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00:00Hello everyone, Neil Tappin here from Golf Monthly and welcome to West Hill Golf Club

00:04and this video looking at the five biggest golf swing mistakes and how to fix them.

00:10I'm joined in this video by Alex Elliott, he's a PGA pro and he's got some really simple

00:14and effective advice for what we think are the most common mistakes that might be costing

00:18you hitting slices or hooks or just hitting shots slightly fat or slightly thin, whatever

00:23your issue, hopefully there should be something in this video to really help you out.

00:32Right, so the first one on our list of biggest golf swing mistakes is the grip and it's something

00:38you're going to need to pay attention to. Alex, what do people need to look out for here?

00:42What are the biggest faults in terms of the grip?

00:44I think if we start off firstly with the palm, we all sort of hear this one banded around

00:49quite a lot. So if you're a golfer, if you're right handed, you struggle losing that ball

00:53off to the right and really don't feel you get a big bang for your buck, then we're going

00:57to tend to see this golf club run through the lifeline, where we're actually told to put

01:01the putter actually for most people. So essentially when we've got the club in the palm, we're

01:06going to see it very similar to as I've got here. And if you just waggle that golf club up

01:11and down, it's going to feel quite heavy.

01:13And what happens in this scenario is that when you return the club to impact, the way in

01:18which your body works, you're going to more than likely return it slightly open, aren't

01:22you? Slightly open or tenter with driver, potentially add a lot of loft, right? So like our ability

01:28to create a good efficient hit is dramatically reduced.

01:31Yes. So if you're, if you have a fault in your grip that isn't a weak grip, but a strong

01:36grip, what does that look like?

01:37So a strong grip would be, let's say two to three knuckles, maybe even four knuckles

01:41showing really our logo of the glove pointing to the sky and sort of this look to how we're

01:46set up to the ball. Yeah. We're going to see that real hook curvature. So finishing off

01:50to the left for right-handed player, finishing off to right for a left-handed player. And

01:54that for me is where we're going to really struggle to control the golf ball, especially

01:59in firm conditions like it is now, like having that strong grip, we're only going to see

02:03sort of lowish ball flights, a lot of hook spin on it.

02:06Exactly. So what does the absolutely technically good grip look like and how can people set

02:11it? The one thing I'd say with this, Neil, is that we've got to be sort of, I always think

02:16of people improving their grip by edging it back slowly. Okay. Because your grip matches how

02:19you release the club. So we need to make sure it's not going from one extreme to the other.

02:23Okay. The only sort of caveat to that is if you do have it in the palm, get it in the

02:26fingers straight away. But if you are weak, edge it stronger. If you are really strong,

02:30edge it a little bit weaker. Okay. But that common ground where I want you to end up in

02:34the end would be a nice simple routine for this as well. If you're out on the golf courses,

02:39grip it sort of in the middle of my shaft as I've done here, tilt it slightly away, place

02:44it in the fingers. And you can see that I've got it right at the base of my fingers. Meaty

02:49part on top. Quick test. Club feels light. Club down to the ground. We can see sort of

02:54two and a half knuckles. Yep. Fingers on in my right hand. And both of these creases should

02:59be somewhere around my right shoulder. Quick question for you, Alex. If you get the left

03:03hand grip right, will the right hand grip then automatically be correct? I think so.

03:07Yeah. You can, you've got a better chance. Right. Fine. So focus. Are we saying focus on the

03:11left hand grip? I think your left hand grip. Yeah. The opposite way. Yeah. Simply whatever

03:15one you have your glove on, get that right. We'll tend to have a better chance of hitting

03:19some good shots. Okay. Good. And if you get it right, then you should hit some nice neutral

03:24flighted golf shots. A bit like this one. No pressure. So yeah, nice, simple routine in

03:29the fingers. Meaty part on top. It's going to give you a much better chance of returning

03:33that golf club back to relatively good to our path. A bit like that. Very good.

