Why 90% of Golfers Can't Hit Their Woods Off The Ground

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Transcript Summary-

Alright, this week we're diving into the topic of Fairy Woods. Nailing your Fairy Woods off the ground can really get you closer to the green on those long par fives. I recently held a golf school and had several students struggling with this aspect of their game. Some were topping the ball, others were thinning it, and some just couldn't get the ball airborne. But by the end of the session, every single one of them showed significant improvement in striking the ball better, and their confidence soared.

So, in this video, I'm going to share five simple tips that you can use or adjust to enhance your effectiveness in hitting your Woods off the ground consistently. You may not need all of them, but combining one or two can make a huge difference.

Before we dive in, if you're new here, consider subscribing. I drop videos like this every week to help you level up your game. Plus, I always provide a free practice guide in the description below, so you don't miss out on any key points.

Tip number one, let's start by assessing your lie. Take a look at this. When you have a pristine lie on the fairway like this, you can easily get the full face of your club behind the ball, perfect for Fairy Woods or hybrids. But just a few inches into the rough, and suddenly, you're struggling. You can't get the club under the ball properly, leading to topping it. Remember, even a slight difference in lie can affect your shot drastically.

Now, onto tip number two, understanding the low point of your swing. With a driver, you want to hit slightly on the upswing, so you tee the ball up in line with your lead heel. But with Woods off the ground, you need to adjust. Move the ball back in your stance, so your low point is just ahead of the ball. This ensures you strike the ball first, then the ground, crucial for a clean hit.

Now, tip number three, let's talk about maintaining balance in your swing. The feet-together exercise is fantastic for this. Stand with your feet together, lead foot slightly turned out, and swing. This helps you stay centered and balanced throughout your swing. Gradually widen your stance as you get comfortable, maintaining that feeling of balance and stability.

Moving on to tip number four, focus on controlling your radius. Many golfers tend to pull up their arms out of fear of hitting the ground. Instead, extend your arms and imagine sweeping the club past the ball after impact. Combine this with the feet-together drill to ensure you maintain a smooth, shallow arc in your swing.

Finally, tip number five, find your rhythm. If you tend to rush your swing, focus on the rhythm of the club head. Count "one" at the top of your backswing and "two" at impact. This helps you establish a smooth, flowing rhythm that eliminates any hurried or jerky movements.

So there you have it, five simple tips to improve your Fairy Woods game. Practice these, and you'll see a significant difference in your consistency and confidence on the course. If you found this helpful, give it a thumbs up and share it with your fellow golfers. And don't forget to subscribe and hit the bell for more tips. Check out the free practice guide in the description below. And if you're interested in improving your driver swing, check out these videos. Thanks for watching!

