Archive for the ‘Golf’ Category
Topping The Ball
Topping The Ball Topping the ball is mostly associated with higher handicap golfers – finding a golf professional who says he has never topped a shot and you have found yourself a liar. Even the best have gone through this awful golfing situation.
Hitting the ball above its equator – is truly embarrassing. There is nothing worse than putting all that effort into the swing and watching the ball scuttle 70 yards or less along the ground. Here are a few remedies to work on.
Your grip may be much too tight to address, preventing you from properly cocking or hinging your wrists on the backswing and from releasing the club head impack.
When holding the club, pressure should be light, but firm and felt in the last 3 fingers of the left hand, and the middle 2 fingers of the right.
Ball Position
The ball may be too far forward in the stance or you may be too far away from it at address.
Correcting Your Ball Position
The ball should always be at the bottom of your swing arc. For the shortest irons (pitching wedge or sand wedge), the ball for an average player should be opposite a point that is almost midway between the feet. With each longer club, the ball moves forward in the stance, that is, toward the target, until, with the driver, it should be opposite the inside of your left heel. Athletic swingers will have the ball slightly farther forward in the stance with every club.
The distance a golfer stands from the ball depends on his height and build. A tall, athletic player will lean over from the hips more and thus stand closer to the ball. This will create a very upright swing. A shorter player will not lean over so much: he will stand farther away from the ball, thus creating a shallower, flatter swing. The butt end of the club should be no farther than 4 to 5 in (10 to 12 em) from the inside of the left thigh.
Stance
The problem may be that the player’s body weight is set too much on the heels at address. This can cause the player to pull away from the ball at impact, pulling the club head up.
Correcting Your Stance
At the address position try to keep your weight on the balls of your feet and be sure not to rock back through the swing.
Posture
An inability to maintain a constant knee flux at address can cause the top half of the body to dip downward on the backswing. The only way to get the clubhead back to the ball is to make an opposing move on the downswing – that is, straightening up the body up and away from the ball. Check that your posture is correct by looking at yourself sideways – in front of a mirror.
To correct this, you should be able to imagine a vertical line from the middle of your shoulders, down through the kneecaps, and into the balls of your feet. The only exception is for a very tall golfer, who may have their shoulders over their toes.
Backswing
A common feature among "toppers" is poor transference of body weight throughout the swing. During a topper’s backswing the hips tend to slide laterally to the right on the backswing instead of turning onto the right leg. This, in turn causes the shoulders to tilt instead of turning.
As a result, the body’s center of gravity is too much on the left side at the top of the swing, and the only way to get the clubface back somewhere near the ball is to reverse the process and slide the hips forward, leaving the center of gravity too much on the right side at impact.
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