My Case Against Keeping the Left Heel Planted

My Case Against Keeping the Left Heel Planted

I have a huge problem with teaching people to keep their left heel planted on the ground during the swing.  For that matter with restricting the feet in any way and here is why.

When I learned to play golf I was mostly self taught with some advice along the way.  Maybe the best advice I was ever given was:

 “Learn to hit it as far as you can and we will figure out how to control it later.”

That is exactly what I did and very few people were longer.  With those that were I would bet I could hit it longer in the fairway.

I had one thing working against me.  I was not very strong in the chest, shoulders and arms.  My  assets were being tall with really strong legs and a very good sense of balance.  I used my legs and balance to make up for my weak upper body.  I did this by loading my body mass on my right side on my back swing and using my legs to move it as hard as I could to my left side on the way down.  This meant I was up on my left toe as I reached transition and actually dragging my right foot at impact.

I had an older cousin that was about the same height and weight as I was but much stronger from the waist up.  We were about the same length with different swings because of our different strengths.

If anyone had tried to restrict my lower body or left foot I would have lost about 30 yards.  I also think good footwork is essential to good balance and balance is what allowed me to keep it in the fairway.

I have no existing videos of my swing but did see it on film in my early twenties and my legwork was obvious with my right knee even with my left knee at impact.

I am sensitive about this topic because I think a lot of young players are ruined by being told to keep their heel planted which is detrimental to what the body and brain want them to do naturally.

Conclusion

Never inhibit the natural tendency just because it bothers you.  It is not about how it looks.  It is all about how it works.

Short Game Alignment and Setup

Thanks to Golf Digest and Sean Foley

I keep seeing articles about your setup on short shots and chip shots, but for some reason, no one mentions that alignment and setup for each shot is slightly different.  The length of the shot and how high or low you want the ball to fly is determined by your setup and alignment.

Align the Shoulders

While ball position and lower body alignment may vary, the one constant is shoulder alignment.  Your shoulders should always be roughly parallel to your target line on any shot whether you are hitting a driver or a putter.  NOT pointed at the target, but parallel to it.

The Lower Body

The lower body – meaning the feet, legs, and hips - will be open or pointing left of the target in order to get yourself out of your own way quickly.  The club needs to travel down the target line as long as possible and a square stance makes it much more difficult to accomplish that. 

Do NOT Shift Your Weight

The single most important factor in developing a good short game is that you absolutely must learn to contact the ground in the same spot in your swing every time.  To accomplish this you simply need to stabilize your weight.  The low point in your swing arc is where ever your weight (or center of gravity) is.  If you shift your weight the bottom of your arc moves constantly with your weight.  The odds of winning the lottery are better than the odds of getting your weight in the same spot every time if it is shifting.

One point that needs to be made at this time is watching and reading about how tour players do it is a waste of time unless you are already that good.  Tour players have extraordinary hand-eye coordination, touch, and feel so they can do things in their swing that would be problematic for the average golfer.

It is easier to just place the weight on the left side or left foot and keep it there throughout the swing. 

 Keep the Club Head Low

Keep the club low to the ground as long as possible on the back swing and the follow through.  Never make any attempt to lift the club or cock the wrists unless hitting out of deep grass.  Keep the hands quiet.  Over active hands will result in fat and thin or skulled shots.

Another very important factor is to be able to have your hands in the same position at impact that you did at address.  The club head must never pass the hands until well after impact.  The chipping or pitching swing is made primarily with the arms and shoulders – not the hands.

How long the shot is determines how wide or narrow the stance and how open your body is.  For a chip shot your right foot is very close to your left foot and your lower body is very open.

For a pitch shot it is less pronounced.  The hands will generally be more forward on a chip, but the height of the ball flight will be determined by the loft of the club and the forward lean of the shaft.

Grip Down On The Club

One final point that needs to be addressed is gripping down or “choking up” on the club.  The shorter the shot the more you choke up.  It is perfectly fine to grip all the way down to the bottom of the grip.  This enable you to be firmer and more aggressive because the shorter you make the club the shorter distance you will hit the ball.

I played a lot of golf with Hubert Green who had 19 PGA Tour wins including 2 majors and he used to choke the sand wedge all the way down onto the steel and open the face so he could be firm and aggressive. 

Never let the golf club slow down prior to impact.  Taking it back too far and slowing down prior to impact will cause the club head to pass the hands with the absolute certainty of a bad shot.

