Golf Misconceptions: I pulled my head up!

This is part 1 in a series of posts that I have labeled 'Golf Misconceptions'. These are the things I often hear people attributing to their poor golf shots. The first one I'm going to address is the 'I pulled my head up' problem. I probably hear this coming from the mouths of more golfers than any other and it probably bothers me the most. Even today while I was out on the course, one of my fellow golfers insisted that the problem with his golf swing was his 'Head Lifting' issue.



I think this problem arises from the belief that in order to strike a golf ball solidly one's head must remain still, with little movement from left to right, forward or back and finally up or down. This is a rather silly notion to think that keeping ones head from moving can solve any issues relating to hitting a golf ball solid as we don't use our head to hit the ball, nor does the head have any connection to the club which in fact is the instrument used to actually strike the ball. So, how can the movement of the head fix or cause problems with the golf swing?


The movement of one's head makes as much sense than saying, I hit a bad shot because I hit the ball poorly. True, but is that the cause of the bad shot? No, it's simply a result of the swing. So in other words, pulling up out of the shot is not the reason for the bad shot, but rather a reaction of the body to the position the golfer was in prior to making contact with the ball. I would estimate that 9 times out of 10, if the golfer does not pull up away from the ball (pulling the head up), the golfer wouldn't even strike the ball at all, instead they would contact the ground a good 4 or more inches behind the ball.

You see, the real culprit behind pulling out of a shot is the fact that the player has to compensate for a bad swing in order to make any kind of contact with the ball. A swing like this can be caused by all kinds of swing flaws including a very 'armsy swing' with little or no body turn, a very steep/over the top swing.

My point here is that the golfer must realize that the solution to thier problem isn't to 'Keep thier head down', as this really isn't solving anything. The golfer needs to learn to swing the club so that there isn't a need to pull out of the shot and lift the body to add clearance for the swing.