Nathan had been taught to keep the club in front of him going back. This is a great swing thought, however Nathan had overcooked this swing thought. To get the club straight back from the ball, Nathan tilted his left shoulder down which caused his shoulders to get steeper and this move slid his right hip to the right. This allowed the clubhead to stay in front of his hands during the backswing, however this was a fake position and actually caused too flat of a backswing. Let me explain. As Nathan’s club reached about waist level in the backswing his body was out of position. Shoulders steep, right hip slide…from here he reversed pivoted his hips (caused them to go left) and then flattened out his shoulders to get to the top. What this caused then on the way down was hips were out in front and his left arm would run away from his body (lose connection) and the club would fall too much to the inside with either an open face (fade with body in front caused low fade) or he would try to flip his hands to square up the face (closed face with body in front caused low snap hook). This was a very inconsistent shot and caused him a lot of mental stress. What we did first was in the setup. Nathan has one of the strongest grips ever and would not change it (because if he did with his left arm running away he would hit it way right and short). We lowered Nathan’s right hip to get his spine in the correct position so his body could work anatomically correct. We then worked on his right arm allowing him to hinge his right wrist earlier and causing him to fold his right arm quicker…this gave him connection to his body. This allowed the club to swing a bit more to the inside on the backswing and this got him away from the steeper shoulder plane that he was accustom to. We next went through the proper body rotation. Nathan’s swing was very disconnected to begin with and when we got his arms connected to his body we were able to get his body to rotate properly which allowed his joints to be stacked over each other. During Nathan’s downswing because of his backswing and because of his strong grip, his left arm ran away and his upper body hung back causing the flip or the right shot. He now could simply unwind his body more naturally and would not have to hang back. We got his upper body more stacked at impact and therefore took stress off of his lower back. Nathan’s work is not finished with his swing. He has come a long way, but he has much better positions in his golf swing and is more connected in his golf swing, which has allowed him to hit it farther and straighter. In my opinion, he is hitting the ball much better now than ever, but he is very humble and does not like to think of himself as great. This is the reason why, in my opinion, his putting has dropped the last two years, because if he had his putting from two years ago he would win frequently. This is the mental part of the game that we all struggle with, but by getting Nathan more connected in his swing, he has become a great ball striker and a player we will see win more frequently on the PGA Tour.

Nathan utilized the Perfect Connection Swing Principles and went on to win the 2009 RBC Canadian Open.

For the readers at home work on the connection in your golf swing. This will allow straighter shots and will take stress off of your body, which will allow you to play this game for many years to come.

Be on the lookout for a video tomorrow about my revolutionary Perfect Connection Golf Swing.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

The normal bunker shot is played the way most people know how to hit bunkers, open clubface, open body. I want you to first draw an arrow in the sand with the arrow pointing away from the target. This arrow represents the standard way of playing a bunker shot. While looking at the arrow, notice how one line points to the right of the target. This line represents the clubface position when hitting bunker shots. We want our clubface open or aimed to the right slightly. The line on the arrow that is pointing to the left of the target represents our bodyline. We want our body aimed slightly to the left and the same degrees that the clubface is open. When we take our normal golf swing with this setup, the ball will fly out of the bunker along the line of the arrow that is pointed at the target. In regards to our swing, the most important fundamental with bunkers is tempo. We want a nice, long flowing backswing and follow through. A great image for those players that struggle to get the ball out of the bunker is to imagine Fred Couples’ golf swing. Imagine his long flowing swing before you hit your bunker shot and you will be much more successful from the bunker. Now that you have a long flowing swing I want the ball to be played forward in your stance about 2-3 inches forward of center. Your focus will be on hitting a spot in the center of your stance and that sand will throw the ball onto the green.

After you have practiced this flowing backswing and full flowing follow through I want you to focus on distance control. The main idea when controlling distance with the normal bunker shot is to control the distance by the follow through. We still want to maintain a nice flowing backswing, but now we need to be a bit more precise with our distance control. I like to divide every bunker into three shots…Short, Medium, and long. For a short bunker shot I want a flowing backswing but with a follow through that is very short. For a medium bunker shot I still want to maintain that flowing backswing, but want a medium finish, and finally a long finish, similar to a full swing for a long bunker shot. After you have practiced hitting three distances with your bunker shot, it will be up to practice and feel to get even more tour like precision, but I am sure that each of you will have improved tremendously in the bunker just based on these simple images and drills.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

P.S. Want to learn more about the Perfect connection golf swing? I will be releasing the Perfect Connection Golf Swing Signature Series next week. So keep an out eye out for it.