Practice with slightly different alignments until you find what is most comfortable for you.  I suggest practicing extensively with a sand wedge which is about 56 degrees.  By adjusting the shaft lean forward and backward and opening and closing the face you can learn to hit a variety of shots.  I am not a fan of using the lob wedge to chip or pitch with.  I agree with Barney Adams, the founder of Adams Golf, when his club designer told him they were going to design a 60 degree lob wedge he told them to stamp a skull and cross bone on it. 

As you go from a full swing to a less than full swing to a chip the right foot gets closer and closer to the left and the hips open more and more.  Shoulders stay parallel to the line.

Once you have learned to develop a solid short game simply start taking a bigger and faster swing and gradually square your body alignment and you will have an excellent full swing as demonstrated by the video below.

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Learn To Hit The Golf Ball Straight

Learning to hit the golf ball relatively straight is not as difficult as most people believe if you simply understand what is required.  Most normal people have the hand-eye coordination necessary to accomplish it.

 Only two things control the direction of the golf ball -  the direction the club is facing and the direction the club is traveling.  If the club is traveling towards the target and the club is facing towards the target the ball will fly toward the target.

Most people have the ability to swing their arms toward the intended target so the trick is to get the club to face in the same direction.  A simple homemade training aid will help you do this.

Take one of your golf clubs and tape a ping pong paddle to the shaft of the club so that the paddle and the club face are pointed in the same direction. Now swing the club toward the target while watching the face of the paddle.  Normal coordination will allow you to control where the paddle faces.  If you have the ability to use a screwdriver you can do it.

If you want to draw the ball or hook it simply  rotate the face of the paddle so that it points left of the target while still swinging toward the target. If you want to fade or slice the ball, have the paddle point to the right of the target while you continue to swing your arms and the club toward the target.

Practice doing this without a golf ball until you learn how to do it and get comfortable with it. As you get used to how it feels you are learning to do it without thinking about it.  The more you practice it the faster it will become automatic.

A final note about slicing.  A slice is caused when the face it pointing right of the directions your arms are swing.  Nothing else.  When you get the face (or the paddle) to face in the direction of the swing the ball will go straight in that direction.  Since most slicers swing from out to in this means you will pull the ball straight left until you fix the direction of your arms.

If you don’t have a ping pong paddle the next best thing is a tennis racket.  Grip it with both hands and swing it like a golf club.

Bobby Jones Was Ahead of His Time.

Either Bobby Jones was ahead of his time or this philosophy got lost as the years went by.

I read a lot of the writings and thoughts of the greats of the past because I believe their message is still effective today and that the future of golf instruction is in learning to teach better.  Not in learning more "what to teach."  It appears that Bobby Jones knew over 70 years ago something that is now being learned, or relearned about how people of all ages learn to swing the golf club.  The science behind human learning is slowly seeping into golf instruction.

They learn primarily with their eyes and not their ears! 

There are sub-groups under that -  visual, auditory, read-write, and kinesthetic, but we primarily learn with our eyes.

Without getting too deep into the rabbit hole of neuroscience, the Holonomic brain theory supports that people learn motor skills not by linking a progression of positions together like line-by-line computer code, but instead by storing the entire movement as a neural 3-D hologram.  In other words they learn from watching.  

It appears that Stewart Maiden and Bobby Jones understood this.

Bobby wasn't a big proponent of teaching the golf swing.  Bobby learned the game by playing and observing the pro at his club, Stewart Maiden.  Maiden did not spend time on the practice tee giving Bobby swing instruction.  In fact, Bobby claimed that, to the best of his knowledge, Maiden never allowed himself to be drawn into a discussion about the golf swing.  To Stewart Maiden, golf was all about striking the wee ball.  Bobby might have been convinced to write about the swing, but I suspect he did so with mixed emotions.  He was not a man who believed in playing the game in a mechanical way.  He was not a fan of what he called, "rigid adherence to prescribed routine," in the teaching and learning of the golf swing. 

Bobby wrote: "Even if a person may not have begun to play golf at an early age, I believe that he may gain much by emphasizing naturalness in his learning processes. I think he has the right to convince himself that an effective golf swing can be made without rigid adherence to a prescribed routine and that there is room for differences in physical structure and capabilities. No matter how nearly equal in performance the top-rank players may be, yet they are as recognizable by their swings as by their faces.

"What the average golfer needs more than fine spun theories," Bobby wrote, "is something that will give him a clearer conception of what he should try to do with the clubhead... When we speak of sound method or good form, we mean nothing more than that the possessor of either has simplified his swing to the point where errors are less likely to creep in and he is able consistently to bring his club against the ball in the correct hitting position."

