Eighty percent of all golfers don’t get to achieve a handicap of less than 18. This is simply because of inconsistency in their golf swing. While you may have difficulties, it should be simple because the major thing you really need to achieve is consistency.

Achieving this golden consistency can help you hit the ball square, giving you longer distances every time and can shave off 7-10 or more strokes off your score. The key principle to consistency is to have a simple golf swing. It is a swing where there is no wasted movement and is easy to do, no matter what. The best way to do anything, whether it is golf or anything else, is to keep it simple.

Spine

One of the secrets to a good golf swing is to have a stable spine which you can work around. Keeping it straight will enable you to use your spine as an axis for your body rotation. Most golfers with high handicaps have a lot of unnecessary movements, swaying as they swing. This makes them waste a lot of energy in those movements and not let them focus on the ball itself. The best way to achieve that consistency is to coil around your spine and limit hip rotation. This will let you put power into your golf swing.

Limit Hip Movement

By having a stable spine, you are to limit hip rotation in your swing. Hip rotation is good for other sports like boxing, but it is no good in golf. Hip rotation will cause you to sway as you swing, which makes it ineffective. Only swing around your spine, and you can take the sway away from your swing.

Back swing

Power is crucial in a golf swing. You can get this by not swinging the club too far back as all you really need to do is to coil around your spine. This is a key in getting power.

Those are three basic principles you need to keep in mind – swing around a stable spine, limit your hip rotation, and shorten your back swing as you don’t really need to swing it back to parallel. These can help you achieve efficient movement in your swing.

The thing you have to remember is that the best golf swing does not have a lot of movement to it at all. Professional golfers understand this principle, and that is why they have such low scores.

When you have trained well and long and hard, your body “becomes” the golf swing itself, as some golfers put it, and almost effortlessly, your swing becomes consistent. By achieving the most perfect golf swing for you, your confidence will be increased.

1. Gives you “Synchronized Power” Automatically.
Because you start turning your core (shoulders, chest & abdomen) first, this makes you make a full turn giving you a bigger backswing. Your core will just automatically turn right body parts at the right time. This “simple sequencing” makes the Symple Turn much more powerful than any other way of turning.

2. Reduces The Tendency To Arm Swing
Because you start your swing by turning your core (shoulders, chest & abdomen) you automatically make a bigger more powerful turn than normal reducing the tendency to lift the club with your arms.

3. Reduces Pulls
Making a Symple Turn makes it much less likely that the front hip will open prematurely on the downswing causing an Outside-To-Inside swing path resulting in a pull or a hook. Because you are NOT turning the front hip forward during the first part of your backswing (or not very much) then you don’t have the need to “turn the front hip back to square” which is often the beginning of the motion that opens the front hip too soon in the swing pulling the shoulders to the left (for a right handed golfers) causing a pull.

4. Makes it easier to keep the front leg straight
Since the front hip doesn’t move towards the ball it’s now much easier to keep the front leg straight. This reduces the tendency to move the body up and down which can cause fats shots and topped shots.

5. Gives you a much more consistent repeatable swing.
The Symple Turn is a much easier motion to do so it’s makes your swing much more consistent. Fewer parts of your body are moving so it’s easier to coordinate.

The bottom line is the Symple Lower Body Turn will allow you to hit the ball longer, more accurately and much more consistently.

If you do “rotate your hips around the spine” as in the conventional swing that means you have to coordinate the motions of the front hip, front leg, rear hip and rear leg. With the Symple Turn the hinge or rotation point is your front hip so you only really have to move the back hip and back leg. Again the main thing we’re trying to do is create a stable base for the upper body (shoulders, chest & abdomen) to provide the power for the swing.

Don’t just turn your back hip away (turning your core WITH your hips) and then swing with your arms. That motion might be necessary if you have serious back problems but you would be sacrificing significant power. Your power comes from your core so you should see your bellybutton turn a little (from square with your hips), your chest turns a little more and your shoulders turn a little more than that.

When using the traditional swing, golfers try to rotate their hips around their spine. In order to turn their hips around their spine they have to bend their front knee which brings their front hip forward (toward the ball) plus sometimes straightening their back leg pushing their back hip away from the ball. While that does rotate the hips it means moving and coordinating a lot of body parts. That requires a lot of timing and practice.

The traditional lower body motion has problems because it tends to over rotate the hips. Over rotating the hips has been tolerated in the conventional swing because most everybody slices and the over rotation of the hips does help somewhat with getting the club face closed.

