Conference 7.286::golf

<    I just got done taking 5 indoor group lessons and now I can't hit
<    the ball anymore.  Right now the only clubs I can hit half way decent
<    are the SW, PW, and 9.  From the 8 on up it's a nightmare.
<    
<    Right now I'm hitting way behind the ball, taking a large chunk
<    of mother earth and ofcourse the ball goes nowhere.  Trouble is

Sounds very familiar!

When I first took up the game, I was playing as a sub in the DEC 
league. I played well enough to catch the bug and made enough golfing 
friends to get invited to go down to Myrtle Beach with a bunch of guys
the following March. I decided I would learn the game over the winter,
so I enrolled in an indoor golf school. Went 3-4 times a week, hit
thousands of balls, was told by the pro that I had a great swing and
should get my handicap down to the single numbers by the end of the
summer. I went to Myrtle beach flushed with confidence. 

I strolled out to the practice tee at Pine Lakes the first morning, 
told one of the guys about how I had worked on my game all winter, so 
look out, and proceeded to hit one fat shot after another. And kept up 
that pace right through the round, swinging harder and madder each 
time.

Ended up tearing all the muscles on my right side, going to the 
hospital, meeting a nurse (but that's another story), and playing the 
remaining 8 days in a fog of pain, muscle relaxers, and codene (sp?).

The moral?

Relax. Go to a practice tee with GRASS and hit a lot of balls as 
smoothly and sweetly as you can. It will come to you.

I'm not sure why that happens, but my guess is that it's one or both 
of the following:

a) Mats are very forgiving of a fat shot; the club bounces through it 
unnoticed. You can groove a fat shot on them.

b) If you were using the kind of mts that are rubber where you stand 
and fake grass in the hitting area, then your feet are artificially 
elevated, and so is your whole swing arc. Go to the lush grass of a 
real course and that arc drops a little, causing that dreaded fat 
shot.

regardless of the cause, the fat shots will go away. (The pro was 
right, I did get my handicap down to 8 by September.)

Good luck.

    I have the same problem, and in my case is due to a couple of things:
    
    1) I turn my left hip in bending down my left knee (I am lefty, so it
    will be your right knee) on  my  down  swing.    If I make a concious
    effort not to bend down my knee,  but move my hips towards the target
    then I usually can hit it clean.
    
    2) Too tense.  When I am tense,  I  don't extend my arms freely while
    addressing the ball, but I do when trying to  hit  the ball, so I hit
    the ball very fat. The cure? What else but relaxing the muscles.
    
    My  guess  is  there are many more reasons, but again  practice  will
    help.
    
    Tavo

You also might want to check your ball position.  You might be hitting shots
fat because the ball is too far forward in your stance and this is putting
you in a goofy stance.

If in doubt of your stance, take a few of your clubs and lay them down on the
ground so you can see where your feet are supposed to be and where you would
like the ball positioned.

Another cause is an incorrect weight shift.  On your follow through, do you
feel like you are falling backwards or are you finishing with all your weight
on your right side?  If so, this is sign that you are not making the weight
transition on your downswing.

Then there is the head dip...  If you can't keep your head still (like having
it dip down on your backswing) this will cause you to hit it fat.  If this
is the case, have a friend grab your hair and hold it when you address the
ball.  Have this person hold onto your hair tightly while you swing.  If your
head moves, your hair will get pulled and it will not be pleasant.

These are just a couple of check points I use when I start hitting fat shots
or chilly dipped shots.  Hope this helps you out.

Mike

    
    Thanks for the insight and tips.  I already feel a little better
    knowing others have suffered through a "Lesson Slump".
    
    Thanks again,
    
    Shane
    

    	One last peace of info on the over-cocking of the wrists.  Let
    this happen naturally (supinate & pronate), it should not be a consious
    effort.  Also, a lot of golfers go past parallel on the backswing,
    when this happens it becomes very difficult to get back to square
    on contact.  Try taking a 3/4 backswing, you may come to realize
    that the 3/4 is in fact a full backswing!  
    	By the by, mats will not make a difference, practice and relaxed
    swings will. Good luck.
    
    Cam 

     I taught golf for a few years, mostly in the Met section (N.Y.)
    of the P.G.A., and I'll go out on a limb and say you have ONE problem:
    The head dip mentioned previously. If your head stays at the same
    level which it is at address YOU CANNOT HIT IT FAT! It's that simple.
    Other things contribute to hitting it fat, but I think you ought
    to work on one simple thought, and that's it. You can have a friend
    hold the butt of a club under your chin to assist you, if you wish.
    
     I like to envision the head as being in a 3 cornered box - with
    the front, top and bottom CLOSED, and the back open. Watch the pro's,
    and notice how square their left cheek stays at impact; it almost
    looks as if their head is moving backward.
    
     Basically, if you lift your head (NOT "look up" with your eyes),
    you'll hit it thin; if you dip your head, you'll hit it (ugh!) fat,
    and if you move your head left (assuming you're a right hander),
    you'll hit it to the right. I'm sure you're picking the club up
    instead of turning your shoulders, and lunging down - but if you
    KEEP YOUR HEAD LEVEL, you CANNOT hit it fat! Hope this helps.
    
    Jack (the Skoal Bandit) Varley