Speaker 1: It's the Son of a Butcher podcast. I'm your host
Speaker 1: Claude Harmon solo episode of the pod this week. Just
Speaker 1: got back from two weeks on tour and one of
Speaker 1: the things went I'm on tour working with players is
Speaker 1: I'm always trying to think about what I see and
Speaker 1: what I see on a regular basis that can help
Speaker 1: all of you listening. And I've talked about a lot
Speaker 1: of things on the pod, but when we think about
Speaker 1: what's going to help you get better, what's going to
Speaker 1: help you improve your game, I think short game is huge, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, every single week on tour there is a
Speaker 1: pro am, and when you watch the best players in
Speaker 1: the world and look at their short games and then
Speaker 1: look at regular everyday golfers and their short games, there's
Speaker 1: a dramatic difference. On DJ's lift team, he's got Patrick
Speaker 1: Reed and I walk a lot of practice rounds with
Speaker 1: Patrick Reed, and the guy's short game is just ridiculous.
Speaker 1: It is one of the best short games I've ever seen.
Speaker 1: And the way that he is able to control spin, trajectory,
Speaker 1: the way he varies his shots, it's amazing and it's
Speaker 1: no surprise that that is kind of the calling card
Speaker 1: of his game. But what can you, as a regular
Speaker 1: golfer do to improve your short game? So I'm gonna
Speaker 1: break this down and you know a few different areas.
Speaker 1: The first thing I think you want to do is
Speaker 1: take a look at your wedge setup. What type of
Speaker 1: wedges are you using? And I'm talking kind of like
Speaker 1: loft wise, do you have a lob wedge in that
Speaker 1: sixty fifty eight degree range? Sand wedges are going to
Speaker 1: kind of run in that kind of fifty six range
Speaker 1: pitching wedge gap weights. A lot of the guys that
Speaker 1: are playing and girls that are playing professional golf, they
Speaker 1: do have four wedges. I'm not saying that works for everybody,
Speaker 1: but I do see a lot of times big gaps
Speaker 1: in people's wedge games right and kind of gaps in
Speaker 1: the distances on they have a shot and they don't
Speaker 1: really kind of have a club for that. So the
Speaker 1: first thing that you want to do is take your
Speaker 1: wedges to the driving range and if you've got a rangefinder,
Speaker 1: you can go ahead and scope out some yardages. If
Speaker 1: you've got access to a launch monitor, that's great as well. Rapsodo,
Speaker 1: who you've heard me talk a lot about on the
Speaker 1: pod I think for the money under one thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: they've got a launch monitor that's portable. You can use
Speaker 1: it inside, you can use it outside. The MLM two
Speaker 1: pro is going to give you carry distances, and I
Speaker 1: think it's very important when you're trying to assess your
Speaker 1: short game to have a very specific, defined group of
Speaker 1: numbers that you know is how far you carry your wedges.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people listening right now, if
Speaker 1: they're honest with themselves, they don't really have a very
Speaker 1: good gauge, a very good understanding as to how far
Speaker 1: they're carrying their wedges. What swing they're making is to
Speaker 1: produce that number. So one of the things that I
Speaker 1: think you want to guard against and stay away from
Speaker 1: is making full wedge swings. You know, a full lob wedge,
Speaker 1: a full sand wedge, a full gap wedge. I think
Speaker 1: that's very, very dangerous because I think it brings in
Speaker 1: a lot of characteristics in order to pull these shots
Speaker 1: off that you need. First of all, you need really
Speaker 1: good launch conditions. You need very very good impact positions,
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of regular golfers, mid handicapped
Speaker 1: golfers struggle with good impact. You know, in their full swing,
Speaker 1: and they struggle with that in the short game as well.
Speaker 1: I think ball position is very important. Is the ball
Speaker 1: in the middle of your stance, is the ball back
Speaker 1: in your stands? Is the ball forward in your stants?
Speaker 1: I see a lot of players have that golf ball
Speaker 1: way forward in their stands with their wedges. They don't
Speaker 1: really know why they're trying to hit something high, but
Speaker 1: they don't really have anything in their technique that they're doing,
Speaker 1: and they don't really know what they're trying to do.
Speaker 1: So start off by neutral ball position right, neutral in
Speaker 1: your stance, so kind of where the buttons on your
Speaker 1: shirt would be, kind of where the zipper on your
Speaker 1: shorts or trousers would be, where your belt buckle would be.
