So I had my lesson yesterday, I was there an hour and a half early, not through design but because of my work schedule getting done early. So I had a lot of time to kill and hit balls to keep active.
By the time Mark got to me I was actually a bit fatigued, but I was still hitting the ball ok. We talked about my game and what I was working on, then I showed him my swing and with it the fade. I hit a 7 iron, then a 5 iron which I absolutely flushed; don’t you always find it the way, that you swing much better when a pro is watching you? Then finally I miss hit one a bit thin and pushy so he saw my bad shot too. I told him about my divots all pointing left.
Then he said something quite interesting, ‘normally I can tell after a swing or two which side a players going to miss, either they slice it or hook it. With you I can’t tell, you’re liable to miss both way’
We talked about my release and my getting my weight through to connect with ball first, he said that particularly on getting the ball first and not leaning back with weight on the right side, I had made progress and was half there but with a bit more work to be done.
Then he had me try and diagnose what I thought the problem was. It came down to path and release. He then was very honest and said, ‘look, what I’m going to have you change will probably mess up your game big time until you ingrain the change, it will feel very alien to you, is that ok?’ Then we went up to the video studio to see my swing.
My swing in the video net was a miss hit but he said it was fine and that it showed the issue clearly regardless, so we sat down and reviewed the video.
Basically I have a very flat swing, a bit like Matt Kuchar, on the down the line view you could clearly see the top of my right shoulder above my left arm, I swing around my body rather than back and through. The follow through is also way flat, mirroring the plane of my back swing. The problem with this is that while the club is already so inside at the top, I somehow manage to follow the flat plane around my body rather than releasing my hands and the club down the line like Kuchar does.
Mark pointed out that I would find no video of a pro swinging through that flat and said that it must lead to inconsistency and lack of balance, which it does. He said he was impressed that I hit the ball so well with that swing plane and that my hand eye co-ordination must be pretty good to compensate.
The fix he suggested was unexpected; he wants me to go on the explanar swing plane trainer. He showed me how to set it up for me and we took a few swings on it, it showed up one aspect perfectly, in my follow through I was holding the club off and therefore not following the plane of the explanar, Mark showed me that I was essentially hitting cover drives instead of releasing the club head. That is why this year I’m fading, where as last year I was pulling. I have stopped releasing the club head.
He invited me to use the machine as often as I wished and could, to ingrain the feeling of the correct swing plane. Unfortunately with the machine being 50 minutes’ drive away it’s going to be difficult to get to it often. Added to that is the fact that he and the machine are leaving at the end of the month.
Now I’m not sure whether to implement his changes or wait for the new pro to be installed so I can at least get constancy of message in the future.
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