This is EXACTLY why I moved away from the TP5x this year. I actually switched to the Vice Pro Plus for this year. Saving money and seems close to the old TP5x version.

Cobster. I think the bottom of the swing should be just in front of the bottom of the ball for long irons. Slightly further forward for mid irons. Maybe 1 inch in front of the ball for short irons. And just a little more than that with wedges.

Long irons require little or no resistance from the ground.

Wedges make the ball spin by compressing it between the ground and clubface. This makes the ball rolling up the face, which utilizes the top grooves that add spin. You cant compress the ball if your swing bottoms out at the bottom of the ball.

That's some interesting perspective into the relative positions of where the clubhead bottoms out at its lowest point for different clubs. As for wedges, if it is true that the swing bottoms out completely much further forward than other clubs, that could explain why I don't hit them far. But that could be understandable as you also use them for short pitches where you use the bounce and slide under the ball more, thus creating a dichotomy of feels.

However, I should point out that the bottoming out that I was speaking of was less focused on the relative forward/back position of the clubhead, but rather the specific sledgehammer feel that occurs during this particular section of the swing, and hence moreso the vertical aspect of it. I get the sense that gaining control of this feel can produce tremendous clubhead speed and power not just in and of itself, but also because it relies on so much else going right, such as having a complete follow through and being on a correct plain etc.

I must note that to me your description of what happens when you compress the ball with a wedge seems opposed to what was described by ntnBO. He stated to another poster that said poster might be experiencing a big gap distance-wise between one of his higher lofted wedges and another club because the ball could have been merely rolling up the clubface on account of him NOT attaining proper compression of the ball, whereas you state that the ball rolls up the face with compression and utilizes the top grooves of the clubface. So, to roll or not to roll, that is the question I guess.

It seems plausible that the ball might move up the face a little bit with compression lest it just gets jammed into the ground, but also that it it "rolls" up the face in a weaker and much slower timeframe without proper compression, so maybe both descriptions could be apt.

Some food for thought about various things previously mentioned.

You do not want to feel the ball rolling up the clubface on any shot, if it does you have next to no control. Case in point, here in the DFW area it's been raining every day. So much so that the fairways can't be cut and of course they're wet. Any time I've had a wedge shot lately due to these factors, I cannot properly trap the ball and it's just riding up the face and I hit these sky high shots that I don't know how far it's going. That's bad.

With any shot hit from the turf, you want to properly cover the ball with the face of the club with proper shaft lean so that the ball compresses between the face and the turf and eventually shoots off powerfully. You never want the ball rolling up the face.

In all my years playing golf, I have never tried to make my club bottom out in different places relative to the ball with different clubs. Never.

So how to bottom out consistently? This can be somewhat complicated, but it has next to nothing to do with the small muscles. It's more important to sequence the swing properly with the bigger muscles so that the smaller twitchy muscles simply fall into place while striking the ball. You certainly don't want to try to control this aspect with the small muscles, that would be disastrous.

As far as the how the pros release the club and why it looks different, it's because they are actually releasing the club through impact while most amateurs actually release the club shortly after starting the downswing and hold on for dear life through impact. There are drills that can help feel the proper release of the club at impact. This is something I have to constantly work on in my swing, but it sure is a good feeling when it's done properly.

So here's what I think is the most important point of this post. Some of you guys are making your swing much more complicated than I am. And that's a very bad thing. The golf swing is an athletic movement, the more you think about it, the less athletic you become. If I tried to bottom out in different places with different clubs, I'd shoot my temperature unless my head exploded first.

This game is hard enough, the key is to make things as simple as possible. This means you hit your stock shot each and every time unless it is absolutely necessary you need something different. If you shoot 90, you probably have a hard enough time hitting a stock shot consistently. So why would you try to move the ball left to right sometimes, then right to left other times? That's just asking for trouble.

Case in point, I move the ball very slightly right to left with my irons. Unless I have to work the ball around a tree, I might hit 1 iron in 50-100 actually trying to work it left to right. It's just not worth it to me.

Can you talk about proper release at impact and post some of the drills you have for that? I feel like I'm getting closer to a "proper" golf swing but I just don't quite have the timing/motion down. I've changed my swing a ton over the course of last year and this year, going from bad swing (Super weak grip, early extension/butt suck, super flippy with the hands) to now a decent base (strong grip, knees and elbow more down, turning through it). I've gotten to where my good shots are way better, but I just haven't found that consistent contact point that I can repeat as the motion of "This is what the swing is supposed to feel like"

I also feel like as a remnant of my old bad swing, I have a very high follow through that goes in front of my body, rather than properly looping the club in front of and then around my head.

