19 Wild Practice Aids You May Already Own

Golf Digest has an interesting article on their website. If you like using training aids, they have a slide show -- actually, it's a short film clip show -- of common household objects you can use to help you improve your swing.

For example, this is a screen grab from the clip on slide 9. They call this a Swiss ball but it looks a lot like a balance ball to me. (Okay, maybe that's not a 'common' household object but I have one so it can't be that uncommon.)



There are some standard suggestions like slide 18 showing Vijay using a water bottle, or slides 6 (a towel) and 7 (a head cover) which show how to use those items to help with connection.

There are several really neat ones, like slide 13's suggestion that you putt with a tennis ball, which is larger than a regular golf ball, or slide 3's use of a CD to check your eye position over putts. (Be sure to use an old one!)

Some seem a bit useless to me. For example, the toothpaste drill on slide 16 seems a bit expensive -- and way too messy -- for my taste.

My favorite is probably slide 4, which teaches you how to use a cookie to help control tension in your swing. Of course, that may just be me looking for an excuse to eat more cookies.

Anyway, you might find something useful in the article so it's worth a look. I admit I would have never thought about using a balance ball to help with my downswing.