Speaker 1: That would be kind of neutral to middle right. And
Speaker 1: if you've got a camera on your I mean every iPhone,
Speaker 1: every smartphone has a camera, go ahead and take a
Speaker 1: look at your setup with your wedges. Look at where
Speaker 1: you're setting up. Are you setting up with the golf
Speaker 1: ball back in your stands? Are you setting it middle?
Speaker 1: Are you setting it up way way forward the club face?
Speaker 1: Start off and just get some baseline ball position. So
Speaker 1: neutral ball position right, get a lob wedge out, get
Speaker 1: your lob wedge. Whether you know sixty fifty eight, In
Speaker 1: my opinion, you shouldn't be playing anything over sixty degrees
Speaker 1: of loft. Anything over that is very very specialized, very
Speaker 1: very specific. Yeah, it's going to help you hit the
Speaker 1: golf b high because you've got so much loft. But
Speaker 1: I have yet to see a non elite competitive professional
Speaker 1: golfer utilize anything more than sixty degrees of loft. Well,
Speaker 1: I just don't see it. So fifty eight sixty is
Speaker 1: kind of in that range where you want your lob
Speaker 1: wedge and club face should be square. The club face
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily need to be open. You can get to
Speaker 1: that right. But I want you to think about your
Speaker 1: short game like being a cook or a chef, and
Speaker 1: what you need to do is just come up with
Speaker 1: a menu of shots that are pretty basic, not a
Speaker 1: ton of ingredients, but are very very reliable that you
Speaker 1: can produce on a regular basis. So I'm sure I've
Speaker 1: talked about this before, but I was watching all the
Speaker 1: guys over the last two weeks that was lucky enough
Speaker 1: to be in practice rounds with looking at their short games,
Speaker 1: and I think it's very important that for whatever yardage
Speaker 1: is that you're trying to hit, that you have some
Speaker 1: end points, an end point to where the backswing is
Speaker 1: going to go and an end point to where the
Speaker 1: follow through is going to go. Because I see a
Speaker 1: lot of people struggle with their short game because they're
Speaker 1: making a backswing length that is way too far for
Speaker 1: the length of shot that they're trying to hit. So
Speaker 1: if that backswing length is too far, Let's say you've
Speaker 1: got a twenty five to thirty yard shot, right, it's
Speaker 1: going to be more of a pitch than a chip,
Speaker 1: but you're trying to carry it thirty yards in the air.
Speaker 1: I see a lot of players struggle because they're making
Speaker 1: a backswing that is easily going to carry the golf
Speaker 1: ball fifty seventy five. Sometimes even they make a full
Speaker 1: length backswing for a very small shot, and then they
Speaker 1: have to decelerate as they're coming into him because otherwise
Speaker 1: you're going to carry the golf ball too far with
Speaker 1: that backswing. So it's a very basic, kind of standard
Speaker 1: way of thinking about this. But again it's a little
Speaker 1: bit like I said, it's like being a chef. If
Speaker 1: you don't know how to cook. It's hard to make
Speaker 1: one Michelin Star, two, Michelin Star, three Michelin Star. You know,
Speaker 1: fancy cuisine. So think about your wedge game, like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm a chef and I just need a couple of
Speaker 1: really good dishes with not a lot of ingredients. Doesn't
Speaker 1: have to be fancy. I talk about this a lot
Speaker 1: with my students. I've talked about it in the pod
Speaker 1: making an omelet. Making a cheeseburger. Right, a cheeseburger has meat, cheese, bread.
Speaker 1: What you put on it after that is adding some nuance,
Speaker 1: some flair whatever. But at the core to have a cheeseburger,
Speaker 1: you need meat for the burger part, you need cheese
Speaker 1: for the cheese part of the cheeseburger, and you need bread. Right,
Speaker 1: that's not a lot of ingredients. So go get your
Speaker 1: lob wedge and say, all right, this is my cheeseburger,
Speaker 1: this is my omelet, an omelet, eggs, not a lot
Speaker 1: of ingredients. You can throw a bunch of stuff in it,
Speaker 1: but really eggs, milk, salt, pepper, some butter, not crazy
Speaker 1: fancy when you and how you make that dish. Another story.
