In this video tip PGA golf professionals Pete Styles and Matt Fryer explain how the best golfers in the world strike the turf after they have hit the golf ball. Striking the turf should be seen as a positive action within the golf swing. However, many amateur golfers fall foul of this fact because they strike the ground before the ball. This ultimately results in poor shots which are not struck cleanly nor do they fly the desired distance. Utilizing a ball ahead drill, Matt and Pete explain how you can strike the ground after the golf ball with confidence and ultimately will see much better golf shots.
Matt have you ever noticed how the golfers on the T.V. always taking divots with an iron shot. They are taking divots but more importantly they're after the golf ball. OK So when we see a par 3 and we see a divot there it is all the way across the tee. Every ball has landed on the green or close to you ask what you think those divots might look like on a club golfer amateur golfer the 1st tee and more importantly where would the ball be landing on that tee? There might be a little bit bigger might be a lot more turf messing because they're coming before the golf ball they're taking quite a bit of turf not seeing the ball traveling as far as seeing it fall short maybe into a hazard of something like that. It's not getting their optimal distance. You can almost imagine that tour pro divots are decent sized if it's all done on the green club pro divots are bigger deeper ball goes half way up the divot is in the wrong place you're saying if it is big for the golf ball for a lot of club amateur golfers. Yes OK so we know now that the divot needs to be after the golf ball ball and her here's a great drill.
Matt is going to try and explain and I'm going to set into a task here make sure that if you come in the right place like Matt set up that ball for me. You know your divot would be after the ball if he struck back correctly yes but if you're a club golfer struggling with this you might be striking the ground back bottoming out here so I want you to focus on moving your body weight more forward and getting more on to your left side. What I am going to do is put your left foot back behind my golf club here wow to now that ball is now way to all normal position ball position. So Matt's normal ball position would be here I'm asking him to focus on 8 9 inches ahead of his ball position and I'm confident that if he moves his body correctly he'll hit that ball and it will fly fine. However if he does the classic mistake of leaning back in trying to skew the ball will be that way above it way back when it's going to struggle so I'm going to suggest that if you could set this drill up yourself on the driving range. The ball goes opposite your left hip is way too far forwards and all but a cracked drill.
If you strike this you might see him at the mark the ball might go high and left because the club is on that part of the arc as it strikes. So what are your thoughts when you're in that position set up there. OK so they're obviously totally alien position for me as we can see from the face on camera like you explain very well their ball is now in that is further than I'd have my driver further forwards but knowing that I want ball than turf and thinking to myself right well I've got to shift myself over to wards the target now to make sure I can get my chest a little bit in front of the ball and help me get ball than turf as I'm hitting it. As you where as you explain one of the classic ones is the I'm going to help it up in the air and we see this chest move further away from the golf ball in this position. So for me to hit that shot way is saying it's might go a little bit left because I'm swinging in a good thing they are left I know I've got to get over this way and what moves to get you know so for me I'm thinking of it from the top of my back swing here as I'm going to start my downswing I am thinking about my left hip now and I want to laterally move that towards the target with this little bit of bump feeling the weight going down into my lead foot. So as I'm doing that I'm nicely in front as I get into impact.
OK when you do this drill and if it's the practice really gonna work and I don't really mind if you take a look at that shot you might feel so far or do you have to take a little step that's fine. Falling forward this way is nowhere near as bad as falling by the way so forward is OK. The long term obviously we want to retain you know if you balance is quite important. Matt give this a go set yourself up here and you know give it the Patty Harrington at the end. Right so going to get a little shift going to get that strike from there. Slightly higher in life yes just as predicted and you were balanced out, but we also did take a divot the golf ball he could really feel your body weight they felt massively massively in my left hip that has actually finished the golf shot and the strike even though it was that far in front of me. It felt so crisp and so clean it was there was a lovely lovely shot. This is a drill I would encourage you to go on practice if you struggle with striking the ball cleanly and you know feel like you're getting body weight forward and you don't take a divot put the ball too far forward into your left side drive across to there and flick it away 10 or 15 of those on a driving range practice ground. Then bring the ball position back to the middle or your normal ball position and the key to this matter is you still remember that feeling of being over there. Actually you can imagine the still something there we might then put the leaf here we have to get the leaf is now way forward past your left foot try to sweep the leaf trying take it a divot after the ball even though your ball position is back in the center. Great shot and if you can keep that same feeling of moving left driving left maintaining your balance that's a cracking exercise to take ball then turf with your irons.