Shallowing the club

[Goober]

Just a personal question. Who on here as gotten or heard of people getting worse. Trying to being taught to shallow the golf club ?

[cnosil]

2 minutes ago, Goober said:

Just a personal question. Who on here as gotten or heard of people getting worse. Trying to being taught to shallow the golf club ?

people get worse doing all kinds of things with the swing.  If you simply focus on the single aspect of shallowing the swing then there are chances you will get worse.  Is your question about just teaching a person to shallow the club or to make a better swing which includes getting the club to be less steep on the downswing?

 

[Kenny B]

11 minutes ago, Goober said:

Just a personal question. Who on here as gotten or heard of people getting worse. Trying to being taught to shallow the golf club ?

Anytime you make a swing change, and shallowing qualifies; you will get worse until the change becomes as familiar as your steep swing.  A swing can be too shallow, so that can be an issue.

[Goober]

47 minutes ago, cnosil said:

people get worse doing all kinds of things with the swing.  If you simply focus on the single aspect of shallowing the swing then there are chances you will get worse.  Is your question about just teaching a person to shallow the club or to make a better swing which includes getting the club to be less steep on the downswing?

 

I guess it pertains to people who are taught. Or being taught to shallow the club. I can see many who goes into this blindly can really make things worse for themselves 

[cksurfdude]

 

.  .

1 hour ago, Goober said:

I guess it pertains to people who are taught. Or being taught to shallow the club. I can see many who goes into this blindly can really make things worse for themselves 

I think that's the key point .. with any new swing change .. is that it's being taught to you by a teaching pro .. who can determine what's the proper correction specifically for you.

There are too many people who cherry pick video tips off YouTube or Instagram or whenever thinking that's the thing that's gonna fix their game... 

Have a good friend who does this and it drives me crazy! He actually takes lessons, but then goes home and picks up something on YT that he thinks is "right" for him - and it's something very different vs what he just did in his lesson

[chisag]

3 hours ago, cksurfdude said:

I think that's the key point .. with any new swing change .. is that it's being taught to you by a teaching pro .. who can determine what's the proper correction specifically for you.

 

... Well said! Two things. First an instructor may give you a drill or a technique that is fundamentally wrong. Not because they want you to do something improper, it is because they are attempting to overcome something engrained that you are doing poorly. Say you are coming over the top and hitting a slice starting on the left side and curving back 20 yds. An instructor may have you try and hit the ball to the right of your intended line, kind like hitting a line drive down the first base line when you had been swinging to third. This will be unique to you and under their watchful eye and making adjustments when you over or under do it, they will begin moving the target gradually til you hopefully start aiming for center field. 

... And secondly, as you and others have said, making a change is just so very difficult. I liked to use a demonstration with my students that were getting a little discouraged and had them walk 5 yards paying attention to how far their stride was, where the feet pointed and how much they flexed their knees. IF they walked normal, which most didn't, once they were aware of a movement they took for granted I had then take a longer stride by 6" and turn their toes in slightly while making sure their knees bent 20* more than their normal bend. It was usually pretty comically awkward and I let them know as they failed miserably, this is what changing your swing is like. You have been doing something one way for a long time and now you are attempting to do it drastically differently. It is also the reason we work on one of those things at a time, not all at once. Making your stride 6" longer is much easier when you aren't trying to bend your knees differently or turn your toes in when they had pointed out slightly in your normal gait. But even that is difficult and the next time you are walking try and shorten your gait by 6" and most will be surprised how difficult it is yet think just changing their grip slightly stronger should be easy. No change is easy. 

[RickyBobby_PR]

10 hours ago, Goober said:

I guess it pertains to people who are taught. Or being taught to shallow the club. I can see many who goes into this blindly can really make things worse for themselves 

Anyone doing something blindly is probably going to lead to getting worse. Many golfers self diagnose wrong. They address a symptom and not a cause.

We will use shallowing as the example. People looking to shallow don’t understand why they come in steep. So they search out drills on how to shallow the club and they chase that over and over with no improvement in swings or score and both may get worse. If they addressed the cause like no hip depth, improper movement of the hips, improper wrist set as some examples then they would eventually see some decline while they retrain the body for the new movement then will start to see the improvement.

The other issue is many get focused on the results and when they don’t see improvement they look for the next fix. It’s something Monte talked about being an advantage of the lessons he was doing during the lockdowns. Indoor lessons where ball flight couldn’t be seen and he had golfers make big improvements because the focus from the student was on changing the movement and not the results 

[GolfSpy BOS]

13 hours ago, Goober said:

Just a personal question. Who on here as gotten or heard of people getting worse. Trying to being taught to shallow the golf club ?

