Joe is the developer of Symple Swing marketed by Simple Golf LLC. He is also the President of GolfHelp.com, the #1 golf only search engine. Joe has been involved in teaching golf for almost 40 years and for the last 15 years has been a golf writer and publisher . He is a nationally known golf lecturer.
His background includes degrees in teaching and coaching. He has taught the traditional swing, was a certified Natural Golf instructor and now teaches Symple Swing. His passion is helping beginners and higher handicappers become successful golfers.
This easy drill has the potential to be the most helpful drill you’ve ever tried. This is absolutely the best drill for keeping your swing on-plane that I have ever seen. This simple little drill will actually cure a huge number of swing faults. This drill doesn’t require any special equipment so it’s easy to try. You can do it at home, at the range or while you’re waiting between shots at the course. It should make your backswing as easy as 1-2-3. It should give you dramatically more confidence over the ball. If you’ve always been a bit unsure about the “swing plane” and whether your swing is really on-plane then this drill will show you. This drill just involves putting two clubs down on the ground in a special way. 1. First you lay a club down about a foot behind the ball right on the extended target line. (The extended target line is an imaginary line that extends from the target by through the ball.) I will refer to the first club as the “target line club”. The Swing Tracks Drill BTW, this drill works best if you have your arms a little straighter than the guy in the image above!!! (As soon as the weather warms up a little I do some pictures of this drill.) How far the first club (the target line club) is from the 2nd club (the hand line club) depends on which club you’re using because you’ll have a more upright stance with your hands closer to the ball (and the extended target line) when using a shorter club. When using a longer club then those clubs will be slightly farther apart. This does mean that when you change club you do have to reposition the hand line club to match your new hand position. There are three simple checkpoints in this drill. As the club comes back 45 degrees from the ball, the shaft of the club should be pointing at target line club. That’s the first checkpoint. Make sure the club head end of the shaft is pointing at the target line club when it’s 45 degrees back from the ball. This checkpoint sure you get your backswing started correctly on-plane. As the shaft of the club comes to a horizontal position it should be directly over the hand line club. So your second checkpoint is making sure your shaft is right over the hand line club. This means that when the shaft is horizontal it should be parallel to the target line just like the hand line club is. This is a key checkpoint. It will help you instantly see if you’re on-plane at this point. Make a number of partial backswings just going to this second checkpoint just to make sure you get the “feeling” of where you should be to make a truly on-plane backswing. As you continue your backswing your front arm should come up to a horizontal position. When your front arm is horizontal you should be able to look down at the hand line club and immediately see if your front arm is parallel to that club. Your front arm won’t be right over the hand line club. It will be a little inside the hand line club which makes it easier to see and use as a checkpoint. When you can see that your front arm is parallel to the hand line club you also need to double check that the butt of the club is pointing towards the target line club. This is most easily done by sticking a long white tee in the grip hole on the butt of the club. Then when your front arm is parallel you should easily be able to see if the tee stuck in the butt end is pointing at the target line club. So the third checkpoint has two parts. In part one you look down and check to make sure that when your front arm is horizontal it’s also parallel to the hand line club. The second part of the checkpoint is to make sure that when your arm is horizontal that the butt of the club is pointing at the target line club. The key to this drill is the hand line club. When you set up arm pretty straight out as we do in Symple Swing then we are setting up with our hands (and the club) on-plane. The hand line club is really a “plane line” because as your hands move along that line (as opposed to inside or outside of it) they stay online and pretty much assure that you’ll keep the club on-plane also. Club on-plane Notice that with the club shaft horizontal the hand are still on-plane. That’s the position you should be in at Checkpoint 2. This is where your club would be right over the hand line club. In this case there is not a hand line club on the ground. The extended target line is represented here by the yellow line on the ground. Start out trying this drill with your shorter clubs and then work your way up to your driver. This would be a good drill to do every time before you go out to play. This drill will even help you with chipping. Just concentration on bringing your hands back right on the line shown by the hand line club. Here’s a quote from one of the Symple Swinger who tried this drill. “I love it. Now, I’m a machine. I’ve never been so confident”. Please try this drill out and leave a comment below about how you like it. Joe Davidson |
Joe Davidson
