I need help.... im pulling shots... bad...

[dashfan87]

Hello everyone,
Im not new here, just never really post... Hopefully that will change now.

anyway sense this is I think my first post, ill introduce myself, give you my story.
my names Micah, I'm 21, and I have been golfing as long as I can remember, my dad put a cut down, left handed Hubert Green edition northwestern 9 iron in my hands as soon as I could walk (which I still carry in my bag). No one in my family is left handed, but they figured out at an early age I was. around 8 years old me and my dad discussed it and I decided that I would change to right handed clubs, but I still putted left handed... so confused ... anyway it worked for a while, but somewhere between the time of 10 and 12 years old, I lost interest in golf, I was always really small, and couldn't hit it real far, but I played, in fact, at like... 11 years old, I played my first 18 and shot 121. but anyway, I didn't pick the game back up till about 15 because my best friend who never played took me to the range, and I fell back in love. I decided that this time around I would do it right, and play left handed, i would have far more power and control that way. fast forward to now, and I'm still playing, pretty good, I'm an 8 handicap, and I love the game enough, that if I ever got good enough, I would seriously consider becoming a teaching pro.
So thats my story for all you guys, to the regulars, I pretty much already know who you are, haha, just from surfing the site so much, feel free to tell me your stories too, I would love to hear them. But onto why I need your guys, and hopefully brians help...

So about a year ago, I started pulling shots, very badly... like 15 to 30 yards right(Im left handed remember) and it seems to correct itself every time, I am constantly tinkering with my swing... going flatter, steeper, in, out, upside down.... you name it, i have tried it... I'm trying to perfect something I don't really know how to perfect... and thats part of my problem I know... anyway, ill try and post a video of my swing on here as soon as I can... i know that will help, but for now, any help on generic reasons people cronicly pull shots would be of great help... I cant continue on like this... I shot an 89 on Saturday on my home coarse... my dad tied me!!! he hasn't even been close to my scores in like 4 years now!! so.... yeah any help would be golden.

Thanks,
Micah.

 

[birdie_man]

Welcome.

Does this miss of yours curve also? Or just a straight pull?

What's your normal flight?

 

[dashfan87]

My normal flight is actually a fade, right to left for me, when i pull the shot, 85% of the time its going to go strait, the other 15% It either slightly draws, or even goes into a bit of a hook... but thats only with my 3 and 5 wood... with my irons, it always goes strait. and its very prominent right down to my wedges, if I'm 60 yards in, ill hit it exactly pin high, my distance control is great, but its 30 to 60 feet right...

and I get great contact, feels great, just when I look up, its horridly right of the target. perfect example is, on this short par 4 on Saturday, I drew a 5 wood around the trees on this dogleg right, and then had an 8 iron in, from 150, exactly what you want... when I hit my 8 iron, i hit it perfect, when i looked up, it was so far right, it was off the green, and into the weeds... its just killing my rounds... were talking 35 yards to the right with a freaking 8 iron... and actually, now that i think about it, its very very prominent with my mid and short irons. it will creep into my woods, and my long irons, but most of the time, i can hit them strait. its my mid and short irons that are giving me the most trouble, and of coarse those are how you score... i went from shooting a 79 two weeks before, to shooting an 89.... and there was absolutely nothing i could do to correct it that day.

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

Your clubface is too closed at impact for the path you are swinging on (out to in) thus it pulls. Find out why it's too closed and fix it, the fade will come back.

 

[dashfan87]

Your clubface is too closed at impact for the path you are swinging on (out to in) thus it pulls. Find out why it's too closed and fix it, the fade will come back.

This sounds like my dads fault... I have a tendency to hit some nasty slices every now and then with my driver, and my dad noticed that i had an open club face at address. So i closed my clubface till he said it was "square" and I started hiting some decent strait drives. He then told me to do that with all my clubs, so I have been. I have never taken a lesson, only what I hear on here, and other golf programs, and what my dad teaches me...

next question would be this... should I work on getting my swing, more on line or even in to out? i have been trying to do that for years, but clearly haven't been successful... Ill buy the DVDs if I have to... but I cant right now, I'm poor! seriously...

Whats a good drill to make sure I'm coming in to out, instead of out to in?

Edit:
ill ask this, is there anything wrong with an out to in swing, I mean Bruce Lietzke has done it for years... Is this something I shouldnt worry about and continue on making small adjustments, or would it be better to overhaul and try making myself go in to out?

 

[puttmad]

....

Your clubface is too closed at impact for the path you are swinging on (out to in) thus it pulls. Find out why it's too closed and fix it, the fade will come back.

Jim,
If the club was too closed to the path, surely he'd be pull hooking?......
Square to the path(out-to-in) would give the pull....?...

 

[Dariusz J.]

Not Jim here, but a pull is out-to-in swing where the clubhead is closed at impact the same amount of degrees towards the target line as the inside swing path (i.e. clubhead is parallel to the path from the outside).
If the clubhead is open in relation to the outside-in path, it would be a pull-fade, if it is closed in relation to the outside-in path - it would be a pull-draw.

Cheers

 

[puttmad]

I just said that Darius...

