Hello and welcome to this week's newsletter where it currently feels a bit more like winter as its -3.5 out there!
January Slade
Last week saw the January meeting of the Slade where 19 players turned up to experience the cold, wet then torrential conditions the day threw at us. Fortunately as I was on the school run I managed to get out first in a 3 ball with guest Will Hartley and Vic 'The Power' Power. I was middle man and we managed a quite uneventful 37 and 38 points. Getting round as fast as we could was the order of the day which we achieved.
Unsurprisingly for what feels like the 10th time on the trot the winner was Andy Fisher well supported this month by Gary Bonner, obviously not feeling the burden of club captaincy yet. They were comfortable winners in the 40's again with the rest feeling the effect of the cold and wet.
Propping up the field and winning the PPPP was serial winner Trevor Rowlandson with a new name on the pot, Robert Register. Next month Captain Nick has promised a much drier day with temperature pushing up towards freezing.
Often this time of year when coaching we see players trying to try too hard to get the ball to go the distances they expect during the summer months. Here is an example of over oration early in the swing leading to faults.
Click here to view these examples in action.
You can see in the first swing how the body has completed its rotation and the club is only just setting up to a half swing position. This means that the club has no direct path back to the ball and the angle of attack will be compromised, basically off plane.
If you compare this to the golfing Falmingo in photo 2, the club is set steeper and on plane, even off one leg you can see in the video the strike is better.
The idea off this drill is not just for 10 minutes of my entertainment watching people fall over whilst trying to attempt it but to get people to swing the club. Many years ago a Pro called Earnest Jones realised that balance and control = timing. If we are off balance, in this case turn too quickly, then we lose control of the club and timing is lost.
An exercise I give to many people is to swing with just your left foot planted. You will see from the video the posture improves as you have to be more balanced and you can only swing the club. As a result in this case the arms and the body worked more together meaning that the club was set on plane and had a natural angle of attack back to the ball. This intern meant a better strike as more pressure was applied to the ball and he was able to stay more balanced as less compensations were needed to get back to the ball. The results clearly worked as Chris nearly had his first hole in one a couple of hours after the lesson, presumably off two feet.