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My season just started this week. I was able to get out a play a couple of times to shake off the cobwebs. I took a great lesson this week from a teacher I just met. He was real great, his rate was $70,but he ended up working with me for over 2hrs. I have always been a 82ish golfer in my area. However I feel I lack distance and know I lack power from my body,and thats what I wanted to work on.

Well since the lesson on Wed, I haven't been able to hit a ball at all. I keep over thinking everything he went thru and am really trying to hit the ball the way he was teaching me. Its getting really frustrating. I am supposed to start playing in my weekly league this week but if I can't hit a shot I don't know why I bother even going.

I went over to the ball field near my house tonight and hit some balls off my mat. I really struggled up to the end. The last 20 balls I hit,I was hitting at a goal about 100 yds away with my 7 and 8 iron. I was finally able to start hitting decent shots, but I was swinging softly just trying to hit the ball.

Looking for recommendations on what to do. Should I try to go back to my old swing,another lesson, more half/soft shots?

Really confused and bummed.
Thanks

I hesitate to offer you advice since I'm not nearly as good a golfer as you are but when you said that you were swinging softly it rang a bell with me. I was having trouble hitting shots especially with my 5 wood last fall and it seemed like the more I tried to just swing easy the worse it got. Finally I just started to swing hard without overswinging and I started really tagging the ball. My theory is that I have a tendency to pull up to follow the ball and if I my swing is too slow I have started to lift my head whereas if I swing harder I make contact before my head begins to pull up. I don't know if this will help but you might give it a try.

Being an 82 (and therefore far above average), I assume you have played quite a while.

So you probably have a pretty decent swing, or at least a servicably repeatable one. You likely have one or more problems with your swing that have been ingrained for years. In these situations, when you want to make serious improvement, and seek out a teacher to get those improvements, often it takes quite a while to see improvement in your scoring (even years).

You have to ask yourself how serious you are about improving. 82 is a pretty good golfer, but if you really want to approach being scratch, it may take a year or more to see any improvement. If you are serious about improving, you may score significantly worse for quite a while if you seriously work on what your teacher has shown you. If you don't want to be a worse golfer for as a long as a year or more, you probably should just accept staying at your current level and not improving much if at all.

Even as good a golfer as Tiger Woods has a setback that can last a year or more when they make significant swing changes. A single lesson and a few days working on it should not discourage you if you don't immediately see improvement. If you really want to improve, keep working on it, and don't let it get you down that you don't hit the ball as well for a while. But if you don't want to accept a fairly long time of not scoring as well, then maybe you should just stick with your swing and be content with occassionally breaking 80.

I was a mid 80's player - after a few years off, went to a pro - found some improvment in my swing - now I am in the 90's but feel much better and feel i will be in the 70's in the future.

I know this isn't advice you would want to hear from a high school golfer, but I play for the absolute worst coach ever. When I entered the golf program at my school I was shooting in the mid 80's and I brought it down into the high 70's... Then I went out on the course and my coach started telling me that I had all these flaws and such. So she (yes, she) took me out to the driving range and made me use goofy contraptions and watch film to try to achieve some aesthetically flawless swing... turns out, when she tried to change me, I lost all feel, control, and power in my shot. my drives went from 290 to 240 and I couldn't hit straight. So I ditched her ideas and went back to my old way. It definitely depends on your level. If you feel like it takes a change of your swing to lower your scores, then go see the instructor and change your swing. If you feel you can handle it, keep your own swing. honestly, there is no perfect swing, it depends on what works best for you. best of luck!

You need to focus on ONE SWING THOUGHT and ONE SWING THOUGHT ONLY.

Remember when you go out to play, you should not worry about mechanics. Target, TARGET, TARGET>>>with One swing thought that works for YOU!!

Mechanics are for the Range, I always tell my clients to work on 1 area of concentration at a time..i.e. maybe focus on the grip for your first ten balls, balance for the next 20, and impact position for the next 20 balls.

p.s. I am sure your teacher already told you to develop a PRE-SHOT ROUTINE for consistency...use this on the range and on the golf course. Get into this pre-shot mode on the range so you can carry it over to the golf course...

Remember it is a PROCESS...FOCUS on the process with patience, persistence, and a PURPOSE>>the 3 P's

Hey Jaybone,

My hear goes out to you.
What did he work on?
What did you change?
Like to help if I can.
Need more details.
Best of luck.

Dave