golfrewind.com

I've been told not to "lash at it as hard as I can" off the tee but my questions is how can slowing down my swing gain me distance, I'm sure its good advice but I don't understand why?

Making better contact with the ball, for one. When you hit the ball off the sweet spot, you're going to gain a lot of distance over, say, a toe ball.

second what Mike said. Also when you're not "lashing at it as hard as you can" you tend to have a lighter grip which promotes correct hand rotation, and you also tend to stay on plane which also will lead to straighter longer shots.

When you really go after one you might catch it in the sweet spot every once in a while and really hit it out there, but the other times you almost miss the ball. It's best to find a sort of happy medium. Swinging out of your shoes for the chance at 20 extra yards isn't really worth it anyway.

mr3856a summed up it, the thinking is if you slow down your swing, you'll make better contact with the ball, thus it'll go farther. I have mixed opinions on this theory, but I won't go into it. A good gauge would be if swinging "balls out" is 100%, try dialing it down to 80% and see how that works out.

All good points above, however IMHO I think when you swing easier you tend to release the club better. Trying to muscle the ball may cause you to hang back, not get a good weight shift through the ball and hang on through impact leaving the face open and causing the ball to slice.

Yep..another good one. I started doing this last year and just couldn't fix it..and it just hit me a couple months ago that I'm not releasing the club. Once I started making an effort to release the club I did start to hook everything, but no biggy...it's just a matter of playing around with it and dialing in.

The resistance of the lower body to upper body is one of the components that helps to create power. Obviously, there are alot of other things (solid ball contact, club head speed, roll, etc.) but the resistance will help us hit it farther than if we don't have it.

I just had a great lesson (I've been struggling) and the pro said something that made alot of sense to me. One of the flaws I was making was to straighten out my right leg (I'm right handed) on the backswing. He had me keeping it flexed, which felt wierd as heck at first.

But, he said that the upper body should turn against a stable lower body on the backswing. The downswing should initiate with the lower body against a resistant upper body.

It took me about two weeks to start to feel it, but when I did, it felt really nice. Now, I try to turn my upper body without turning my lower much (look at Tiger or Ernie at the top of their backswing), and I try to start turning my lower body and actually try to hold off my upper body for a second. The lower body ends up basically dragging my upper body with it. At least that's what it feels like.

When I hit it solid, it goes farther than it did even though my swing is shorter due to the more stable lower body.

Feels cool.

I was just reading in last months issue of Golf Magazine how to add 25 yards to you tee shots. Its called the "X" factor. By drasticly turning your hips at the top of your swing while keeping your shoulders square, you create a ton of power and maximum swing speed. A really great article. It also gives you about 6 exercises to do that will help the "X" factor and the flexibility used in the "X" factor. I'm not sure if it actually works but I'm deffinatly going to give it a try this season.

You've received a lot of good information from other posters.

Another good part about slowing down your swing is that it insures you get a better weight transfer to your right side on the backswing. It's the weight transfer along with the coil created by the lower body resisting the upper body that creates stored up energy and power in your downswing.

My best golf swings are made when everything seems so smooth it's almost effortless.

It was mentioned above but not in so many words.... momentum transfer. Swinging within yourself is much more likely to result in your weight behind the ball and moving through it correctly.

I would only like to add my opinion about the backswing. If done too slowly and with a feeling of pausing at the top, as some teachers suggest, you will not load the shaft much, if at all. I'm not advocating too quick of a takeaway or backswing but it should be done smoothly and with enough speed to properly load the shaft as you transition from backswing to downswing. If you don't load the shaft you won't generate much distance no matter how well you perform the rest of the swing. jmo.
Jerry

Thanks for the tips lads :)