It has been just more than a year since my beautiful light went out. Months of the 2023 year were passing like weeks, weeks like days, so fast it is all happening, like I wanted my end here to become as soon as possible. I lost my nerve to think about golf almost completely, I stopped to to read books from my library, I stopped to watch swings of famous players and I stopped to think about my amateur studies....
However, suddenly it has dawned to me that it would be unfair to everyone, including my Dear Wife to end this blog that way. I said to myself that my miserable existence should still include giving something to the world even if it is so insignificant as my amateur theories for golfers. I have been recently slowly but steadily returning to golf, even enjoyed few Trackman sessions with my Son. To my great content it appeared that my swing, although very rusty, is still consistent and timing-proof to a degree, so to speak. Of course I used my Controlled Draw swing, as this was what I was working on as the last pattern before the break.
Funny thing, I was never a fan of practice swings before hitting balls. What is to be stressed here, this practice swing makes the late inside approach in the following swing (see the picture below) practically automatic. Unfortunately, it does not make the angle of attack of the clubface automatic, however, it is entirely compatible to the long flat spot concept and the horizontal AofA of the whole clubhead is not that fat away from 0 degrees.
Furthermore, practice swings might be a precious link between the address and the waggle and the real swings. As you might remember, we have never dealt with the issue of setting up too close or too far away from the ball. It has dawned to us that the closer you set up to the ball the less are the chances of swinging from the outside as there is no time for an excessive opening up of the body in a rotational motion. It somehow forces the shoulders girdle to stay closed while the whole torso is opening which makes the draw swing even more automatic. Please look at the diagramme below:
The green spots are just bottom ones of swings depending on how close we are from the ball (of course in exaggeration). Notice that the closer we are not only the longer the bottom spot is (we have explained this in detail in the articles devoted to the Flat Spot Concept and Phil Rodgers) but also their location and direction is very different. Why it is like that ? Because when we try to swing very closely to our feet we shall hit the ground much earlier than in case we hang out to reach the ball. It is just a perfect scenario for our practice swing -- to swing between the ball and our feet while having adressed to the ball before and without changing neither our feet nor our joints' presets and just following it with our true swing.
Imagine two middle green spots for a better understanding -- the lower and right one symbolizes our practice swing while the upper and left one is our true swing:
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