By Bob E. Jones

The most aggravating mistake in golf is for your 8-foot birdie putt to be tracking right at the hole — and stop six inches short. Now doing that once, well, that’s golf. But if you do that all the time, if you leave strokes on the course like that every time you play, here’s how to get those seven inches that you need.

Fear. You’re afraid you’ll hit the ball too far past the hole so you hold back. If you hit the ball past the hole, in your mind there’s nothing to stop the ball from going ten feet before it stops rolling. It won’t, you’re a better putter than that, but you see no obstacle beyond the hole that would prevent the ball from just rolling and rolling, and that makes you nervous.

So you settle for leaving it short. This becomes your psychological comfort zone. Let’s change your mind. Hit practice putts that will deliberately miss the hole and end up about two feet beyond. Practice like this in the 6 to 15-foot range.

Use just one ball. Watch the ball go past the hole. Get accustomed to seeing the ball go by and not being bothered by it. Next, walk up and hit the ball in the hole. Convince yourself that you can make the comebacker.

Do this over and over to convince you that you have the skill to hit the ball past the hole and leave yourself with a slam dunk coming back.

The second reason you leave putts short is that you’re concentrating too much on line, trying so hard hit the ball on the line you’ve chosen that you hit the putt too delicately and it doesn’t get to the hole.

To combat this mistake, do two things. First, practice hitting putts that go by the hole, as you just read. Then, find a spot on the green about six inches from your ball, along the chosen line, and putt the ball across that spot. If you do, I guarantee the ball will go where you intended, and get to the hole.

One more thought. You might try playing a round of golf with only one objective in mind — to hit every putt hard enough to either go in the hole or past it if it misses. Don’t be concerned about how far past the hole it goes, don’t worry about your score. Just get the ball past if it misses.

You might hit a few home runs early in the round, but if you keep at it, you will adjust quickly and start making a few. That will get you playing offense on the green, and that is how to make putts and lower your score.

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By Lawrence Montague

Possibly you have read the advice in golf instruction books about finishing your golf swing with your belt buckle facing the target? Good advice for sure, but rarely do you see it because it’s far more common to see amateur golfers with an in-completed three quarter finish.

Why is it more common for amateur golfers to achieve a three quarter finish as opposed to a complete rotation at the end of their golf swing?

One of the most common flaws in many amateur golfers’ techniques is their inability to maintain rotational speed and stability in their lower body-particularly their hips when their hitting golf shots.

Two main factors contribute to instability in this region.

1. Excessive back-swing hip rotation through a straightening of the right leg leading to premature acceleration of the hips
2. Too much lateral motion (sway) in the hips and the upper torso

Excessive hip rotation in the back-swing is a very common occurrence in amateur golfers and results from the right leg straightening too much, which moves the centre of pressure of your right foot too much into your heal. The effect of this is that your right hip must travel too much outwards towards the ball before it travels towards the target.

This early and indirect acceleration of the right hip towards the ball leads to a rapid slowing down of the hips pre-maturely in the follow-through, which triggers early acceleration of the shoulders and arms in the down swing leading to a dramatic decrease in club-head speed, and a reduction in distance.

The key to improving this situation is to control the amount and direction of your hip rotation as you complete your back-swing. Here are the three steps that you should implement if you’re finding it difficult to finish your golf stroke completely.

1. Make sure that your foot pressure at address is positioned over the balls of your feet with just enough knee bend to cover your shoe laces.
2. Maintain the same amount of knee bend in your right knee during the back-swing that you established in your address position.
3. Ensure that your belt buckle rotates just to the right of the golf ball by the time you reach the top of the back-swing. If the golf ball is at 12 o’clock, then your belt buckle should rotate to no more than 1:30.

Another helpful way to practice this back-swing process is to place a chair against your buttocks so that both legs are against it. As you swing your golf club back, you will feel your right hip gently push into the chair which will indicate to you that you have created enough hip rotation.

Then, rotate your hips in the opposite direction rapidly until the side of your left hip comes into contact with the chair and your belt buckle is pointing just to the left of your intended target.