Speaker 1: So sixty degree fifty eight degree lob wedge. Go get
Speaker 1: your lob wedge, middle of your stance faced square, weight's
Speaker 1: going to be on the left side. The stance is
Speaker 1: going to be maybe slightly open, and the handle at
Speaker 1: a dress is maybe going to be a little bit
Speaker 1: leaned forward. That's a pretty standard way of chipping and
Speaker 1: hitting a lot of pitch shots inside of fifty yards.
Speaker 1: The ball is going to be neutral, the stets is
Speaker 1: going to be a little bit open, the handle is
Speaker 1: going to be a little bit forward. We're going to
Speaker 1: have our weight on our front foot. I'm sure a
Speaker 1: lot of people listening have heard that before. But why
Speaker 1: are you doing that? Why are we getting you into
Speaker 1: that position to chip? The main reason is we're not
Speaker 1: making a big golf swing around the greens. We're only
Speaker 1: carrying the golf ball five ten, maybe even less yards
Speaker 1: to three yards, so you're not going to need a
Speaker 1: big swing. So the setup a little bit open, ball
Speaker 1: kind of neutral, maybe just slightly back in your stance,
Speaker 1: handle a little bit forward, and wait a little bit forward.
Speaker 1: All of that is to basically preset your impact position.
Speaker 1: That's what we're trying to do, right, We're trying to
Speaker 1: preset good impact because we're not making a weight shift.
Speaker 1: We're not making a big turn off the golf ball.
Speaker 1: We're not making a big turn through the golf ball.
Speaker 1: And then I've talked about this before, but it is
Speaker 1: such a simple way to try and gain some repetition
Speaker 1: in some consistency. Use the clock method. You're standing within
Speaker 1: the dial of a clock. If you're a right handed
Speaker 1: golfer standing within the dial of a clock, your head
Speaker 1: is at twelve o'clock and where your hands are are
Speaker 1: at six o'clock on the dial of a clock. And
Speaker 1: if you think about it, so you've got six o'clock,
Speaker 1: so your hands are at six o'clock. And on the backstroke,
Speaker 1: on the backswing, your hands can go to the seven
Speaker 1: o'clock position, the eight o'clock position, the nine o'clock position,
Speaker 1: the ten o'clock position, the eleven o'clock position on the backswing,
Speaker 1: and on the follow through, your hands on the follow through,
Speaker 1: if they're starting at six, they can follow through to five,
Speaker 1: they could follow through to four, they can follow through
Speaker 1: to three, to two to one. So think about your
Speaker 1: hand position. Don't think about the club head. Don't think
Speaker 1: about where the club at is. Think about where your
Speaker 1: hands are. Think about where the grip is right, and
Speaker 1: I do think one of the ways to become more consistent,
Speaker 1: more repetitive, and kind of get the contact to be
Speaker 1: a little bit more consistent more often is to use
Speaker 1: that clock theory. Hands are at six o'clock. My weight's
Speaker 1: going to be a little bit on the forward side.
Speaker 1: The reason I'm going to keep my weight on the
Speaker 1: forward side on my lead leg. If I'm a right
Speaker 1: hand golfer, that's going to be my left foot. If
Speaker 1: I'm a left handed golfer, that's going to be my
Speaker 1: right foot. But if you're a right handed golfer, your
Speaker 1: weight's going to be a little bit on the left side.
Speaker 1: You're trying to preset impact. One of the things that
Speaker 1: I see. I posted a video on my social that
Speaker 1: I did for Cobra Golf a couple weeks ago. I
Speaker 1: put a shaft down kind of parallel to where my
Speaker 1: right foot would be, and what I'm trying to do
Speaker 1: is make sure that I'm not going backwards to try
Speaker 1: and get the golf ball in the air and hitting
Speaker 1: the shaft. So it's going to help me have that
Speaker 1: little bit of downward angle of attack to try and
Speaker 1: get the golf ball in the air, the angle of attack,
Speaker 1: how much we're hitting up and how much we're hitting
Speaker 1: down on the golf ball dramatically influences how the ball launches,
Speaker 1: but it dramatically influences the quality of the contact and
Speaker 1: the quality of the strike. So if you are hitting
Speaker 1: your chips thin, if you are hitting your chips heavy
Speaker 1: pitches thin pitches heavy, make sure that when you're coming
Speaker 1: through impact that your weight isn't going to the back foot.
