Complete Guide To Better Driving

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Complete Guide To Better Driving

Hit the ball further and straighter in 2020 with help from Andrew Reynolds

Dball well is one of the great pleasures golf has to off er. What’s more, if you are able to make a full, athletic swing and watch the ball sail off towards the target, your whole game will get a vital injection of confi dence. On the fl ip side, nothing will undermine your game like consistently missing fairways. In this feature, Golf Monthly has teamed up with one of the most highly respected coaches in the country. Andrew Reynolds is the head professional at Royal Cinque Ports Golf Club, and his tips and drills will help you set the platform you need to hit the ball further and straighter in 2020.

1Five set-up keys Let’s start with the boring part –the set-up. You might think your address position is good, but in my experience most of the issues amateurs have with their driving stem from simple set-up errors. Whatever you are trying to work on in your driving, devote some time to grooving a technically sound address –I promise it will pay off! Here’s how to build the perfect pre-shot position...

4. Posture Now set the perfect posture –this is an essential aspect to good ball-striking. Stand upright and keep your spine straight, then bend at the hips and flex your knees until your upper body is nicely set over the ball. 3. Body alignment It’s now time to build your stance. The key here is to ensure that not only your feet but your knees, hips and shoulders are all parallel to your ball-to-target line. It should look like you are stood on a train track.

2. The grip Now grip the club, ensuring your palms are facing each other. A handy checkpoint is the logo of your glove –it should be pointing towards the target, not towards you or the ground.

1. Aim the face Before doing anything else, aim the face of the club directly at your target. The face angle has the biggest effect on direction, so take care to aim it correctly. 5. Ball position The final piece of the jigsaw is to ensure the ball is set just inside your left heel. This will help you find the ideal upward angle of attack through impact.

COMPLETE GUIDE TO BETTER DRIVING

2Tee-height tip With your driver, you should be looking to strike the ball slightly higher on the face than you would with your other clubs. This creates a high launch and low spin –ideal for more distance. To help, tee the ball up so the equator is in line with the top of the driver, as shown here.

3Alignment trick You will often hear professional golfers explain the importance of being as specific as possible with your aim. The idea here is that if you aim small, you’ll miss small as well. When teeing the ball up, pick something just in front of it that sits on your target line to aim at. In this situation, there is a broken tee peg on my line. I can use this as a handy reference point from which to build my stance and narrow my aim.

4Slice fix For the majority of golfers who suff er with a slice, the issue stems from leaning back through impact. By doing this, the face will stay open and you will lose the ball to the right. Instead of keeping your weight on your back foot through impact, try to ‘cover’ the ball with your chest. Notice how my sternum is over the ball in the right-hand image. Finding this position through impact should help kill your slice. As you work on this in practice, close your stance slightly at address –this will also encourage a better in-to-out swing path.

In practice, close your stance slightly

COMPLETE GUIDE TO BETTER DRIVING

5Ball accuracy drill Often, the difference between a good swing and a bad one is nothing more technical than your rhythm. Finding the right tempo will help the sequencing of your swing as a whole, and this drill will give you a great feel for what the right speed is for you. Take nine balls and split them into three piles. For the first three shots, hit the balls as hard as you can and keep a rough note of where they go. For the next three shots, swing the club as smoothly as you can. Finally, hit the last three balls taking ten per cent off your smooth swing. You will notice some trends in terms of the ball flight. It might be that your flat-out swing hits the ball a bit to the right (you might well be able to use that knowledge to your advantage on the course). Of course, what you will also notice is which swing speed delivers the straightest flight, and that’s the one you need to stick to on the course.

Warning: Whenever you use a practice drill that involves hitting shot after shot, take a moment between them and build a good stance before each one. Simple mistakes here can skew the results.

6Use the tee Where you choose to tee the ball up can have a huge effect on the success of the shot. The simple advice here is to choose the position that will promote the shot shape you are looking to create. As a right-hander looking to hit a fade, tee up on the right-hand side and aim towards the left edge of the fairway. Alternatively, if you hit a draw, tee up on the left side and aim more to the right. This process will open up the fairway and build a positive pre-shot mindset.

The face should point slightly left of target

COMPLETE GUIDE TO BETTER DRIVING

Warning: Don’t use your driver in this scenario. There isn’t enough loft for you to close the face and get the ball airborne. A 3-wood of around 15˚ should have enough loft to create a straight ball flight.

7Driving in the wind One of the big challenges you face from the tee is controlling your ball fl ight in the wind. Without question the direction to master is a crosswind that encourages a slice. This is a nightmare for most golfers, but the solution is surprisingly simple. Put your driver away and use your 3-wood instead. Before you set your hands, simply turn the top of the grip so the face points slightly left of your target. Now take your normal grip and stance. This basic adjustment will create a small amount of hook spin that will hold the ball straight in the wind.