The Best Golf Investment You Could Make

What do you believe your best golf investment is?

Is it your clubs?
Maybe it is your driver?
Maybe the golf balls you use or the shoes you wear?

The best investment you could probably make would be to get lessons from a good golf professional.
The sooner people get professional instruction the better their golf will be simply because they won’t need to relearn the correct techniques to replace bad habits.

Golf is all about fine tuning and making small improvements that compound over the course of a round to sometimes quite dramatically reduce your score and handicap.

Imagine the benefit of becoming more proficient with the use of your putter where it helps to save a shot every few holes.

At the end of the round, that could be the difference between a score in the 80’s and dropping into the 70’s.

Imagine knowing that should you get in the rough you will be able to chip out and set yourself up for a better approach.

Having the confidence to play from anywhere on the course will also make the game more enjoyable and this only comes from experience.

There is no faster way to gain experience than through the help of a professional.

They will be able to stand and observe you to correct any errors in your swing that you wouldn’t be able to target on your own.

You might be only a fraction of an inch away from setting your balls up in the right position or your hand placement on the club might be slightly ill placed to get the correct movement.

A well-trained golfer will do more with a poor set of golf clubs than an inexperienced player with the best clubs in the world.

It is wise to get some good tuition first and then you might just find that you will be ready for a better set of clubs as your experience has risen to the next level.

Golf lessons are a very wise investment if you intend to play for any length of time.

Technorati tags: golf will best investment clubs from

Golf Training for Success

How does anyone become better at what they do?

Anyone knows that get to the top of your game you need practice and the more you want to succeed the more you will need to practice.

Vijay Singh has been known as the golfer who practices more than any other.
He has stated that he might not be the most talented golfer in the world but his dedication to practice more often and longer than most others enabled him to succeed beyond the expectations of many people.

Vijay got to the top of his game by practicing from morning until night.

Before tournaments here would be practicing for hours.

Michael Campbell won the US Open and in his early years when he was a youngster he would practice so much in his yard he would literally wear the clubs out and have to replace them for more practice.

The more you practice the higher the probability that you will naturally make the right moves without having to think about the actions you are taking.
And the less you have to think about your stance, swing and so on, the more likely you are to hit the sweet spot more often and get the ball sailing through the air as though Tiger has just hit it.

Practice can be both cheap and convenient with driving ranges allowing you to hit a bucket full of golf balls to naturally program your mind and body to perform better once you hit the course in the weekend.

Here’s the fun part - while your mates are watching television during the week you can sneak off to the driving range and sharpen your skills and then trounce them on the weekend and they will be none the wiser where your newfound skills have been honed.

Technorati tags: more practice will would have golf

Check out Charles Barkleys golf swing….mind you he is a top flight athlete. OUCH!!!

This may be the worst golf swing I have ever seen I think I pulled a hammy just watching the video.

Are You a Leftie?

We can’t blame the golf club manufacturers for targeting their most profitable market of right-handed golfers, but it is quite difficult for those golfers who play left handed to find the selection offered to the mainstream players.

I have known a few golfers who made the change early on by training to play right handed but this is unrealistic for most people.

You should be playing in the most natural manner possible and if that means left handed then so be it.

Unfortunately with everything these days it all comes down to economics and profitability and there just isn’t enough money to be made for many manufacturers in the left-handed market.

The percentage of left handed players to right handed players is somewhere in the region of 8 percent so the market is quite small, although it is a niche market that some manufacturers are targeting albeit at more expense in most instances.

But there is always a silver lining to the problems that we might encounter.

At a recent after tournament function I was introduced to an elderly gentleman who was playing on a low handicap and had done so for many years.

During the discussion he mentioned left-handed clubs and the fact that he had started playing left handed initially.

He hadn’t learnt how to play from a professional and had developed some bad techniques.

Eventually, due to frustration with his game and the inability to source the clubs he wanted to, he enlisted some professional help.
After much discussion it was decided that he should try playing right handed and the golf pro would give him the necessary tuition.

It was a godsend as he was effectively starting from scratch and he learnt how to play golf without any of the bad techniques that he had developed on his own.

The change from left to right, along with the professional training had held him in good steed for the rest of his golf playing life.