Speaker 1: So you've got your left foot if you're a right
Speaker 1: handed golfer and your right foot is a right handed golfer, okay,
Speaker 1: And when you set up, go ahead and think in
Speaker 1: terms of okay. In a normal setup, I'm going to
Speaker 1: have fifty to fifty experiment with feeling okay, sixty forty
Speaker 1: on the left, maybe seventy thirty on the left. Really
Speaker 1: get my weight over there and see what that does,
Speaker 1: and then experiment. And I think the easiest baseline to
Speaker 1: get is you're setting up with your lob wedge balls
Speaker 1: in the middle, weights a little bit forward, you're a
Speaker 1: little bit open, handles a little bit forward, and then
Speaker 1: think in terms of okay, and that clock theory. When
Speaker 1: I take my arms back, when I take that grip back,
Speaker 1: I'm going to try and take it to that kind
Speaker 1: of nine o'clock position on the backstroke if you're right handed,
Speaker 1: and then follow through to three o'clock on the follow through.
Speaker 1: And that's going to give you a very specific end
Speaker 1: point to the backswing and a very specific end point
Speaker 1: to the follow through. The reason why I think that's
Speaker 1: really important is within that kind of zone, you know
Speaker 1: where your backswing zone ends and you know where your
Speaker 1: follow through zone ends. And film this film ten practice
Speaker 1: swings without a golf ball and say, okay, so go
Speaker 1: put the camera on a tripod, set it up on
Speaker 1: a backstand, put it on your bag, lean it up
Speaker 1: against something, but have it face on so facing your
Speaker 1: chest right so it's directly across when you're setting up
Speaker 1: directly across from your torso, and make ten practice swings
Speaker 1: and think, okay, I'm going to try and go nine
Speaker 1: on the backstroke three on the follow through. Now, when
Speaker 1: you're making these practice swings, you're going to set up
Speaker 1: as if you were going to be hitting a regular shot,
Speaker 1: so slightly open ball position would be neutral handles, just
Speaker 1: a little bit of chaffleen weights on that front foot
Speaker 1: we're trying to feel like the arms go back to
Speaker 1: the hands, that handle and that grip go back to
Speaker 1: that nine o'clock So that's probably going to be somewhere
Speaker 1: around waist high, and then it's going to go through
Speaker 1: to the corresponding follow through. So you can start off
Speaker 1: by just doing slow motion swings to where you're just
Speaker 1: setting up and then making a backstroke and going to
Speaker 1: nine o'clock. Do ten of those and just do the backstroke. Okay,
Speaker 1: just set up and just make your backstroke and stop.
Speaker 1: You can do this a couple times with your eyes closed.
Speaker 1: So take that set up, wait slightly on the left handle,
Speaker 1: just a little bit forward. The ball would be pretty neutral.
Speaker 1: Go and close your eyes and go back to where
Speaker 1: you feel like your hands, your left hand in your
Speaker 1: right hand would be about that nine o'clock position. Do
Speaker 1: that five times, and then go ahead and take a
Speaker 1: look at what that looks like on camera and say, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: I was able to do that. No, that was going
Speaker 1: too long. That was going too short, because you're trying
Speaker 1: to have a sameness to the backswings, and then same
Speaker 1: thing set up and then just follow through to that
Speaker 1: three o'clock position and do just the follow through. See
Speaker 1: if you can follow through. Have a look on camera,
Speaker 1: see what that looks like. Okay, so you've done that.
Speaker 1: You kind of got the feeling of where nine to
Speaker 1: three is. You can do it with eight to four,
Speaker 1: you can do it with seven to five, you can
Speaker 1: do it with kind of that, you know, ten to two,
Speaker 1: whatever it is. Do it without a ball and just
Speaker 1: see if you can make ten practice swings that are
Speaker 1: nine o'clock on the backstroke, three o'clock on the follow through.
Speaker 1: The other thing that's very important here is when you're
Speaker 1: making your practice strokes, make sure the golf club it
Speaker 1: starts on the ground, and when you make your practice stroke,
Speaker 1: make sure it hits the ground. If you're hitting golf
Speaker 1: balls off a mat, it's a really good way to practices.
Speaker 1: Make sure that you can hear that golf club hitting
Speaker 1: the ground. In your short game before you hit a shot.
