===================================================
How To Break 80 Newsletter

December 26, 2007

“The Web’s Most Popular Golf Improvement Newsletter”
===================================================

In this issue we’ll discuss…

1) Eliminating Tension Cuts Strokes
2) Getting Hip To Power
3) Question of the Week - Hitting From a Sidehill/Uphill Lie
4) Article - Change Your Game Without Changing Your Swing
5) Article - Grooving Your Swing

===================================================
1) Eliminating Tension Cuts Strokes
===================================================
Tension is an insidious golf “disease.” Usually, it starts in your hands and then creeps into every muscle in your body. It breaks down your golf swing. And it strips it of power and accuracy. When tension gets into your address position, it generates mistakes like the dreaded pull hook. Eliminate tension from your body and you eliminate strokes from your score.

Bad swing thoughts cause tension. They include thing like:
* Thinking about swing technique
* Confusing power with speed
* Recalling a bad memory or experience
* Doubt about the shot

To eliminate tension, focus on the bad thoughts causing you to tense up and eliminate them. Doing that produces a smoother, more rhythmic swing that drives the ball longer with much less effort. Here are some suggestions for achieving a tension-free swing.

* Add to your pre-shot routine a starting thought of feeling relaxed by focusing on slowing down your heart. Take deep breadths with an inhale count of five and an exhale count of five. This exercise prepares you for taking a lighter, softer grip.

* Make mini swings in slow motion. Concentrate on your core rotation, with your hands and arms swinging freely and the weight of the clubhead moving slowly through the impact zone. Make a conscious effort to relax your hands.

* Before walking into your address position recall the feeling of your most solid shot and how great it felt when the ball left the clubhead. If you don’t have any good shots to recall, think of a memory (family, pets, jokes, etc.) that makes your feel good.

Sports science research tested the longest drivers on the PGA and LPGA tours. It found that they had several common tendencies, including the absence of tension in their hands and bodies. Eliminating tension from your hands and body may not help you drive the ball as far as a tour player, but it adds power to your swing and helps cut strokes from your game.

===================================================
2) Getting Hip To Power
===================================================
The young guns on today’s PGA Tour think nothing of driving a ball 300 yards. To hit a ball that far you need flawless hip movement to obtain maximum power from your swing. But golfers—even good ones—are prone to making two common hip mistakes: (1) sliding their hips past the ball without enough rotation and (2) spinning the hips too early without proper weight transfer. These mistakes short-circuit power and hamper accuracy.

Below are 5 keys to achieving proper hip action:
1. Take your normal address position
2. Unlock your hips
3. Transfer your weight
4. Push your backside out
5. Maintain your spine position

In a good downswing, there’s a point where the weight transfers from the rear hip to the front hip, setting it up as the rotational center for your release. This is called hip whip. It only occurs if you unlock the hips at address, so that your abdomen is retracted upward and inward. This motion causes your backside to protrude, acting as a counterweight to keep you in balance.

In addition, maintaining your address position while swinging prevents your lower spine from thrusting toward the ball and ruining your hip whip. To take advantage of the hip whip, the spine must never move toward the ball, since that ruins the ability of the hips to rotate—a key element in generating power and accuracy.

Hip Drill
Put the ball on a tee and assume your normal address position with two clubs, a 6-iron and a 7-iron. Lay the butt end of the 6-iron against your back hip, just inside your hip line. The head of the club should rest on the ground inside your back foot. Hit a shot with the 7-iron, keeping your back hip back as you start down. Since the hip is supposed to slide before it rotates, the 6-iron should stay propped up. If the hip spins prematurely, the club falls to the ground.

=====================================================
3) Question of the Week - Hitting From a Sidehill/Uphill Lie
=====================================================
Q. I totally enjoy reading your newsletter, and have drawn on several of your pointers to help lower my handicap (currently at 11). I do however have one shot that sends shivers up my spine every time I encounter it. That shot is the sidehill/uphill lie (ball above my feet). It matters not whether I am hitting a fairway wood, a mid iron or a wedge, I invariably hit an ugly short shank, which is needless to say very frightening. I do not shank the ball on any other shots. My expectation is that I will hit this ball right to left (I am right-handed), but that does not happen. Sure would appreciate some advice with this.

Thanks for your consideration,

Brian Fedy
New Hamburg, Ontario

A. Thanks for the question, Brian. I’ve been getting a lot of questions on sidehill/uphill lies lately, so you’re not alone.

The main concern with sidehill/uphill lies, as you indicate, is keeping the ball from flying right (for right-handers), the result of a more upright swing produced by the slope and your address position. The more upright swing forces the club to take an out-to-in path through the hitting zone, sending the ball right.

Here are 5 other keys to preventing the ball from flying right:
1. Put weight back on heels
2. Aim left to allow for fade
3. Maintain your spine angle
4. Keep your head at the same level
5. Stay down through hitting zone

To hit this shot, you must bend from the waist more than normal, which can cause you to fall forward. To compensate, stand a little closer to the ball, choke up on the club, and set your weight back on your heels. Maintain your spine angle and your head level throughout your backswing, and aim slightly left to allow for a fade.
In addition, focus on staying balanced at the top of the backswing, maintaining a smooth rhythm in the downswing, and on keeping your left heel firmly planted through the downswing, which counteracts the slope. Also, keep your chin up, which allows for your shoulder to turn. Above all, stay down through impact. Follow these tips and you’ll conquer the sidehill/uphill lie.

