So it’s fair to say that when we set up to the golf ball, it’s important to have the ball in the right place all of the time to help us improve on the consistency of our shots. But then it’s also important to make sure that the body isn’t bouncing up and down during the swing to help improve the consistency of our golf shots and our top shots as well. So golf is a very closed skill, if you can do the same thing each time, the golf ball should start to do the same thing each time. So we need to be super consistent with ball position. Now a great way of checking that, is that we lay the club on the ground, pointing towards the golf ball and then we ensure that it’s in the right and consistent position all of the time. And that could be a spare club, and then I'm holding another club and this is the correct ball position. Now we need to be able to understand that ball position does move with different irons. So the ball position would be in the center with the short irons slightly ahead of center with the longer irons and then moving in towards the left instep with the longest irons. And it’s a gradual ball position that would help us be consistent. But try and make sure that you have an understanding that the ball is always in the same place each time you set up to that particular club and it doesn’t dance around too much.

Now the other thing that is going to be really help you to being a consistent golf ball striker and stop topping the ball is if your upper and lower body aren’t coming up and down as well. So if we set up from this side of the swing, there's two main areas where you will be lifting and lowering yourself that would cause problems. Now one area could be in the back of the legs and the curves. If somebody is hitting the golf ball with a rising motion through here, you’ll be surprised a number of golfers I actually see standing on their tip toes when they hit the golf ball, literary up on both legs. Now the right leg might be lifting up as it turns, but the turning motion of the right leg is different from a straight on lifting motion. Turning is okay and acceptable, lifting is not really where we want to be and particularly if the left leg started to lift up as well that would cost you big problems.

It’s kind of obvious that if I stand up on my tip toes, I'm going to hit the top part of the golf ball. Another area where there could be an issue is actually if the upper body stands up and lifts too early in the downswing as well. So I’ve got my nice spine angle, at set up, turn back, turn through, keep my spine, I go nice and consistent. I wouldn’t want to have my upper body lifting up as I swing down, so I'm going to hit over the top of the golf ball. So consistency is the key to avoid the top. We want consistent ball position, we want a good leg action that doesn’t involve any standing up, and we want a nice turning body action that doesn’t involve any standing up as well. If you can improve those three elements, you should start to top the ball less regularly.