who has written a great thesis on talent development and this link from the Titleist Performance Institute:

http://www.mytpi.com/articles/juniors/more_sports_better_development

I run Junior classes every weekend involving children, developing their skills and, most importantly, we have fun. Please contact me to sign your child up, whether they are a complete beginner or an already experienced player.