With the start of another season just around the corner, it is time to get reacquainted with your putting stroke.  If you haven’t already pulled your putter and some balls out to do some practice on the living room carpet… its time!  When you first put the ‘flat stick’ back into your hands after a long winter break it might feel like a stranger so the first thing you want to do is get the ‘feel’ back into your stroke.  When you get yourself into a good putting position and are ready to stroke a putt… close your eyes and focus on how the putter feels as you swing it and what the ball feels like coming off the face at impact.  Don’t worry about hitting any targets or practice cups just yet, but instead with your eyes closed focus on the tempo and size of the stroke to hit the putt a certain distance.  After several practice putts removing the visual aspects of your stroke and focusing on the feel, rhythm and tempo, go ahead and try a few with your eyes open and see how much smoother your stroke is.  If the sight of the ball still causes your putter head to move about violently close your eyes again and continue to practice until your stroke is as smooth with your eyes open as with them shut.

See you soon,

Dave Lengyel

Now that we know how to hit a ball on an ‘uphill or downhill lie’, we should review how to hit a shot with the ball above or below your feet.  You may have heard the expression that ‘your ball will FLY downhill’ when hitting a shot with the ball lying ‘above or below’ your feet.  It is a good way to remember to align your shot accordingly and the more lofted the club you are hitting, the more you will have to compensate.  For you right-handers, aim a little to the left of your target when the ball is below your feet, and to the right when the ball is above your feet. 

For extreme versions of the ball above your feet, it can be a good idea to choke down a little on a less lofted club and open the face slightly to minimize the effect of the slope on ball flight.  For extreme versions of the ball below your feet it is important to get your center of gravity as low as possible so take a wider stance and flex your knees a little more to get the club head to reach farther down the hill without having to bend at the hips as much.  In either of these extreme conditions it is also important to take a practice swing somewhere nearby your ball with a similar sloped condition to see where your club will bottom out, and then properly gauge where to play the ball in your stance for the shot. The practice swing will also indicate the level of balance and stability you will need for the shot, and there will be times where you may have to swing a little easier and take more club in order to remain standing in your finish position.

Play Well, Dave Lengyel

•1 tablespoon olive oil
•2 cups chopped onion
•4 large garlic cloves, minced
•1 pound skinless boneless chicken breasts or chicken tenderloins, washed and cubed
•1 large jalapeno pepper, seeded, finely chopped
•1 teaspoon ground coriander
•2 teaspoons ground cumin
•2 cans (14.5 ounces each) diced tomatoes in juice
•2 cans Great Northern beans (16 oz) drained and rinsed well
•juice of 1 lime
•2 cups frozen corn kernels, thawed, or fresh
•salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
•1/2 cup sour cream
•1/4 cup finely chopped red onion
•2 tablespoons chopped cilantro

Preparation:

Heat olive oil in a large nonstick saucepan over medium-high heat. When oil is very hot, add onion and garlic; saute until onion begins to brown, Add cubed chicken and brown on all sides; add chopped jalapeno, coriander, cumin, crushed tomatoes and beans. Reduce heat and simmer for about 5 minutes; add juice of one lime and stir in the corn kernels. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.
Cook chicken chili, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes longer; serve with sour cream, chopped red onion and chopped cilantro.

Enjoy

Swing a towel to help improve your weight transfer…

Grab a medium size bath towel; twirl it up a little and choking down a bit on one end put on your best golf grip.  Now slide your bottom hand down the towel to separate your hands about 6 to 8 inches and get into a good golf posture with both your arms extended down and out in front of you with the section of towel between your hands parallel to your target line.  From here make a good turn into your backswing keeping your target arm extended and hold at the top allowing the towel to flip up over your shoulder.  As you rotate to the top you should feel that it is the upper body pulling the lower body into the back swing.  As you arrive at the top you should feel fully coiled and ready to rotate.  Now from the top let go of your trail hand and ‘leading with the lower body’ allow your target side to pull the towel down whipping it through an imaginary ball position and through to a full finish.
This is a great weight transfer drill that can be done anywhere that you can find a towel and you should repeat this drill often to reinforce the upper body initiating the backswing and the lower body initiating the downswing…

Dave Lengyel

The more moving parts that you have in your putting stroke, the more difficult it is to repeat.  If you want more consistency in your putting, then turn your putting stroke into a ‘simple machine’ with few moving parts.  Simple machines don’t tend to break down that often and are easier to fix.  All sorts of problems come from moving your lower body around or worse yet moving your head around during your putting stroke.  To help teach yourself to stay steady during your putting, try this simple drill.  Take your putting stance while resting your forehead against a wall or on the inside of a door frame.  Now take a few putting strokes and feel how steady your head stays.  If this ‘steady head’ sensation feels foreign to you, then you have probably been moving your head around during your putts.  Now turn around and back your tailbone up against the wall and make a few more putting strokes feeling how quiet your lower body should stay.  Practice this often until it becomes second nature to only move what you need to in order to make a good stroke.  The more you can teach yourself to keep things steady during your putting stroke the simpler your stroke becomes, the easier it becomes to fix and fine tune, and the more putts you will sink.

