By Kim Jeong-kyoo
Korea Times Golf Columnist
Oftentimes, golf is compared to life. As with everything in life, crucial to success in golf is to get things ready in advance in the correct fashion. What has to be done first to hit the ball far and straight is to make proper pre-swing preparations including grip, alignment, posture and ball position.
Hold the club lightly with the last three fingers of your left hand so its heel pad is on top of the handle of the club. Avoid taking hold of the club tightly with your left hand.
It's rather as if you were fitting a lego. Wedge the club between the heel of the hand ― a rounded pad at the bottom of the palm ― and the first knuckle of the index finger. Once the club is held there firmly in the correct manner, you don't have to tense up the muscles in your hand. All you have to do to complete your left hand grip is just wrap your fingers lightly around the handle of the club.
As for the right hand grip, hold the club lightly with your fingers as a pitcher in baseball would do. You may feel a slight pressure on the middle and ring fingers.
The fingers are the most sensitive parts of your hands. For more feel place the club more in the fingers rather than in the palms. That also encourages wrist hinge, which is a power source underlying longer shots. Holding the club too much in the palm of your hands reduces wrist action.
A critical fault commonly committed by the recreational golfers is to allow the crease formed between the thumb and forefinger of their right hand to point to the chin.
At the completion of the grip, the two creases created between the thumb and index finger of respective hands need to be parallel to each other and pointing to a spot somewhere between your right ear and shoulder with the palms of your hands facing each other.
This means a tad strong grip, with which you don't have to deliberately cross your right forearm over the left through the ball. However, a weak grip makes it necessary to rotate your forearms through impact to square the clubface, which robs your swing of its consistency. It's hard to turn your right forearm over the left through the ball with perfect timing every time you swing, particularly in a situation under severe pressure.
After gripping the club correctly, stand behind the ball and visualize a shot called for and yourself perfectly executing it with a smooth, effortless swing. Then, select an intermediate target ― a small spot on the ball-target line ― within your vision and start setting up by aligning your shoulders parallel to the ball-target line.
The club tends to work along the shoulder line and aligning your shoulders squarely is a must for the pinpoint accuracy. To this end, your mind's eye needs to be fixated on your target from beginning to end.
Avoid standing too close to or too far from the ball. You need to stand a bit farther so there exists at least a one-and-a-half-fist gap between the left hip and the butt end of the handle.
Importantly, stick your rear end out so a tight tension is felt on the small of the back.
This tight tension needs to be felt during the entire swing as it ensures that you maintain your hip and knee bends created at address, obviating your standing up or dipping through the ball, which causes either a thin or fat shot.
Also crucial is to get your weight distributed on the inside hip-joints and flex your knees sufficiently so you can feel your feet vital, active and full of life.
Not less important than proper weight distribution is the side tilt of the spine to the right away from the target. It's essential that your left shoulder stay behind the left knee at address, which promotes a powerful swing whose path is from inside the ball-target line before impact, along the line through impact and inside it again after impact.
Finally, make it certain that your hands obstruct the view of the left foot, which means that your left shoulder, left hand, clubshaft and clubhead are forming a straight line at the address. That encourages the proper takeaway path that fits your posture.
Now, turn your face with your eye-line parallel to the ball-target line to look at the target, get your eyes back to the ball and let your hands go before starting to take the club away from the ball. Letting go of your hands, or rather loosening your grip guarantees a light grip pressure during the swing, which promotes a swing that is smooth, easy and effortless.
To trigger the swing smoothly gently kick your right knee toward the target with a slight movement of the inside hip-joint before swinging your arms, hands and club backward by shifting your weight to the right. The weight shift needs to be gradual rather than abrupt; at the top of the backswing the majority of your bodyweight should be on the inside of your right hip-joint so you are in a position ready to transfer your weight to the inside hip-joint on the left.
Now you've finished your backswing properly, you will encounter no difficulty swinging down properly. In a no-nonsense golf swing nil of forced effort or superfluous movement, downswing is a mere reaction to backswing.
However, to further ensure a correct forward swing, be sure that your hands do nothing but hold the club lightly as they did at address. Instead of jerking your hands and arms down from the top, initiate your downswing by shifting your weight to the inside hip-joint on he left.
Last but not least, maintain the top-of-the-backswing position at the beginning of the downswing. That keeps your hands and arms staying quiet at the initial stage of the downswing, opening the door to swinging in the correct sequence from the ground up.
That also facilitates changing direction from backswing to downswing at a leisurely pace without rushing, enabling you to maintain the L-shape created between your left arm and clubshaft sufficiently till the right moment when the clubhead is fully released.