- 2 months ago
In this video, Neil Tappin is joined by PGA professional and Golf Monthly Top 50 Coach Katie Dawkins. They discuss some of those simple lessons we all get taught when we first pick up the game but that we all forget! These are the simple and effective tips that can make a huge difference to your scoring potential. Katie's advice should help you from tee-to-green!
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00:00Hello everyone, Neil Tappin here from Golf Monthly and welcome to West Hill Golf Club
00:03and this video in which we're going to take a look at the seven tips that every golfer forgets.
00:09Now these are all things that you'll pick up as you play golf over the years. The really simple
00:13stuff that can actually make a big difference to your scoring but that from time to time we all
00:19forget. Now the advice in this video comes courtesy of Katie Dawkins. She's a PGA pro,
00:24she's one of the Golf Monthly top 50 coaches and she's going to talk you through everything
00:28you need to know and it should help you in all areas of the game from tee to green.
00:32Right, let's get started.
00:38Right, so for our first one we're going to talk about the speed of your swing and in particular
00:42the tempo of your golf swing. Katie, what do people forget here? I think people tend to forget that
00:49this is a golf swing, it's not a golf hit and I think that's probably the key thought for a lot
00:55of people to kind of bank in the memory banks because actually the fact, the act of the golf swing
01:00suggests that there's a natural flow to it, there's a natural swing back and swing through.
01:05The problem people tend to find is that they've got lots of swing thoughts going on in their
01:10in their minds and that tends to stunt this nice natural rhythm that we're looking for in the golf swing.
01:16So you tend to find people thinking about stuff too much and therefore even if you're a decent sports
01:21person, you've got a good ability to hit a ball with a racket, a club, a bat, whatever you happen
01:26to be using, that can sometimes disappear just because you're overthinking it and you're trying
01:31to hit it and trying to force the ball to do what you want it to do.
01:34It's such a good point. I think my specific issue on this I think is that I tend to start getting too
01:40aggressive when I'm on the golf course, under pressure, start snatching at it a little bit too much.
01:45So okay, so most people watching this will know tempo really important. So how do people practice
01:51it? How do you make sure that you don't go too far wrong?
01:55I think it's important to have something that you can take out on the golf course with you because
01:58like you said, there's situations out there where you need a little bit of restraining perhaps.
02:06So you actually need just to calm things down a bit. So a really good drill to do that is to actually
02:11maybe do one of your practice swings or just your sole practicing with your feet together because
02:16what that does is it starts to create this lovely freewheeling chilled out tempo. If you go at it like
02:24a bat out of hell with your feet together, guess what? You fall over. So you're throwing yourself
02:29off balance. Okay, so if you are somebody like me who has a tendency to snatch at their shots a little bit
02:34too much, that feeling that you're hitting and not swinging, try to incorporate that into your pre-shot routine.
02:41Okay, so we have reached the inevitable part of this video which we're going to talk about alignment
02:48and most golfers watching this will know how important it is and yet there'll be a lot of
02:52people watching this that don't do it correctly every time and that's because they're forgetting
02:57something. What is it that golfers tend to forget about aiming properly? I think the biggest thing golfers
03:02tend to forget with alignment is they forget that it's not their body that's lined up to the target.
03:07They're on those old train tracks so the ball and the target are on one train track, your feet near
03:12hips and shoulders are on the other so in theory you're running parallel to your target but the
03:17problem is when a lot of people set up to the ball is they look down their shoulder and they tend to
03:23kind of shuffle themselves and aim themselves at so they've skewed themselves across the line.
03:27Yes, so what's the process? How do you get it right time and time again?
03:32So you need to build it into your pre-shot routine so you need to stand behind the ball,
03:36use your club almost like a ruler, point it at your target, pull the club down and pick yourself
03:41a mini target just in front of the ball. It's so much easier to get yourself lined up on those train
03:46tracks because you can see the tracks down there. When we're looking up at the target it's much easier
03:50to have a little shuffle, do a little dance and immediately you've pushed yourself offline.
03:56Yeah. So having a mini target is probably my biggest tip for this and being able to aim yourself
04:01to that is much much easier than the longer one. Yeah and it's so important so if you can just do
04:06what Katie said and get it right more often chances are you'll also start making better swings,
04:11better contacts and just generally playing golf a little bit better.
