THE PLAYERS COACH

Alignment for golf.  Is it important? alignment for golf

Recently I did a 2 day seminar on a mental training aid that is supposed to measure your brainwaves throughout your golf pre shot routine and while swinging the golf club. There were numerous topics covered in this seminar, one of which was alignment.

The two men said many things that I may or may not agree with, but the main point I am going to talk about today is when they made the statement “alignment to the target is not important when executing a golf shot”.

1. Sure for some, alignment may not be important but for others it is the most important aspect to the fundamental routine before hitting a golf shot. For me, I believe alignment is very important (I have a strong belief in the basic golf fundamentals). Alignment for the golf swing is where it all begins. If you set up to the ball – lined up right of your target, I believe your subconscious will make a compensation in your golf swing to make your ball go to the left of where you misaligned. I do not believe you can be a consistent golfer if you have compensations in your golf swing. My goal is for my athletes to eliminate as many compensations from their golf swings as possible, in order to create consistency.

That being said, there are many great players that misalign. Some of these players might have great awareness for their target and consistently re direct their swing to the target. Or they might have a swing that consistently swings “over the top” and they need to line up right. Unless you are a tour pro, and have that consistent golf swing and result, I would recommend fixing your alignment!

2. Awareness – what does this mean? This refers to how aware you are of where your target is while set up to a shot, while looking down at the golf ball. If you can create awareness for where your target is, then you will be more likely to hit your ball towards that target.
Tip 1: The first thing you can do to test awareness is to close your eyes and point to the top right corner of the room. Now open your eyes. Are you high, low, left, right of the corner? Now start over and do it again. Try to get to a point where your finger point is spot on to your target when you open your eyes. By practicing this drill, you will improve your awareness quickly.

In my opinion, both alignment and awareness are equally important. Try to accomplish great alignment and awareness and you will see your scores lower!

 

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