Understanding Your Golf Shot Shape (Video) - by Pete Styles
Understanding Your Golf Shot Shape (Video) - by Pete Styles

I think for a lot of golfers they don’t necessarily understand what their natural shot shape is. They either don’t quite visualize the flight of the ball clearly or they cannot remember the really bad shots and the really good shots. They don’t actually take a good view of what their average shot shape looks like. So next time you’ve played a round of golf, when you get at home that night, just with a piece of paper right in front of you, just draw a center line down the middle of the piece of paper and that’s going to be your straight line and then think back through the round of golf and every ball that you hit, let’s say more than a 100 yards, draw the flight on the piece of paper. Don’t just draw the finished position on the piece of paper, try and draw the actual flight. How did it get to its finished position? Did it finish straight? Did it finish left? Did it finish right? But how did it curve or shape to get there.

And over a cause of a normal round of golf you might have let’s say 30, 40, 50 shots that you’ve hit more than 100 yards. So by the time that you’ve finished if you could remember all those shots you should have 30 to 50 lines out on that piece of paper, each one showing a different direction. Then you can look at that piece of paper and work out what your averages look like. Then you might be able to sort of draw on a few stronger lines that show where your average shots might be. It might be the average shot is a right to left or a left to right, but once you’ve gone ahead and established that natural shot shape, you can start to utilize that on the golf course. You can maybe stand behind your next shot looking out down the fairway, remembering that piece of paper and remembering the fact that your natural shot shape will move left to right and finish to the right hand side. Well if that’s the case, how can I affect my course management as I stand behind the ball. If my average shot shape moves left to right and there’s a pond to the right of the green, I need to do something about that, because I know my natural shape is going to hit it into the pond. So I go left, or I can make alterations into my swing, or I could choose a different club that’s not going to get me into trouble. So understanding that natural shot shape by drawing it out on a piece of paper is very worthwhile. It’s also worthwhile checking back out on a regular basis because there’s no saying that natural shot shape would remain, particularly if you’re working with a golf coach and trying to improve your swing. You might feel that your natural shot shape over time changes and develops. On a fairly regular basis, maybe every month, maybe every quarter, actually draw out on a piece of paper how your natural shot shape’s changing and use that shot shape to determine the shots you hit out on the golf course. 2016-07-18

I think for a lot of golfers they don’t necessarily understand what their natural shot shape is. They either don’t quite visualize the flight of the ball clearly or they cannot remember the really bad shots and the really good shots. They don’t actually take a good view of what their average shot shape looks like. So next time you’ve played a round of golf, when you get at home that night, just with a piece of paper right in front of you, just draw a center line down the middle of the piece of paper and that’s going to be your straight line and then think back through the round of golf and every ball that you hit, let’s say more than a 100 yards, draw the flight on the piece of paper. Don’t just draw the finished position on the piece of paper, try and draw the actual flight. How did it get to its finished position? Did it finish straight? Did it finish left? Did it finish right? But how did it curve or shape to get there.

And over a cause of a normal round of golf you might have let’s say 30, 40, 50 shots that you’ve hit more than 100 yards. So by the time that you’ve finished if you could remember all those shots you should have 30 to 50 lines out on that piece of paper, each one showing a different direction. Then you can look at that piece of paper and work out what your averages look like. Then you might be able to sort of draw on a few stronger lines that show where your average shots might be. It might be the average shot is a right to left or a left to right, but once you’ve gone ahead and established that natural shot shape, you can start to utilize that on the golf course. You can maybe stand behind your next shot looking out down the fairway, remembering that piece of paper and remembering the fact that your natural shot shape will move left to right and finish to the right hand side. Well if that’s the case, how can I affect my course management as I stand behind the ball.

If my average shot shape moves left to right and there’s a pond to the right of the green, I need to do something about that, because I know my natural shape is going to hit it into the pond. So I go left, or I can make alterations into my swing, or I could choose a different club that’s not going to get me into trouble. So understanding that natural shot shape by drawing it out on a piece of paper is very worthwhile. It’s also worthwhile checking back out on a regular basis because there’s no saying that natural shot shape would remain, particularly if you’re working with a golf coach and trying to improve your swing. You might feel that your natural shot shape over time changes and develops. On a fairly regular basis, maybe every month, maybe every quarter, actually draw out on a piece of paper how your natural shot shape’s changing and use that shot shape to determine the shots you hit out on the golf course.