04:19Okay so we've come down to the green here and Katie we're talking about chipping,
04:23what do people forget to do in a situation like this?
04:27I think the biggest problem people have when it comes to shots out on the course around the green
04:32is they choose the wrong club. Right.
04:34So I think there's that idea that because I'm chipping I need to look good and they want that
04:38savvy-esque sort of high floaty shot that's going to land right by the flag and zip back and stop.
04:43That's not reality. Reality would be if I was to give you a ball and throw it to the flag.
04:48Go on then.
04:49Yeah right. I'm not going to go up and over like that because I've got no control over it,
04:54the bounce is going to be more unpredictable, everything's just a little bit more dangerous.
04:58My safest possible option would be to almost play lawn bowls basically so I'd roll it
05:04on the first available bit of green it would run into the flag.
05:07Yeah.
05:07So then what I'd want you to do out on the golf course is kind of put into your hand the club
05:13that best fits that carry and roll. Right.
05:16So for me that went low and rolled out so it'd probably be something like an A time.
05:20Yeah.
05:20The majority of people would not be choosing an A time from here.
05:23Well I think that they possibly just automatically grab the lob wedge or the sand wedge.
05:27Yeah.
05:27Whatever shot they're facing around the green.
05:30I know that I'd probably have a tendency to do that a bit from time to time just immediately
05:33pick the club.
05:34You just want to look the best you can possibly look and for a lot of people that's the ball in the air.
05:38But what's interesting about this Katie is that you're saying work backwards figure out what the
05:42shot looks like the best most reliable looking shot what it looks like and then pick your club.
05:47So with this little short chip this almost tick tock action I can afford to miss hit it a little
05:53bit and still get away with it. I think that's the important.
05:56Go on then.
05:56Miss hit it for us and get away with it.
05:58Miss hit it and get away with it. Oh great.
06:01So all I'm going to do is just that little tick tock bounce it on that top bit and let it roll around.
06:08This is good.
06:08This is very good.
06:09You told me to miss hit it and I said no.
06:11No you did it perfectly.
06:13But I think the point remains keep it simple it's the best way to do it.
06:20Posture. It's something that I think most golfers understand how important it is to have a nice
06:24athletic posture yet the amount of golfers that you see out on the course who have stood over the
06:29ball not looking particularly athletic. Why is it so important to get right firstly Katie?
06:35It's so important to get right because posture good posture gives you good balance which in turn
06:41gives you control in your golf swing and we want control in our golf swing right yeah we don't want
06:46to stand there in a position where we're rocking about the place and this is what happens when the
06:50position that you're setting up in is poor you're setting up in a state of almost sitting down or
06:56sometimes tipped over too much but the one we see the most is the fat back kind of slightly lazy
07:02posture almost what you've got there is you've got the weight on the heels so you're going to
07:07swing the club back and you're going to be rocking around rocking all over the place what we want to
07:12see is a more of a planted onto the balls of the feet and the ability to actually be in balance as
07:18you come back to the ball good posture to begin with is usually going to mean better posture as you
07:23hit the shot yeah poor posture you're just not going to introduce any of the bigger muscles so you're
07:28not going to get that lovely rotation and that lovely weight transfer through the ball so what's
07:32a good tip what's a good checkpoint to make sure you're in the right posture you could stand in
07:37front of a mirror at home and actually take your posture if the mirror's there take your posture set
07:41yourself up have a look go yeah all right that's great but we want something we can take onto the golf
07:46course you do see people out there going tippy over flex your knees and going through almost a little
07:51routine in their heads but that can introduce tension okay in good posture you should be able to a bit like
07:57you're about to return to serve in tennis you should be able to give your heels a little tap
08:01that tells us we're ready to run somewhere tells us we're athletic if you're setting up to the ball
08:07and you try and do that and you think oh blimey i'm rocking back already because i can tap my toes
08:12if you're a toe tapper your posture's lacking athleticism it's a really simple tip and if you do have
08:18issues with your posture over the ball then maybe introduce that into your pre-shot routine it could
08:23make all the difference okay so we're going to talk about bunker play and obviously the two biggest
08:32mistakes are either leaving it in the bunker or thinning it over the back the lesson that people
08:37forget here is that the bunker shot the green side bunker shot is the only one in which you're not
08:43trying to make contact with the ball first right exactly and i think this is the thing is that we
