I softened my golf grip to see what my swing feels like

Only by chance a few weeks ago I noticed something about my golf swing. I realised that I am manipulating the swing into the ball. What I mean is that as I’m swinging, my hands work extra hard to guide the golf club into the ball. This is not right. I think that once the golf club starts on the downswing, it should simply hit the ball using nothing but gravity. My hands should only be there to accelerate the club in the right direction and to hold onto it so that I don’t get pronounced a danger to society.

I noticed that when one day, at the golf range I was getting really tired and was barely holding onto the club. I noticed that my right hand and especially my right index finger was doing a lot of work guiding the club into the ball. What that meant to me was that I took my club way too far back, which I always did. In order to actually hit the ball, I had to push it hard forward with my right hand to steer it in the path of the ball.

I was only able to feel that when I was barely holding onto my club. That way I could easily feel the weight of the club, and any deviation from the proper circular downswing path I felt right away. When I hold my club firmly, I can’t feel that at all. This little thing helped me re-align my backswing so that I don’t manipulate the club at all and the way down.

Actually, I was really far back. What I do is, instead of taking the club right and up, I take it back and up. That always made me get out of position. Lift my head and consequently create the over the shoulder swing. I mean, in a downswing, I had to bring the club forward first and then hope to hit the ball. Otherwise, I would collect my right ankle. That would be a spectacular swing, but sadly not repeatable, like ever…

I am slowly getting right to the bottom of the golf swing technique. And I am happy that it is slowly seeing progress in my game. I played my favorite golf course, the Rosnay Park, and I hit so many good shots, I didn’t want to go home. I got the twilight session, which btw is now $16 after 2pm but got really tired, so instead of walking the whole course, I was hitting the 11th and the 12th, which are both par 5, with my irons, a few balls at a time.

I still shanked a few shots, I have to work on that, especially with my 52 deg wedge, but… most of my 9 to 5 iron shots landed within a few meters from each other. That was happiness. Well, I still lost a ball but who cares… I landed a 5 iron shot 2 feet from the hole, and no – it wasn’t a fluke.  It was a perfectly executed tiny draw. For me, that’s worth a few lost balls… 🙂