This paragraph really struck me as being common sense, yet something I neglect to follow.

I never said anything about "feeling the ball roll up the face." I agree with bo that this is bad. What he's describing is a fanned wedge. Yeah it also happens when the grass is wet. The result is a weak strike that invariably falls short of the target. I totally agree that trapping the ball produces the desired strike with proper forward lean of the shaft. However the ball does gain spin as it compresses and rolls up the face(in a grippy way. Not in the way a wet flier does nor a fanned shot).

I dont think about the differences in where my swing bottoms out. This is taken care of by ball position. The body's geometry dictates where the bottom of the swing is. We put the ball a little further back the shorter the club, and the swing will bottom out in front of the ball, creating the downward strike that takes a divot.

With longer irons the ball is basically aligned with my spine at address, which causes the swing to bottom out just in front of the bottom of the ball due to the slight forward movement of my whole body during the downswing. Here I rely on muscle memory and geometry to get a clean strike. I'm not thinking about the bottom of my swing, but at the same time I'm aware that taking a divot like I would with a wedge will hardly ever produce the desired flight. In fact if I take a large divot with a long iron it probably means that my body shifted too far forward during downswing or my knee, hip, or spine stability was compromised somewhere between address and contact, causing the bottom of my swing to be lower than intended. This almost always leads to bad shots.

I totally agree that trying to control the bottom of the swing is futile. Put the ball in the way of the swing and let geometry do its thing.

Only thing I disagree with from bo is the advice to never work on curving it. Maybe there are fewer obstacles where he plays? Or maybe hes so consistent off the tee that he rarely has to get creative? Idk maybe. Either way, I wonder at what point does it become a priority. In the book golf is not a game of perfect, I learned the difference between creating a shot by feeling how its going to fly when I take practice swings, compared with manufacturing shots by brute force. I prefer the former. I dont play courses that let me bomb drivers on all or most par 4s and 5s. There are obstacles that come into play for me on shorter courses exactly because these shorter courses are designed to challenge shorter hitters. If I just played my stock shots 100% then my margin for error shrinks a lot. Being creative on the course makes golf feel more like an art than sport, and thats How I think it should be.

Dont get me wrong though. You definitely gotta put in time practicing different shots before Trying it on the course. If you havent practiced the shot then its probably not going to work, and if you cant yet hit it straight consistently then this is what you should work on during the vast majority of your practice time. Then when on the course we should stick with what works for us unless hitting the stock shot isnt an option.

All that said, if youre trying to shoot your best score today, then stick with bo's recommendations. If you dont mind sacrificing theoretical fractions of a shot in favor of getting better at a wider variety of shots then I say go for it (after practicing and gaining some confidence in whatever shot you want to hit).

there are aspects of Bo's post that reminds me of things that Marcus Bell teaches



he has plenty of other vids if you want to look them up.

I think I'm going to start heckling my playing partners who play PXG clubs until they start yelling "ka-BOOM BABY" after every shot

I practice this two different ways.

1, when you watch a slo mo of a tour player's swing you notice that on the downswing when the hands return to where they start, the club is still parallel to the ground. Start in this position and then release the club solely with the right hand. It should feel that the left hand is not doing anything, it's solely a right hand movement extending down the target line for as long as possible. Do this in slow motion to get a feel for the proper release before moving slowly to full speed.

2, once you are comfortable with the move, here is a key to think about during a full swing. On the downswing when the butt of the club is pointed at the left inner thigh, simply apply the right hand release as described above. It can be easier to try this with full speed half swings first. Make sure the clubhead extends down the target line as long as possible.

Keep in mind that during both of these drills that the right hand doesn't pass the left until well after the ball has been struck. It's not a flip cup of the right hand, it's the right hand extending down and through the ball.

Bob, I'm not saying never practice moving the ball either way, I'm saying you should only deviate from your stock shot when there is a tree or other object preventing you from doing so. If the pin is tucked on the right and your stock shot is right to left, aim at the pin and if it draws like usual you're in the middle of the green. Just because the pin is tucked right does not mean you should try to cut it in there.

I am incredibly creative on the course, but only when necessary. Can curve the ball tons either way and control trajectory at will. Yes, it can be fun, but from a scoring point of view I'd prefer not to have to slalom around trees very often.