Full Transcript- so this week we're talking Fairy Woods if you can learn to hit your Fairy Woods off the ground effectively you can start to get much closer to the green on these long par fives now this week I had a golf school with a number of students really struggling with this part of their game some would top the ball some would thin it someone really struggle to get the ball Airborne now by the time we'd finished every single one of them were striking it loads better and their confidence would really come up in this video I'm going to give you basically five simple wees that you can kind of use or adapt to help you hit your Woods off the ground effectively and really consistently the likelihood is you won't need them all but a combination of one or two is going to super super help now before I get into the video if you're new to the channel it's when your first lessons of mine please consider subscribing I release videos just like this every single week to try and help you improve your game plus you never have to remember a thing I'll always put a free download practice guide in the description box below so tip number one and this happens before we even get into all this cool stuff that's going to really help you with your ball striking can going have a look at this you need to assess your lie now look at this if I if you end up on The Fairway and you have a beautiful lie like this you can get the full face of that club into the back of the golf ball in fact you could get any club into the back of that golf ball that's perfect for hitting your Fairy Woods off the ground so great tick in the Box you can use your fairywood or your hybrid you're all good to go but look at this come going to have a look at this one just a few inches this side I've just found the rough and now look just I can't get that club to the bottom of that golf ball I can only get it one/ third up from the bottom that is a top every day of the week now I could avoid hitting a top by actually striking down on that golf ball maybe moving the ball slightly further back in my strance that would certainly improve my strike but if I've got a three-w in my hands and I've lent and I'm hitting down I've taken all that Loft off of that freeway that 15° and turned it into almost like five that Ball's going to come off like a rocket too low to the ground so when your ball is maybe not even in the rough look at this here look if I move that ball there that's still nestled look see how it just drops into like a little muddy kind of indentation there that makes that lie very difficult you're going to have to come down on it whenever you come down on it you deloft something you're going to have to deloft the ball's going to go back in your stance suddenly now a fairywood is probably not the best choice you're going to need something with more Loft if you've got a hybrid maybe like a five or a six that has maybe 26 27° that's okay on a lie like that because you can come down on it but three woods and five Woods very very risky okay in fact joking aside me and my dad went to St Andrews recently my dad who's been playing golf for like 30 odd years probably 40 odd years took a hybrid out of pretty much a hole on a golf course so no matter how long you've been playing we all make these mistakes but this is one of the reasons why so many people top it it's not down to your swing is cuz you haven't assessed your lie so you've assessed the lie you're almost ready to make a swing but there's one more thing you need to do beforehand remember the golf swing is a circle yeah and there's always a low point to that Circle really really important now I've got my driver here because I want to show the difference between a driver a fairway wood a hybrid and an iron now with a driver I set up here look with a ball in line with my lead heel now why do I do that because I want to hit this ball it's beautifully perched up on a te I want to hit the ball slightly on the way up so I can launch it miles down the Fairway okay now the low point of your circle is directly underneath your lead armpit here now my lead armpit is just set just behind the ball here absolutely perfect for me to Simply make a swing and all from here look I can simply boom hit that ball beautifully off that tea piece of cake right now the problem is if I go to my five wood or three wood and I literally do the same thing what's going to happen is my low point is behind that ball here and I start to come down I'm now going to hit it up and there's no T I'm going to top it on the ground right so what do we do well we need to move that ball behind the low point and the way we do that look is we simply we start with a driver position here and what I'm going to do is I'm going to move just about a club and a half's width about maybe a club a club which will be enough and what I've done is my low point now is just ahead of that golf ball this is absolutely ideal look to make a swing where I'm going to swing the club's going to come beautifully down on the circle strike the ball then the ground just afterwards and make a great

