edingc's Work In Progress

[edingc]

Not quite the offseason yet, but they are talking frost next week. The range closes on Oct. 19, weather permitting, so realistically I have maybe two rounds this weekend left, plus a small handful of range days.

Calling my offseason plan "20/20/20." Trying to lose "20-ish" pounds and hit "120-ish" with driver in "20-ish" weeks . We have a "Walktober" challenge going on at work at the moment so I've been easing into some light jogging and will add weights once the range closes for good. Stack System won't be far behind - two years ago I was right around 120 MPH coming out of winter, I think I can do it again.

If you've followed along, you'd know my coach of a few years moved to another state at the end of last summer. I took an online lesson last fall, that helped a lot, but really I've been my own instructor for the past year or so. That basically involves going through old lesson video, figuring out what bad habits I've slipped back into, and then correcting (and over correcting). Rinse, repeat.

I'm feeling better about where I'm at than I have in a while, so while it is certainly against my better judgement, I took some video at the range the other day and will comment on what I've been focusing on lately:

My online lesson focused on balance. It's something I've struggled with all year despite that lesson, and I finally just purchased an Eyeline Balance Rod which has been helping a lot.

At setup I'm really trying to feel my pressure almost following the angle of my spine down into the center of my feet. The Balance Rod really helped with this. It made me realize my pressure was too far in either direction. Lately, it had been too much in my heels, which was causing me to kind of fall forward and lose my balance on the backswing.

My hips naturally sit left/open to target. A long while ago my coach had suggested I pull my right foot back. This is something I've revisited lately as it helps square my hips more to target and makes getting my right hip to move back in the backswing a little easier.

I tend to play the ball a little forward which gets my shoulders slightly open at address. After years of hitting pretty big draws I now play a fade. It has helped my scores but cost me some distance - I need to add back some speed and reassess this.

 

On the backswing I'm working to get a more centered pivot. I have a tendency to sway back and get stuck back there, so I've been trying to feel more down into the ground (straight line) than rotation back (squiggly line). A helpful feel has been "keep right shoulder pointed at ball."

Impact as improved immensely over the years. Below is a 9 iron from a little over four years ago. I don't have the rest of the videos clipped out, but the club path after impact is significantly less "flippy" now.

I'm hoping to check in more this offseason (hopefully with continued progress!).