If you tend to sway too much during the back-swing then still follow the same three steps above, and use the same chair drill but simply move it from behind you to the right side of your leg so that it rests against your right hip. Make sure that you have plenty of clearance as you swing your golf club backwards and forwards and simply let your right hip rotate along the back of the chair without moving the chair from its position.

Also consider that a big part of a dysfunctional hip rotation for many golfers is related to inflexibility in their lower back and hips. If you believe that the reason you find it difficult to complete your hip rotation in the finish of your golf swing is because of a tight lower back and hips then visit  www.vitalperformance.com.au for some advice on how to improve this with some lower back exercises.

Controlling the amount of hip rotation you produce is important if you want to increase your distance from the tee because it has a significant influence on the sequencing of your down-swing. By rotating your hips a smaller amount going back, it means that your hips don’t have as far to travel when you’re coming through.

What this means is that your hips can release a fraction earlier than your shoulders as you initiate your down-swing, which creates a trailing or lagging condition of your arms, hands and golf club, leading to an increase in swing speed and overall more distance.

If you want more distance with your irons and woods then you need more control of the direction and speed of your hips when you swing. So give these suggestions a try and you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how easily you can add additional speed to your club-head leading to longer shots, more golf confidence and consistency.

Would you like to develop loads more confidence, consistency and competence in your short and long game leading to lower golf scores when you play? My brand new online golf instruction program “The Golf Confidence Solution” is chock full of the highest quality golf instruction content designed specifically for amateur golfers who are sick and tired of playing inconsistently and want to lower their golf scores. With my new program I WILL teach you exactly how to spend less time practicing and more time improving. Head over to http://www.golfconfidence.org right now to sign up for your free golf coaching videos.

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By Bob E. Jones

There are two ways your wrist can hinge, or cock, in the backswing. Every golfer does it one particular way. To get the most out of your swing, you have to hinge them both ways, which few recreational golfers do.

Hold your hand together in front of you, palms and fingers touching as if in a praying posture. Now hinge your wrists directly up toward you, so your fingers point straight up in the sky. That’s the first way to hinge your wrists, and that’s the one very golfer does. It’s the way you would hinge your wrists if you were chopping wood by lifting the axe straight over your head and swinging it back down.

Put your hands in the starting position again and hinge your wrists to the right and left, so each hand is alternately folding back on itself. That’s the second way, which is the way recreational golfers should learn how to do. It’s the way you would hinge your wrist if you were hitting a forehand shot in tennis.

The reason this is important is that allowing your right wrist to hinge backwards on the backswing preserves the square alignment of the clubface you had at address by preserving the angle your left wrist had at address. The right arm folds on the backswing and if the right wrist does not fold backwards with it, the left wrist is forced to hinge backwards, taking the clubface out of alignment.

Then you would have to make a correction on the downswing to square up the clubface, and that is awfully hard to do consistently.

Learning how to hinge the right wrist takes a drill and a mirror. The drill will teach you the new movement and how it feels. The mirror will let you make sure you’re doing it right, because what needs to happen takes place behind your back. Remember while you’re doing all this that letting the right wrist bend backwards is an effect, not a cause. You don’t deliberately hinge it back; it is something that happens by itself when you take the club back correctly.

Take your grip on the club and hold it out in front of you. Notice the amount of bend there is in the left wrist. Now swing your shoulders and arms around so your hands are in about the place in space they get to at the top of your backswing and do not let the amount of bend in the left wrist change.

You will find that your right wrist bent backwards. That is what you’re looking for. That’s the wrist hinge you want to add to your swing.

Stand with your mirror to your right, and swing to the top of your backswing, keeping the left wrist as it was at address and letting the right wrist hinge backward. It’s really not hard to do, but if you haven’t been hinging the right wrist, it will feel quite strange.

Practice this every day until it you get accustomed to the feeling, and keep checking in the mirror to make you sure you’re doing it right.

The payoff comes in the downswing. As you start down, maintain this right wrist hinge until the momentum of your swing forces it to release. That will happen when the hands get about hip height. When the right wrist unhinges, the right hand comes into the ball providing effortless power and real accuracy.

Bob Jones is dedicated to showing recreational golfers the little things, that anyone can install in their swing and game, that make a big difference in how they play. See more at http://www.therecreationalgolfer.com.

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