Sure, it was a major decision that most golfers wouldn’t make, but you can never beat a golfer at trying to improve his game no matter what steps they might take.

Technorati tags: handed most left playing golf golfers

The Most Common Golf Problem Is

The most common problem beginners have playing golf would surely be the slice shot.

This is where the ball curves through the air from left to right assuming the player is right-handed.

The flight of the golf ball is determined by the spin of the ball and a slice is caused by the ball spinning clockwise thereby causing it to travel in a clockwise arch.

The most common reason why this happens is people tend to lift their head when they strike the ball.
The action of lifting the head causes the face of the club to hit across the ball and not through it.

By hitting across the ball, you are essentially hitting the ball from the outside in and this is the action that causes the ball to spin clockwise.

If you tend to slice the ball try to keep your head down until after you have hit the ball.
By keeping your head down, and your eye on the ball to the point of contact you will play through the ball and your swing will remain straight, which will cause the ball to follow a straight path.

Keep your head down until after the ball has taken flight keeping your head and shoulders solid.

Another reason why you will get slice shots is by trying to hit the ball too hard.
In doing so you could be using your arms to pull the club in and this will also cause it to spin.
By hitting for less distance you can concentrate on getting the correct swing and playing for accuracy rather than length.

Try reducing your swing with these smaller shots to see if this starts to correct the problem.

As you begin to hit straighter you can begin to increase the length of your back swing and go for more distance.

Concentrate on accuracy first and distance follows.
That is a good rule to always play by.

Technorati tags: ball head will slice swing most

Your Own Personal Golf Pro at Every Game

Have you ever considered what the source of your problems might have been when you just finished a poor round of golf?

Many people will be surprised to know that most of their problems stemmed from the way they were holding their clubs.

You probably already know the situation I am about to describe.
You hit a bad shot and then you tell yourself that the next shot has to be better to compensate and the pressure begins to grow.

Along with the increasing pressure is a tendency to grip the clubs too hard.
Tension has a tendency to make us do that.
Along with this tight grip we have on the club goes a corresponding loss of control.

The ball starts flying in all directions, and the tension builds ever more, until you look at your knuckles and they are white from the pressure.
If your clubs had to breath you would have choked them by now.

I had a playing partner who had a simple list of instructions that he would read when his game started to fall apart and at the top of that list was ‘don’t strangle the clubs‘

It’s simple and we all know about it, but this visual reminder was all that it would take to get his game back on course and ensure that the tension wasn’t there in the rest of his game.

This technique of having written guidelines was so powerful that several other people started using it.
It was like having your own personal golf pro walking with you and giving you the necessary instructions when things started to go wrong.

Those words would allow him to focus on the next shot and release all the tension that would have otherwise crept into his game.

Try carrying your own list of ‘game savers’ around with you next time and don’t hesitate to read them at the first sign your game might be falling apart.

It is an incredibly powerful technique.

Technorati tags: game have would with tension golf

How to Get a Hole in One

I‘ve played some excellent golfers in my time but none impressed me quite like the old guy I played with on a weekend tournament.

Soon after we started he hit a hole in one and while everyone else was impressed he didn’t seem overly excited.

Assuming it was his first hole in one, we all congratulated him only to find out that he had hit many holes in one in his playing career.

“How did he do it so often” was the question everyone asked.
Simple - everyone else was trying to hit his or her golf ball into a small hole and he was shooting for a bucket.

Let me explain. He always visualized the hole as the size of the bucket and having that mindset made it possible for him to get so many holes in one.

After hearing that way of thinking I immediately used the same visualization for myself that day.
I didn’t get any holes in one but my putting was out of this world.

Every time I got on the green I knew the ball was going to land inside that huge hole, the size of a bucket, I could see in front of me.

It’s a fact that good golf is more about your mind than any other factor.
Sure you have to know how to hit a golf ball correctly.
You need to have a good stance and swing, but those things can be taught to anyone.
If you can master your mind you will master the game of golf and that’s why so many people go back to the golf course week after week.
They never seem to quite master it completely and there is a challenge with every stroke.

