Back from Glasto!!

Well what an amazing few days I had at Glastonbury. It was the most incredible thing I have ever done, literally, a once in a lifetime experience for reasons both good and bad! I wont dwell on the negatives, they were centred around toilets and queuing constantly.
The biggest positive was the music, but in a much bigger sense than I ever imagined. I saw people I like and I was introduced to people I didn't know. Regina Spektor was absolutely phenomenal!! What a talented lady, not to mention very gorgeous too. I think I might be in love haha!! There's something about talented musicians that does it for me. Maybe because it's something I aspire to be.
Other great performances were Paolo Nutini, Bat For Lashes, Bjorn Again (an Abba tribute band that were surprisingly good) and Newton Faulkner. Nutini and Faulkner were incredible. Paolo's voice and Newton's guitar playing were amazing and it was just a pleasure to witness. This has definitely spurred me on to improve my own musical skills. I'd give anything to have a decent enough singing voice to seriously persue music. I feel that with time and work (which I haven't properly had) that I could be a good keyboard/pianist!!
So, to conclude Glasto - well I can't conclude it really except to say that the music really made an impression on me that I will never forget! I have forgotten the downsides already and am wishing I was still there. But, all good things come to an end and I think I may have to go again someday!!

Anyways, I came back and went to the range last night. It was a pretty good session actually. I was striking it well and hitting it quite long. I have to keep reminding myself to bet more over the ball at address but when this is good, I hit it it pretty well. I have gotten far more comfortable with my downswing too and seem to have figured out how to do this properly. One thing I looked at was my tendency to get my clubface closed at impact which has been really irritating me! I decided to heat 4 or 5 balls with a grip that felt really weak and low and behold started to hit slices. So, I worked back from there and ended up with a grip that still felt quite weak but was hitting the ball straight as an arrow!! This was the main thing. I'm happy with this as I've always thought that grip was a personal thing anyway and this may well be the right one for me.
Anyways, lots of golf coming up for me!! I'm gonna practise tonight, then play 36 holes tomorrow. Then, I will play thursday afternoon too and then both days over the weekend before my tournament at Pyrford next monday!!! It's all preparation really for this event. I know my chances of qualifying are very slim, but I just want to post a reasonable score. It's the mental side of competitive golf that has been the hardest for me. I think I might play extremely conservatively on the day from the tee and hit away from any trouble. One of my best bits of advice, and very basic, is from my dad. It is: "if you hit the fairway, you are in the hole".
So here will be my three aims for the round:

1/ No unnecessary risks - if I make a bad swing, so be it, but at least do it trying to hit the right shot!!

2/ Do not bring a double bogey into play. This essentially means playing percentages and identifying when I am in trouble!!! If I don't make a double bogey then I think i'll be fine.

3/ 18 circles. This refers to a mental tip from Karl Morris. It essentially means that I must pick 2 or 3 components of a preshot routine and produce them on every shot on a hole to win a circle. This will illustrate that I have given my utmost attention to every shot.

Anyways, that will do for todays blog and will update again soon!!!

Chartham Park...

Well I shot loads. That's the long and short of it really. I was surprised as my session at the driving range went pretty well last night. I hit a lot of great shots and really started to feel comfortable on my downswing.

I actually drove the ball quite nicely today. In fact, in terms of ball striking, everything was pretty solid. It was just the accuracy side of things. I am missing a whole bunch of shots left and this is a real worry as I really don't seem to be able to sort this out. I'm not convinced that I'm always coming over the top. For some reason I am getting my clubface really shut unnecessarily. It's not like im starting shots right of my target. They start straight, or left even, and then curve left. This has kind of been a long term habit as I always used to get stuck on my downswing and then have to flip my wrists to square my clubface. With any luck if I continue to swing down on a better line, this may well correct itself.

My short game was much better tonight. I didn't stub one chip shot and got up and down a good few times!! This was nice. I'm basically focusing on getting my weight on my left side to start with and then I have to be really careful not to slide my hips and throw my upper body backwards which has been causing me to duff my chip shots.

I leave tonights blog there, as I'm away to Glastonbury tomorrow and therefore am going to forget about golf for a few days. I'll hit the range next monday before playing on tuesday and wednesday. I'll continue to work on these things i've been working on, as I feel I am definitely heading in the right direction.....

