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In this video, Neil Tappin is joined by PGA Professional Alex Elliott to look at the 5 biggest golf swing mistakes and how to fix them.
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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
01:01put the putter actually, for most people. So essentially, when we've got the club in
01:05the palm, we're going to see it very similar to as I've got here. And if you just waggle
01:11that golf club up and 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. Yes. So if you're, if you have a
01:33fault in your grip that isn't a weak grip, but a strong grip, what does that look like?
01:37So a strong grip would be, let's say two to three knuckles, maybe even four knuckles showing
01:42really our logo of the glove pointing to the sky and sort of this look to how we're set up
01:47to the ball. Yeah. We're going to see that real hook curvature. So finishing off to the left
01:51for a right handed player, finishing off to right for a left handed player. And that
01:55for me is where we're going to really struggle to control the golf ball, especially in firm
01:59conditions like it is now. Yeah. Like having that strong grip, we're only going to see
02:03sort of lowish ball flights, a lot of hook spin on it. Exactly. So what does the absolutely
02:08technically good grip look like and how can people set it? The one thing I'd say with this,
02:13Neil, is we've got to be sort of, I always think of people improving their grip by edging it
02:17back slowly because your grip matches how you release the club. So we need to make sure
02:22it's not going from one extreme to the other. Okay. The only sort of caveat to that is if
02:25you do have it in the palm, get it in the finger straight away. But if you are weak, edge
02:29it stronger. If you are really strong, edge it a little bit weaker. Okay. But that common
02:32ground where I want you to end up in the end would be a nice simple routine for this as
02:37well. If you're out on the golf courses, grip it sort of in the middle of my shaft as I've
02:41done here, tilt it slightly away, place it in the fingers. And you can see that I've got it
02:46right at the base of my fingers. Meaty part on top. Quick test. Club feels light. Club
02:52down to the ground. We can see sort of two and a half knuckles. Yep. Fingers on in my
02:57right hand. And both of these creases should be somewhere around my right shoulder. Quick
03:01question for you, Alex. If you get the left hand grip right, will the right hand grip then
03:05automatically be correct? I think so. Yeah. You can, you've got a better chance. Right,
03:09fine. So focus, are we saying focus on the left hand grip? I think your left hand grip...
03:12Right handers. Yeah. The opposite way. Yeah. Simply whatever one you have your glove on,
03:17get that right. We'll tend to have a better chance of hitting some good shots. Okay,
03:20good. And if you get it right, then you should hit some nice neutral flighted golf shots. A bit
03:25like this one. No pressure. So yeah, nice, simple routine in the fingers, meaty part on top. It's
03:31going to give you a much better chance of returning that golf club back to relatively good to our path.
03:36A bit like that. Very good.
03:47Okay, so next up, alignment. And it sounds easy enough, doesn't it, to get your alignment right?
03:52But it's something that can go wrong quite easily and something that even the best players in the
03:56world are constantly checking, making sure they get it right. So, Alex, how do you get it right?
04:02Firstly, don't aim your shoulders at target. Right. Which might sound like, to you watching
04:06this right now, a comment where you go, well, of course you do. If you're going to throw something
04:11or fire something, you'd be sort of looking at our alignment. And a lot of you will be standing there
04:14going, right, I'm aligning to target. Stand up, check. Oh, I look a little bit lefty. Start to
04:22adjust ourselves. So it looks like our eyes are perfect. Well, in reality, it's going to be aiming to the right.
04:26It's the club face that you need to worry about, not your body alignment. So what's a good way of
04:31checking it in practice, out on the golf course? Yeah, I would, like we've got set up here. So
04:37I would do these simple things when you're hitting balls in the range. And if you play on your own
04:41in an evening, just throw them down on the ground. But then we'll also talk through a scenario you can
04:45use in a competition. So everything, Neil, has got to start from a ball to target line. Yes. So I would
04:51stand behind at the start of a range session and simply pick out my ball to target line,
04:56place the alignment stick down there. Then I can walk in and it's making sure that our feet, knees,
05:04hips and shoulders all run parallel to this. And when you do stand up, your shoulder line will be
05:10working parallel left to target. Yeah. So it's like you're almost like you're on a set of train tracks.
05:14Exactly that. And then you're out on the golf course playing a competition. You know you have
05:19a tendency to aim a bit right. How do you make sure that you don't do that? Simple, simple trick.
05:25We all got logos on our golf balls or some others even put lines on our golf balls from a button.
05:30Use this line to advantage on par three tees and when you're hitting some drives away. Okay. Stand
05:35behind the golf ball again as if you've got an extension of what we did during practice. Place
05:40that down parallel lines and we can simply again build our stance from this as opposed to building
05:48it from this way to the ball, build it from the ball upwards. It's called a ball to target line
05:52for a reason. Yeah. And I think the important point to make here is that if you are devoting
05:56some time to your alignment, it won't be wasted. There's a whole host of other good things that
06:01will happen once you've got your alignment spot on. Right. Next up, the slice. Alex, most of us know how it
06:11feels. Most of us, it's very demoralizing when it happens. What have you got here? I can see you've
06:17got a drill for us. Yeah. I mean, it might look quite strange you're putting this out on the range,
06:22but honestly, I've used this analogy with people who come for lessons and this is really nice and
06:26simple. If I gave you a tennis racket, but we don't have that right here because it's not something
06:31that you can attach quite easily to a golf shot. So let's use our right palm. Okay. Okay. So if we're a
06:35slicer and our golf ball was sort of at this height, we'd work like this. Yeah. And we'd go,
06:41oh, of course the ball would work this way. Yeah. Okay. So if we did the opposite to that
06:46in golf posture, but then we just stand upright to hit this ball away like tennis,
06:50I want to take the ball away as far as I could, we'd make sort of this motion. So that would be my
06:56club traveling a little bit more into out, my club face being a little bit more closer to square,
07:01if not close to my path. And this would be quite an easy motion for a lot of us to make
07:06with the ball at that height. Yes. So question then. So it feels like a fairly simple resolution.
