Golf Misconceptions: I didn't get under it!

How often have you been playing when a player hits a thin shot and says, "Damn, I didn't get under that one!" This is one of my favorites and I find myself having to bite my tongue each time I hear it. Players using this 'expanation' for their bad shots, hate playing from tight lies, and will more often than not admit that they like playing from the rough instead of the fairway.



The misconception here is that we need to hit the ball into the air by striking the ball with an upward stroke that contacts the ball as close to the bottom of the ball as possible. Or in otherwords that for the ball to go up, we need to strike the ball with an upward strike. This misconception is going to lead to a very inconsistant ball strike, resulting in many fat and thin shots as the timing and position of the club at impact are both difficult to pull off, and even then will result in lost distance as the transfer of energy from club head to ball is lost or never exists due to the means to get the club head on the ball this way.


We must keep in mind that the golf club is designed to compress the golf ball and spin it. This happens with a proper delivery of the club face on the golf ball. When we use the club head as it is designed, we must deliver a downward blow, striking the the golf ball before the club contacts the ground. This is a general rule and won't always apply. For example, a ball hit with a driver off a tee or a ball hit from a sand bunker. But these are rarely the shots we hear the 'I didn't get under it' excuse applied.


Part of this initial deception in golf lies in the fact that the ball is round, and our clubface is lofted (angled back). On first look it might appear that our goal is to slide the lofted clubhead under the ball, striking its lower half on the upswing, and thus driving - or lifting - the ball into the air. However, it is critical to note that the golf club has not been designed to get under the ball to lift it. It has been designed to strike the ball as the clubhead is descending - on the downswing.

The face of the club will then contact the surface of the golf ball just prior to reaching the bottom of the swing arc. As a result, the ball becomes trapped between the descending clubface and the ground. The ball compresses. Because the face of the clubhead is lofted, the ball - rather than be driven into the ground as a downward hit might imply - will spin backwards up the clubface, decompress (adding energy to its escape) and climb into the air. The angle at which the ball climbs (trajectory) will be directly related to the loft of the club we have chosen for the shot.

Unfortunately, until the technicalities of hitting down are fully explained, hitting up seems, on the surface, more logical. If we want something to go up, we tend to hit up at it. If I gave you a tennis ball, and a racket, and asked you to hit the ball up into the air - what would you do? You would lower your racket and strike up at the tennis ball. And the tennis ball would go up. It's logical. So why wouldn't it be logical with golf too?

Certainly - on the surface anyway - hitting down at something you want to go up, is not logical. And until it becomes logical, your muscles may resist as a result. Gaining a firm understanding of the golf swing - and especially the mechanics of "hitting down" - is vital to programming muscle memory. And good muscle memory in golf is essential, so you can stop worrying about your swing, and concentrate on the game itself.

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.

What I've Learned

This is my first attempt at a blog for something in which I'm hardly and expert, but knowledgeable enough I think to help a lot of weekend golfers. I have been playing golf since the mid 80's, but didn't take the game serious until around the year 2000. Since then, I have taken lessons from 3 different professionals as well as taken group lessons. I've read countless books and articles on the golf swing and have determined that I know what makes a great golf swing, albiet it escapes me on how to repeat it consistantly.

My goal with this blog is to share what I have learned and to pass along my take on the knowledge I have gained over the past few years.