High Hopes

You’ll discover the need to hit over an obstacle–tree, fence, even a scoreboard–during the course of an everyday round. And while amateurs fear the shot, pros know that only a few setup adjustments can fuel success.
You’ll discover the need to hit over an obstacle–tree, fence, even a scoreboard–during the course of an everyday round. And while amateurs fear the shot, pros know that only a few setup adjustments can fuel success.
Many golfers have difficulty in hitting a high-trajectory shot when they have to. A reason for this inability is a ball position that’s too far back in the stance. This makes varying the trajectory of your shots nearly impossible.
Regardless of where you play, you’ll eventually face a tough pitch off
hardpan. This is a dicey situation, as ultra-tight lies such as hardpan
make it easy for the clubhead to bounce off the turf and into the top
half of the golf ball, skulling it over the green. The key for pitches
off hardpan is to make sure the clubhead does anything but bounce off
the turf. Knowing how to accomplish this will save you strokes
not only in this situation, but in dozens of others that involve tight lies.
To get the clubhead traveling a little faster (a necessary requirement
for hitting longer shots), you need to create a longer backswing with
an increase in the amount of arm swing and body turn. Not only must the
swing be a little longer, but you need to pick up the pace of your
swing to increase clubhead speed as well. The pace of the forwardswing
should be slightly faster than normal.
Set up with your spine perpendicular to the slope and shoulders
parallel to the ground so you can swing up the slope on the backswing
and down the slope on the forwardswing. The arrangement of your body
will favor the creation of an upright swing and make it more difficult
to square the face through the hitting area—that’s why a shot from a
downhill lie tends to curve a little to the right. To help shallow the
plane and encourage a swing that’s a little more around your body, drop
your right foot back to close your stance slightly and match up the
ball position to your stance by putting it about two inches back of
normal.
Golf isn’t a game of who hits it the best, it’s a game of who misses it the least. Even the best players in the world routinely mis-hit shots. In fact, the average Tour player hits only about 12 greens per round! How do they miss one out of every three greens and still manage to routinely shoot under par? Two reasons: steely determination and a red-hot short game.
It’s a “how-to” world these days. Everywhere you look, you’ll find someone, somewhere or something dedicated to what I like to call, “HTH” (How-To Hysteria). “How to bake a cake, how to wire a motorcycle, how to build an arboretum, how to fix a car—we as a culture have become so fascinated by the “how-to” genre that dozens of magazines, Websites and even television channels have been developed to help you help yourself. Luckily, Golf Tips is no exception, as the authors in every instructional story provide you with the scoop on how to become a better player.
It goes without saying that the players who compete on the PGA Tour are
the best in the world. Not only do they have impressive natural talent,
but every guy out there spends a tremendous amount of time and effort
working on his technique, strategy and fitness. For those of us not
fortunate enough to be able to spend all day, every day improving our
all-around game, this opportunity seems like a dream come true. For the
players on Tour, however, it’s a job that they take seriously, and one
that’s both extremely competitive and tough.
Shotmaking is a broad term and one that’s typically reserved for highly skilled players. Yet all golfers, even those who have a tough time breaking 90, should consider themselves shotmakers. Face it, the game of golf constantly demands a degree of creativity, and unless you play on a perfectly flat course with no rough, no hazards and no undulations on the greens, you have to be ready with a variety of plays–just to get through a single round.
In the late 1970s, the greatest player in the world came to the realization that he had to change his swing in order to better control his golf ball in the wind. That golfer, Jack Nicklaus, spent the better part of a year relearning the golf swing in heavy Florida winds. A few years later, Nick Faldo retooled his leggy, high-ball hitting motion by inserting mechanisms that helped him lower his trajectory in order to produce a more penetrating ballflight. The move led him to six majors.