Ah k I won't bet against you for a small bet, I'd rather root for you to do well, hopefully we can play together sometime, I'm around an 8 also, unfortunately this year I'm only in vegas for a super short trip so no golf time, good luck!

Looks pretty good! Hard to explain, but try working on a smoother turn with your shoulders, rather than your whole body twisting.

Stance seems a little wide, too.

Really nice balance..

Post some bad swings too.

the stance looks wider than it is, i have been pointing my toes out to help with rotation a la charlie wie

sure, if you're in vegas and want to golf hit me up!

At the top of backswing, it seems like your head lifts with your turn a bit. Cant be sure from vid. You should try downloading the golf v1 app and load your videos up to it. You can draw lines at different spots to see the movements during the swing. With the lines drawn in, it is easy to notice good and bad movements, like swaying or sliding or head lift. Head lift during backswing will rob power, as well as oyher bad stuff. Otherwise looks like contineous improvement.

You have a lot of head movement.. I think that's cause of your turn.. over rotating.. stop your swing about 10% sooner..

about the head wobble...my head turns some with my shoulders and there's a small bit of side to side movement, but it stays level, doesn't move up or down...from all i've read online, as long as your head isn't bobbing up and down, a bit of movement is ok.

but yea, i've been trying to shorten my backswing, it's hard! i was coming across the line for the last week or so, so i've actually improved in that area. but yea, thanks

Ok, you're right

Breaking 80 will be tough, but I'll be rooting for you.

Your rythm looks really great to me. Focus on keeping your rythm and have a good short game tomorrow, that should give you the best chance to play well and win you bet imo.

Good luck

thanks for the well wishes, going out tonight for some last minute bunker practice. the pot bunkers at this course look treacherous!

we've come a long way so far

maybe time for new shorts

hehe i got new shorts for my birthday but they haven't made it into a video yet!

tourney trip report below, might not be of interest. tldr:

had fun at the tournament though i didn't do well. carded a 91 which included a 9 on the par 4 16th and a penalty stroke for slow play (bad beat story to come).

didn't really play that bad, though. course is pretty tough, if you miss a shot you can get really screwed. deep pot bunkers and and gnarly weeds. i think that it lives up to the name of a links style course.

so, the 16th hole. second 9 was going ok, i had just parred 15 and was +3 for the back. i was feeling good because i had hit every fairway. i decided to hit driver to take the fairway bunkers out of play, even though the fairway is narrow, it seemed like the right play, and i was feeling good.

i hit a pull-hook, but everyone in the group thought it would be fine since i hit it pretty pure and it went far. it looked like i had cut the corner and would be in the rough. i ended up not being able to find my drive, and didn't play a provisional upon the advice of one of my playing partners, so i had to make the embarassing drive back to the tee where the group behind us was waiting.

we had already fallen behind the group ahead of us on 15 and we were trying to play quick. pulled a 3wood into the weeds and hit a provisional which would end up being my 5th stroke. made a 20 foot putt for a 9 and was just glad that i was no longer holding up the groups behind me with my crappy play. i had already written off the round so i just wanted to gtfo off the hole...stupid rules of golf.

as we're driving away from the 18th tee, we find my original drive from the 16th hole, about 100 yards from the green, over the weeds about 50 yards farther than i was looking . siiiiiiiiiiiiiigh. i finish with a bogey on 18 and stagger into the clubhouse to drop off my card.

the guy running the tourney goes into a speech about how we finished 20 minutes behind the group ahead of us (we were 12 minutes behind at the turn, which was apparently fine) and that we were subject to a 1 stroke penalty. we were asked to fill out a piece of paper to state the reason why we think we don't deserve the penalty stroke.

standing there severely sunburned, half way to a heat stroke, and having blown a perfectly good back-9 because of not finding a ball that was in plain sight, part of me was annoyed that he was taking the net division of a meaningless tournament so seriously when nobody in the group was even in contention.

i wanted to tell them to just give me the penalty so that i didn't have to fill out the piece of paper, but i showed them respect and scribbled something down with a frowny face and handed it to the gentleman.

the penalty was obviously dumb and i could have made a pretty good case had i been in contention. the group ahead of us was a 3some, and we were a 4some. we had a woman in our group, and she was playing from the forward tees, so that adds like a minute to every hole no matter what. also, we were playing ready golf and were well aware we had fallen behind and were trying to catch up. i bet the group behind us would have attested to that even though i had to drive back to the tee on 16. we were all just sucking and golf takes longer when you're sucking.

my score is listed as 91 so apparently they assessed the penalty. at least i learned a valuable lesson and will no longer suffer the embarrassment of the drive of shame for a lost ball!

it's actually not a bad looking scorecard, especially considering it's your first tourney.. (I assume) 4 pars and a birdie.. Just remember the positives..