If you’ve got a golf question you’d like answered, send an email to us at questions@howtobreak80.com and we’ll review it. I can’t guarantee that we’ll use it but if we do, we’ll make sure to include your name and where you’re from.

===================================================
If you want to truly discover the secrets of shooting like the Pros and creating a more reliable and consistent swing, check out: http://www.HowToBreak80.com

Also, for past issues of this newsletter and some of my most recent articles, visit our blog at www.HowToBreak80.com/blog

To view this newsletter online, please visit:
http://www.howtobreak80.com/newsletter12262007.html

Here are some of my recent articles:

4) Article - Change Your Game Without Changing Your Swing
http://www.howtobreak80.com/articles/changeswing.html

5) Article - Grooving Your Swing
http://www.howtobreak80.com/articles/grooveswing.html

Until next time,

Go Low!

Jack

P.S. Feel free to share this newsletter with family and friends. If you would like to subscribe to this newsletter, send a blank email to break80ezine@aweber.com

===================================================
About the Author
===================================================
Jack Moorehouse is the author of the best-selling book “How To Break 80 and Shoot Like the Pros!”. He is NOT a golf pro, rather a working man that has helped thousands of golfers from all seven continents lower their handicaps quickly. His free weekly newsletter goes out to thousands of golfers worldwide and provides the latest golf tips, strategies, techniques and instruction on how to improve your golf game.

What does throwing a baseball and swinging a golf club have in common? They both use the ground to add some power to a motion. You wouldn’t get anything on your throw or hit the ball very far if you didn’t. You wouldn’t think of throwing a baseball without pushing off on your back foot, would you? Often, leveraging the ground is a natural tendency. But sometimes it’s not.

Ground leverage in golf is the same principle applied in every day actions like walking, skipping a stone over the water, or closing a car door. Ground leverage enables you to add thrust and power to your action. In golf, this ability must be learned. And that takes concentration and work. But once you’ve mastered the mechanics of ground leverage, it can have an enormous impact on your swing and your golf handicap.

Start with the Setup
Your setup has a lot to do with how much ground leverage is in your swing, so we will begin there. To create ground leverage, you need to make some setup changes. The five golf tips below will help you leverage the ground when swinging a golf club.
* Widen your stance
* Flare your back foot in
* Flare your front foot out
* Use a trigger
* Transfer your weight

The changes in your setup are minor, but taken together they have a profound effect on distance. Begin by widening your stance slightly to shoulder length (measuring from the inside of your foot.) Flare your back foot in slightly to create a solid coiling post to support your backswing as well as your torso rotation and weight transfer. Also, flare your front foot out slightly. This setup may feel a bid odd at first. But it doesn’t restrict your ability to turn. More importantly, it stops you from twisting you hip, producing a reverse pivot.

With a reverse pivot, you do the opposite of what you should do when transferring wieght. Instead of transferring your weight to your back foot and then to your front foot when swinging, you (1) transfer your weight to your front foot during your takeaway, and then (2) transfer it back to your back foot during the follow through. This sequence constricts your body turn, short-circuiting power and inhibiting consistency. Golfers with a reverse pivot don’t get much on their drives or iron shots.

Get Comfortable
Since this setup is new, take a few practice backswings to get used to the feel of it. You should sense a lighter coil. Notice also how your front foot points forward with your toe open toward the target—almost as though you were stepping forward to throw a ball. This open foot position offers the best leverage into the forward swing.

The open foot position also encourages your weight to shift and allows your rotation to powerfully unwind your hips, arms, shoulders, and hands with full acceleration. On the way back down, use ground leverage to create the dynamic weight transfer and acceleration that produces power—the kind of power that drives a ball for distance and helps lower golf handicaps.

Add a Trigger
In addition to using ground leverage, many golfers with low golf handicaps add a trigger to the process. Some players push the front knee slightly towards the target. This move acts as a forward press, triggering their swings both mechanically and psychologically. It also helps build up rhythm, another contributor to power. Gary Player uses his knee. Jack Nicklaus turns his heads slightly to the right. Use whatever works for you.

Using ground leverage can have an enormous impact on your golf scores and your golf handicap. Ground leverage takes advantage of a simple principle that we use every day with a wide variety of actions. In golf’s case, using ground leverage must be learned and mastered, whether through golf lessons or on your own. Once mastered, it helps you drive the ball longer and straighter.

Jack Moorehouse is the author of the best-selling book “How To Break 80 And Shoot Like The Pros.” He is NOT a golf pro, rather a working man that has helped thousands of golfers from all seven continents lower their handicap immediately. He has a free weekly newsletter with the latest golf tips, golf lessons and href=”http://www.howtobreak80.com”>golf instruction.