In this video, Neil Tappin is joined by Tour Coach Liam James to look at the biggest driving mistakes and how to avoid them!
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00:00Hello everyone, Neil Tappan here from Golf Monthly and welcome to the London Club and this video on
00:04the biggest mistakes the players make off the tee. We've teamed up with Ping and with tour coach Liam
00:09James to offer you the best advice that we can about how to stop hooking it, how to stop slicing
00:14it and also about how to find a little bit more distance off the tee as well. This is all about
00:19trying to make the game as easy as possible so if you do struggle off the tee this video should
00:24really help. If you're new to the Golf Monthly channel please do hit the subscribe button to
00:27make sure you don't miss any of our videos. Hit the like button if you're liking the video but
00:31let's head out now onto the golf course here at the London Club and look at the biggest driving
00:35mistakes the players make. Okay Liam let's start with a lack of distance off the tee, a lack of
00:45speed. If there's a fault that you see more often than not with amateurs that costs them yardage
00:50what would it be do you think? I'd say the biggest fault is them trying to generate more speed in the
00:55manner that they do so the biggest thing that we start to see more than anything is that in a bid
01:00to try and hit the golf ball harder they're moving from side to side more often and then moving
01:05towards the target too much is causing them actually to hit down on the golf ball even more
01:10and essentially slice the golf ball so in a bid to try and hit the golf ball harder and further
01:15they're actually hitting it shorter so there are things that you can do in the setup that will just
01:20make sure that you generate a little bit more speed without losing the control of where the
01:24ball strikes on the face. Yeah and don't forget you're looking for that kind of high launch,
01:28low spin, those perfect optimized launch conditions to get the most out of your driver.
01:33Absolutely and that's the thing even if players are swinging at slow speeds or slower speeds than
01:39we see on the television we can still optimize those speeds by making sure the impact factors
01:44are as good as they possibly can be and 90% of the time that's just how they set up to the golf
01:49ball that's got nothing to do with what's happening in the swing. Okay so give us some ideas about what
01:54people should be looking out for. So the biggest thing first of all is I think we need to maximize
01:58everything we can in the setup in order to actually wind up behind the golf ball and give
02:03ourselves the biggest range of movement we possibly can and a very simple tip for that would be
02:08obviously the first thing to just keep an eye on is the ball position we want to make sure that's
02:12inside my left heel but I've got a nice wide base here now but as you have a look you can see my
02:18toes are fractionally turned out now what that's actually enabling me to do now is turn my hips
02:24okay if we see players which we see a lot of almost turned in with their toes it really restricts
02:29their range of movement and it's impossible for them to make a full turn up to the top of the
02:33back yeah so that little bit more range movement in your hips gives you more range movement in
02:37your shoulder which is what you're looking for absolutely and then it's a bigger rotation it's
02:42not necessarily more effort it's not them doing it any faster all you're all you're doing simply
02:47here is turning your toes out freeing your knees and your hips up to complete a full turn and as a
02:52result of that you're going to generate more speed okay go then let's show i'll show you hit
02:57one for us so again ball up off that left heel i've got a nice wide base with my toes turned
03:03out i'm gonna have a little rehearsal up to the top full rotation then i'm just going to go ahead
03:08and give it a hit yeah hopefully and what you should see through the cameras there is just how
03:16well centered liam stays over the shot he's not making a big sway off the ball and then back onto
03:21it because if you are it's quite dangerous that isn't it absolutely and it may feel like might
03:26feel quicker it might feel like more effort but essentially all that's going to do is increase
03:31your off-center hits whereas if you're doing as we're mentioning here turning your toes out big
03:35wide base nice rotation up to the top you're then going to stay behind it and not only swing it
03:41faster just due to that but hit the middle of the face more often yeah more speed and more control
03:45okay so we're going to move on to slices and hooks i think most golfers their bad shot will
03:50likely be one or other of these two so liam let's talk about i know that you're going to speak about
03:54them in connection with each other because the thought i guess is the kind of opposite of each
03:58other right absolutely i mean you know you tend to see very similar characteristics of a player
04:04who's slicing the golf ball and then counter to that you see the opposite when when you've seen
04:08a player hook it and generally most of those things are coming from the way they're setting
04:12up to the golf ball and actually the way they're placing their hands on the grip so
04:16we start with a slicer yeah the biggest thing that we'll start to see with with excessive slices of
04:21the golf ball is quite simply where the golf club is running through your left hand so players who
04:27get it too much into the palm okay it's going to do two things for you if you're too much in the
04:32palm it's going to lean you too much towards the target in your second and that's a setup position
04:36you see a lot isn't it absolutely right so their head's closer to the target than their belt buckle
04:42is and that's going to cause them to hit out and down on the golf ball and the second thing that
04:47grip is going to do is that's going to make this club face open up too much on the way back so now
04:51we've got the golf club coming from the outside with the face wide open you're just going to hit
04:55slices hook then is the opposite issue is it absolutely right so if we see a player with
05:00an excessively strong grip now to define strong grip i don't mean strong in in strength i mean
05:06strong in if i was to look down at my left hand now i can see all four of my knuckles so
05:12that would define as a strong grip now as a result of that what we're going to tend to see is
05:17not much loft on the golf club at the top so we would call this a closed position with the club
05:22face not much loft and now the compensations that the players are having to make in order to try and
05:28get the ball up in the air now we're going to start to see a lot of leaning back and that's
05:32going to obviously cause cause the hook so just by two poor grip positions in the setup all these
05:38things you know the slices are coming over it the hooks they're leaning back so you know you've got
05:43to be careful with how you're setting up so that begs the question what's the checkpoint that
05:47people need to get the right grip on the club to be stood correctly at the ball at address so it's
05:51all keep it really constant with the routine so the biggest thing i would say about this is when
05:57you see golfers on on the golf course it's where they actually place their hands on the golf club
06:01in their routine so you'll see some players have it down here some players it's up in the air
06:06keep it really consistent we want to hold the golf club up out in front of us shafts parallel
06:11with the ground here and i'm just going to run this golf club just through the fingers of my left hand
06:16and if i place a little look now i just have a look at my left hand i've got a two knuckle left
06:21hand grip now so that's what we would define as a neutral grip that's going to feel much weaker to
06:26a guy who grips it strong and it's going to feel much stronger to the slices but just by fixing the
06:31left hand grip it's going to offer us the chance to get set up factually in behind the golf ball
06:37with my shirt buttons but now i've got a neutral left hand in order to make sure that clubface is
06:42square throughout my swing okay go on then liam hit one for us let's see what it looks like so
06:47i'll show you my routine shaft up in front of me clubbing the fingers two knuckle left hand grip
06:56and then i'll give it a hit
07:02lovely so there you have it if you are struggling with your driving i think that the advice that
07:07liam has given us there shows that it doesn't have to be a big technical fix to do with any
07:12of the complicated movements in your golf swing it can be something simple and a lot of the time
07:17these things can be done at address and there's no reason why any golfer can't get them right
07:22thanks for watching we'll see you next time