New Nationwide Tour Student - Blake Adams

 

Below I have included some screen shots and explanations of the changes we have made:

 

 

I will explain more of the changes in detail as time permits, but for now, you can see one major change to get things started. The swing on the left is during our playing round but BEFORE I did any work on his swing. Blake plays the ball just about off his back foot for most all iron shots and flips his hands through impact in order to square the face with such an extreme ball position. While he has made this work well enough to make it through PGA Qualifying School this year, it was necessary to move the ball slightly forward in order to correct his tendency to block shots (As he did on this one in the left frame) and to hit quick hooks. That was the reason for making the changes to his swing. Before ever making a change, I insisted on playing 9 holes with him to get an idea for what types of shots he hits in the real world, not just on the range. While he shot 1 under for the 9 holes, it was evident by his misses that this was the first problem to tackle.

 

As we moved the ball position more forward, Blake was able to approach the ball from a less extreme inside angle and not have to release his hands so aggressively to square the clubface. As a result, you can see in the second frame that he can now setup square rather than slightly closed as he did before and hit a little draw. He now hits the ball more straight and can even have a slight fade, which will be more consistent for him week in and week out. Notice in the frame on the right his shoulders are more open at the same point in the swing. This is something that we will continue to work on as necessary if he still tends to flip, but as you can see at impact, he is in a very nice square position and his body has cleared better as his weight has been allowed to more naturally transfer to his left, giving him more power with less effort and less hands.

 

 

These changes of only a few degrees in body rotation and a different swing thought have gotten him to the point where the club rotates about 10 degrees less a couple frames past impact which is evidence that his hands are flipping less through impact.

 

Blake is coming down tomorrow to work for another week or so on his game and I will continue to update you on his progress. Look for him to play well this year on the Nationwide Tour when starts up around the end of March.

 

-Chuck

 

Omar

 

Great stuff. It really makes me feel good that there is someone out there at that level of golf (Nationwide Tour) that 1)struggles with flippy hands and 2) has successfully made it to a tour with that swing fault! I am currently having problems with the same thing. Ball position and alignment has been a problem of mine forever. I am continually working on this in my practice sessions. I also like the angle formed by his right hand as he approaches impact. The club is so parallel to his target line! This is also something else I have been working on and I have seen my ballstriking improve.

 

Do you think you will do any impact bag work with him?

 

Do you plan on posting his swing in the members vault (maybe a video lesson?)

 

 

At the top of his swing his arms are in a much better position, as his body as can be seen on the left. He doesn't hunch over as much at address and gets into a more athletic position at the top (we extended his 7 iron 1.5" over standard the night before - he's 6'3"). The clubface is much more square than before also, a very important change.

 

 

Huge improvement here. No more flippy from this position.

 

 

Huge difference here all the way around. Shoulders aren't tilting as much, clubface not shut and on plane.

 

Pretty amazing differences for just his second lesson. Shows what a phenomenal talent Blake is to be able to make changes like this and hit the ball even better.

 

 

Lastly, we're still working on this one, but it is significantly better going back on plane. Before he was very steep with an extremely cupped left wrist and it took some great hands to get the job done. The clubface is not hooded as before either which has made a huge difference in his accuracy. Now Blake feels much more effortless bringing the club back down and his accuracy is now dramatically improved. On the range with his 7 iron, he was literally missing the flag by inches and feet slightly left or right of the target, not yards, and hitting it about 175. Very exciting stuff.

 

Pretty dramatic changes for one day, much more invasive than I wanted to be to be quite honest but he talked me into it and convinced me he could do it. I literally gave him one hour to work on it before I was going to take it back several notches, but he made it look easy. Like the commercial says, "These guys are good."