08:48don't want to hit the ball first we want to hit the sand behind the ball so it floats out on that
08:52lovely cushion so it's really important here that we address the part we want to hit so we're actually
08:58addressing the sand behind the ball okay so talk us through how you do it so it's important to almost
09:03think of the ball as being sat on a fried egg so the ball is the yolk essentially just draw a couple of
09:09little circles obviously not allowed to do this in real play for obvious reasons but draw a couple
09:14of circles around the ball and you can even give yourself three circles in a row almost like traffic
09:19lights practice hitting the right bit of sand so if i was to have a little practice traffic light if you
09:25like so i'm going to set myself up swing back swing through and take the whole thing out what i'm
09:31then going to do is set myself up to the back of the egg where the ball is and again almost try and
09:37repeat it so i'm just letting the ball get in the way but i'm aiming to hit the back of that egg
09:44perfect great shot and you'll notice i mean that description there that Katie's given is so simple
09:49it's something that every golfer can do but you do need to practice these things trust it and practice
09:55it it should help okay so our next one is about grip pressure and okay this is starting to feel
10:04actually a bit like a personal counseling session for me because i know that under pressure i have
10:09a tendency to really squeeze the grip and strangle the grip and i know that's not good but can you
10:15explain to everyone why it's not good so the first thing is you're not alone probably 90 of the people
10:21that i teach are strangling the club now the effect that this has on your ability to get back to that
10:27ball is huge the reason being if you're holding the club in an appropriate manner an appropriate
10:32amount of pressure is being applied you're holding it almost like a tube of toothpaste with the lid off
10:36so that would be quite a good way of remembering it what people tend to do is they tend to go from
10:42setting themselves up holding it all right and then suddenly the squeeze comes in so you've got a nice
10:48relaxed hold where the club's on the ground check out what my club face does when i squeeze it
10:53that's literally down to me strengthening my grip my forearms are contracting and therefore shortening
11:00and lo and behold you can imagine the shots that you're going to get from that you've got an iron
11:03in hand you're likely to hit i would think you're likely to hit bins yes maybe tops absolutely yeah
11:08you are but also it's the impact that it has on your rhythm which we've talked about before you want
11:16that free easy swing you want that lovely flow to your golf swing yeah so as katie said a nice
11:22light grip pressure it'll help your rhythm it'll help all sorts of different things in your golf swing
11:32okay so the number one tip on our list that golfers forget is they forget to aim at the middle of the
11:38green in particular when the flag is cut tight to one side or another so imagine for a second
11:45that the green behind katie and i here imagine that flag is tucked just over the bunkers on the
11:49right hand side appreciate it's not today but imagine that it is that's a really dangerous flag
11:55yeah especially when you consider katie you've got so much room to aim out on this green haven't you and
12:00and we've all said it we've all got up there and gone damn it i'm in the bunker look how much room
12:05there is on the left yes and for some reason reason we tend to go at tiger line at the flagstick
12:12something that will really help you to avoid this and remind you that actually the middle of the green
12:18you want to be on the middle of the green because you're never going to get a really long putt
12:21you're never going to be too far from the flag are you no but it's just a safe place to be but a way
12:26that you can do that is actually pay attention to what's behind the green so for example here we've
12:31got two tall fir trees um just to the right of where our flag is but that's center of the green
12:37i'd be thinking about aiming at those and use that as my marker as my part of my pre-shot routine just
12:42draw my attention to what's at the back it lifts you up body language wise so you're looking up
12:48you're visualizing a decent shot because you're going at something that's beyond the green yeah
12:52and it just takes your attention away from any trouble that might be sneaking around in the
12:57foreground come on katie let's finish off with a good shot shall we so that flag let's be honest
13:02is in a pretty good spot not giving you any excuses here yeah right no pressure
13:11lovely shot nice high soft draw very easy and i think it goes to show that if you're out on the
13:17golf course and you're thinking about how to compile a score maybe just have one round of golf where you
13:21just aim at the middle of the greens forget about where the flag is see what it does to your score
13:26it might just help okay so there you have it that's our look at the seven tips that every golfer forgets
13:32if you've enjoyed the video please do hit the like button if you have any questions or any comments
13:37leave them below but that's it for now from west hill thanks for watching we'll see you next time
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