strike beautiful now look at this come a quick closer look at this you can see he look there was where the ball was and the divot look is afterwards my low point is after the golf ball this is what's going to give you your strikes with your woods now the only difference with a hybrid and an iron and it's very very subtle is every Club every ball that you hit off the ground needs to be struck slightly on the way down so where the uh the Fairwood might be a club width you might do a club and a half with your high okay simple as that anything that's going to help you strike the ball then the ground this is the main difference between driver or any club for that matter off a tea now some people say well if I what do I do on a if I tee my um Freewood up maybe off a tea well you can get away remember anything off a tea you can get away with a slightly upward strike which is one of the reasons why a lot of players love to hit um they love those lies where you're perched up in the rough when it's perched up in the rough you can get away with an upward strike because in theory it's on a little T anything that's down nestled down or whatever requires a downward strike so ball position relative to where your low point is very very important experiment with moving it slightly further back so you naturally guarantee a downward strike so tip number three and we're now on to the swing and trying to help you improve your strike maybe stop topping your Woods get a consistent strike now the simplest way I know for you to try and achieve this and I gave this to one of the guys Clive who is really struggling with consistency is the feet together exercise a lot of the time look fairwoods are tricky they need they're really require a kind of a premium swing right now the simplest way to achieve that is you put your feet together like this turn your lead foot out now I want you here to maintain a consistent Circle yeah backwards and forwards it's been discussing it but a lot of times when people are making a swing they're tending to lift up like this they tend to sway off the ball now what I love about the feet together exercise here to start with at least is this it really helps you maintain and get a sense of swinging IM balance now notice this as you do this I'm not trying to stay still like this I'm just swing my arms I'm basically making a swing Swinging with as much freedom in my ankles my knees my hips as you physically can and simply hold that balance swinging balance now what I love about this is if you go slightly off you're going to feel it immediately and it gives you a great feedback for you to immediately improve next time okay so what I did is and what Clyde was amazed at when he hit this shot now of course it took him a few attempts initially just to get the feel of this he lost his balance great feedback for him but after a while he could not believe how far he was hitting the shot because the feet to get the drill ensures look at that consistent contact I have to basically swing in balance and stay very and look after the quality of that Circle over and over again and if I lose my balance I'm immediately going to get instant feedback and you will too so learn to swing in balance with your feet together and then gradually move them slightly further apart like this and just Build It Up gradually that way you can build a great swing look at that I've absolutely ripped that down the middle of fair we' what is is just a very very tiny tiny motion okay and you can see here I'm taking a slight diot after that golf ball that means I'm striking the ball then the ground this is what's giving me that lovely strike each and every single time I am not trying to lift the ball up in the air which one thing I want you to just bear in mind before we move on to the next step some of the guys don't have uh in the group didn't have the power really to be using a free wood very few people should be using free wood most people should be using five woods and sward things we've Loft because they don't have the club speed if you don't have the club speed you could put a great swing on your freeway the ball still goes ready really low and the problem is psychologically you start to try to lift the bulp in the air just to get more elevation ruining your swing often using a five wood seven wood you're going to hit it just as far if not further than you'll ever hit a free wood so tip number four and this is really helpful for those of you might struggle with you know topping it or sometimes even fatting your kind of um your Fairy Woods and your h now ultimately here it's radius control you know a lot of times when people are swinging this and they creating this circle what they tend to do often with the fear of maybe hitting the ground they pull up their arms like this you see them kind of almost like this getting quite nervous so what I want you to do is just extend those arms out we want to maintain look the radius of the circle we don't want those arms kind of lifting now the simplest way to do that let's combine it with the feet together drill I want you to imagine putting the club maybe a foot behind the ball like this and all we're going to do stretch out those arms and just imagine gliding the fairywood maybe a couple of feet past the ball so foot behind the ball a couple of feet fast the ball and you're going to get a sense of this kind of extension through the impact area here right then what you're going to do you're going to combine that kind of motion here with the feet together exercise really sensing that you've got this kind of long kind of Ark in this swing you haven't got this kind of chop and this kind of lifting motion you're really looking after in the bottom of that Circle okay so feet together again just again visualize that kind of sweeping motion yes we're coming slightly down on it but we're not chopping down and we're certainly not lifting up so just visualize that lovely shallow Arc of that Circle again we'll stick to the feet together drill to really enhance your

mechanics absolute Beauty down the middle of the Fairway so tip number five I give it to so many people rhythm with all of this if you find yourself rushing your golf swing in any shape or form find something to kind of concentrate on to create the Rhythm and what I like to do is is I like to put my attention on the club head a lot and and I help my students do this by going one when the club gets to the top of the back we're going say and two one and two one and two find that Rhythm then go in don't waste any time get yourself set put our feet fairly close together again okay I'm going to go one and two and what we create look is a beautiful flowing Rhythm that isn't rushed isn't snatch it isn't anxious start to create maybe a combination of those five simple ways to hit your fairwoods and I promise you you're going to get become much much more consistent off the ground if you enjoy the video give it a thumbs up maybe share it with one of your friends friends and of course look if you're new to the channel press that subscribe button and the bell and remember there's a free practice guide in the description box below if you love to see how I help golfers improve their driver swing check these one of these two videos out here that'll be the next stage for you after you forward.