- 10 hours ago
In this video, Golf Monthly reader Amanda Rowley gets a golf lesson from Nick Dougherty in this episode of Game Improved.
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00:00Hello everyone, Neil Tappin here from Golf Monthly and welcome to Wentworth Club and the second in our three-part
00:05series in which we're going to try to help some amateur golfers shoot lower scores.
00:10Now, in this episode we have Amanda Rowley who is an 18 handicapper. She's only been playing the game for
00:16sort of five or six years but she's managed to get her handicap down to 18.
00:21She's going to get the chance to play three holes here on the west course at Wentworth and then head
00:25to the range all with Nick Doherty to see if Nick can offer her some tips and some strategy advice
00:30on how to play better.
00:32Right, let's get started.
00:46Right, so Amanda, tell us a bit, what's your handicap and where's your golf at at the moment?
00:51My handicap at the moment is 17.7 so I play off at my club about 19, 20. I've had
00:58quite a good summer of golf. The consistency is definitely getting better.
01:03But my weakness, I would say, is my short game and that's down to confidence really. I've just lost my
01:08confidence with it.
01:10So you only, I think I'm all right in saying that you only started playing golf a few years ago.
01:14Yeah, 2016 and then obviously we've had COVID in between so a few years off.
01:19Okay, so you've come down quickly then.
01:21Yes, yes.
01:21Where would you want to get to in, you know, the next couple of years' time?
01:25I'd love to be eventually single figure if I can ever get there. I can't see it because I always
01:30manage to blob holes.
01:32Every time I go out.
01:33We know how you feel.
01:34But yeah, I mean, I would love to comfortably be able to play off 12, 13 and still be able
01:40to score well.
01:41So what do you think Nick will be able to help you with the most?
01:44My drive and definitely the short game.
01:46Yeah, some nice, simple tips that will hopefully you'll be able to take with you onto the golf course to
01:51help you get your handicap down.
01:51Yeah.
01:52Yeah.
01:53Yeah.
02:04Yeah.
02:05Yeah.
02:06Yeah.
02:06Yeah.
02:08Yeah.
02:09Yeah.
02:09Yeah.
02:10Yeah.
02:10Yeah.
02:11Yeah.
02:12Yeah.
02:13Yeah.
02:13Yeah.
02:16Yeah.
02:18Yeah.
02:27It's a bit like you're going to hit it, lovely, or isn't it, it feels completely different,
02:32I mean, like I'm hitting a high shot, you're going to feel a tiny bit more this way, if
02:41it's too low it's going to make us want to sort of hit the ground first, nice, see the
02:47swing, depending on the distance, and it's going to have that same flow, whatever it is.
02:52Lovely.
02:54Thanks.
02:55Okay, so Nick, you got the chance to play three holes with Amanda and then spent some time
02:59on the range with her, good player, strikes it really nicely, what were the sort of things
03:03that you were talking about to try and help them improve?
03:05Well, we talked about a couple of different parts of game, one was sort of short game pitching
03:10and then the long game, the long game was the easiest, these are the sweetest things to
03:16work on with people because it's a gift that gives immediately and was very easy to attain.
03:22Right, okay.
03:23So for her it was something simple, whenever there's things to amend that are pre-movement,
03:29they're always going to bear fruit quickly.
03:31Right, okay.
03:31Because it's something that you literally stood over the ball and I made a slight adjustment,
03:36as much as it might feel a little bit different, and it's not drastically different, and then
03:40the rest is you just do what you do.
03:41Right.
03:42That's going to be easy to apply.
03:43Once I start saying, well, as we change direction, I want you to, you know, and I will do anything
03:47I possibly can to avoid that.
03:49I may try and provide someone with a feel, a general overwhelming feel.
03:53For Amanda, it was really easy.
03:55The ball flight, I thought the T was a little low for starters, but then when I went to check
03:59out where she stood to it, she could see she's got plenty of power, moves well.
04:02You can see that she's strong in the way that she moves the club, but it was flatter.
04:06So I could see a big improvement could be made with the ball flight.
04:09I noticed that in the 11th.
04:10Then when it got to 12th, she actually had to improve the ball flight because of the fact
04:13of there's trees in the way.
04:15I was like, how was she going to do it?
04:16And the interesting, this was a classic again, feel versus real thing for Amanda, where she
04:21thought the ball was in her stance actually wasn't where it really was.
04:26Right, okay.
04:26So what we did to improve it was I wanted a little bit more tilt in her upper body, which
04:32is what you'd see with any top player.
04:33I mean, you think about Rory McIlroy hits up on it six degrees when he's going for the big one.
04:36It's a lot of that.
04:37And of course, we're not looking for that.
04:38But what we don't want is a really either a descending blow, certainly, even zero and
04:44out is like, it put pressure on her as well with the low tee.
04:47You've got to be spot on.
04:49It's like, I'm a big fan for if anything, give it a little bit too much air.
04:52It also means that you can obviously tee it up nice and high and meet the ball up here.
04:55Yeah.
04:56Whereas if it's at a perfect level when your club's on the ground, you ain't going to,
05:00well, you shouldn't be touching the ground when you come through the driver,
05:02which inevitably means you're going to be hitting it too low in the face.
05:04So it's going to come out flatter with too much spin, which means you're losing distance.
05:08Okay.
05:08So low flight, high spin, not good.
05:10We want high launch, low spin, don't we?
05:12Yes.
05:12Hit the top end anyway.
05:13So we simply moved the ball further forward in the stance, which to Amanda felt way forward.
05:18All I had to do was to take a picture and show her.