 

[puttmad]

Whats a good drill to make sure I'm coming in to out, instead of out to in?

Lead the downswing with your lower body, while your shoulders are still back...feel as if your right upper arm is staying behind your right hip..i.e. don't lead with the shoulders...
And keep you swing center steady until after impact........

 

[Erik_K]

This sounds like my dads fault... I have a tendency to hit some nasty slices every now and then with my driver, and my dad noticed that i had an open club face at address. So i closed my clubface till he said it was "square" and I started hiting some decent strait drives. He then told me to do that with all my clubs, so I have been. I have never taken a lesson, only what I hear on here, and other golf programs, and what my dad teaches me...

next question would be this... should I work on getting my swing, more on line or even in to out? i have been trying to do that for years, but clearly haven't been successful... Ill buy the DVDs if I have to... but I cant right now, I'm poor! seriously...

Whats a good drill to make sure I'm coming in to out, instead of out to in?

Edit:
ill ask this, is there anything wrong with an out to in swing, I mean Bruce Lietzke has done it for years... Is this something I shouldnt worry about and continue on making small adjustments, or would it be better to overhaul and try making myself go in to out?

Lietzke is the exception, not the rule. He learned to score with his swing. I think if he was really struggling, he would had his move overhauled at some point. I am also not so sure that he had some severe OTT type move. Maybe he does hit the inside of the ball, it just isn't as pronounced as we see today.

Having said that, most good players hit the ball solidly from the inside.

Erik

 

[dashfan87]

Lietzke is the exception, not the rule. He learned to score with his swing. I think if he was really struggling, he would had his move overhauled at some point. I am also not so sure that he had some severe OTT type move. Maybe he does hit the inside of the ball, it just isn't as pronounced as we see today.

Having said that, most good players hit the ball solidly from the inside.

Erik

I was watching a thing with Lietzke and he was saying he always has had an out to in swing, he even stated that all of his divots are left of the target line, then he hit a shot and showed it, theres no way your hitting the inside of the ball like that. I know he is an exception, but he was and is a phenomenal player for a person who swings like he does, and with minimal practice. If only i could do that...

 

[dashfan87]

Lead the downswing with your lower body, while your shoulders are still back...feel as if your right upper arm is staying behind your right hip..i.e. don't lead with the shoulders...
And keep you swing center steady until after impact........

Im left handed, so do you mean keep my left arm staying behind my left hip?

 

[puttmad]

yup

 

[dashfan87]

Ill try it today on the range, and let you all know how it goes.

 

[dashfan87]

So, I went to the range...

I had some decent shots trying to "keep my left arm behind my left hip" to get it inside out.
what I struggle with the most right now is my tendency to slice the drive... I know I know, I need to buy NSA, but, i cant right now, I don't have the money, so in the mean time, any suggestions on how to fix the slice using pointers from NSA, until I can buy it?

 

[puttmad]

dash,
just for now you could try the "no-look" drill.
This is where you (while still doing the above) hit 3/4 shots without letting your head and eyes follow the ball, or in fact even look where the ball has ended up. For this exercise you are not concerned with the outcome.
So hit the shot keeping your head and eyes down. At the finish you will be looking at a point roughly 10-15 yards down the fairway..
NOTE. Only use a 3/4 swing as holding your head downish can be painful on your neck joints and muscles.
What this exercise does is train your arms/hands to square up properly in the impact zone....you will actually see your arms/hands pass across your vision thro the impact zone and follow through, which is something slicers seem to lack..
No doubt Brian and co can come up with some alternatives as well...
Once you have done the drill, forget about it on your normal shots. Simply retain the "hand/arm" feeling....

 

[dashfan87]

Thanks for the drill puttmad, Ill give it a try.

I kind of had a realization last night after re-watching episode 6 of Brian's show. When I was younger, I swayed like a mother... to get me to stop my dad would hold my hips to keep me from sliding over. This was help, because I obviously can play some good golf now, but I think what happened is it caused my upper body to lean forward on the back swing, which would promote an out to in swing, and would cause many of the thinners I hit too...
what do you guys think?
I think I need to practice a swing thats on the draw side of the "manzella matrix" to get me to stop doing that...

 

[Kevin Shields]

Lietzke is the exception, not the rule. He learned to score with his swing. I think if he was really struggling, he would had his move overhauled at some point. I am also not so sure that he had some severe OTT type move. Maybe he does hit the inside of the ball, it just isn't as pronounced as we see today.

Having said that, most good players hit the ball solidly from the inside.

Erik

Lietzke without question hits the inside of the ball. He fades it with a bowed left wrist.

 

[dashfan87]

So, another session at the range today...

It was going alright for the first half of the session, trying to use that feel of the draw side of the "Manzella matrix" then I started working on something kinda by accident... Thats how it goes most of the time though anyway, I started to really make myself feel like I was lagging that club behind, and then feeling a snap release at the end, this really straitened out my drives, I was hitting it noticeably longer as well. Anyway, I am playing tomorrow, hopefully Ill get it back in the 70s...

Oh, and unless Lietzke doesn't know what he is doing, from his mouth "I have an out to in swing" tells me he aint hitting the inside of the ball... just saying...