03:47Okay. So next up, alignment. And it sounds easy enough, doesn't it, to get your alignment

03:52right? But it's something that can go wrong quite easily and something that even the best

03:56players in the world are constantly checking, making sure they get it right. So Alex, how do

04:01you get it right? Firstly, don't aim your shoulders at target. Right. Which might sound like to

04:06you watching this right now, a comment where you go, well, of course you do. If you're going

04:10to throw something or fire something, you'd be sort of looking at alignment. And a lot of

04:14you will be standing there going, right, I'm aligning to target. Stand up, check. Oh, I look

04:19a little bit left here. Start to adjust ourselves. So it looks like our eyes are perfect. Well, in

04:24reality, it's going to be aiming to the right. It's the club face that you need to worry

04:28about, not your body alignment. So what's a good way of checking it in practice, out

04:34on the golf course? Yeah. I would, like we've got set up here. So I would do these simple

04:38things when you're hitting balls in the range. And if you're playing on your own in an evening,

04:42just throw them down on the ground. But then we'll also talk through a scenario you can use

04:46in a competition. So everything, Neil, has got to start from a ball to target line. Yes. So I

04:51would stand behind at the start of a range session and simply pick out my ball to target line,

04:56place the lineman stick down there. Then I can walk in and it's making sure that our feet,

05:03knees, hips, and shoulders all run parallel to this. And when you do stand up, your shoulder

05:09line will be working parallel left to target. Yeah. So it's like you're almost like you're

05:13on a set of train tracks. Exactly that. And then you're out on the golf course playing

05:17a competition. You know you have a tendency to aim a bit right. How do you make sure that

05:21you don't do that? Simple, simple trick. We all got logos on our golf balls or some others

05:27even put lines on our golf balls from a button. Use this line to advantage on par three tees.

05:32And when you're hitting some drives away, stand behind the golf ball again, as if you've got an

05:37extension of what we did during practice, place that down parallel lines. And we can simply again,

05:44build our stance from this, as opposed to building it from this way to the ball, build it from the ball

05:50upwards. It's called a ball, the target line for a reason. Yeah. And I think the important

05:54point to make here is that if you are devoting some time to your alignment, it won't be wasted.

05:59There's a whole host of other good things that will happen once you've got your alignment spot on.

06:09Right. Next up, the slice. Alex, most of us know how it feels. Most of us, it's very demoralizing when

06:14it happens. What have you got here? I can see you've got a drill for us. Yeah. I mean,

06:19it might look quite strange you're putting this out on the range, but honestly, I've used this analogy

06:23with people who come for lessons. And this is really nice and simple. If I gave you a tennis

06:27racket, but we don't have that right here because it's not something that you can attach quite easily

06:32to a golf shot. So let's use our right palm. Okay. Okay. So if we're a slicer and our golf ball was

06:37sort of at this height, we'd work like this. Yeah. And we'd go, oh, of course the ball would work this

06:42way. Yeah. Okay. So if we did the opposite to that in golf posture, but then we just stand upright

06:49to hit this ball away like tennis. I wanted to take the ball away as far as I could,

06:53we'd make sort of this motion. So that would be my club traveling a little bit more into out,

06:58my club face being a little bit more closer to square, if not close to my path. And this would

07:03be quite an easy motion for a lot of us to make with the ball that height. Yes. So question then.

07:10So it feels like a fairly simple resolution. So how does it look with the golf club in your hands,

07:15Alex? And how, what should people be wary of the kind of body movements that they're making that

07:20are causing them to cut across it? I think that the biggest reference point I would have for a lot of

07:25golfers is when we start the downswing and it, it comes so especially with driver, we want to hit it

07:30far. We want to get that distance. It's right shoulder, right hip working out, which works this way.

07:36Yes. A bit eager to hit it quite a long way. And suddenly you come over the top. Exactly. Whereas in

07:40tennis, the ball would come, we'd move in and through. And we'd make that sort of reaction

07:48to a good body movement because we're orientating it to a moving object. Now, obviously in golf,

07:53the little white ball is still. So we've got to think of an analogy and a nice simple way would

07:57be actually address the golf ball down here, swing up, feel that you meet the golf ball away. Okay. Now

08:05you might think, well, Alex, you're standing up, but what we're trying to do is get the club

08:09to work this. Right. Yes. And not the other way around. Exactly. Yeah. So we could have two or

08:14three practice swings on the course, on the range, walk into the shot. We've now got the feeling of

08:19being able to work the club through this space as if we're hitting a tennis shot away, but just more

08:25tilted over the golf ball. Okay. Go on then hit one for us. Let's see how it looks. So I'd really make

08:29a few waggles, tennis shot away. Imagine him hitting that ball down to target.