“When a right-handed golfer initiates the downswing, he shifts his body weight onto his target side (left side) by positioning his target-side knee (left knee) over his target-side foot (left foot). This places the golfer’s lower body into an ideal force-generating position. With the knee over the foot, the quadriceps can function to straighten the knee, and the gluteus maximus and hamstring muscles can contract to create extension of the hip and pelvis. This combined extension movement drives the target foot into the ground. The ground creates a resultant force back into the golfer that can be passed effortlessly through the legs and into the golfer’s pelvis and core…This force can be transferred into the arms and, finally, into compression of the golf ball.”

The study of the human body of how it is supposed to work and create power without injury is the source behind the perfect connection golf swing. Stacking the joints, setting the spine and the body in the proper position at address, creating a powerful ¾ length backswing, all of these principles are addressed in my golf swing and are many of the reasons why the Perfect Connection Golf Swing is the best swing out there. Understanding this paragraph from the book Golf Anatomy already eliminates such swing theories as the one plane golf swing and the stack and tilt method. Using these swings as well as many traditional golf swing theories will certainly have you ending up in the chiropractors office and lead to many disappointing rounds of golf and lots of frustration in the future. Best wishes to all my students.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

P.S. Want to learn more about the Perfect connection golf swing? I will be releasing the Perfect Connection Golf Swing Signature Series next week. So keep an out eye out for it.

I have seen many of my students improve just by practice swinging with one hand. This drill forces you to support the club properly at the top with the right elbow and right hand underneath the shaft. This is the position that we want to achieve with both hands on the club, but many do not. Another great reason for practicing with one hand is the width that it creates in your downswing. If you are a player that has the club come down from over the top then the one hand swing will be good because of the extra weight that the club will feel like. In order to swing one handed your body must transition properly or you will stick the club in the ground. The lack of support with two hands will force the body to shift to the left to help the right arm start the club down. You will also notice that as you do this you will maintain width in the right arm and this will allow the face to be square through the impact area longer, causing straighter shots. Once you can do this drill with practice swings I encourage you to hit some balls with an eight iron. Try it slow at first, but as you practice this shot you will notice that you will be able to hit your eight iron over 100 yards in the air. After some success with this drill place both hands on the club but feel like your grip pressure with your left hand is a zero and try to sense the feeling that you had with only one hand.

One handed swings are a great way to improve your driver because it forces the club to fall on plane and it creates the proper feeling of width that you need to hit long straight drives.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

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I keep hitting block shots dead right and high. It’s costing me from breaking 80 for the first time any suggestions?

Rick

This is a question I received from Rick and I am pleased to tell him that he is in good company. The dreaded high and right shot is a typical miss of good players. Getting the club “stuck” behind him on the way down causes this miss. In other words basically as Rick transitions into the downswing his club will drop too much to the inside and his hips will spin out causing the club to come too much from behind him. This is the cause of the high right shot and if Rick gets a bit too quick with his hands, he will hit a snap hook. This is the same problem that Tiger faces when we see him start to spray his driver all over the lot. . There may be several reasons for this stuck shot and maybe that the club is too flat at the top of his swing or his hips are too fast on the way down.

The key to fixing this miss is to get the club coming more in front of him on the downswing or for him to feel like he is coming from over-the-top. Another way to fix this shot and to get the club more in front of him is to do what Tiger does in tournaments and that is to hit knockdown shots. The great aspect of knockdown shots is that in order to finish low, which is the key to hitting knockdown shots; the body and club must work in sync together. Not even Tiger is strong enough to have the club come from inside and finish low. Centrifugal force would force the club to flip through and therefore would require a high finish.

The club coming from the inside too much is one that most slicers would love to experience, however there is not a worse feel in golf for good players than that of being stuck through the shot. This is certain death for good players, since they must overly use their hands to hit shots, which will kill your ball control. To fix this shot on the course I recommend the knockdown shot until you can get to the range and work a bit on your technique to figure out the cause of the stuck club.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

Are you frustrated with your golf game?

Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

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Tom

I want to sincerely thank all my students for writing in questions like Tom did.

I truly enjoy helping each of you with your game and will from time to time, instead of answering on the blog, take your questions and write an article to help them and each of you.

Tom expresses concern on his short putts and the main reason for this problem according to him is his distance control. I break putting down into three areas and you will learn this soon when I release my putting DVD, but the key to making putts boils down to speed, roll, and break. In its simplest form speed is a result of practice and a great drill to help Tom with his speed control is my front, middle, back drill.

1. First find a straight putt from about 4 feet.
2. Hit the first putt where the ball barely drops in over the front edge.
3. Hit the second putt where it falls in the middle of the hole.
4. Hit the third putt where it hits off the dirt in the back of the cup before falling in.
5. Spend about 5 minutes varying up your objective from front, middle, and back.
6. Now practice this drill from about 15 feet with a big breaker and choose your speed and break accordingly. I am not concerned with makes and misses, but most importantly your distance control.

Most people struggle with distance control because they do not practice the proper way. Speed in its simplest form boils down to practice and I promise you that most people do not practice their speed control on short putts. In order to improve your short putts it is essential that you practice your speed control on these putts. Working on the front, middle, back drill is a great way to improve your control on these short putts and lower your scores as a result.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

Are you frustrated with your golf game?

Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

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I didn’t seem to trust my head pro and his fitting abilities.

Do you recommend any good senior shafts?

I have a clubhead speed of @ 95 mph.

I recently received this question from one of our readers and wanted to help out.

The key to getting the right driver is understanding the combination of launch and spin and ball flight. To best figure this out you need to divide the golf ball flight into two halves. The first half will tell us launch angle and the second half will tell us spin. We want to launch the ball high initially. The key to launch angle comes from loft of the driver as well as angle of attack, but remember we want the ball to be pretty high. For most people in Texas they do not like seeing this launch, but the ideal launch angle is between 12-16 degrees, depending on clubhead speed. The faster your clubhead speed the lower the launch, but remember that 12 degrees is still pretty high. The second half of the ball flight dictates spin of the ball. What we don’t want to see is the ball rising in the second half of the flight. Sometimes if the spin is too high you will actually see the ball seem as though it is rising in steps. What we want for the ideal spin is the ball to flatten out and maintain the launch angle. If you watch a good player at your club you should be able to see this ball flight. You won’t see the ball fall out of the sky (too little spin), nor will you see the ball climb during the second half of the flight.

The key to finding the right driver is finding a good club fitter. Ask your friends or good players at your club. They will usually know the best fitters in the area. I do recommend finding a fitter that has a launch monitor as this gets pretty precise and can fine tune your driver and get you that extra 20 yards pretty easier.

In regards to the question, I recommend going with a big name brand company. Shafts from UST, Fujikura, Aldila, and Mitsubishi are a few big names that have excellent shafts. There are thousands of shafts out there. It may take a bit of time, but when you find the right one, you will know immediately.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

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Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

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The proper golf swing should have our upper bodies turn about ¾ of the way back with our shoulders with just a bit of left knee turn in the backswing. Anything more than that and we are not only losing power, but increasing our chances of injury greatly. Any person that has seen a kid swing has noticed the over emphasis of the lower body in their kids swing. The reason that kids do this is because they are compensating for the weight of the club. The club is very heavy for these kids and their hips are the most powerful area in their body. It amazes me how golf instructors will teach adults to swing with these same principles of an active, driving lower body. These kids usually create extremely long swings, lots of mishits, and a reverse C or finish that sends me into pain just by watching it. This is not the way to swing the club, or if it was then why do we not all swing that way. That is what most instructors are teaching. This is definitely the first way to hit the ball unsolid and to never play the game again due to bulging discs and hip replacement.

The key to solid golf is to wind the upper body just enough while maintaining a solid lower body. Once your lower body starts to move that should be enough shoulder turn. This will be about a ¾ turn and is plenty far enough to crush the ball. The basic principle of the golf swing should be similar to life. Would you build your house on sand? Would you shoot a canon from a canoe? I don’t think I would want to be in that canoe, nor would you.