Speaker 1: You should be able to make a practice stroke, you know,
Speaker 1: whatever you're trying to do from a mimic standpoint, and
Speaker 1: the golf club should start on the ground and it
Speaker 1: should return on the ground. You need to hear that sound.
Speaker 1: Do that ten times. See if you can get some
Speaker 1: sameness to the length of the backswing and the length
Speaker 1: of the follow through at that kind of waist tie,
Speaker 1: that kind of nine o'clock. You don't need a ton
Speaker 1: of wrist set here. We don't need to do a
Speaker 1: lot with our wrist action here. We don't need a
Speaker 1: lot of setting of the wrist because if you set
Speaker 1: the risks, you're loading the golf club. And that's another
Speaker 1: thing where I think so many golfers struggle around the
Speaker 1: short game is they take their set up, they get
Speaker 1: a lot of a set in the wrists, so they're
Speaker 1: loading that shaft and so they've got a lot of
Speaker 1: angle coming into impact, and that's going to make the
Speaker 1: golf ball go a specific distance. So you don't need
Speaker 1: a lot of wrist hinge, you don't need a lot
Speaker 1: of wrist set. You're basically just trying to that kind
Speaker 1: of Steve Stricker esque Jason Day. Just no riskset, no
Speaker 1: risk to angles, and just see if you can go
Speaker 1: nine to three and just see where that golf ball goes.
Speaker 1: Take ten balls and hit one, video it and then
Speaker 1: get your rain finder out, see how far it went,
Speaker 1: and then look at it on film and say, okay,
Speaker 1: that went nine to three. And that ball went X
Speaker 1: amount of distance. It's going to vary for everybody. It's
Speaker 1: going to vary on how much speed you're putting in.
Speaker 1: But baseline numbers I think are very important with all
Speaker 1: of your wedges right to make sure that you can
Speaker 1: get that good number so that when you're on the
Speaker 1: golf course you can take some of the guesswork out
Speaker 1: of it, because I think so many golfers they don't
Speaker 1: really know when they get into short game what they're
Speaker 1: trying to do. They don't really know what shot they're
Speaker 1: trying to hit. They're trying to hit a shot that
Speaker 1: they've seen somewhere on television. Face wide open, big flops.
Speaker 1: You should never be hitting a flop shot unless there
Speaker 1: is absolutely positively no other way you can get the
Speaker 1: golf ball close to the hole, and unless you're playing
Speaker 1: a competitive round of golf, just dump it anywhere on
Speaker 1: the green and just try and get out with hole
Speaker 1: in a twenty foot of for par and get out
Speaker 1: of there. But don't try the hero shot. Try on
Speaker 1: the range and just say, okay, how far does my
Speaker 1: nine to three go? Film it enough times to where
Speaker 1: you're saying to yourself and you can visually confirm, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's how far the golf ball or how fur my
Speaker 1: backswing is going. Yet it's going about that waist hype
Speaker 1: nine o'clock with not a lot of riskset I'm following
Speaker 1: through to three o'clock, and I know that that swing
Speaker 1: produces this yardage this number, and say, okay, let me
Speaker 1: just see if I can bang these out. If I
Speaker 1: can just repetitively hit the golf ball the distance I
Speaker 1: hit it for my nine to three. Like I said,
Speaker 1: everybody's going to be different, it's going to vary. It's
Speaker 1: not going to be the same for everybody. But I
Speaker 1: just think if you can have an understanding, I mean,
Speaker 1: and then you know, get a target, take your towel,
Speaker 1: walk it out to twenty five yards, walk it out
Speaker 1: to you know. I think good baselines would be to
Speaker 1: get three towels, do twenty five, fifty and seventy five
Speaker 1: right start there and say, okay, what length of swing,
Speaker 1: what club would I need to use to hit the
Speaker 1: golf ball these distances? I think those are kind of
Speaker 1: good round numbers for me. Twenty five fifty seventy five.
Speaker 1: I think if you can get really good at your baseline,
Speaker 1: twenty five, being able to have a technique and a
Speaker 1: swing and a swing length to carry the golf ball
Speaker 1: twenty five yards in the air, to have one to
Speaker 1: carry it fifty yards in the air, seventy five in
Speaker 1: the air. If you want to make that smaller, you
Speaker 1: can do five. You can do ten, you can do fifteen.
