Golf practice over the last week, ups and downs

I haven’t posted individual summaries about my golf practice sessions this week as I’ve had more interesting things to talk about. So this is a summary of the various golf practice sessions throughout the last week. Starting from Monday which was a very poor session, graded myself 4/10, the following day was a 6.5/10. Then I played a round of golf and equalled my sub 90 score off 88, the day after that the golf practice session was graded 5/10.

As you can see the quality of the golf practice sessions are somewhat variable. Looking over my historical statistics for my golf practice sessions at the range I’m averaging a 6/10. However since the middle of December it’s been around 5/10 with significant inconsistency from one golf practice session to the next.

What’s the cause of this decline am I getting worse?

The answer to that questions lies with what I trying to learn and grove in my golf swing. Around the time that my golf practice sessions started to become inconsistent in quality is directly related to learning the downswing and follow through. This is an area I am having significant issues with and trying to get this movement correct is immensely difficult for me.

Many different things go wrong at different times, because there are many factors in play that need to be synchronised.

Start of the downswing is to transfer my weight on to the left foot, there are many varied ways you can do this and what you’re supposed to feel. The basics are simple and not hard to understand, but the fact the downswing and follow through lasts no more than a second makes this incredibly difficult to get every move happening at the right time and in harmony with each other.

The downswing and follow through, my understanding

At the top of the backswing to start the downswing, the hips turn and move laterally to the left and the weight starts to transfer from the right to the left foot. As this happens the arms come down with the move, it’s important the arms shouldn’t be coming down on their own accord. Not until the hips are square with the ball and the arms are in 9 o’clock position should the arms then come down and through the ball. The left arm should remain straight at all times throughout the swing.

I can do all this precisely as it should be done when performed in slow motion, as soon as I go to full speed many things go wrong and not the same things every time. This is very frustrating as I have now been at this for over 6 weeks, yes I have got somewhat better but I do now have a block. I know that gradually with time I will start to get the swing right more often and I expect things to just all of a sudden fall in to place. In the mean time I have to live with this frustration and continue being determined with my practice and Golf Challenge.

Just look at what happens to the pro’s with their consistency, which is what I do for some solace and another blog on the subject of changes from day to day.