A Repetitive Golf Swing and How to Get One
Good golf is not played by hitting good shots, but by minimizing the number of bad shots. To play golf better, you don’t always need to improve your swing. All you need to do is learn to use your best swing more often.
One way to do this is to hit hundreds of balls every day, but unless you’re a competitive golfer, who has time? However, you can swing the stick at home whenever you want, and that’s just as good. Take fifteen minutes to swing the club 120 times in this way, in this order:
20 normal changes
20 swings with the left hand only
20 normal changes
20 swings with the right hand only
20 swings with feet together, heels touching
20 normal changes
Take a step back after each swing and set up again each time. This gives you additional practice entering your settings and prevents you from getting into a rhythm that you cannot repeat in the course. Strive to finish calmly after each swing and don’t rush. Calm your mind and give your full attention to each swing.
Before swinging, pick a point on the ground and make sure the club rotates back through that point in a line toward the target. Just swinging is not enough. You are training your swing to follow the correct path away and back through the ball.
The goal of the one-handed swing sections is to isolate that hand and arm to teach you how to move during the swing. This is also a good way to build golf muscle strength, especially when swinging with just your left arm.
When swinging with one hand, do it the first time with both hands and stop at the top of your backswing. This is to remind you where the swing is supposed to take you. Take off the unused hand and complete the swing. For all subsequent one-handed swings, brace yourself with both hands, remove the one you’re not using before starting the swing, and swing with that arm all the way.
In the feet together section, there will be some lower body movement, but the point is to minimize that movement so that you can focus on getting your arms and upper body rotating together.
Strive to make all the swings in a particular section the same. Resist the urge to experiment by adding something extra here or there. By taking 20 identical swings, you are making great strides in learning how to repeat that swing. The only way to build a repetitive swing is to practice the same swing over and over again.
Question: How do you ensure that you are practicing your best swing and not swinging poorly? The one hand and foot sections together take care of that. Unless you get it right, you just can’t swing with one hand, and in the foot-together section, you will fall off if you make mistakes.
Do this exercise at least once a week and parts of it daily. When you finish the exercise, your swing will be smooth and repetitive, light and powerful. Since this exercise involves making many changes in a short period of time, you may want to gradually increase to 120. Stop if you begin to feel pain, especially in your lower back.
As for the clubs to use, you can use just one club for everything, or change clubs with each new section. When you’re having trouble with a particular club, doing the exercise with just it will help you become friends.
If you are doing this drill at the shooting range, hit a ball every ten strokes to keep your interest. However, not more often than that. This is a swinging exercise, not a hitting the ball exercise.
If you can’t get to range, you can do this exercise indoors with a 7 iron and adjust your stance to simulate swinging longer clubs. Swing a club indoors? It is not to worry. I’m six foot six and can swing a 7 iron in a room with an eight foot ceiling, without hitting the ceiling. And my wife is fine with that. (I got married well.)
I do this 120 swing exercise several times a week. If I relax, I can tell the difference, and when I do it again, I just make one good shot after another.