Speaker 1: You can do it in five yard increments. But I
Speaker 1: think if you can just use some round numbers, you know,
Speaker 1: ten to twenty, and say, okay, I'm gonna you know,
Speaker 1: the short end is going to be ten yards, the
Speaker 1: long end is going to be twenty. I don't want
Speaker 1: to hit any short of ten yards. I don't want
Speaker 1: to carry any past twenty yards. Right, you can go
Speaker 1: out on the driving range and put you know, clubs down,
Speaker 1: alignment sticks down, give yourself a visual and say, okay,
Speaker 1: I've got my lob wedge. Now I've got an alignment
Speaker 1: stick at twenty on the ground, and then I've got
Speaker 1: an alignment stick at ten, and it's creating this kind
Speaker 1: of ten yard window, and I'm just going to try
Speaker 1: and carry my ball somewhere in between that window. And
Speaker 1: if you can get good at just again, it's like cooking,
Speaker 1: it's just a basic, basic technique to be able to
Speaker 1: carry that golf ball in a confined space somewhere between
Speaker 1: ten to twenty yards. And I think you can think
Speaker 1: in terms of how far you're trying to carry the
Speaker 1: golf ball, not how far the flag is. Yeah, obviously
Speaker 1: you want to get a good idea of how far
Speaker 1: the flag is. So if you've got a shot, you've
Speaker 1: laid up on a par five and you know you're
Speaker 1: say you're twenty five yards from the green or from
Speaker 1: the flag, then walk from where your ball is, walk
Speaker 1: to where the green starts and get a number. Get
Speaker 1: that number. Okay, let's say that's fifteen yards, right so,
Speaker 1: or fifteen steps and then you've got another ten steps
Speaker 1: to the flag. So then the number that you're trying
Speaker 1: to hit is. You want to know where you want
Speaker 1: to carry the golf ball, right, don't think in terms
Speaker 1: of where you want the golf ball to end up.
Speaker 1: Think in terms of, okay, where do I need to
Speaker 1: carry this golf ball? And get that part first. So
Speaker 1: I think if you can get that basic part first
Speaker 1: of okay, how far do I need to carry the
Speaker 1: golf ball, then the math in your head can become
Speaker 1: somewhat easy. Okay, I've got a twenty five yard shot,
Speaker 1: but I really only need to carry this golf ball
Speaker 1: ten yards in the air, and then I've got rollout room.
Speaker 1: Is it uphill? Is it downhill? Is it into the grain?
Speaker 1: Is it down grain? Is it going to break left
Speaker 1: to right? Is it going to break right to left?
Speaker 1: All that comes afterwards, But then just saying okay, I
Speaker 1: don't necessarily need to worry about the twenty five yard number.
Speaker 1: I just need to say, okay, what club in my bag,
Speaker 1: my lob wedge, my sand wedge, my pitching wedge, my
Speaker 1: gap wedge. What yardage is going to be produced with
Speaker 1: this length of backswing and this length of follow through.
Speaker 1: So it's not about worrying about hitting it twenty five yards.