08:39Arrow straight. If you have a slice, it can be one of those things that takes a little bit of

08:43time to get it out of your game, but work on it. As Alex is saying here, it could really help.

08:52This one is all about starting the golf swing correctly, but let's start with the fault.

08:56Alex, what do people do that costs them in the golf swing? I think we just put it into two

09:01categories. One, not control the club face and not get the arms and body working together. So

09:06simply it would be closing it too much or open too much. Right. Okay. And that second one looks

09:14as if you're taking it away on the inside. Are you taking it away on the inside? Yeah, very much so.

09:18And I think sort of that open face, especially with longer clubs, everybody thinks it's a little bit

09:22more rounded. It's very tempting to sort of work it in this direction. Yeah. And it's something you

09:27see a lot, isn't it? So what can people do to resolve the problem? So a nice, simple routine

09:33as I've done here is I've simply just placed my golf club down directly behind my ball. So if we sort

09:39of give those two scenarios, if I go too much in the inside, well, look how the club really works.

09:44If I wanted to push that golf club back as far as I could, I would really want to get arms and the

09:52body working together and more of what would feel like this sort of, I guess the term a lot of people

09:56would use, one piece takeaway. One piece takeaway. Yeah. You hear it a lot. So down behind the ball.

10:00I mean, look at the difference of this here. Yeah. A lot more control. Golf club's gone a lot further

10:06back. Yeah. And if you were to draw a triangle between the club head and your shoulders, that triangle

10:10would pretty much be kept in intact for a lot of that, wouldn't it? Exactly. Rather than changing

10:15your angles, changing them means a lot more compensations have got to take place. Yeah.

10:19So if you can start the golf swing correctly, the chances are the rest of the swing will follow

10:23and you'll hit better shots.

10:30So the last one on our list is standing up in the downswing. Alex, what do you mean by standing up

10:34in the downswing? I think a lot of people will see another term that they'd use is early extension.

10:38So essentially belt buckle getting higher or standing up and then we see that scoopy sort of

10:44look to our impact position. Right. Okay. Yeah. It's something you do see quite a lot. So how do you

10:49solve the issue? I think you see, I'll even with very good players as well. It's not just sort of

10:53your beginners, your higher handicappers. It's something that happens with a lot. So a simple

10:58thing we can do. I mean, I've just placed my bag here. This could be alignment sticks. If you're watching

11:02this at home, this could actually be the wall behind you. If you've got a few spare minutes each day,

11:07I think the important thing of this, Neil, is we make it flow. Right. Okay. So golf club across

11:12our chest, we don't want to just be position, position, position, because we know in reality,

11:17the golf swing's got a bit of flow to it. So what I want you to do here is have the bum just

11:21out of touch of whether it's the wall alignment stick or your golf bag as I've got here, go through

11:26swing, try and touch it with your left pocket, back, right pocket, through left pocket. And you can really

11:32see here how I'm a lot more over the golf ball throughout the whole motion. Yes. Yeah. And

11:38you're avoiding that issue of standing up, aren't you? You're retaining that posture,

11:43that really good posture that you set at address. I can see that you're still in it. Yeah. As you

11:46reach that kind of impact position. Exactly. And just to sort of preempt a few questions that people

11:50might ask to us to stay more over the golf ball impact. Well, our belt buckle has to work more to

11:55target to give us the ability to be here. If our belt buckle's a little bit higher, we're going to

12:01find it very, very hard to hit the golf ball in that direction or remain over it. Yeah. It's a really

12:06simple way of thinking about it. Hopefully it's a sort of a non-technical fix for a technical issue

12:12that should help you out. So there you have it. Some really great advice there from Alex. Really

12:17simple, really effective. If you do have any questions, please do post them below. We hope to get

12:22back to as many of you as possible. But that's it for now from West Hill. Thanks for watching,

12:26and we'll see you next time.

Common Golf Swing Mistakes

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Expert Advice | Golf Monthly

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