How To Keep The Ball In Play With The Driver

Here is a wonderful video on learning a quick and simple way to keep your driver in play.  It actually applies to every club in your bag, but I find it easier to learn by starting with the driver.

The most important key to this is taking practice swings.  You need to swing without the ball until you are comfortable taking a full swing at various speeds.

Take the practice swing and then hold the finish long enough to remember what it felt like.  Remember the feeling of being balanced and controlling speed.  Then just repeat that feeling.

Just remember that it is not a three-quarter swing - it is a full swing at three-quarter speed.

You will find out that when you start to relax and slow the club down you will start to make very solid contact.


The importance of this was taught to me by the legendary Mickey Wright.  How far I can hit a club and how far I should hit it are two different things.

The video only takes a couple of minutes and will be well worth your time.  It and several more are posted on my YouTube Channel.

A Simple Way To Check Your Alignment.

A Simple Way To Check Your Alignment.

I just ran across this and had one of those moments where you slap your forehead and say, "Why didn't I think of that."

I have noticed over the years that many of my students struggle with getting the club face square at address.  Most have it slightly open and then wonder why they slice.

Well, here is a simple and inexpensive way to help you check your club face alignment.  Simply buy some small magnets and glue long tees (the longer, the better) to the magnets.

It will help you train yourself to what proper club face alignment actually looks like.

Golf Instruction From 1953 With Hogan, Snead, and Others.

In 1953 the PGA released an instructional movie along with Life Magazine called "Keep Em On the Fairway".

The intro is by Bobby Jones and the explanation of the golf swing is as true today as it was then.  I love the way it uses what was then state of the art technology to inhance the instructional portion.

The film features a nice mix of footage where the pros are seen both attending to the common faults of some everyday golfers and demonstrating their techniques on the course. Included in the film are the giants of the game at the time: Ben Hogan, Sam Snead, Lloyd Mangrum, Jerry Barber, Cary Middlecoff, Walter Burkemo, Ed Oliver, Jimmy Demaret, Lawson Little, Byron Nelson, Lew Worsham, Pat Abbott, Miss Louise Suggs, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope.

Learn to Control Your Driver and Keep the Ball in Play

Here is a wonderful video on learning a quick and simple way to keep your driver in play.  It actually applies to every club in your bag, but I find it easier to learn by starting with the driver.

The most important key to this is taking practice swings.  You need to swing without the ball until you are comfortable taking a full swing at various speeds.

Take the practice swing and then hold the finish long enough to remember what it felt like.  Remember the feeling of being balanced and controlling speed.  Then just repeat that feeling.

Just remember that it is not a three-quarter swing - it is a full swing at three-quarter speed.

You will find out that when you start to relax and slow the club down you will start to make very solid contact.


The importance of this was taught to me by the legendary Mickey Wright.  How far I can hit a club and how far I should hit it are two different things.

The video only takes a couple of minutes and will be well worth your time.  It and several more are posted on my YouTube Channel.

The True Art of Helping Golfers.

Golf Instructors Looking For Other Career Options.

I just got a message from a friend of mine that is also a fellow golf instructor.  He was very upset.  He says that we need to start looking for another line of work.  He just observed something that is going to put all of us out of business.

While watching The Golf Channel this morning he observed infomercials where Rick Smith, Hank Haney, and Bobby Clampett are all giving away secrets that they have learned from tour players or while on tour.

So far the comments show that we instructors are in a panic:

“Well there goes my future lesson revenue! My students won't need me after they see Rick’s

“Are his secrets different than Bobby Clampett's and Hank Haney' free secrets”?

secret lessons and start shooting par.  Anyone hiring for odd jobs around the house”?

“Sam , all I know is it seems The Tour is some kind of secret society and a few renegades are blowing it wide open !!! This thing is bigger than all of us” !!!

Apparently there is a tour rookie orientation class where they are told all these secrets and

The golf instruction business will never recover from this.  Then on top of everything else, I opened my email and find out that Gary McCord is now doing the same thing.

I’m going to wrap this up now and go get on social media and let all the young guys out there know that they might want to start looking at other career paths.  Sad to see it end this way, but at least all the golfers out there will be scratch players hitting it 30 yards farther. 

have to sign an oath not to reveal them. Then you have these sneaky instructors drugging them or just getting them drunk and stealing them.  Now they are going to give them away free.

Guess there is a silver ling to everything.

What You Should Know Before Taking a Golf Lesson

If You are Thinking of Taking Lessons.....

                Finding a Good Instructor/Coach

The major reason it is difficult to find good golf instruction today is that instructors/coaches are not ranked by results.  The PGA, Golf Digest, no one does this.  What we need is an “Angie’s List” for golf professionals.  This may be why eighty percent of golfers don’t take lessons.  I’m sure it is at least a factor.