I thought more about your swing, and basically I think you have a reverse pivot at the top. If you focus on swinging 75% you'll be hitting the ball much further and crisper. However, no one on this forum listens to me, lol.

i 100% agree with you, and now i have a few weeks before the next tournament to hammer it in!

Augie, here is a video to help you solidify some of the things people have been saying. This drill is given by Pete Cowen to some of Europe's top players. Through reverse hand positions and their resistance, it helps you feel the proper backswing plane and also what kind of angles to have before impact. Enjoy

"The Split Grip Drill"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVuY0O-WYFk

oh my god i love this camera!



so much easier to see so many things in slow motion. the reverse pivot is very obvious now, well spotted dickpound! you can see my toes come up and my body fall away right at impact. can't wait to get back to the range and fix it!!

latest problem has been hitting it on the toe. as you can see in this video, i hit a pretty good shot (thanks to my new super-thick old man irons) but it's clearly right off the toe. happens a lot and all the tips i've found on google don't really seem to apply to me.

Well for me, and it kinda looks like for you also, I hit off the toe when I am trying to hold the club head off instead of releasing it enough. My swing thought to help with this is to push the ball out to the right and extend my arms in the follow through (ideally I play a small push draw, so this might not work if you hit mostly cuts)

couple things i noticed. first, what iron are you hitting? your set up seems a bit too bent over and your rear too far out past your heels. i would prefer a little more upright and maybe less knee bend. this should bring your hands closer to your body which seem a bit reaching. especially if this is a short iron.(you seem to be choking up a lot on this club) i would prefer your arms to make a line 90 degrees to the floor. if this is a wedge or other shorter iron i understand the more bend but your arms are reaching to far out then. this could be a factor in toe hits.

also i would like to see FO view to see your set up and shaft position.

next, in your take away to tend to bow your wrist and your club head gets below your right forearm when shaft is parallel to ground. if you pause it at the point of your shaft being parallel to the ground,(from dtl you should see no shaft at this point) you will notice the club head is below your hands and right forearm. this can cause you to get stuck and your general bowing of the left wrist causes you to flick your wrist through impact. in the takeaway you can try to keep your hands closer to your body while keeping the clubhead out.(rickie fowler is extreme example)

finally, on your downswing you drop the club alot and really shallow out your swing. as you unwind left your head moves backward a bit(behind you) causing you to pull out and stand up at impact. if you pause it at impact you have lost all spine angle and are more upright. great ball strikers lower more and increase their spine angle to the ground. it is very hard for you to compress the ball and it seems more of a sweeping blow. not sure from dtl but at impact it also seems your left leg is still bent and your weight is hanging back on your right foot. you should be posting up on your left leg sooner.

alot of stuff to digest!!! just work on your set up and the other things should start to fall into place. remember with your irons you want to compress the ball into the ground. you cant do that if you are standing up during impact. you want to keep your spine angle if not increase it.(lower into impact and then blasting up out of it after impact.)

if you get the golf v1 app(couple bucks on apple) you can draw lines into your video as markers to really see all the small movements during your swing. draw lines on your head and other spots to notice incorrect movements. after doing this myself it opened my eyes to "what you think you feel is not anything like what really is happening."

nih han, you were so right about the posture being too bent over. i tried a more upright stance and it was an instant cure for the toe hitting. now, a new problem is sometimes hitting it on the heel! gotta play around and find the perfect median.

well spotted.

i think i've finally got the takeaway figured out. now, next to work on is maintaining my spine angle. i'm still standing up on it a bit but it's slightly better than last video. at least now i know to work on it.

really excited about my progress. i'm playing golf on tuesday and i'll be disappointed if i don't break 80.

7-iron


3w

looks pretty god damn smooth to me dude. Nice work.

Amazing f-ing progress. I'm done helping; I don't want to get beaten next time!

looks great, good job

what's your HCP?

why you never take a front view of your swing ?

New shorts! It's gotta be da shorts!

thanks all! yes, it's more than likely the shorts. maybe i should get some jorts for extra distance?

HCP is 9.3 but that's from only 6 rounds over the last 2 months. i practice a lot more than i play. and i'm hitting it so much better than i was in may, who knows what my "true" hcp is.

i'd like to get more front views but it's hard sometimes when there's other people at the range. people love to come up next to me even when the range is not crowded.

also most of the time i've been working on the backswing and keeping my right elbow down and the DTL view is most helpful there.