Head Cover Drill - Lesson by PGA Pros Pete Styles & Matt Fryer
Head Cover Drill - Lesson by PGA Pros Pete Styles & Matt Fryer

In this video tip PGA golf professionals Pete Styles and Matt Fryer will talk you through the process of how a simple head cover can improve a golfers ability to reduce the amount of curvature and slice they get on the golf ball.

Many golfers struggle with their swing direction towards the golf ball which results in a slicing golf shot. By placing a head cover outside the line of the golf ball, this can reduce the club's ability to attack the ball from outside the line which will in turn result in a straighter swing direction and improved golf shot accuracy.

So one of the most common shots we tend to see a fault with with people who come for lessons would probably be the slice would you agree Pete. Absolutely probably the most frustrating shop that club and amateur golfers have is how can I cure my slice. So if I were to give you one head cover. Is all I get? Yes one head cover I want you to fix a slice or give us some tips or we could do with this one drill with a head cover to fix our slice. I think the first important point is to understand where to slice come from. So we understand that the slice is generated by a club path that is out to in. So if the target line is down the middle of the range the club path is coming this way and generally accompanied with a club face that's going to be to the right of that, so an open club face effectively so out to in, and open. So I've been given a head cover and I think this is one of the most useful training exercises and techniques to get rid of that out to in line. Definitely yeah simple tips and things that you know we're all going to have and we can utilize to really improve our golf swings. It's quite simple in a golf lesson we've got that the flights go to the track man's the cameras the training aids and everything else and we say to the client off you go and practice but hopefully this is a technique that you can actually take to the driving range and utilize as if you've got your own goal coach there. So we identified the path line that we want we want a line that comes up and down the correct way into the ball and I'm going to suggest we take a head cover and put it just outside that line. So now the head cover is affectively blocking the wrong line so I can't now come out to in.

Yeah it is a good visual aid and also my Pete said if you've not got your coach are you not privy to having launch monitors this is going to provide some feedback if you were to make the wrong swing. Now what's going to happen? Well instantly I think it's see both in the back swing and the downswing the club head cover will be contacted. So if I'm steep and I'm lifting the club away I'm going to hit the head cover way in the back swing and then I'll show you how to set that up as well. I take that back exactly in line with my target line and put the head cover right in there next to the driver head so it gives me room to come back but not come over. OK so if you are coming from the outside then would it be the same that the club is going to clatter it on the way down? Absolutely so I get to the top bit early extension early rotation position of the upper body comes to here and I now can't access the line to the ball without hitting that head cover. Excellent so a feeling as you're going to hit this better shot now we're going to get a more neutral path with this hopefully the face is going to be matched up to that. What would you feel is it that you're coming more inside from the head cover? Definitely I think it's in as soon as the head cover goes in there both the visualization and the understanding of the swing coming from the inside is helped by the head cover being there, and the golfer now understands that OK I meant to come this way and I and we often see golfers who initially would shallow the shaft up here just to avoid that down there.

Which is great because we want to change the top position to allow the right half the right route in to avoid the head cover. I think early stages of doing this drill would often see the ball go more to the right sometimes people panic without because of change the path. If we understand path to face relationships we know that path can go out to the right that can be shot number one. Now we can actually change the face to match that as well. So if you were to demonstrate that now and what we're going to see here hopefully with Pete shot is that he gets more of a draw because he's coming more from the inside now as opposed to the old path coming outside and then he's got to face where he started to release it and match it towards his path which is going to result in some better shots. So the shaft is going to shallow here we're going to come through from inside a role a face just a general one to start with, and we can start to see the ball just that right select shape if you've sliced the ball and you've come over the top you just seeing that one shot move right to left. It gives a little warm tingling sensation to go oh I'm on the right track here. Rather than the head cover getting demolished here as I come through hit this on the way to this. I would like to think that head cover like an early alarm signal it's an early warning that I'm in the wrong place. Definitely so I just summarize there practicing with something that can provide feedback to us when we are practicing is going to give us a better chance of actually making a correction because it's easy just stand there hitting balls with nothing there with no feed back other than the ball flight. So if you're looking to neutralize your slice you can do it very simply with head cover place it just outside your ball to target line and what we want to see is that you're not catching on the way back or on the way down through into impact and hopefully that should give you more inside path and start to see a more neutral ball flight.