05:21So this is what you were stood to the ball on this last shot.
05:24And of course, it's not forward.
05:25It just looks great.
05:26Yeah.
05:27It looks like that's where it should be all the time.
05:29Yeah.
05:29Well, that's where we're going to put it all the time.
05:30And then we're going to have it teed up higher and the ever so,
05:33and it's very subtle, a movement.
05:35The shift obviously creates this a much easier position to find that upstrike.
05:39And also for her,
05:41it's a very easy, natural way to get away from a little bit more of that feeling of oats.
05:45Which is not a lot, ever so slightly over the top.
05:47Just moving this way a little bit will help to encourage that more inside out.
05:50Again, without having to think about not trying to do anything funky.
05:54And she got that changed pretty quickly.
05:55Immediately.
05:56And the drives were the best drives that we saw all day.
05:58The ball flight was great.
05:59It was strong.
06:00It was long.
06:02I mean, that was, that was again hitting the driver that she was using today.
06:06And you wouldn't change anything about that.
06:09That's as good as it gets.
06:10Right.
06:10Okay.
06:10So I think that was a really, I mean, it's so easy to change.
06:13And then we did some stuff with the short game as well,
06:15which was when you get out of heavy lies, the instincts for everybody really,
06:20like I need to lift it out of that lie because it's gnarly.
06:23And like, how's it going to come out?
06:25But ironically, the lifting thing is something that moves the sternum back usually.
06:31And if nothing else, certainly shallows out the attack,
06:33which means you come through more grass, which means it won't come out.
06:36So ironically, we have to make peace when we're going down into the ground
06:39and it's the club, not me, that gets the ball out the grass.
06:43But going in through that grass as well, we had to make peace with,
06:45got to hit it harder.
06:46Bit like out of a bunker shot.
06:47Bit like I talked with Josh there as well today.
06:49Like you've got to have more speed.
06:50Just trust, have more speed, have more speed and it is better.
06:53Not enough speed will create way more problems.
06:56Yeah.
06:56And that's why you've got to practice these shots.
06:57You've got to convince yourself that it's the way to play it.
06:59And she demonstrated prowess in that straight away.
07:02And I think for her as well, getting a feeling for the pace.
07:04And we talked about controlling distance is something she battles with.
07:07So we talked about trying to match it on both sides.
07:10Because again, that becomes easy, right?
07:12Yeah.
07:12Same there.
07:13So it's quarter, quarter or half, half or three quarter, three quarter.
07:17And a rhythm though, like that, that stays the same.
07:20Whereas if I'm always going to be different, sometimes short and quick,
07:23sometimes longer and slightly slow, how do you know?
07:26Really hard to judge the pace.
07:27Whereas then if I've got the same feeling all the time,
07:29I can stand next to the ball.
07:30That's why we see like the guys, sometimes top players be next to the ball
07:33and feel the shot like that, because they know exactly that pace.
07:37And then they're going to step in and just recreate it.
07:39And it makes it so much easier.
07:41Again, not an overly complicated thing for her to apply.
07:44And she did so beautifully as well.
07:46So I think she made some really big strides with that.
07:48And then what about in terms of game plan and strategy?
07:52Amanda seems to me to be getting better quite quickly.
07:55So how do you adjust your kind of game plan as an improving goal?
07:59For what do you, how should she be thinking when she's out on the golf course?
08:03I think again, resisting the urge to force it along and building a way around the golf course,
08:08playing to your strengths is a great way to get better.
08:11You know, and you could see that today a couple of times when we looked at how to,
08:14how to play the hole.
08:16You know, I think for instance, like the 11th where she was hitting up the hill,
08:20picking the shot that gives you the most amount of room.
08:23So I think that's the strategy that applies across the board, regardless of ability,
08:25but having the patience that you're naturally going to get better each time,
08:29and you will be able to alter your target lines as you go.
08:32But make it easy, make it easier.
08:35Don't put yourself under the cosh to make it harder than it needs to be,
08:39even though you think, oh, I think I can play that shot now.
08:42It's like, that's fine in practice, but in tournament stuff, play smart,
08:46because generally the best players, and it's the biggest ever misconception about Tiger Woods,
08:51is that we think, well, this is a box office golfer,
08:53of which there's never been another like it.
08:55Yeah, yeah.
08:55One of the most conservative golfers of all time.
08:57Is that right?
08:58Very rarely went at the flag, in terms of if it didn't fit in his dispersion pattern.
09:03Right, yeah.
09:03Never took a risk, played smart, always picked the right side of the hole to give him a buffer.
09:08So playing smart gives you room for error, and if he needed to do it,
09:12and he was arguably one, if not the greatest ever, certainly one of the top two with Jack,
09:17then we should probably take a note from that, and we probably play too aggressively at times.
09:21So playing within ourselves, as much as it's sometimes fun to go for the heroes,
09:25shot, and I'm a big advocate of that. When push comes over, if we're talking handicap,
09:28let's play smart.
09:29Yeah, so there you go. If you want to get your handicap down,
09:33then sometimes that patience, it sounds easy, but it requires a lot of discipline,
09:37it's well worth giving a go.
09:39So there you have it. That's our look at Amanda's game, and Nick's advice to help
09:43her shoot lower scores. I think the key thing here is the advice coming from Nick,
09:48really simple, really effective. Hopefully it's something that Amanda can take forward with her
09:52game to help her shoot lower scores, and hopefully there's some bits in there that might help you
09:57as well as you play golf in the future. But that's it for now from Wentworth.
10:01Thanks very much for watching. We'll see you next time.
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