Limerick Summary has to wait until Tuesday because the Tour Championship doesn't finish until late Monday. So today let's learn something from the leader...
On Saturday Dustin Johnson had the worst driving day of his professional career. He hit only TWO fairways. Yet on Sunday he hit ELEVEN! How did he make such a dramatic change overnight?
He stood closer to the ball at address on Sunday. That's all. In his own words (quoted on pgatour.com):
"I felt like I was swinging well. The setup was just a hair off. I was just hitting the driver a little bit towards the toe, and obviously when you hit it off the toe it does not like to cut.”
I point this out because small changes in a player's address position happen all the time, to the pros as well as us weekend players. But we mere mortals don't keep check on such things because we think we need big changes to see any improvement in our scoring.
But we don't. For many of us, we are -- like DJ -- standing too far away from the ball.
Or we might be standing too close to it. Both problems show up from time to time.
So it's worthwhile to experiment a bit at the range if you're having trouble hitting the ball where you think you're aiming.
- If you're having trouble with a slice, perhaps you're standing too close to the ball.
- If you're having trouble with a hook, perhaps you're standing too far from the ball.
And let's add one other thing to check. Your ball position might be wrong for your swing as well. You might need to move it a bit forward toward your lead foot or just a bit back toward the center of your stance.
But first I think I'd see what kind of change you get when you stand nearer to (or farther from) the ball at address. With just a little tinkering to your setup, you might make a huge improvement to your ability to hit the fairway.
Before you start making big swing changes, I think it's worth a try. After all, it fixed DJ's problems overnight.
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