Alignment is one of the most challenging fundamentals to master. Even highly accomplished players can go through periods where lining up the target becomes challenging. It seems so simple. Why would lining up your body to the target be such a challenging thing? I'll give you a clue about that. The very wording of the question above is at the root of the problem. I'll explain.
To illustrate, I’ll give a common scenario that beginning golfers face and I’ll show how it can lead to a long list of problematic issues.
SCENARIO
So, there you are, the beginning golfer. You’re ready to take on this game called “golf”. You’ve seen the pros on television. They make it look so easy. And yet, your friends who play assure you that it is the most confounding and difficult sport that they have ever played. Unsure as to which will be more true for you, you step to the driving range poised to become the next Tiger Woods or Annika Sörenstam.
You pick out a flag in the middle of the green field and take dead aim, ready to become the phenomenon who hit the perfect shot on your very first try. You ready yourself, take a deep breath and away you go. You swing…and you miss.
*NOTE: If you did not miss on your first try, congratulations. You are among golf’s elite.
When you finally do figure out how to make contact with the ball, you receive the joy of seeing that little white ball flying though the air, the result having been directly caused by something you did (even if you have no idea what it was). You rejoice, not caring in the least about the direction that the ball actually went.
*NOTE: If you did care about the direction of your first ever golf shot and became frustrated that it did not go exactly where you wanted it to go, do yourself a favor and take up another game. I hear Sudoku is fun. Perfectionists tend to end up despising a game that so rarely produces a perfect outcome. That is, unless you are a masochist, then by all means, have at it.
Following your initial ecstatic moment, you find yourself hitting a few more off the ground, feeling certain that now you’ve got this “hitting the ball” thing pretty well figured out. Soon, however, you begin to come down from the ecstasy and elation of getting the ball in the air. You have gotten your first golf “fix” and you are ready for more….NOW!
*NOTE: Welcome to the world of golf addicts. We have a therapy group that meets every seven to ten minutes (fifteen to twenty minutes if the weather is horrible) during daylight hours (sometimes at night) on the first tee at a golf course (maybe in an open pasture) near you.
Next, you begin to notice that your shots are generally flying to the right of that thing you are aiming for out there.
*NOTE: If you are not aiming at anything and are having a grand ol’ time…ENJOY! Hold on to the joy of just watching that little white ball fly through the air. Invariably, it is only a matter of time before you will find yourself slamming your club on the ground in disgust because your shot went 250 yards but didn’t curve to the left enough. If you are still deriving great pleasure from the flight of that little sphere that you are whacking out into infinity and beyond, close out of this blog now. Seriously, the rest of what I have to say will be horribly boring to anyone who is not hopelessly and irreversibly addicted to the pursuit of being the greatest to have ever played the game of golf…or the best golfer in the area…or at the local golf course…or in the family…or in the foursome…or between imaginary friends.
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You're still reading. Sad.
Well, if you must, you must. But, I beg of you, never forget that this always has been and always will be a game about whacking a little white ball and deriving great pleasure in watching it soar through the air. The rest is about friendship and sharing a laugh when fate (or a horrible golf swing) send your ball careening into the trees, a lake, the sand, someone’s backyard…or even into the bottom of a well-manicured, 4.25 inch diameter hole in the ground.
Okay addicts, sorry for the digression, but it had to be said. Now back to this whole alignment thing. I promise I will be much more serious from this point. This is, of course, relatively speaking.
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You notice that your shots are generally flying to the right of your target. You think to yourself, "I must be doing something wrong with my swing. I need to hit it so it goes farther to the left." Five thousand shots later, you are either hitting a big hook (a shot where the ball curves in the air from right to left) or a pull (a shot that goes straight but left of the target) or you have overcorrected and now you hit a vicious slice (a shot that bananas from left to right in the air) or some other horrid result that has you considering taking up knitting instead of “this stupid game”.
In reality, this is a scenario that most beginning golfers progress through when they begin learning the game on their own. If it has happened to you or someone you love, take solace in knowing that you are far from being alone.
You may be wondering, “Why does it happen?” and “What do I need to do to correct what is going so wrong?” and “Is he ever going to actually teach me anything?”
Okay, okay…jeez.
There are two things that are generally happening in this scenario that need to be addressed. The first, alignment, we will cover in this chapter. The second, a balanced, on-plane golf swing, we will deal with in another chapter. For now, let’s focus on the fundamental of alignment and how our mind and eyes trick us into a false sense of straight in the game of golf.
