Driving the Golf Ball

Every golf player would like to know the techniques of driving a golf ball straight. Among all the clubs, the driver is the most difficult one to master. And with the club getting harder to use, that means more and more people don't know how to use it properly. You need to learn a few tips and practice a good deal, but after that you are on your own. Trust me; you will become proficient in driving the ball straight.

A good shot off the tee should not have caused much of back spin to the ball. It should travel low as far as possible and should have the necessary power to add yards after it lands. You can become a proficient golfer only by mastering all these things.
The first and foremost thing that every golfer needs to know in driving a golf ball straight is this. Never underestimate the importance of leverage during the course of a full swing. If you want to achieve proper leverage, then it is advisable that you keep your head behind the golf ball right from the start, all the way to the point of impact.
Golfers need to know this strange fact. Distance comes more from the speed of the club head than the strength of your arm. By muscling your way through the shot, you might end up with a poor hit. Understand that speed and power are mainly generated by hips, and legs and make use of this knowledge.
Although other clubs might somewhat be flexible during swing path, drivers are not that flexible. So, while starting your backswing, keep the swing plane as low as possible.

In driving a golf ball straight, there is one more thing you must know.

During impact, let your hands lead the club. This is known, in the game of golf, as “letting your wrists break”.

Many golfers make this common mistake. They tend to stop the swing suddenly once they hit the ball. You need to avoid this. Let your arms and the body move during the course of full swing, and also during the follow through.

If you want to drive the golf ball straight, never grip the club tightly. Focus on whipping the ball and not chopping at it.

Those with the tendency to slice the ball should slow their downswing. If you come down too fast or too hard, it is more likely that you might come out of the proper swing path. Examine your grip to avoid the slice. You might be about to slice it if you are unable to see two or three knuckles while looking at the grip.

This grip tip can be useful for those who hook the ball too. If you see more or less than two to three knuckles, then your grip will probably change during impact leading to a severe hook.

Never pull or push the ball. This can happen when you are hitting the fairway or coming off the tee. You can find out if you're guilty of this by looking at the divot left behind after your shot. If you find that the divot points to the left or right of the target line, your body is not properly aligned.

But none of the tips I've mentioned so far will help you unless you practice them well. Remember, in golf, there is no alternative to hard work and practice.




http://bbgolfer.hubpages.com/hub/7-Tips-On-Driving-a-Golf-Ball-Straight



 

The Game of Putting

Putting is often called a game within a game, because many of the skills you need to be a good putter are different from those required for the rest of the game. What's more, studies show that putting accounts for 43% of the shots among better players. You'd be hard-pressed to find a great golfer who wasn't a good putter!

Given these facts, it makes sense for time-pressed golfers to invest time in their putting. Yet in my experience, most students ask for tips on everything but putting. If you're serious about lowering your scores, try following these five simple steps to putting perfection.

1. Position
Position yourself so your eyes are over the intended line of the putt (ball line). To do this, hold your putter loosely and directly under your eyes as you address the putt and let gravity take it straight down. Now, make sure that when you look down at the putter, that it covers the ball. If not, move forward or back until it does. Ball position should be slightly forward (toward the left foot). Hands should also be forward. Align the putter shaft with the left forearm. This position promotes a good roll as the ball leaves the putter face.
2. Grip
Your hands should work as a unit and not be spread apart. The farther apart your hands are, the more likely you are to use your wrists, which is not desired. (The putting stroke originates in the shoulders and arms.) Use a normal grip, with three fingers of each hand on the club and the others just along for the ride. Use relatively light (5 on a scale of 1-10) grip pressure in order to promote feel.

3. Aim

Find a target and imagine a straight line through the center of your putter. Don't get too caught up in the line that your feet make, but do be sure the putter face is square to the target. This is also the line your stroke should follow. Don't tilt your head, or you'll distort the perspective.

4. Stroke
Your putting stroke should be dominated by the shoulders and arms and involve as little wrist movement as possible. Minimize body movement, and try not to shift weight or turn the hips. (In other words, forget much of what you've learned about the body's role in a full swing!)

5. Acceleration

Successful putters have a backswing and follow-through of equal length. This promotes acceleration and aids distance control. One of the most common faults I see is a player taking the club way back and then stopping at the ball on the down stroke, anticipating the hit. Remember to stroke through the ball, not at it!

http://www.learnaboutgolf.com/beginner/lesson/Develop_the_Perfect_Putt.html

The Bunker

Bunker Shots

There are various techniques for getting out of sand, but using the same principle as the flop shot is very effective. The main difference is that you hit the sand first, not the ball. If you were to take a divot with a practice swing (which is not permitted during play) the ball would have been in the center of that divot.

Just like the flop shot, let the club do the work and keep the arms and center moving to a follow through. If you want to get the ball up faster, hinge your wrists in the back swing.

http://www.golflink.com/golf-tips/tips/stafford008.aspx

A good rule of thumb for soft sand and good lies is to open your stance and your club face. For bad lies, wet or hard sand, square your stance and close your club face. Remember: hit the sand first and follow through keeping your arms and center moving.

Keep in mind it is against the rules to ground the club in a hazard and test the depth of the sand. You are permitted to take a fair stance, so moving your feet to get a balanced position is permissible.



A typical bunker shot calls for an open stance, an open clubface, and a nice shallow swing while taking a little bit of sand. That will not work with a plugged lie, regardless of how hard you swing. Your club will be approaching from too shallow an angle. You will hit the sand to the RIGHT of the ball, instead of hitting the sand UNDERNEATH the ball. Thus, your club will just bounce, or deflect into the ball. Worse yet, you will plow too much sand into the back of ball and it will go nowhere, just like the pro I saw on TV. You need to get below the ball somehow.