2018-11-12

In this video tip PGA golf professionals Pete Styles and Matt Fryer will talk you through the process of how a simple head cover can improve a golfers ability to reduce the amount of curvature and slice they get on the golf ball.

Many golfers struggle with their swing direction towards the golf ball which results in a slicing golf shot. By placing a head cover outside the line of the golf ball, this can reduce the club's ability to attack the ball from outside the line which will in turn result in a straighter swing direction and improved golf shot accuracy.

So one of the most common shots we tend to see a fault with with people who come for lessons would probably be the slice would you agree Pete. Absolutely probably the most frustrating shop that club and amateur golfers have is how can I cure my slice. So if I were to give you one head cover. Is all I get? Yes one head cover I want you to fix a slice or give us some tips or we could do with this one drill with a head cover to fix our slice. I think the first important point is to understand where to slice come from. So we understand that the slice is generated by a club path that is out to in. So if the target line is down the middle of the range the club path is coming this way and generally accompanied with a club face that's going to be to the right of that, so an open club face effectively so out to in, and open. So I've been given a head cover and I think this is one of the most useful training exercises and techniques to get rid of that out to in line. Definitely yeah simple tips and things that you know we're all going to have and we can utilize to really improve our golf swings. It's quite simple in a golf lesson we've got that the flights go to the track man's the cameras the training aids and everything else and we say to the client off you go and practice but hopefully this is a technique that you can actually take to the driving range and utilize as if you've got your own goal coach there. So we identified the path line that we want we want a line that comes up and down the correct way into the ball and I'm going to suggest we take a head cover and put it just outside that line. So now the head cover is affectively blocking the wrong line so I can't now come out to in.

Yeah it is a good visual aid and also my Pete said if you've not got your coach are you not privy to having launch monitors this is going to provide some feedback if you were to make the wrong swing. Now what's going to happen? Well instantly I think it's see both in the back swing and the downswing the club head cover will be contacted. So if I'm steep and I'm lifting the club away I'm going to hit the head cover way in the back swing and then I'll show you how to set that up as well. I take that back exactly in line with my target line and put the head cover right in there next to the driver head so it gives me room to come back but not come over. OK so if you are coming from the outside then would it be the same that the club is going to clatter it on the way down? Absolutely so I get to the top bit early extension early rotation position of the upper body comes to here and I now can't access the line to the ball without hitting that head cover. Excellent so a feeling as you're going to hit this better shot now we're going to get a more neutral path with this hopefully the face is going to be matched up to that. What would you feel is it that you're coming more inside from the head cover? Definitely I think it's in as soon as the head cover goes in there both the visualization and the understanding of the swing coming from the inside is helped by the head cover being there, and the golfer now understands that OK I meant to come this way and I and we often see golfers who initially would shallow the shaft up here just to avoid that down there.

Which is great because we want to change the top position to allow the right half the right route in to avoid the head cover. I think early stages of doing this drill would often see the ball go more to the right sometimes people panic without because of change the path. If we understand path to face relationships we know that path can go out to the right that can be shot number one. Now we can actually change the face to match that as well. So if you were to demonstrate that now and what we're going to see here hopefully with Pete shot is that he gets more of a draw because he's coming more from the inside now as opposed to the old path coming outside and then he's got to face where he started to release it and match it towards his path which is going to result in some better shots. So the shaft is going to shallow here we're going to come through from inside a role a face just a general one to start with, and we can start to see the ball just that right select shape if you've sliced the ball and you've come over the top you just seeing that one shot move right to left. It gives a little warm tingling sensation to go oh I'm on the right track here. Rather than the head cover getting demolished here as I come through hit this on the way to this. I would like to think that head cover like an early alarm signal it's an early warning that I'm in the wrong place. Definitely so I just summarize there practicing with something that can provide feedback to us when we are practicing is going to give us a better chance of actually making a correction because it's easy just stand there hitting balls with nothing there with no feed back other than the ball flight. So if you're looking to neutralize your slice you can do it very simply with head cover place it just outside your ball to target line and what we want to see is that you're not catching on the way back or on the way down through into impact and hopefully that should give you more inside path and start to see a more neutral ball flight.