I’m sure people have. 
 

I know I’ve ruined a few range sessions in the past trying to “hold my lag” or create more. I’d put lag and shallowing in the same vein… if you usually you need to change something else to get the desired effect on those things. They’re more of a result of your sequencing than any manipulation you can do on the fly. 
 

[GaryF]

1 hour ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

Anyone doing something blindly is probably going to lead to getting worse. Many golfers self diagnose wrong. They address a symptom and not a cause.

We will use shallowing as the example. People looking to shallow don’t understand why they come in steep. So they search out drills on how to shallow the club and they chase that over and over with no improvement in swings or score and both may get worse. If they addressed the cause like no hip depth, improper movement of the hips, improper wrist set as some examples then they would eventually see some decline while they retrain the body for the new movement then will start to see the improvement.

The other issue is many get focused on the results and when they don’t see improvement they look for the next fix. It’s something Monte talked about being an advantage of the lessons he was doing during the lockdowns. Indoor lessons where ball flight couldn’t be seen and he had golfers make big improvements because the focus from the student was on changing the movement and not the results 

I think that is the key point.  If someone is consistently coming in too steep, and the “solution” is to come in shallow, that in itself is focusing on the result.  The solution needs to be focused on what elements of the swing are causing the steepness, and there could be multiple causes.  

With my normal swing with irons (not wedges) , I generally take a slight or no divot, but there are days either playing, or at the range where I take more divot.  Some is ok, but others are clearly too deep.  When it happens, I try to shrug it off.  When it becomes frequent, and I’m at the range, I’ll try to figure out what I’m doing different.  I may even cut the session at the range short, and chalk it up to that’s just my swing that day, and not get overly concerned. I mean, I’m a 3/4 bogey player.  I certainly want to improve, but not getting overly concerned with a bad shot or mishit frees my mind for the next shot.  

[RickyBobby_PR]

15 minutes ago, GaryF said:

I think that is the key point.  If someone is consistently coming in too steep, and the “solution” is to come in shallow, that in itself is focusing on the result.  The solution needs to be focused on what elements of the swing are causing the steepness, and there could be multiple causes.  

The result I’m talking about is the ball flight. Most people see what the ball does and they they try to make a change again when they don’t see the flight or change they expect. Monte has talked on wrx about how different handicaps approach swing changes.  He says something to the effect high handicaps think in terms of shot to shot, mid handicaps in terms of round to round low handicaps in terms of range session to session and and pros in terms of months or years.

But yes the solution needs to be focused on the cause and most people and some teaching pros can’t figure it out.

[Ramon Rivera]

1 minute ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

The result I’m talking about is the ball flight. Most people see what the ball does and they they try to make a change again when they don’t see the flight or change they expect. Monte has talked on wrx about how different handicaps approach swing changes.  He says something to the effect high handicaps think in terms of shot to shot, mid handicaps in terms of round to round low handicaps in terms of range session to session and and pros in terms of months or years.

But yes the solution needs to be focused on the cause and most people and some teaching pros can’t figure it out.

I agree. A lot of times the issue involves posture and/or lack of hip rotation as you come down on your back swing. That’s generally been the area I’ve had to focus on. Once I address these two areas I find myself automatically shallowing my club. 

[RickyBobby_PR]

38 minutes ago, Ramon Rivera said:

I agree. A lot of times the issue involves posture and/or lack of hip rotation as you come down on your back swing. That’s generally been the area I’ve had to focus on. Once I address these two areas I find myself automatically shallowing my club. 

Yes most issues arise from posture or grip, followed by the takeaway.

anything that happens in the downswing is a compensation for the club being out of position. The swing is 1/2 over once the lead arm reaches parallel and there’s not enough time to fix a bad club position at this point and even less once the club reaches the top of the swing.

[GolfSpy BOS]

2 hours ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

Yes most issues arise from posture or grip, followed by the takeaway.

anything that happens in the downswing is a compensation for the club being out of position. The swing is 1/2 over once the lead arm reaches parallel and there’s not enough time to fix a bad club position at this point and even less once the club reaches the top of the swing.

That’s a great point. My brother is working pretty hard to get better, and he keeps asking me questions about what to do in the downswing and I keep telling him if he’s thinking during the downswing he’s lost. There’s not enough time to correct anything from the top to impact.

with him I try to stress getting in a good setup. Committing to the shot, and to “sling it” so he swings freely. 
 