07:13So how does it look with the golf club in your hands, Alex? And how, what should people
07:17be wary of the kind of body movements that they're making that are causing them to cut across it?
07:22Like I say, I think that the biggest reference point I would have for a lot of golfers is when we
07:26start the downswing and it, it comes to, especially with driver, we want to hit it far. We want to
07:31get that distance. It's right shoulder, right hip working out, which works this way. Yes.
07:37You get to hit it quite a long way. And suddenly you come over the top. Exactly. Whereas in tennis,
07:41the ball would come, we'd move in and through and we'd make that sort of reaction to a good body
07:49movement because we're orientating it to a moving object. Now, obviously in golf, the little white
07:53ball is still. So we've got to think of an analogy and a nice simple way would be actually address the
07:59golf ball down here, swing up, feel that you meet the golf ball away. Okay. Now you might think,
08:06well, actually standing up, but what we're trying to do is get the club to work this. Right. Yes.
08:11And not the other way around. Exactly. Yeah. So we could have two or three practice
08:14swings on the course, on the range, walk into the shot. We've now got the feeling of being able to
08:20work the club through this space as if we're hitting a tennis shot away, but just more tilted over the
08:26golf ball. Okay. Go on then. Hit one for us. Let's see how it looks. So I'd really make a few waggles,
08:30tennis shot away. Imagine I'm 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 time
08:43to get it out of your game, but work on it. As Alex is saying here, it could really help.
08:47This one is all about starting the golf swing correctly, but let's start with the fault,
08:56Alex. What do people do that cost them in the golf swing? I think we just put it into two categories.
09:02One, not control the club face and not get the arms and body working together. So simply it would be
09:07closing it too much or open too much. Right. Okay. And it looks, that second one looks as if you're
09:14taking it away on the inside. Are you taking it away on the inside? Yeah, very much so. And I think
09:18sort of that open face, especially with longer clubs, everybody thinks it's a little bit more
09:22rounded. It's very tempting to sort of work it in this direction. Yeah. And it's something you see a
09:28lot, isn't it? So what can people do to resolve the problem? So a nice, simple routine as I've done
09:34here is I've simply just placed my golf club down directly behind my ball. So if we sort of give those
09:40two scenarios, if I go too much on the inside, well, look how the club really works. If I wanted
09:45to push that golf club back as far as I could, I would really want to get arms and the body working
09:52together and more of what would feel like this sort of, I guess the term a lot of people would
09:56use one piece takeaway. Yeah. You hear it a lot. So down behind the ball. I mean, look at the difference
10:01of this here. Yeah. A lot more control. Golf club's gone a lot further back. Yeah. And if you were to
10:07draw a triangle between the club head and your shoulders, that triangle would pretty much be
10:11kept in intact for a lot of that, wouldn't it? Exactly. Rather than changing your angles. Yeah.
10:16Changing them means a lot more compensations have got to take place. Yeah. So if you can start the
10:20golf swing correctly, the chances are the rest of the swing will follow and 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
10:34standing up in the downswing? I think a lot of people will see another term that they'd use is
10:38early extension. So essentially belt buckle getting higher or standing up and then we see that scoopy
10:44sort of look to our impact position. Right. Okay. Yeah. It's something you do see quite a lot. So how
10:49do you solve the issue? I think you see, 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 thing
10:58we can do. I mean, I've just placed my bag here. This could be alignment sticks. If you're watching this at
11:02home, 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 our
11:12chest. We don't want to just be position, position, position, because we know in reality, the golf swing's
11:17got a bit of flow to it. So what I want you to do here is have the bum just out of touch of whether
11:22it's the wall alignment stick or your golf bag as I've got here, go through swing, try and touch it with
11:28your left pocket, back, right pocket, through left pocket. And you can really see here how I'm a lot
11:34more over the golf ball throughout the whole motion. Yes. Yeah. And you're avoiding that issue
11:40of standing up, aren't you? You're retaining that posture, that really good posture that you set at
11:44address. I can see that you're still in it as you reach that kind of impact position. Exactly. And
11:48just to sort of preempt a few questions that people might ask to us to stay more over the golf ball at
11:53impact. Well, our belt buckle has to work more to target to give us the ability to be here.
11:59If our belt buckle is a little bit higher, we're going to find it very, very hard to hit the golf
12:02ball in that direction or remain over it. Yeah. It's a really simple way of thinking about it.
12:07Hopefully it's a sort of a non-technical fix for a technical issue that should help you out.
12:14So there you have it. Some really great advice there from Alex. Really simple, really effective.
12:18If you do have any questions, please do post them below. We hope to get back to as many of you
12:23as possible. But that's it for now for West Hill. Thanks for watching and we'll see you next time.
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