A good grasp of swing mechanics is the first step toward bettering your golf swing. This is true of every golfer at all levels but understanding the correct swing mechanics alone is not enough to be a top-caliber golfer.
You need to train your muscles so they memorize your understanding, without which it's hard to apply what you have learned during the round naturally and automatically without having to think about it. Your ultimate goal is to take the understood swing onto the golf course and make it work instinctively on a consistent basis.
It's essential to sweat blood hitting a lot of practice balls so as to make the understood swing become second nature to you. But equally crucial to getting your playing ability to the next level is to trace and eradicate the origins of your swing problems, which are, in the main, poor pre-swing preparations.
What has to be done first when a swing problem arises is to check your pre-swing preparations including grip, posture, alignment and ball position. Check to see if they are correct before pulling out all the stops to discover its causes in your in-swing movements.
It's a rarity to hit the ball consistently well without the proper pre-swing preparations. It is impossible to swing effectively without correct pre-swing basics. Most causes of in-swing faults lie in poor pre-swing preparations.
Too strong a grip, for example, tends to cause a hook while too weak a grip brings about a slice. Similarly, setting up with the body opened to the ball-target line tends to bring about a slice and a closed body alignment causes a hook.
It behooves you to be more concerned with the root causes and effects than merely striving to hit the ball straight. Whenever a problem occurs, you need to be smart and avoid grappling with the details of in-swing movements.
Keep from hitting balls continuously until they are struck well. Instead, when a swing fault emerges, take your time to think things out to discover the faults in your pre-swing preparations. Once you have gripped the club in your hands and finished your setup, it is as if more than 90 percent of the shot has already been destined.
Refrain from checking on your in-swing movements only whenever swing errors present themselves. Search for incorrect pre-swing preparations. In most cases, only proper preparations can speed up solutions to the swing faults.
In a nutshell, when your swing turns sour, do not struggle to analyze your in-swing movements into parts to fix them. That's a waste of time and energy. It is not an efficient way to put a stop to your in-swing errors.
Not being a robot, sometimes you can stand too close to or too far from the ball. You can also commit a setup error by bending your spine too little or too much. You can also tilt it immoderately right or left. Similarly, you may flex your knees in the wrong way, placing your weight too much or too little either on the right or left. Equally, your stance may be either too wide or too narrow with the ball positioned too far forward or too far back in your stance.
On the practice range don't waste your time trying to swing the club correctly with faulty pre-swing preparations. Allot the lion's share of your practice time to checking your pre-swing basics, examining the inter-relations between poor shots and improper pre-swing preparations. That's the shortcut to fixing your swing faults and a sure-fire way to improve your swing.
A swing is not something that can be improved all of a sudden. It requires time and energy, plus patience. It is improved little by little as you understand the causes of bad shots and correct their root causes, most of which are hidden in the pre-swing preparations.
Jack Nicklaus who was awarded the title of 'the golfer of the 19th century' is often quoted as saying that if you set up correctly, there's a good chance you'll hit a reasonable shot, even if you make a mediocre swing. However, if you set up incorrectly, you'll hit a lousy shot even if you make the greatest swing in the world.