How Do Professionals Work The Golf Ball? (Video) - by Peter Finch
How Do Professionals Work The Golf Ball? (Video) - by Peter Finch

How do professionals work the golf ball? Now professionals have great control over their ball flight because they understand the relationship between club path and face angle of impact. Now in general terms as players swing through as they want to fade the ball, the club will travel from out to in on a slight out to in path with the club face open to that path and that'll produce the face spin which will send the ball from left to right. With a draw shot the club needs to be travelling from a slightly in to out swing path with the club face slightly close to that path and that will create the draw spin to send the ball from right to left. With a straight shot the club is travelling on a very, very slightly inside path to square, with the club face square to the impact which will produce pretty much back spin. Now it's those kinds of relationships that the professionals not only understand but practice and that’s the key.

Professionals don’t simply stand on the tee and understand and do it naturally its practice, its preparation and then its understanding how you can implement that on the golf course. Now a great little drill you can actually use is to get three balls during practice just take an iron say a 7-iron, start off with a fade where the stance is slightly open to the target, you cut across the body and you just keep the club face a little bit open through impact to produce a fade shot. So a little bit from left to right in the air then the very next ball put the stance a little bit to the right hand side of the target come from in to out and through impact just close the face slightly to the path, try and produce a draw shot. And then on the last one square that stance up to the target, swing through the ball and try and get that club face nice and square at impact. Now using those three balls and that three-ball drill you can get a better understanding one after the other of swing path and club face angle. A big mistake to make would be to think that professionals do – just do it naturally. They’ve practiced it and they’ve honed their technique and they understand this relationship between path and club face angle. So if you do want to shape the ball you do want to control it better, get out to the practice range, use that drill and hopefully when you're out on the course you'll be able to control your ball flight and your shot shape a lot, lot better. 2014-05-28

How do professionals work the golf ball? Now professionals have great control over their ball flight because they understand the relationship between club path and face angle of impact. Now in general terms as players swing through as they want to fade the ball, the club will travel from out to in on a slight out to in path with the club face open to that path and that'll produce the face spin which will send the ball from left to right. With a draw shot the club needs to be travelling from a slightly in to out swing path with the club face slightly close to that path and that will create the draw spin to send the ball from right to left. With a straight shot the club is travelling on a very, very slightly inside path to square, with the club face square to the impact which will produce pretty much back spin. Now it's those kinds of relationships that the professionals not only understand but practice and that’s the key.

Professionals don’t simply stand on the tee and understand and do it naturally its practice, its preparation and then its understanding how you can implement that on the golf course. Now a great little drill you can actually use is to get three balls during practice just take an iron say a 7-iron, start off with a fade where the stance is slightly open to the target, you cut across the body and you just keep the club face a little bit open through impact to produce a fade shot. So a little bit from left to right in the air then the very next ball put the stance a little bit to the right hand side of the target come from in to out and through impact just close the face slightly to the path, try and produce a draw shot. And then on the last one square that stance up to the target, swing through the ball and try and get that club face nice and square at impact.

Now using those three balls and that three-ball drill you can get a better understanding one after the other of swing path and club face angle. A big mistake to make would be to think that professionals do – just do it naturally. They’ve practiced it and they’ve honed their technique and they understand this relationship between path and club face angle. So if you do want to shape the ball you do want to control it better, get out to the practice range, use that drill and hopefully when you're out on the course you'll be able to control your ball flight and your shot shape a lot, lot better.