[PHOTO: Keyur Khamar]
In case you didn’t know, here is the science behind why you’re slicing: your clubface is open in relation to your club path at impact. That’s all there is to it. Where the ball curves depends on your path (in to out, out to in, neutral in relation to your target line). For example, for a right-handed golfer, if the path is straight at the target or moving a little in-to-out in relation to the target, the ball will start right of the target and curve even further right. If the club’s path is out-to-in in relation to the target line, the ball will start left of the target but curve back to the right.
That’s why you often see right-handed slicers adjusting their bodies more and more to the left of the target in the hope that they can start the ball far enough left that it won’t overshoot the target on the right. Unfortunately, the more they swing out-to-in, the more the ball curves.
There are a lot of things you can do in the golf swing to prevent a slice, but if you’re stuck inside because of wet weather or want to do something about it without hitting a heap of range balls, you can train your body to really help the club swing down from the inside. The most common reason amateurs slice the ball is because they initiate the downswing with a big rotation towards the target with their upper body. This throws the club way out on an out-to-in path. If they’re lucky enough to square the clubface to that path, it will produce a “pulled” shot that flies straight, but offline. Most of the time, however, that ball is going to curve away from the target.
Remember that during the downswing, the lower body leads while the upper body rotates on an axis. This allows the club to move into the ball from inside the target line. That means if you are right-handed, your right shoulder should move down towards the ball while your left shoulder moves up and away from the target – like you see Si Woo Kim demonstrating above.
Training your body to rotate from a titled axis takes work on the range, for sure, but a little work in the gym also will go a long way to making sure you can banish the banana ball for good.
