You're Correct!

In order to hit a straight golf shot all you need to do is get your club head swinging directly along the target line, with the club face aiming down the target line and you will hit a straight golf shot.

f you are hitting a slice and you are a right handed golfer what is happening is that your swing path, so that is the direction your club head is travelling in, is moving from outside the target line and then across it to the inside of the target line as you are striking the ball. As you are doing this your club face is aiming to the right of your swing path but to the left of the target and that difference between where the swing path and the direction of the club head is travelling in and the direction the club face is pointing in, will put tilted axis spin on to the ball. You will see the ball curve in its flight. The ball will start on the left of the target because the club face is aiming left of the target, but it will then swing to the right because the club face is actually aiming left of target but it is aiming right to the direction of travel of the club and that tilted axis spin will now make the ball spin left to right in the air.

To correct a slice and get you swinging the club head straighter along the target line, try using an alignment pole, or golf club, as follows. Place the pole on the floor to represent the target line. Put an alignment pole into the ground on the right hand side of the pole on the ground. This alignment pole is going to be pushed into the ground at the angle that you set the shaft of your golf club from the ground when you set up to play a golf shot. As you set up to hit your golf shot, the club sets a natural angle and if you set the alignment pole to a similar angle to the shaft, that is the position we need the alignment pole in. It needs to be about three feet to the right of you down the target line alignment pole.

What you now need to work on, is making sure that as you swing back you swing the club head along the target line on the floor and then up the alignment pole that you can see on the right of you. Then make sure that you swing the club head back down that alignment pole on your down swing, so that you then swing the club head along the target line. If you swing the club head directly along the target line, with the club face aiming the target, you will hit a straight golf shot.

If you are hitting a slice what tends to happen is that on your down swing instead of following the angle of the alignment pole down to the ground, the club head will be way out in front of the alignment pole, to the left of that alignment pole as you are looking at it and as a result the club head will swing down towards the target line and have to cut across it to strike the golf ball, because you are on the outside of that target line.

Rotating your hands through impact will mean that the club face is not as open (or aiming to the right as much). But if you rotate your hands through impact and the club head is travelling to the left of target as you do this, you will now start to hit the ball straight to the left of the target. Rotating your hands through impact does square the club face up more, but if you are swinging the club head across the target line, it will now mean you will miss the target on the left rather than the right – but you will still miss the target!

A lot of golfers, because they see the ball swinging left to right and finishing more on the right of the target, believe that if they aim more to the left it will correct the problem. In fact aiming more to the left will actually increase the amount that the club head is cutting across the target line and if you are aiming your club face to the right of that, the bigger the difference between the direction the club head is travelling in and where the club face is aiming, which results in even more curve during the balls flight. Aiming left will not correct your golf slice, it will actually make it worse.

Work on swinging the club head down the target line, with the club face aiming at the target and this will fix your slice.