Build your golf swing with a base that is shoulder width apart and not a lot of movement in the golf swing. A great drill for this would be to take your address position and then to bow your knees out. Hit a few shots with this and feel how stable your lower body is and try to maintain that feeling while making your normal golf swing. Build your House on the rock as well as your golf swing and it will be there pain free in the future.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

Are you frustrated with your golf game?

Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

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This is the quote after my lesson yesterday and it seemed quite funny to me. I have this student, Jack, at my club and he was in desperate need of a lesson or so he said. He told me that he had been hitting the ball pretty well, but had no consistency and that it was impossible for him to hit our first green even from 100 yards. I watched him hit the ball on the range and he was hitting a slight pull because he was losing lag because his body stopped rotating through the shot. I gave him a simple drill of hitting ¾ finishes similar to a punch shot that everyone here in Texas knows and needs to hit in the high winds. This finish did wonders for him because in order for him to finish in the way that I wanted he needed to synchronize his body with his arms. This instantly allowed him to hit the ball with greater control and allowed him to hit very repeatable shots. I then changed our lesson plan very quickly and took him straight to the first hole about 130 yards away. To describe the first hole at TPC Craig Ranch, it’s a beautiful hole with a creek that runs down the right side of the fairway. The second shot (which is where we were hitting in from) is a side hill lie with the ball below your feet to an uphill green with bunkers short and left and a severe slope to the right of the green. Anything that lands on the right side of the green will end up 20 yards to the right of the green. Jack aimed slightly right of the flag (expecting his pull) and hit it perfectly where he was aimed; however the ball faded slightly to the right and missed the green. I will not tell you what he said, since this is a family website, and a clean one at that, however I asked him if he accounted for the side hill lie. He said no, so I asked him to act like he was hitting towards the tee box and now he was faced with the ball above his feet. I asked him if he thought the ball would curve and he said absolutely he could feel that it would hook. I asked if he thought the same for the ball below his feet and he never thought of that. He then proceeded to hit the next five balls very well and all of them hit the green. He was so excited and I left him to play the next few holes and report back to me.

After his few holes he said that quote to me “Thinking your way around the course…That’s a concept I have never done before”. I challenge all of you to find something simple for your swing so the ball is repeatable. It does not matter if it curves as long as it is curving the same way every time. If it does do that then it is repeatable and applying a bit of course management can make all the difference in your game.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

Are you frustrated with your golf game?

Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

Discover it here – – – Body Friendly Golf Swing.

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Speed in its simplest form is related to practice. If you were struggling with speed then I would encourage you to practice while working on speed related drills. Roll is related to technique and that is the area where an instructor can really help you by improving the path and face of your putter. To determine if your roll is good you should take a sharpie and draw a straight line on your golf ball. Titleist already places a line on their golf balls, however I encourage you to trace over that line with a sharpie to make it easier to see the ball roll. Now line up the ball at your intended line (obviously playing break if need be) and then to hit the putt. If your technique is good the line will roll end over end perfectly and will look like a solid straight line while the ball rolls. If your technique is not good then the line will wobble slightly and or you may not see it at all. If the line does not roll perfectly end over end then this is a clear indication that you need to work on the technique of your putting stroke. The final factor that goes into making putts is the break. Break is related to experience and this is one area that even tour players struggle with. I will guarantee that if you do not have proper speed control or proper roll of the ball then the break is the least of your concern. There are two areas of the putt that you can control and that is the speed and the roll. The next time you hit a putt I want you to evaluate the putt versus judging the outcome of the putt. Everyone needs to evaluate the putt based on the speed and the roll. If you hit the ball with the correct speed that you wanted and the ball rolled end-over-end then you hit a great putt regardless of the outcome. Too many factors can cause a putt to miss and living your life by makes and misses will provide you with a very frustrating life. The key to making more putts is to control what you can control and that is the speed and the roll.

I promise you, if you can roll the ball end-over-end properly and your speed is correct the outcome will be more favorable than not and your scores will fall dramatically.

Keep em Long and Straight,

CJ

Are you frustrated with your golf game?

Click here to discover a scientifically proven “body friendly golf swing”, that is so darn powerful yet simple to repeat. Check it out here.

Discover it here – – – Body Friendly Golf Swing.

Please comment below.