Lindfield Golf Club

Lindfield Golf Club - 21/6/09
Score - 75 (+7)
G.I.R - 10/18
F'ways - 4/12
Putts - 33
U & D - 0/8 !!!
Penalties - 1

Yesterday I played a practise round at Lindfield Golf Club with my brother. It was a fairly short course (a par 68) and I shot 75. This was a bit of a disappointing score, but considering I hit 10 greens and didn't get up and down once from any of these missed greens, this was certainly the highest score it could have been. I started the round really nicely with a cracking drive and wedge to 12 feet for a birdie on the 1st and then a nice 6 iron into the par 3 second. There were good and bad shots from then on but on the whole I was fairly pleased.

To summarise my tee to green play, my mid to short irons and wedges were pretty solid really! It was a lot better than it has been. My steeper shoulder angle at the top of my backswing definitely has yielded an improvement. But my wood shots weren't as I would have liked them.
I think I need to work on ensuring I am get my arms in the right position alongside my steeper shoulder turn ie 'closing the a' as JH writes about. A problem I seemed to have, especially with my longer clubs was 'coming over the top'. I believe this was that my steeper shoulder turn was getting my arms too much in front of me. Thus, I am off to the range tonight to work on this. I think I am getting the hang of the correct downswing moves. I need to put more work into my 2 move and try to ingrain this as I do not like it as a swing thought on the golf course!!

With regards to my short game, well I really am struggling big time. I am stubbing an awful lot of chip shots and feel extremely uncomfortable over the ball. I think I will have a look again at my Stan Utley short game book to try and rediscover my touch. I feel I have the knowledge and feel to be good around the greens, I just don't seem to be executing very well at the moment.

Lots of work to be done really. I am hitting the range tonight and then heading to Chartham Park for a game tomorrow. Hopefully I can hit some decent shots again. I look forward to working on it tonight.

I am away for the Glastonbury Festival from Wednesday, but I have a tournament in 2 weeks time at Pyrford so next week I will really try and put some good work into my short game ahead of this. It would be nice to get it up to scratch definitely...

Intro and Tonbridge Range Session

Hello!! This is my blog where I can write purely for myself purely about my golf. It will mainly be a point of reference but also a journal of my golfing experiences. I am virtually fully qualified as a PGA Professional Golfer, and I have recently turned my attention to changing my technique.
I am very much intrigued by Jim Hardy and his one-plane swing theories!! I would say that I have been working on adapting this technique with a determined and adamant view that when I get this right (whenever that may be) I will be a consistently high performing level. I don't know what my level will be, that is to be determined with I guess no set deadline.

Anyways, I had a good range session tonight. I went to Tonbridge Golf Centre (my local range) with the view that I haven't been turning my shoulders properly and getting them pointing within the zone that JH talks about. This is zone extends from the ball to about 48" outside it. I was thinking, if I don't get to this position at the top of my backswing, how can I execute the downswing properly! So my goal was to establish (by use of the mirror at the range) exactly the position I needed to be in! Then I needed to figure out, how would I get there consistenty.

I ascertained that when I am in the correct position at address, I can comfortably reach my knee caps with my arms and hands. This is the first aim, and feels that I am very bent over. Once I have done this, it feels that my right shoulder goes high behind me on my backswing. Whenever I got this right I must say I was hitting very good shots!! So I need to get the right start position and then turn my shoulders this way to stay in my posture!! Remember this. Also, don't sway AT ALL!! I don't want any lateral movement at all (my swing is rotational!).

With regard to the downswing, I haven't quite put my finger on this just yet!! I'm aware of and happy with the principle of turning my shoulders on the downswing but as for doing this 'on plane', I don't know if i'm quite there yet. This has always been something I've struggled to do consistently. But whenever I get it right, it really does feel so easy!! I must have hit about 10-12 8-irons tonight, all exactly the same strike and penetrating ball flight. All I know is I need to get the backswing right and then keep my spine angle the same. If I do this I have a good chance, but I still need to learn the shoulder turn on the downswing.

The two move works well on irons for compressing the ball. I simply stand on my left foot a little bit more for my downswing and let rip. I haven't noticed any great consistency with this yet but we'll see how it goes.

I'm playing Lindfield Golf Course on Sunday with the swing thoughts mentioned above. Let's see how it goes....