In this video, Golf Monthly Top 50 Coach Ged Walters explains the main cause of fat and thin shots and demonstrates an easy drill that should help elevate your ball striking abilities! He also helps with that particularly destructive and expensive shot, the skied drive using a simple but clever drill that involves a headcover.
► This video was shot on location at Sandiway Golf Club in Cheshire.
► This video was shot on location at Sandiway Golf Club in Cheshire.
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00:00The fat, the thin and the top, the most destructive shots in golf. Jed, please help us fix these.
00:09They all live in the same house, they all come from the same issue and that issue is not being
00:14able to control where the lowest point of the golf swing is. So sometimes you might hear the term
00:20low point, it's the bottom of the arc of the swing and if that is either in a real variable place
00:28or it's just way too far back from the golf ball, you're always going to struggle. And then
00:35from there, that's where we start to sort of cast, release, scoop, all those knock-on effects all come
00:42from golfers who struggle to control where the low point is. So the low point, where should it be?
00:49Well, I mean, I've got a six iron in my hands here, but even if I had a driver in my hands,
00:54there is still a bottom to the circle and it would be over here. It will be forward.
01:03As a reference point, you could think about it as being not a million miles away from being in line
01:09with your front heel. Yeah. Because when we're making our downswing, we are moving the pressure
01:16of the body towards our target. So that is shifting where the bottom of the circle is going to be.
01:21So that's going to move it over here. So if we think about those golfers who hit fats and thins,
01:27a lot of them keep the pressure on the trail side. So we can career into the ground back here,
01:33or we keep the club moving away from the ground to avoid that. And that's where the thins and the
01:37tops come into it. So the bottom of the circle of the golf swing is back here where the club wants
01:42to meet the ground. We want to shift it and move it more towards the target. So it's more on this side
01:48over here. And as you can see, as I keep doing that and brushing and hitting that part of the ground,
01:53it is on the target side of the golf club. So a little drill that you can do to practice it
01:58is if you're on a grass range, like we are here, just get two T-pegs to create a gate and put the
02:04golf ball right in the middle. Your task is to hit the golf ball and the ground on the left hand side of
02:09the gate. If you're on a normal driving range, where you're on a mat, get some chalk, just chalk
02:15a line and then put the golf ball behind it so that if you move the golf ball, nice strike, brush
02:20the chalk away, then you'll have the chalk dust on the bottom of the golf club. So you're getting
02:24constant feedback on whether or not you are or are not controlling where the low point of your swing is.
02:31Jed, do you mind? Let's have a look at this drill in action.
02:35So taking your normal setup and then we just want to focus and you can, rather than looking
02:41at the golf ball, keep your focus on the ground that's over here. So all you've got to make sure
02:47you do is when you get to the top of the backswing is you are moving the pressure of the body towards
02:52the target. Some people will start to do that and then they'll sort of back themselves up. Some people
02:58will just be way over on this side. Just try and keep that focus on moving towards your target.
03:05And strike your shot. And as you can see there, the divot starts right where the gate of T's are.
03:12And that's where the low point, the bottom of my circle is.
03:15So there we go. An easy fix for the top, your thin and your fat. No excuses now to go out and hit that
03:22perfect golf shot. And finally, we're going to be looking at probably the most expensive destructive
03:28golf shot. And that is the sky. Skying your driver. Now, can you tell us why this happens
03:35and how we can go about fixing that? It's painful to watch. It's one of those where you cringe when
03:41you see it happen. You know the dread that the golfer's going to have to look down on forever until
03:46the league can afford to buy a new one. It's a sort of two pronged attack of what's happening.
03:54When we get the club travelling down too much and it can travel down too much from both
04:02into out as well as out to in. A lot of people think it's just going to travel down steeply and
04:08then come down and across. And we get this sort of contact here. But there are golfers who travel too
04:14much from the inside. But they've got too much forward handle. So the club head is still travelling
04:21down at the point of contact. And the face is now this way. So it's exposing the top of the golf club.
04:28But yes, down being the big key. If we're hitting down on it, then the club has not reached the bottom
04:36of its circle before it's made contact. And with the driver, ideally for most of you, you need to be
04:42hitting. And hitting up on the ball. Is there any drills or anything we can do that you can take
04:48home to your driving range to help fix? There is. I've got a head cover here. You could use, you know,
04:54an empty box of balls when you buy your box of balls, take the sleeves out, use the empty box that
04:59it comes in. And really all you want to do depends on how much down and how quickly it pops up into the
05:06air. You could probably look, I mean, if I was to put my foot here, I would say, well, if you were to
05:13put your head cover, your driver, about there, so it's probably about then 18 inches in front of the
05:21golf ball, then you just want both golf ball and club head to avoid hitting the head cover. Anyone who's
05:31hitting down, the ball will go up, but the head of the driver will just career into whatever you've
05:39got there. So if it's the empty box, it'll just obliterate the box. If it's the head cover, it'll
05:42just move the head cover out of the way. It won't damage the club, but you'll get your feedback on
05:48whereabouts your contact is. So what we want to be thinking of is when we're making our swing here,
05:55we want the club head to feel like it passes the hands a little bit more, and it travels a little bit
06:00more on the up as we go through the shot. So the whole focus is not so much on trying to hit your
06:07fairway, stop your slice. It's about making sure that you avoid the object that you've put in front
06:12of the golf ball. It's a nice visual representation. Yeah. So hopefully it should look like this.
06:24So the ball's been hit on the up, and as you can see, head cover is still in place, missed by both.
06:30Fall and club face. Perfect. A nice, easy drill for you to take back to your driving range.