Here’s how to make a Symple Power Swing Lower Body Turn

Stand up straight with feet a little wider than shoulder width. Then lock your front leg straight. (Important to keep in mind we normally do not “lock” the front leg we just keep it straight but when trying to learn the correct motion it’s okay to lock the knee back) (Your back knee is stays bent at address and through the back swing and downswing.)

Next pull the back hip back away from the ball. As you pull the back hip away from the ball (keeping the front leg locked straight) the front hip should act as pivot point or hinge. Practice this turning a number of times feeling the pivot point of the front hip. Do this a number of times turning your upper body with your hips. Then do it a few more times and don’t turn the upper body much at all, just turn your hips. Next, then get in your address position and try that lower body motion a few more times just as you would in your swing.

Here’s the Symple Turn sequence.

1. Begin the swing by turning the upper torso (chest and shoulders) around the spine.

2. Then let the turning of the upper torso pull that BACK HIP AWAY FROM THE BALL. (Your front hip moves just slightly towards the ball it just becomes the pivot point which allows you to turn your back hip away from the ball.

Do not bend your front knee and move your front hip towards the ball to begin your backswing. The problem with bending the front knee and moving the front hip toward the ball on the backswing is that you have to straighten the knee and move the front hip back away from the ball on the downswing.

It’s when you have to move the front hip back (on the downswing) that most people wind up over rotating that front hip and opening that hip up (moving it past square and back away from the ball). That opens the hips up too much, pulling the shoulders open and causing either a pull or a slice (depending on the position of the club head at impact).

If you do “rotate your hips around the spine” as you would in the conventional swing that means you have to coordinate the motions of the front hip, front leg, rear hip and rear leg. With the Symple Turn the hinge or rotation point is your front hip so you only really have to move the back hip and back leg. Again the main thing we’re trying to do is create a stable base for the upper body (shoulders, chest & abdomen) to provide the power for the swing.

Go to Symple Swing and learn more.

Next post we will discuss the benefits of this simple lower body turn.

What does it really mean to ‘Turn the Core’? We use the term ‘turning the core’ quite often yet a lot of folks don’t really understand it. Even when we say the ‘core’ is the abdomen, chest and shoulders together as a unit most people nod their heads and realize it has something to with the body but most don’t really understand what a ‘core turn’ is.

We’ve come up with a little drill that should help. It’s designed to teach you the feeling of ‘Turning the Core’ while chipping.

You start by finding an open wall where you can stand with your back to the wall with your butt up against the wall and your feet together. You will be bent over at the waist in a chipping address position. Depending on your body size your feet will likely be 4-6 inches away from the wall. As normal keep your feet together with most of your weight on your front leg.

Your goal is to make your chipping motion without any CONSCIOUS arm or wrist power just by turning your upper body. Your arms should be loose so your core can actually swing your arms. Your goal is to make your chipping motion with your ‘core’ not with your hands and arms. Your arm, wrist and the club will lag a split second behind your core. There is some “thumb cock” (cocking of the wrist in the direction of your lead thumb) but that cocking is a reaction with the loose arms not a conscious hitting at the ball.

You should feel your stomach, chest and shoulders turning as a unit. On longer chipping strokes you should feel just a little turning with the belly button. Although your hips shouldn’t be turning much (because your butt is up against the wall) you should feel a small turn of the stomach. On longer chipping motions, if you look at your belly button you should it turn just a little bit.

Your ‘Triangle’ (the triangular space formed by your chest and the your two are should remain intact throughout the whole chipping stroke even the longer strokes. The inside of your upper arms should be glued to the sides of your chest so your chest, shoulders and upper arms turn as a unit (but your arms should be loose).

You won’t be able to make a long chipping motion in this position but that’s a good thing. Your chipping motion should have a short backswing and an accelerating downswing that continues through the ball. Your chipping follow through should be longer than your backswing. Make some practice chipping strokes gradually lengthening your stroke.

Here the key point: You should NOT feel any CONSCIOUS arm motion or wrist motion doing this drill. Try chipping some balls in this position. You should have a good appreciation of ‘Turning the Core’ now. If you think you’ve got it here’s the next step.