Something else, different people play for different reasons. Not everybody plays to see how low they can shoot. If one values art over score (style vs. substance) then by all means curve the ball to your heart's desire if that's what makes you happy.

my set of clubs is a little screwey right now so im forced to get creative with 7 irons and 6 irons becasue of the hole created when i lost my 8 iron last year. I bought a used 8 iron from the grab bag at the local course. i got the hang of the new club but it doesnt fill the gap around 140 yards. the 8 iron flies about 135 max and thats if i really rip it. also, my 9 iron is too upright for me, which causes a big draw with that club. last year i got pretty good with the 9 iron and could control the draw but now i prefer the new 8 iron from 120 to 130. so now my distances look like this without obstacles:

120 to 130 = straight 8 iron
130 to 150 = have to get creative with 7 iron or 6 iron.
150+ i just play straight shots with 7 through 5 irons.

if i got the 9 fitted and got a new 8 that fills the gap, i would definitely score more consistently, however im getting pretty good with the 7 and 6.

My friend who I play with has a similar problem, He lost his 8 iron and doesn't have a 7 iron. He is fairly new to the game but he hits the ball a country mile.

We have a couple of small Par 3's like 110-120 yards. I think his smallest club in the bag is a 58 degree, Some how he just flies it over the green and lands in the bushes, but yeah does have a few shots where he'll just basically flop it 90 yards. He doesn't understand yet that he needs to learn to play knock down shots. He is 1 of those guys that see's a yardage and takes x club and always aim's directly at that flag.

I've been watching a lot of Malaska Golf seems fairly decent not sure what you guys think of him.

Anyone had the Covid vaccine yet? I got it last night and my arm is completely dead, Hoping this goes away by Sunday, I've tried swinging a club but I can't get past half way .... Might actually be better for me.

I actually got the board he has. Just a FYI the price is insane for what it is and you can probably make it yourself fairly easy, but thought whatever.

It comes with them disk's that allow you to freely move your ankles, I tried it last night not swinging a club but one I stood off it and did the same movement it felt a lot easier to recognize the same feeling and almost felt a bit weird.

yeah, the price is nuts. you can buy the twisty discs for about $12 each on amazon

Who are you and where did you bury nitBO's body?

Some people naturally hit the ball really far, which is pretty funny.

I got my second Moderna shot a week ago and felt like I was coming down with something for a few days, including headache and muscle soreness.

But today at work I was sitting on a flat cart at Trader Joe's and it tipped over backwards and I bruised the very base of my thumb under the palm, so no golf or gym for hopefully just a few days. It was pretty sad.

You do get a 2 hour video with it though. Only watched like 15mins but I presume he does go into detail about hoŵ to use it to its full potential.

If I get anything from it I’ll update you guys and tell you my thoughts.

Time to go find someone that makes a 7 hybrid. I had three or four shots today where I really would have liked to have one -- right in the gap between my 6h and 6i and thick lies that would have been better played with a hybrid. I'm not consistent at all trying to knock down the 6h.

1 and 2 make a ton of sense and I think that was the piece of the swing that was missing. I was just dragging the club through the strike zone.

I was so averse to uncocking my right wrist at all because I used to have such a bad and flippy swing. Today I was striping it on the range and actually was able to bring some of that to the course. The idea of it being a right hand only motion makes a ton of sense to me.

, "I'm not saying never practice moving the ball either way, I'm saying you should only deviate from your stock shot when there is a tree or other object preventing you from doing so. If the pin " -bo

Ok we agree. I usually devote the last 10 practice shots to messing around with 7 irons 8 irons and 5 woods(the closest thing I have to a rescue club) because these are the clubs that get me out of trouble most often.

What if that object blocking your shot is wind?

I just discovered golfballstamp.com and am seriously glad that I did. They can make me a custom stamp?! I was getting tired of drawing **** on my ball for identification, and now my troubles may soon be lifted.

Editor: "Hey, we need a generic golf photo for a short piece."

Photographer: "I don't know any golfers, or anything about golf."

Editor: "Just take the distribution kid to a course and stick a club in his hand."

Photographer: "Done."

Chipping with the driver isn't the worst play that guy could make.

Any tips or tricks to help keep lead tape in place on the bottom of the driver? I hate having to fix it after every swing. I currently have two strips on the heel of the club and the back 1/3 of it wants to bend. Not like I'm hitting the ground or anything.

Thoughts?