Speaker 1: Maybe I only need to carry it ten steps. So
Speaker 1: then that task in your head becomes much easier to manage. Right,
Speaker 1: I'm not carrying the golf ball twenty five yards. I
Speaker 1: only need to carry it ten yards fifteen yards, and
Speaker 1: then I'm focusing very much on where I want the
Speaker 1: golf ball to land. So again, get twenty five yards out,
Speaker 1: go on the green and lay a alignment stick right
Speaker 1: where the green starts and then walk off five steps
Speaker 1: and then put another alignment stick there or put a
Speaker 1: club there, So ken you've got kind of this barrier
Speaker 1: to where you have to carry it over the first
Speaker 1: alignment stick or golf club, but you don't want to
Speaker 1: carry it past the second one, so you're trying to
Speaker 1: carry it somewhere in between these two alignment sticks. So
Speaker 1: that can be five steps. I think that's a pretty
Speaker 1: good baseline to where if you can kind of hit
Speaker 1: your target, that's your target area. Right. You could even
Speaker 1: take four golf clubs and make a box, right, So
Speaker 1: lay them down on the ground and make a box
Speaker 1: with the golf clubs you have, and then you're just
Speaker 1: trying to carry the ball in that box. I think
Speaker 1: that's a great way to kind of heighten your focus,
Speaker 1: heighten your visualization. So now you're not even thinking about
Speaker 1: the pin. Now you're not even thinking about the rest
Speaker 1: of it. You're just trying to get the basic part first,
Speaker 1: carry the golf ball in a specific area that you
Speaker 1: know is a specific distance. And I think if you
Speaker 1: can start to do that consistently, if you can get
Speaker 1: a consistent quality of contact, a consistent quality of strike
Speaker 1: between the club and the ball and video what that
Speaker 1: looks like so that you can then because I think
Speaker 1: feel is recreating what you see, right, But I get
Speaker 1: asked this all the time, how do we create How
Speaker 1: do I think you create feel by going out and
Speaker 1: matching the visual to what your technique is. So that's
Speaker 1: where I think your smartphone having a camera so you
Speaker 1: can look at it can say, Okay, I just hit
Speaker 1: that one really really well. I had a good quality
Speaker 1: of divot that went the distance I was trying to
Speaker 1: get it to go somewhere in between ten to fifteen yards.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to land the golf ball. Got a barrier
Speaker 1: on the ground at ten and I've got a barrier
Speaker 1: at fifteen. If I can consistently carry the golf ball
Speaker 1: in between those two alignment sticks and then I can
Speaker 1: get an idea of what that looks like on camera,
Speaker 1: I think it's a really good way to start to
Speaker 1: gain some consistency of motion, some consistency of contact, and
Speaker 1: just some overall club control consistency. Because when you're looking
Speaker 1: at your golf bag, always remember this. Every single golf
Speaker 1: club in your golf bag will stay in your golf
Speaker 1: bag until you or someone else takes the golf club
Speaker 1: out of the golf bag, picks it up, grips it,
Speaker 1: and starts to move it. So the golf club cannot
Speaker 1: move itself. So it's your job as the player to
Speaker 1: move the golf club, and it's your job as the
Speaker 1: player to control the golf club. And I think one
Speaker 1: of the best ways to start to gain consistency in
Speaker 1: your full swing is to gain consistency in your short
Speaker 1: game so that you know where you're putting the golf
Speaker 1: club in position on the backswing, you know where you're
Speaker 1: putting the golf club in position on the follow through,
Speaker 1: and I think if you can do that consistently, it
Speaker 1: makes the full swing much much easier. Every wedge you
Speaker 1: have for the nine to three shot is going to
Speaker 1: produce a different distance, a different trajectory. Obviously, the trajectory
Speaker 1: from nine to three with the golf ball in the
Speaker 1: center of your stance with your lob wedge is going
Speaker 1: to be vastly different than what the trajectory is going
Speaker 1: to be with your pitching wedge from the same set up,
Speaker 1: from the same length of backswing and from the same
Speaker 1: follow through, and the trajectory is going to be very different.
Speaker 1: The lob wedge is going to come out higher, the
Speaker 1: pitching wedge is going to come out lower. So then
Speaker 1: you can take some of the guess work out. Okay,
Speaker 1: I've got a shot length of twenty five yards. I
Speaker 1: only need to carry the golf ball just over ten yards.
Speaker 1: So if I hit my lab wedge, that's going to
Speaker 1: come out higher, softer, and not roll out. But if
Speaker 1: I hit my pitching wedge, that length of the backswing
Speaker 1: and that length of follow through might be shorter than
Speaker 1: with a lob wedge, might be eight to five or
Speaker 1: eight four, seven to five. But I just think half hour, right,
Speaker 1: a half hour of you going out and saying, Okay,
Speaker 1: i've got to hit this ten yards in the air.
Speaker 1: I've got to hit this fifteen yards in the air.
Speaker 1: I've got to hit this twenty yards in the air.
Speaker 1: I've got to hit this twenty five thirty. You can
Speaker 1: do in five yard increments. You can do ten yard increments.
Speaker 1: You can do ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy eighty,
Speaker 1: ninety one hundred. If you had a really good gauge
Speaker 1: on how far you carried it, and you had a
Speaker 1: really good gauge on controlling the length of back swing
Speaker 1: and the length of follow through that you need to
Speaker 1: do to produce these baseline numbers takes the guest work
Speaker 1: on the golf course out. It really really does neutral
Speaker 1: ball position, length of the back swing. Nine to three,
Speaker 1: eight four, seven to five. Try that with all your wedges.
