How Not To Strike Turf Before The Golf Ball Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles
How Not To Strike Turf Before The Golf Ball Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles

This can be one of those most frustrating times on the golf course. You’ve got yourself 120 yards out from the flag middle of the fairway lovely nice little shot into the green with a 9-iron. You set up to it all beautifully you swing back you whack the ground about eight inches before the ball and the ball goes – it doesn’t even go 20 yards towards your target. And that’s the classic fat shot. And like I said, it’s a very, very frustrating shot everything looks set up to be perfect gouge the turf divot goes nearly as far as the golf ball and you look a bit of a fool. Now the point to this shot, is you should be taking a divot. The divot is a good thing. The divot just got to be in the right place and the right depth. And the divot has to start under and after the golf ball. So when you watch the guys on the TV taking divots and the caddy is running after them bringing back these great big slabs and dropping them back in, that’s a good shot because the ball and then the divot happened.

If the divot happens first that’s when you get in trouble and you’re getting your fat shots. Here’s a couple of exercises just to make sure you’re in the best place to strike a ball and turf rather than turf and ball. So as I setup to this golf ball first thing to check is where is the ball positioned and where is my body weight positioned? If the ball is too far forwards and my body weight is too far back, instinctively my lowest point will be under the center of gravity, my center of gravity is behind the ball I’m already in trouble. So we keep the ball positioned for a 7-9 as I’ve got it here very slightly ahead of center. And maybe in the center for the 9-9 pitching wedge area that we talked about before. So 7-9 is just slightly ahead of center. Then as I’m coming in to the impact position my body weight is moving through to the left side. So now my centre of gravity is past the ball, therefore the lowest point of my arc will be past the ball as well so I want to hit the floor after the golf ball. One other big area of concern we see for golfers is that they lose their angle in their wrists too early and they’re effectively scooping the ball when they hit it. So that let me explain that again. The angle is created here in the back swing face but I put an angle between the shaft and the left wrist and I swing that nicely to the top and as I return down to the ball I should maintain some of that angle at least until the last second where at impact I straighten my left arm out again. If I have created the lag but then I’ve lost the angle too early the club has a tendency to bottom out and then start it’s upwards journey before it gets to the ball and effectively scooping and flicking. We often see golfers when they’re trying to help the ball up in the air to hit it high, they make that mistake. If you are trying to hit the ball high just consider it’s the club’s job to hit it high. Your job is to hit it downwards and forwards and the club’s job is to hit it up in the air. So we can actually create a little pumping drill exercise to help you with this. We bring the club back we hold the 90 degree angle; and we pump up and down and up and down and we’re holding the angle and then on the third go we release down into the golf ball. So it’s going to be angle one, two and then clip it away and as you clip it away in that third one you should be hitting the ground after the golf ball. So as I setup now I got a good setup position there’s the angle. One, two, three and I got a nice clean strike ball and turf. When you see it, when you're doing this out in the golf course you will see the divot shape when you're practicing this on the driving range you need to listen as much as anything. You need to listen for a clean ball turf contact make sure is not turf first. Practice that drill strike the ball better the next time you go and play. 2014-03-26

This can be one of those most frustrating times on the golf course. You’ve got yourself 120 yards out from the flag middle of the fairway lovely nice little shot into the green with a 9-iron. You set up to it all beautifully you swing back you whack the ground about eight inches before the ball and the ball goes – it doesn’t even go 20 yards towards your target. And that’s the classic fat shot. And like I said, it’s a very, very frustrating shot everything looks set up to be perfect gouge the turf divot goes nearly as far as the golf ball and you look a bit of a fool. Now the point to this shot, is you should be taking a divot. The divot is a good thing. The divot just got to be in the right place and the right depth. And the divot has to start under and after the golf ball. So when you watch the guys on the TV taking divots and the caddy is running after them bringing back these great big slabs and dropping them back in, that’s a good shot because the ball and then the divot happened.

If the divot happens first that’s when you get in trouble and you’re getting your fat shots. Here’s a couple of exercises just to make sure you’re in the best place to strike a ball and turf rather than turf and ball. So as I setup to this golf ball first thing to check is where is the ball positioned and where is my body weight positioned? If the ball is too far forwards and my body weight is too far back, instinctively my lowest point will be under the center of gravity, my center of gravity is behind the ball I’m already in trouble. So we keep the ball positioned for a 7-9 as I’ve got it here very slightly ahead of center. And maybe in the center for the 9-9 pitching wedge area that we talked about before. So 7-9 is just slightly ahead of center. Then as I’m coming in to the impact position my body weight is moving through to the left side. So now my centre of gravity is past the ball, therefore the lowest point of my arc will be past the ball as well so I want to hit the floor after the golf ball.

One other big area of concern we see for golfers is that they lose their angle in their wrists too early and they’re effectively scooping the ball when they hit it. So that let me explain that again. The angle is created here in the back swing face but I put an angle between the shaft and the left wrist and I swing that nicely to the top and as I return down to the ball I should maintain some of that angle at least until the last second where at impact I straighten my left arm out again. If I have created the lag but then I’ve lost the angle too early the club has a tendency to bottom out and then start it’s upwards journey before it gets to the ball and effectively scooping and flicking. We often see golfers when they’re trying to help the ball up in the air to hit it high, they make that mistake. If you are trying to hit the ball high just consider it’s the club’s job to hit it high. Your job is to hit it downwards and forwards and the club’s job is to hit it up in the air.

So we can actually create a little pumping drill exercise to help you with this. We bring the club back we hold the 90 degree angle; and we pump up and down and up and down and we’re holding the angle and then on the third go we release down into the golf ball. So it’s going to be angle one, two and then clip it away and as you clip it away in that third one you should be hitting the ground after the golf ball. So as I setup now I got a good setup position there’s the angle. One, two, three and I got a nice clean strike ball and turf. When you see it, when you're doing this out in the golf course you will see the divot shape when you're practicing this on the driving range you need to listen as much as anything. You need to listen for a clean ball turf contact make sure is not turf first. Practice that drill strike the ball better the next time you go and play.