I am still shooting for my first hole in one, but in the meantime my handicap has come down considerably, except when I let my mind play the wrong games on the course.

Technorati tags: hole golf after everyone many holes

The Problem With Hills

There’s nothing like a hilly golf course to test your skills.

In a perfect world the golf ball would always fall on flat smooth ground, but that’s why golf is so addictive.
Every shot is different and the lie of the land is one of the factors that can make or break your game.

So what are you to do when your ball has just landed on a slope?

The first step is to have a practice swing to determine where your golf club is striking the ground.
Without the practice swing you will most likely be relying on good luck to hit the perfect shot.

When you see where your club is striking the ground you can alter your stance accordingly.
If your club strikes the ground nearer your back foot you will need to move your stance so the ball is nearer to your back foot and the inverse is the case if your club is striking the ground nearer your front foot.
Just position your feet back so the ball is nearer your front foot.

It might sound more difficult than it actually is but all we are doing is ensuring the ball is going to be in the right position for where the club is striking.

Now this is the simple explanation for when the ball is on an uphill or downhill slope but there will be many occasions where the ball will be on a side slope and this is where things can get tricky.

On a side hill lie you will position your feet according to whether they are above or below the ball.
If they are above the ball you will tend to pull the ball to the left due to the action dictated by your legs as you try to maintain balance and therefore slow your swing down.
With the ball above your feet you will normally hit it straight or to the left.

If that seems confusing then there is, as always, a good solution.
Take a few balls to a slope and practice.
There is nothing quite like it for getting the perfect shot.

Technorati tags: ball will where club there golf

How Do You Keep Your Head Still?

One thing we are all taught when getting golf lessons is to keep your head still when you hit the ball.
Obviously this is not completely possible and even the best players in the game have some head movement during their swing.

Observe them next time you see them play and you will see what I mean.
There is one thing that all good golfers do manage to do and that is, they keep their head behind the ball at the point of impact.

They might have some movement on their back swing but they will ensure that their head is behind the ball when they strike it and that is what is most important.

You should certainly try to keep your head as still as possible and the less movement you have the better, however as you drive faster and harder you will naturally get more head movement.

While you need to control your head movement it is not something that you should have to focus on when you are playing.
This action should come naturally and that will happen more easily with practice.

As soon as you start thinking too much when you are about to take your shot you will begin to have trouble.
Your head will naturally move to the back of the swing as it would do with any swinging motion, and the bigger the swing the more your head is likely to move.

Once you have hit the ball your head will follow through naturally with the movement of your shoulders.

You can even observe how some golfers actually tilt their head to their trailing arm before their downswing to ensure that it is behind the ball at the point of impact.

This is something that you could try, but at all times your swing should feel comfortable and the movements should feel natural or you will revert to actions that won’t deliver the best results.

Technorati tags: head will their have when movement

Should You Continue to Get Lessons?

If you are wondering whether you should continue to get lessons once you have learn how to play golf and have a relatively good handicap, then the answer is a definite yes.

Unless you are the best golfer in the world then you still have lessons to learn.

Even the best listen to the advice of their caddies so you can certainly improve your game with more lessons.

While we might think we are playing to the best of our ability, golf is a game that no one ever masters completely so any minor change that can help your play can pay major dividends when it comes to competition time.

We all develop quirks in our game and these can make the difference between winning and losing.

There is nothing better than having a professional watch you while you swing your club to see what areas might need adjustment and improvement.

Golf lessons are a golfers best investment and this also applies to competent players.

Not only could your golf improve but also playing better always adds to the enjoyment of the game.

No one ever hits the perfect shot every time, so that in itself shows that we all have more to learn.

The more advanced you get, the more important it is to ensure you get professional help that can actually benefit you and this might mean you need to seek the advice of a PGA or LPGA Professional rather than the club pro you might have used in the past.

Lessons will help you to play more consistently, drive straighter and further, and correspondingly you will score better.

Fine-tuning your play is best left to a golf professional who can pin point where you might need to make changes.

Even advising you on different equipment, golf balls or golf shoes can have a positive effect on your game.

Golf development is ongoing so what might have worked best for you yesterday could be inferior to the products that are available today.

Technorati tags: golf have best might lessons more