Here's what I recommend from a buried lie in a greenside bunker:

1. Set up with a bit squarer stance.
2. Square the clubface a bit also. This will allow for the leading edge to enter the sand first.
3. Pick the club up steeper, and then swing down steeper and stick the club in the ground. Hit about 1-3 inches behind the ball. You can swing hard, just don't follow through. You won't be able to follow through if you make the correct swing, because you will be coming down too steep. That's good!

This is not a shot that you will face a lot, but I still think it is worth practicing. Go to a practice trap and step on a couple balls to bury them a little. Then hit some shots. Experiment a bit. Especially get the feeling of that up and down "chopping" motion, and that no follow through release. By doing so, you will find that this shot is not really that hard to get out of the bunker.


http://www.golflink.com/golf-tips/tips/sullivan016.aspx

Here is a checklist for you when you enter the dreaded fairway bunker:

1. Take one or two extra clubs.
2. Place the ball a little farther back in stance than normal.
3. Dig in a little (sand is slippery if you don't get to the bottom of it!)
4. Now for the fun part'swing while keeping your lower body as still as possible.

A couple of good images to help achieve this are to "freeze your lower body like a camera tripod", or pretend like you are "playing on ice".

Use these thoughts on shots from about 80 yards and up. Anything less than that is a separate animal altogether and takes a few adjustments. I will get to that in a future tip.

http://www.golflink.com/golf-tips/tips/sullivan003.aspx

The Swing

Greenside Bunker

With a good lie, the ball should be placed left center in the stance. The stance itself should be very open, with you half facing the target. This allows you to open the face of the wedge and use the "bounce" or the flange of the club. Now aim at the area behind the ball (approximately 1 1/2") and swing through, taking a divot of sand. The ball will be in the middle of the divot and come out softly. The distance the ball will travel depends on the texture of the sand and how hard you swing.

With a buried lie, the ball should be addressed off the right foot, and should assume a square stance. The blade of the wedge will be hooded (or closed). You simply swing the club up abruptly and drive the leading edge of the wedge into the sand about 1" behind the ball. This chopping action will force the ball up and out of the trap. This shot is very unpredictable as to the amount of roll. Your expectations should be realistic.

Fairway Bunker

Fairway bunkers are as often placed for protection as they are for penalty. Often a shot that is hit astray will be saved from going into the woods or a hazard by a fairway bunker.

Club selection is the key: choose a club with enough loft to easily clear the lip of the bunker.

For good execution, the ball must be struck cleanly. Follow these three tips for good contact:

1. Take one extra club and shorten 1" on the grip.
2. Play the ball right center in the stance.
3. Try to strike the middle of the ball

http://www.golflink.com/golf-tips/tips/ogs007.aspx

PGA top 10 Bunker Shots.....

A guide to the rules of golf

The aim of golf is simple: hit a small ball into a hole with the fewest possible shots, 18 times.

Unlike other sports, a golfer's real enemy is never his or her opponent but him/herself and more importantly, his or her surroundings.

That is one reason why the game has managed to keep a sense of sportsmanship at its heart - because even at the highest level golfers are united in their battle against the course as much as each other.

If you're new to the sport, either as a player or spectator, our guide to the basics will provide an insight into what it's all about.

THE COURSE 

A standard golf course is made up of 18 holes. That is just about the only thing all golf courses have in common. The first shot on each hole is played from a teeing area (known as a tee) with the ball usually being placed on a plastic or wooden peg (also known as a tee).

The rest of the hole consists of a mixture of long grass called rough or a closely-mown stretch of grass known as the fairway which leads to the green, where the hole is. As well as rough, there may be other hazards to contend with such as bunkers and streams. A flagstick sits in the hole to show the target - usually with yellow flags on the first nine holes and red on the second nine. Most courses are around 6,000 yards long and take between three and four hours to play 18 holes, which involves walking about five miles.

SCORING

In basic terms your score on a golf course is made up of the number of shots you take, plus any penalties you may incur. So if you take 90 shots to go around a course and your friend takes 92, you are the winner.

Scoring centres around the "par" for the course. This is the number of shots that it takes a top golfer to go around, usually between 70 and 72. And each hole has a par according to its length and difficulty. A par-three hole lets you have three shots. Let's say you score 92 on a par 72 course. Your score will be 20 over par.

 

Similarly if you score five on a par-four hole, you will be one over par for the hole. In addition golf allows you to play against better players by giving you extra shots, almost like a head start. This is called handicapping.

RULES

There are many rules that apply to golf but unlike many other sports, unless it is a tournament, there is no need for a referee or umpire. Players must know the rules themselves, be honest about the number of shots they take and play the ball as it lies. Moving or interfering with the ball is a big no-no, although there are some exceptions. If you lose your ball or hit it in a lake then you will have to add strokes to your score before you can play on. But generally common sense prevails.

ETIQUETTE

The great American golfer Bobby Jones said: "In golf, the customs and etiquette and decorum are as important as the rules of play." The host of dos and don'ts can seem petty, especially at the more elitist clubs.

But this code of conduct has allowed golf to retain its sporting values despite becoming a multi-million pound global industry. At its heart are two principles - respect for the course and respect for fellow golfers. Examples include not talking during a player's swing, not walking on the line of their putt on the green, raking bunkers, repairing pitch marks and replacing divots.

 

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/golf/rules_and_equipment/4229612.stm