Play well, Dave Lengyel

If you want to be able to post a good score at RedTail Landing or any other course that has undulation as a ‘defense’, you need to know how to hit it well from hills and valleys.   When hitting shots from ‘uphill or downhill’ lies, it is important to first match your shoulders to the slope and then take a slightly wider stance to help maintain your balance during the swing.  For a shot on an uphill lie, you will need to adjust your shoulders (and spine angle) to allow the club head to follow through past impact and not get ‘stuck in the ground’ at the ball.  When you tilt your shoulders and spine back, take a practice swing to confirm your balance and where the club is hitting the ground (needed to confirm correct ball position for the shot).  This adjustment will mean that your shot will launch higher with the addition of the slope to the loft of the club, and you may have to take a less lofted club and choke down a little on the grip to control the trajectory and distance.  For a shot on a downhill lie, adjusting your shoulder and spine angle forward to match the slope will keep you from hitting the ground behind the ball as you swing, but be aware that this shot will launch at a lower trajectory and have more roll out when choosing your club and your target.  The big key for these shots is to maintain your ‘balance’ as much as possible so don’t be afraid to ‘club up’ and take an easier swing.

See you in the ‘flat stuff’, Dave Lengyel

An easy way to analyze your season…

For most of us, the golf season is at an end and it is time to move on to ‘winter activities’.  This means that unless you have a winter golf getaway planned, obsessing over golf will get about a five month break.  Before you turn your golf switch off, look back at the season and do a little analysis of your game.  For those of you with the latest and greatest smart phone applications, you can continue to obsess over your golf game whenever you pick up your phone, but for those of you ‘low technology’ folks try this…
For most of us, the golf season is at an end and it is time to move on to ‘winter activities’.  This means Take out a piece of paper and write down what your handicap index was at the start of the season and what it finished at.  If your handicap index decreased, write down which part of your game had the most improvement (for most of you it will probably be some area of your short game) and which part of your game you know still needs work to help you lower your scores even more.  Now write down ‘See my golf coach in the spring for more guidance’.  If your handicap stayed about the same, write down what you think the reason was… injured, new job, new baby, didn’t play, didn’t practice, ‘don’t know’, etc., and then write down ‘Take golf lessons in the spring’!  If your handicap index increased, jot down why you think your game went downhill and then write the words ‘TAKE GOLF LESSONS IN THE SPRING’!  Now take this piece of paper and put it in your golf bag where you will find it first thing next time you grab your clubs.  I recommend putting it inside of your golf glove.
Make sure to bring this piece of paper with you to your first golf lesson in the spring and we will use it to help create the  ‘game plan’ of learning and practice that will allow you to play your best golf ever…

Cheers, Dave Lengyel

Now that it is getting a little cooler outside it is time to go through the ‘fall golf checklist’…

Make sure that you are carrying extra layers for warmth, a toque, cold weather gloves or cart mitts, some air activated charcoal hand warmers, an extra towel and some softer compression golf balls.  Keeping your hands warm is one of the most important cool weather tips for a number of reasons.  With extra layers on your arms will feel ‘confined’ in your backswing so remember to complete your full shoulder turn.  With the ground a little harder and the greens firming up consider the ‘bump and run’ shots a little more often.  Lastly, try to remember all of the wonderful things that your golf coach taught you earlier in the season so that you can shoot your best scores yet!

See you on the practice green,

Dave

There is nothing more rewarding to a golf instructor than to see that a student can feel a swing change during a lesson and improve their ball flight because of it.  Long term changes to a golf swing however take a lot of repetition… practice, practice, practice!  During the time when we try to break the old habits and create the new ones; the ‘swing transition’, there will be a few missed shots as the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ are battling with each other.  This can lead to some serious frustration out on the course.  The best thing that I can suggest to those of you who want to continue to play as they make their transition is to consider that the practice range is where you ‘study’ and do your homework by working on your swing mechanics and that the golf course is where you write the exam.  If you want a better score on the exam… spend more time studying!  If you gave up playing one round of golf during the week and used that 4 to 5 hours of time practicing (a bucket of balls every day for a week), your transition would be much more complete.   The bottom line… while your swing is in transition practice more and play less.

See you on the range,

Dave Lengyel

Far too often during my days of instructing as I stop to survey our fabulous practice facility I see a site that makes me shake my head in wonder… The driving range full of well meaning, yet white knuckled ‘want-to-be long drive champions’ trying to smash their drives to the highway and beyond, and not a sole at either of our two beautiful practice putting greens, the chipping green, or the greenside bunker. 

The single best way to lower the numbers on your score card is to spend at least as much time working on your short game as you do hitting balls on the range.  Next time you head out to practice; do yourself and your scorecard a huge favor by just pulling out your putter and your wedges and leaving the rest of your clubs in the trunk of the car.  Let me finish by reminding you of one of golf’s great truths…

‘He or She who hath the best short game wins’…

Play well, Dave Lengyel