At this point word-of-mouth is all we have.  If you are thinking of taking lessons, you need to do some research before you pay your hard earned money to someone.  The good ones will have no problem with this.  If they are offended by your questions then move on.  You would be wasting your money with them anyway.

Here are a few points to consider before signing up with someone: 

.   Never pay extra for technology like Trackman unless you are a 5 handicap or below.
    
.   If they try to sell you a package up front there is a problem.  If I haven’t worked with someone at least once I have no idea how many lessons they will need.  Packages are not bad unless you are being asked to sign up for one initially.

.   If they do split screen video comparing your swing to some tour player you need to ask for your money back.  This is what I and my friends refer to as “Let me show you how many ways your swing sucks” school of instruction.

.   The real red flag is do they teach a method?  Every instructor should have a method of teaching but should never teach a method.  It’s like saying “One size fits all”.  No method fits everyone.  People and golf swings are individual.
Here’s what to expect from a good instructor/coach on the first lesson:
.  Introduction. Students are often intimidated by PGA pros, so he or she should try setting the student at ease and developing a rapport prior to the session. This leads to more effective communication between the teacher and the student.
    
.  They will want background information. This information includes: Previous golf and sports history; previous injury history; simple movement screens to detect physical limitations; occupation; previous instruction history; goals for golf.
    
.  They will want specific golf information. This includes: examination of the golfer's equipment; ball flight characteristics; determining how far the golfer hits each club; strengths and weaknesses in the various aspects of golf; practice habits; motivation for playing golf (i.e., competition vs. hobby vs. spouse activity, etc.); motivation for taking golf lessons.
    
.  A good instructor will form a personal relationship with you and be personally interested in your success.

The real art of instruction is figuring out what is integral to each players swing and knowing that you should not try to change that.  You have to work around it and help them become the best they can be with the swing they have.  If you know someone who does this, please let me know.  I want to promote them to everyone.

There is good news though.  There is a growing number of instructors out there that will help you simplify what you need to do and will help you maximize your swing and ability – not remake your swing in their image of what it should like.  It’s just difficult to find them because they don’t get much publicity.

One word of caution – if you try to go it alone, keep this in mind.  If you Google golf instruction, golf tips, how to fix a slice, etc. you will get a huge selection.  One reason for this is that these people are in it purely for the money and not to actually help golfers.

You are bombarded by emails and infomercials telling you that if you buy this DVD or training aid, this book, etc. your game will dramatically improve and each one is telling you a different secret.  They have tour players and ex-tour players swearing its some type of breakthrough.  I hate to tell you, but virtually all of them are all scams.  Nobody has the secret because there is no secret.  They are simply trying to make money off you regardless of what they tell you in their video.  Anyone that appears on the first page of Google results has an ulterior motive or they wouldn’t go to that much trouble to get that highly ranked.














Regardless of what Hank Haney or any of the others tell you there is no tip, secret, method, or anything else that works for everyone.

If you have questions or would like to get in touch with me just click on this link. 

Old School Golf Instruction Video

A wonderful Old School video on golf instruction from one of the great Old School players.

Practice Drill to Improve Quickly!

Slow Down to Improve Quickly!

I was taught at a very early age to take a full swing, as far as length of swing is concerned, and only hit the ball 150 yards.  Once I could do this and hit the ball solidly I was allowed to increase the swing speed until I started to lose control of solid contact and direction.

This drill will teach you how to swing within yourself and gain control of your golf shots.  Dead solid contact at a slower swing speed will produce more distance and accuracy than a miss hit at a higher swing speed.

You may hit the ball longer, but you will certainly hit the ball closer to your target.

It will be a little awkward at first, but I promise it is worth the effort to stick with it and anyone can master it.

Taking time to learn this drill will improve your ball striking dramatically and enhance your ability to score better. 

Everyone has the ability to do it.  It’s like taking a full swing at the speed you would hit a pitch shot.

I have used for years with my students and have seen the results it can produce.  If you are serious about golf you owe it to yourself to give it a try.  It could be game changing.

I did have a student ask why once, and I simply replied, “If you can’t hit it solid at a slow speed, how are you going to hit it solid at a fast speed”.

I attached a video that does a great job of showing you what I’m talking about.

I had a student come to me once and his first statement was “I have a short, quick back swing and there’s nothing I can do about I”.  I asked him if he gave himself a black eye every time he scratched his nose.  He said no so I told him there was hope.