I also keep telling him to go see a pro, cuz I’m not one! Haha

[Jim Shaw]

Help me understand what you mean by shallowing the club? do you mean sweeping at impact as opposed to compacting at impact?

[RickyBobby_PR]

1 hour ago, Jim Shaw said:

Help me understand what you mean by shallowing the club? do you mean sweeping at impact as opposed to compacting at impact?

Shallowing the club happens in transition. Ifs when the club goes from steep point at the top of the swing to a shallower position 

[Jim Shaw]

ahh, so Rickybobby, you are talking about "casting" at the top? 

[RickyBobby_PR]

1 hour ago, Jim Shaw said:

ahh, so Rickybobby, you are talking about "casting" at the top? 

Yes and no. Casting is one of the movements that happens but also there is added flexion of the lead wrist. Casting doesn’t shallow the shaft

[Jim Shaw]

ok, dont know what "flexion" is but I will look it up

[Goober]

The think I tried to relate was what I learned from Mr Martin Chuck and his assistants. His one helper told me you can beat someone who is only focused on super shallowing. You can beat someone who is focused on a mega squat in transition. You can beat someone who is focused on hips wide open at impact. But it is hard to beat someone who focuses on a good impact position. Which is what his whole training aids and teaching resonate 

We all had a chuckle at his clinic talking about instructors who focus on overdoing one aspect of the swing with their students. But fail to realize that overdoing one area. Forces one to have to over do another to compensate. And on and on the compensations go. Swinging a club within variables is the key. Not in over exaggerations. 

Great conversation here. Can’t wait to go back in a few months to the tour striker academy for a second time. For online in person instructions. I would say Mr Martin Chuck would be the best for many if not all. He focuses on the main area of the swing that matters the most 

Edited January 4, 2023 by Goober

[RickyBobby_PR]

40 minutes ago, Goober said:

Great conversation here. Can’t wait to go back in a few months to the tour striker academy for a second time. For online in person instructions. I would say Mr Martin Chuck would be the best for many if not all. He focuses on the main area of the swing that matters the most 

He is one of a handful that are well known that has this philosophy and I like him as an instructor. I’ve watched a lot of his YouTube videos over the last 3 years. I put him, Monte and GG as the more well known instructors that teach the golf swing and don’t emphasize one area over another. 
 

Some lesser know names that I think are the same way and can work with any golfer and make them better are Eric Cogorno, Shauheen Nakhjavani, Dan Carraher, Milo Lines, Henry Fall, Ed Lasater, Tyler Coonts and Jake Hutt
 

Some think that some of these names teach a certain swing style and it has to be their swing style but that’s not even close to the truth. Example GG everyone thinks Matt Wolff’s swing yet Wolff is the only one of his students that swings that way. 

[vandyland]

On 12/31/2022 at 12:19 PM, Jim Shaw said:

Help me understand what you mean by shallowing the club? do you mean sweeping at impact as opposed to compacting at impact?

To me this photo pretty well captures the shallowing of a club:

You will notice that the club is at about a 45* angle going back and then, in the down swing, shallows/flattens out significantly. This can be accomplished a number of ways but, as @RickyBobby_PR astutely pointed out, the best players in the world do this via wrist flexion. You could technically (and many people try) flatten out by tilting your trail shoulder down towards the ball but that will probably lead you to hit massive blocks or hit the ball fat. 

[RickyBobby_PR]

2 minutes ago, vandyland said:

To me this photo pretty well captures the shallowing of a club:

You will notice that the club is at about a 45* angle going back and then, in the down swing, shallows/flattens out significantly. This can be accomplished a number of ways but, as @RickyBobby_PR astutely pointed out, the best players in the world do this via wrist flexion. You could technically (and many people try) flatten out by tilting your trail shoulder down towards the ball but that will probably lead you to hit massive blocks or hit the ball fat. 

The titling of the trail shoulder is a compensation for a steep shaft

[MacTourney]

21 minutes ago, vandyland said:

To me this photo pretty well captures the shallowing of a club:

You will notice that the club is at about a 45* angle going back and then, in the down swing, shallows/flattens out significantly. This can be accomplished a number of ways but, as @RickyBobby_PR astutely pointed out, the best players in the world do this via wrist flexion. You could technically (and many people try) flatten out by tilting your trail shoulder down towards the ball but that will probably lead you to hit massive blocks or hit the ball fat. 

He's shallowing himself directly, and the club indirectly, the club represents how well he completed the mission.