Speaker 1: See how that trajectory changes, See how that distance, how
Speaker 1: that carry distance changes. Go to a chipping green and
Speaker 1: see what the rollout is like. So nine to three
Speaker 1: with your lob wedge, the rollout when the ball lands
Speaker 1: and rolls out, is going to be very different than
Speaker 1: your pitching wedge. And if you know that, then you
Speaker 1: maybe don't have to make as big of a swing.
Speaker 1: You can take less club and say, Okay, I don't
Speaker 1: have to make as big of a swing. The ball's
Speaker 1: going to get on the ground. It's going to come
Speaker 1: in a little bit lower, but it's going to come
Speaker 1: in a little bit faster, it's going to come in
Speaker 1: a little bit hotter. So now let's say I've got
Speaker 1: to carry the golf ball thirty forty yards in the air,
Speaker 1: but I'm still only ten yards from the front edge
Speaker 1: of the green, So then I've got all that area
Speaker 1: to work with so then maybe I take something that's
Speaker 1: got less loft carry it that ten yards, but when
Speaker 1: it bounces, it rolls, and it rolls more like a
Speaker 1: putt as opposed to trying to control a lob wedge
Speaker 1: and carry it all the way to the flag. Every
Speaker 1: single pro am that I've ever been in, I'll see
Speaker 1: someone carry the golf ball. They're in the rough, they're
Speaker 1: trying to fly it. They carry it right to pin
Speaker 1: high and then they say bite, spin, And I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: what did you do to put any sort of bite
Speaker 1: or spin on this? You carried the golf ball the
Speaker 1: distance of the flag. Now it's going to roll off
Speaker 1: the other side of the green because you carried it
Speaker 1: too far. The pin may have been twenty five yards
Speaker 1: away from you, But the last thing you want to
Speaker 1: do is carry it twenty five yards because if you
Speaker 1: don't know how to spin it, if you don't have
Speaker 1: a ton of speed, if you don't have a good
Speaker 1: method to do that, you're not going to be able
Speaker 1: to control what happens to the ball after it gets
Speaker 1: on the ground, after it starts to roll. But just baselines,
Speaker 1: club face square and then I'm sure I've talked about
Speaker 1: this in the past. Put the golf ball back in
Speaker 1: your stance, you know, kind of more off of your
Speaker 1: back foot, and then see what nine to three with
Speaker 1: you lob wedge does. That's going to bring the trajectory down.
Speaker 1: Play the golf ball a little bit more forward in
Speaker 1: your stance, which is going to give you a little
Speaker 1: bit higher traction. Again, all of this being done with
Speaker 1: the club face square Again, we're making omelets here, we're
Speaker 1: making cheeseburgers. This is not fine dining with tons of
Speaker 1: ingredients and tons of different processes. It's just just really
Speaker 1: really basic, basic stuff. And I think it's a fantastic
Speaker 1: way to gain club control. I think it's a fantastic
Speaker 1: way to gain consistency in the quality of the strike.
Speaker 1: But I also think it's just a very very basic
Speaker 1: way for you as a player to just gain some knowledge,
Speaker 1: gain some control over what you're doing. And I think
Speaker 1: if you can get that on a consistent basis, then
Speaker 1: you're going to have the ability to control your shots
Speaker 1: on a regular basis. I know that sounds really really
Speaker 1: simp I know it sounds kind of short game one
Speaker 1: to one, but if you can just master the basics
Speaker 1: of where your ball position is consistent all the time,
Speaker 1: the setup is consistent all the time, The length of
Speaker 1: the backswing and the length of the follow through is
Speaker 1: consistent all the time. I think that's a very simple
Speaker 1: and a very easy way to start to gain some
Speaker 1: very good baseline numbers for how far you need to
Speaker 1: carry the golf ball on a consistent basis, and I
Speaker 1: think you're going to see your short game improve. I
Speaker 1: think it's going to take a lot of the guesswork
Speaker 1: out of what you're doing on the golf course, and
Speaker 1: I think your handicaps going to go down because your
Speaker 1: short game is going to improve. I want to thank
Speaker 1: everyone for listening, rate, review, subscribe wherever you get your podcast.
Speaker 1: It's the Son of a Bunch Podcast