Practice Strategies
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The amount of curve in your golf shot is created by the face-to-path relationship. In general, the greater the curve, the more your face differs from your path. Learn how to address the two common pattern, a face-to-path relationship that is too open, or one that is too closed.
Tags: Fundamentals, Poor Contact, Not Straight Enough, Impact, Concept, Intermediate, Beginner
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This video is learning from your curve.
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So in this video, I'm going to present a really clear formula for you.
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If the ball curves more than you want, then you have a face to path problem.
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There's a lot of videos on the site that will help you with reading feedback, whether it's
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the steepness or the chalonist of the path, whether it's the club face orientation, the
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low point control.
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All of those things are critical for learning to properly read feedback.
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But for many golfers, I just give you one clear formula.
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If the ball is curving a lot, then the face and the path are in different directions.
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So I always use the ping pong example, because most people are used to getting a ping pong
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ball to curve, where sometimes it's hard to change the curve and golf.
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So in ping pong, I want you to imagine that I was going to hit a shot kind of like this,
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or I would hit a shot like this.
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Obviously that first one would have very little curve to it.
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We'll see if this will curve.
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Golf balls are tough.
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You can see even as that lands, the second one is going to have a lot of curve to it.
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Now let's break that down so that we can see exactly what's happening, how it's producing
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the curve.
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So if I was to bring the ping pong paddle through here, the paddle is pointing in a certain
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direction.
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It is also traveling in pretty much the same direction.
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When those two are in the same direction, you're going to have very little spin, imparted
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on the golf ball.
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When I come outside in like this, the ping pong paddle is pointed this way, but the path
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that's traveling on is pointing this way.
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The greater the difference between those two, roughly the more spin you're going to
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create.
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So if you're hitting a ball and it's curving 30 yards to the right, it means that the
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club face is significantly open to the path that it's traveling on.
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If you hit a shot and it curbs way to the left, it is significantly closed to the path
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that it's rotating on.
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You want to do something to solve that.
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Now there's two different ways you could solve a face to path issue.
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One is you could change your grip.
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If you can make the exact same swing and simply, if the club face is coming in like this,
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simply rotate the club face to the path, either more closed if you're slicing it or
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more open if you're hooking it, then it'll tend to balance it out and the ball will go
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straighter.
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Now, oftentimes you'll hit a shot that'll slice and then you strengthen your grip and
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you hit a shot and it has about the same amount of slice because your body was trying
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to accomplish more a certain impact feeling or impact club position rather than just making
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the same swing.
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So oftentimes you're going to have to change some of the arm movements in order to
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affect where the club face is pointing.
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So one good place that you can check is kind of it shaft parallel.
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If it's wide open like this and it slices, you might want to consider strengthening your
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grip or looking at the wrist movement.
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If it's way closed, you might want to consider alternating or changing your grip and I got
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the video on five degree grip changes to show you how I like to play around with grip
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strength.
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But let's say that's not the answer and I need to change the club face with my swing.
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There's usually different solutions whether it's an open club face or a closed club face.
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Typically if it's an open club face, then I need to work on getting the club face to
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either close more to the path with the flexion of the wrist or extension or the motorcycle
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movement or let it keep closing with more of the supination down at the bottom.
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Or I need to shallow the club while I do that in order to help the club close down at
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the bottom.
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Because if the path is too much outside to end and the club face is open, I'll have
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a harder time getting it to close.
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If on the other hand, I'm hooking the ball and I have a situation where the club face
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is coming in too close.
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What I tend to see is that it's more of a, I've got the club face maybe rotate a little
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bit but what'll really happen is down at the bottom, I'll rotate it closed and I'll
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let the club pass.
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What that does is that overly closes the face and usually takes the path way out to the
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right.
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It kind of has a pattern that looks more like that there where I tend to get a big amount
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of curve.
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For that one, I don't recommend twisting the club differently here.
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What I recommend is delaying or changing that movement down at the bottom by getting
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either more body rotation, more of the white movement or just basically getting more
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shaft lean.
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So if I'm hooking the ball, I still keep closing the club face and I just work on getting
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a little bit more shaft lean down at impact to straighten it out.
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If I'm slicing the ball, I usually have to work on twisting the club or strengthening
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the grip.
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So if you're struggling with reading feedback, it's a really clear, or this is a really
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clear, one single thought that you can use.
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If the ball curves more than you want, then you have a face to path problem and if the
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more that it curves, the more open or close the club faces.
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So if you have a lot of curve, one of your goals is to match those up better and this gives
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you a couple of solutions whether the club faces too open or too close.