Note: we are not saying don’t turn the hips at all when chipping. We’re just trying to reduce the amount of hip motion to give you more consistent and more accuracy shots. On really, really short chips you don’t need any hip motion but on longer chips some hip motion is normal. The purpose of the hips against the wall drill is to teach you what reduced hip motion feels like not to have you hit without any hip motion at all. All too often golfer chip by turning their hips instead of turning there core (torso).

Practice this same core chipping motion with one arm. Hold the club in your lead hand. Then take your trail hand and grab your lead hand wrapping your finger over and around your lead hand. All of the fingers of your trail hand should be wrapped about your lead hand rather than on the club. Then keeping your lead upper arm against your side make a one arm chipping motion again using your core not your arm as the power of the chipping motion. When you chip with one arm you should feel the arms being swung by the core (shoulders, chest & abdomen).

When you think you’ve got it, then take this swing outside and make some practice swings. Start with shorter chipping motions. Then gradually lengthen your swing. As your swings get longer you will feel your hips turning a bit which is normal and exactly what we want. However you should watch to make sure that the hips are turning synchronously with the core.

By now you should see that the chipping motion is the heart of the Symple Swing method. The beginning of chipping motion is identical to the beginning driver backswing. The downswing of the chipping motion is a main component of the downswing of the full swing.

The full swing is longer but it’s actually the same basic swing motion as the chip. We say you hit the ball with the same swing from the chip to the driver because the same basic ‘Core Turn’ is the heart of every Symple Swing motion.

A slide or sway off the ball and onto the back leg. From here the player finds it difficult to get back to the front side during the downswing. He may end up lunging back to the ball and dragging the whole body and the club with him.

The result is often an open face hit and a corresponding slice. Or a topped shot.  Or he may be unable to freely move back to the ball and end up hanging back on the right leg (or left leg if he is lefthanded) while he makes the stroke. This position produces weak shots, slices and topping the ball.

The body, arms, hands and the club are not drawn back in unison but the several parts are moving independent of one another. This creates a less than desirable position at the top, from which it becomes difficult to synchronize all of the parts in the downswing.

It becomes very hard to move the club in a single plane stroke. If the club changes plane during the swing, the player must add additional force (Newton’s first law) to the thrust or the club will decelerate.

In many cases the player is already swinging at his limit and cannot create the extra force needed. Out of synch swings also greatly reduce the chance of a square, on center, contact with the ball. The effective mass of the collision is reduced and the ball goes off line as a weak shot.

Frequently the player initiates the takeaway with his hands. One result is that he wraps the club around the backside and overturns, making it vitually impossible to get back to his front side and to the ball, similar to the sway move described above.

The front arm moves ahead of the torso and virtually flattens onto the chest. This makes a synchronized downswing, with the club head catching up to the hands for a square hit next to impossible. Net result – a block or a slice.

Another common fault is that the player takes the club back with his hands outside the target line. He becomes trapped on his back leg. On the downstroke he initially casts the club backwards in an effort to free himself. He ends up falling back, away from the target, with a weak, slice swing.

Bobbing the front shoulder and head up and down in the takeaway, leading to an erratic swing and miss hits.

Any of these common faults, or combination, prevents a powerful on plane hit and  reduces  energy transfer to the ball. Accuracy is greatly reduced.

With the proper set up and grip, Symple Swing allows the player to arrive at the top of the backswing in a tight, compact position. All he needs to do is rotate the shoulders and top of the spine to initiate the takeaway. He will make a one piece backswing into a defined “slot” at the top. Swaying, elevation changes, casting – all of the above difficulties – are eliminated.

Well first off, what you should not do is  bang your clubs on the ground! Or jump up and down and scream like a three year old!

Don’t turn away and not watch the shot! Never complain to your playing partners about all the bad breaks you’re getting.

1. Accept it was a bad shot and that every golfer has MANY bad shots.

2. Watch every bad shot because at the very least it will make finding the ball easier. Quite often you can learn what you did wrong by watching the flight of the ball.

3. Next, decide how you can minimize the damage already done! Don’t turn one bad shot into a triple bogey. Make sure you only lose one stroke!!!

4. Then you should try to objectively analyze what happened in your swing to cause the bad shot and if you can, try to figure out what not to do next time so you prevent it from happening again. (Not everyone will be able to do this.)

5. Finally, after you’ve learned what you can from watching and analyzing the bad shot, FORGET ABOUT IT!!! Don’t think about it again. Remember the most important shot in golf is “The Next One”. Just keep concentrating on your next shot.