I recently played a course that well... kicked my butt. The rough was up so the smallest miss left me with a wedge back to the fairway. The greens were small and the pins tucked. Anyway, my primary difficulty was an inability to see a straight plane line to trace and execute a hinge action on etc. It was just that usually a lot of courses I play are more forgiving from the tee. When I practice I put two dowels down to create a plane line, I even spray painted them cone orange! I hit a lot of quality shots on the range, but on the course I struggle to "see it"
What do I have to do to see a straight plane line out there? I tend to lose it when I go from behind the ball to the side of it. Using an intermediate target does not help a great deal. Also, when a tour player's plane line is not his target line do they look up at the target, or do they track down the plane line? Say I am aiming 15 feet left of the flag if I look at the flag I tend to lose my plane line. Make sense? This happens all too often on the greens. A key for me is to see the plane line. Any suggestions on how to see it a little bit better?
Most right handed golfers have problems with severe left to right breaking putts. The view of the hole way out to the right causes a little push that sends the ball low. There are a variety of remedies like putting to the apex spot , disregarding the hole a little while concentrating on weight , drawing a line on your ball, making sure your skull or eye line returns to square after looking at the hole......what ever works for you. Knowledge of the cause of the push is hopefully all one needs, but I still suffer.
On the fairways if you dont already, pretend you are hitting a straight shot 15' left and then open the club up to the hole by rotating the club in your hands. Dont rotate the hands just rotate the club in the hands. Experiment with hinging and non hinging. I find I have to vertical a little on a cut shot 'cause Im a drawer of the ball.
I lose my plane line when I align at the hole and rotate my body left or right for shape, so I align at the alt target and rotate the club. To each his own.
I'm referring more to the mental aspect. I have difficulty seeing line that can only be seen in my mind's eye. I am wondering if someone has a party trick or two that could help me develop a knack for being able to see a straight plane line. It may be a mental capacity thing, or just years of gripping it and ripping it! Seeing a straight line is apparently hard work for me!
As you track with your eyes try to visualize the grass lighting on fire. Go back and forth a couple of times slowly to get the image of the line "burned" into your mind. You can even stand behind the ball and use the clubshaft to describe the plane line and pretend you are sighting a gun. Either way, it is going to take more mental energy. You may even practice on the range by switching from your practice station that has the plane lines to outside of it while going through a pre-shot routine that assists you in being able to SEE the line.
Move your eyes SLOWLY when you are looking back and forth from the ball down the plane line.
See it and Sink it by Craig Farnsworth might be a useful book. I think I browsed over it a number of years ago.
I guess the other possibility is to zero in on the target and TRUST that you will respond to the target by tracing the plane line. Maybe this is something that would take more practice than what you are trying to do already. No idea, in any event, report back and best of luck.
Matt
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"In my experience, if you stay with the essentials you WILL build a repeatable swing undoubtedly. If you can master the Imperatives you have a champion" (Vikram).
The reason you can't sustain the lag is because you are so eager to make the club move fast (a reaction to the intent of "hitting it far"). So on a full shot you throw it away too early, which doesn't happen for your short chip. (bts)
I'm not so sure golf is that exact a sport. On tight, punishing courses you're going to miss fairways and greens. As silly as it sounds, I would avoid courses that are overly penal... they're just no fun to play. PGA and LPGA golfers arrange their schedules to avoid course like those.
On the other hand, courses like that are an excellent test of your entire game.
Is it a body , foot line thing too or just the plane line? I know a foot line fretter who loves his dowels for the wrong reason. He aligns his feet to them on the range but is lost on the course, always looking down to try to figure out where his feet are pointing etc. He places his foot line above all and extrapolates out from it his plane line etc.
Perhaps this isnt your problem but it is common. Learn to align the clubface to the intermediate spot and then the body to the clubface rather than the target. The TGm set up procedure is very cool.. Not sure where it is in the book.
Hybrid Mode
