I am going to tell you something today that is going to help you massively during your golf
career. I am going to tell you why the golf ball starts in the direction that it does. Why does
a golf ball start to the right? Why does the golf ball start to the left? And why does the
curve happen? Why do I hook the balls or slice the balls? When I started playing golf 40 years ago,
we did not know anything about this. It is only recently that the following has become known
to all golfers. And you are going to know about it as well! So, the reason why the balls don't
start straight is because the club face is either open or closed. The club face is the reason why
your ball starts to the right. It's not the swing direction. A lot of golfers who slice their balls
will automatically start swinging to the left. But as long as the club face is open,
the ball will still start to the right. I am going to prove that to you right now. Ok, so the club
face is pointing right of the target. I'm going to swing towards the target. Let's see what happens.
The ball flew to the right. So let's see what happens if I swing to the
left. My club face is still pointing about 20 degrees right of the target. This time I
am going to really try to exaggerate it. I am going to try to swing to the left.
Slightly better, but that ball also started to the right. Ok, so now let's close the club face.
My club face points to the left. And I'm going to swing towards the target. The ball
flies left. And let's try to compensate by really swinging way to the right.
Slightly better, but that ball also flew to the left. So what does the swing direction do
I hear you say. So let's say that the club face points towards the target in impact
but my swing direction is 20 to 30 degrees to the right of that. The difference between the
swing direction or the swing path and the club face will create a curvature.
What will happen then? The ball will then curve to the left - as though I cut the ball. So, which of
the two are more important? Definitely the club face angle. And let's say that you are a slicer.
How can you get your club face to be straight at impact and not open? Well there are a few
options. The one would be to strengthen your grip. The other would be to swing more from in to out
and then to rotate the arms more. You are probably swinging from
out to in and leaving the club face open. Another way would be to
straighten the back of your hand at the top of the backswing. A lot of golfers are very
open at the top of the backswing. Do you see - my hand's cupped and my club face is totally open.
If I make a perfect downswing from there, my ball can only start right because my club face is going
to be open. Just bend the back of your hand in that direction. That will close the club face.
Don't do it too much, it can hurt your wrist. And if you are a hooker - you hit to the left,
then you can weaken your grip. Or you can work on your body turn so that your club head doesn't
overtake your hands. You can really practice it a few times and get a feel or this position. Or,
it could be - and you can see by your divots: if your divots point to the right, you are swinging
too much from in to out and you are rotating too much with your arms or maybe you are not turning
your hips enough. You definitely need to start the downswing with a turn of the body to the left
to get the club face on plane. You will rotate the club face automatically less.
Ok, I hope that helped. The main message, that I want to give you in this video is that the
club face is the cause for the ball starting in all sorts of directions. So, go to your PGA pro
and find out what you should do to straighten your club face in impact.
Thanks so much for visiting my little channel. I look forward to helping you in the future. Bye.