FIGURING OUT “GOLF-STRAIGHT”
A tendency that I have seen in myself and in the vast majority of the students I work with is that of lining up the feet and body to the target. This makes sense in our minds. The thought goes something along the lines of, “Aim my body at the target and the ball will go there.” That seems like pretty sound thinking, so we give it a shot and away we go.
The problem is that our bodies are not on the target line…the ball is. We are standing a few feet inside of that target line.
In order to get the ball lined up to the target, we have to get our bodies parallel to the line of the ball.
What happens for most beginners is that they aim their body at the target and, in reality, the parallel line of the ball ends up being aimed off to the right of where they think they are aimed.
This information can be extremely confounding to the mind and sometimes words don’t teach it as well as a visual representation. If what I said did not just cause a moment of enlightenment, let’s look at it visually.
In the above drawing, the feet and body are aimed directly in line with the target. The ball, however, is aimed on a parallel line headed off to the right. Without a conscious understanding of this alignment flaw, a golfer can spend years of frustration trying to manipulate the ball to go “straight”. A player with this issue will hit a ball to the right and think they hit a “bad shot”. Actually, they may have made a good swing and instead of realizing their alignment issue, they begin to change their swing to match their poor alignment.
Trust me, it is much easier and more productive to fix the alignment issue than to try to groove a repeatable “pull it left” swing to match the “aimed to the right” alignment.
Here we have a representation of square alignment. The feet and body are parallel to the target line and the ball is now on line to the desired result.
ALIGNMENT SHOCK
When I work with students who are struggling with alignment issues, their first reaction when we begin to get the body square to the target line is almost always one of shock. They can’t believe how far to the left they feel like they are aimed.
What has happened is that they have trained their eyes to see a skewed version of straight. When they look up at the target with that skewed vision and a “pull it left” golf swing they are convinced that the ball will go way left of the target…and they may be correct. They now no longer need to make that golf swing that they have become accustomed to making. They can now begin to work on a golf swing that is balanced and on plane. As I have said earlier, we will cover this balanced and on-plane golf swing in a later chapter. For now, even if you hit every shot 30 yards to the left, stick with working on your alignment. With this basic fundamental in place, a lot of good things can begin happening in your game.
DRILLS AND TIPS TO HELP GET YOU TO THE ALIGNMENT PROMISED LAND
Test Your Alignment
Take 2 clubs. Set one club on the ground near your ball and use the other club to prepare to hit a shot. Make your best attempt at squaring your body to a specific target. Then, take the club in your hand and set it down at your feet with the shaft of the club touching both of the tips of your shoes. Take the other club and set it, removing the ball, in the exact spot where the ball was and parallel to the other club. Now walk back behind the two clubs on the ground and draw an imaginary line that extends out beyond the club where the ball once rested.
How far off were you from the intended target? For many, this can be an eye-opening experience.
From time to time you may want to revisit this exercise to check how you are progressing with your ability to line up squarely to the target. You will especially want to recheck things once you have begun working with the other tips in this section.
I should also add that it is important to square your entire body, not just your feet. Your head, shoulders and hips should be just as square to the target as your feet are. This will be discussed further when we cover the fundamentals of stance and posture. For now, getting your feet square will be an excellent start in the quest for proper alignment.
Club-on-the-Ground Drill
To begin training your eyes to see “golf-straight”, set a club on the ground between you and the ball, making sure that it is parallel to the intended target. Now, for every shot, simply make sure that both of your feet are at an equal distance from the club you set on the ground. You don’t have to have your feet touching the club; however, the closer the club is to your feet the easier it will be to make sure your feet are both the same distance from it.
The value of the “club-on-the-ground drill” is that each time you hit a shot you can be assured that your feet were square to the intended target. You will be training your eyes to see “golf-straight” and you will also be eliminating one variable from your results. Consider it a bit of a scientific experiment. You will now know that, whatever the result, it was not caused by your feet being poorly aligned. You can then begin to experiment with a golf swing that matches your newly found, square alignment.
You are not allowed to use an alignment aid such as this when you play the game, but it is an excellent way to improve your alignment when you are practicing. In the next tip, a strategy for aligning without the help of an aid like the club on the ground will be discussed.
Jack’s Alignment Tip
Years ago, I read a tip from Jack Nicklaus about how to line up squarely to the target when you are playing. I have used this tip ever since and, regardless of other suggestions that have come my way over the years, I invariably return to Jack’s advice. I do so because it is the simplest and most repeatable way to line up to the target (without the help of an alignment aid like a club at my feet) that I have found. As one of my students recently said, “If it’s good enough for Jack, it’s good enough for me”. Harumph.
*NOTE: For those not familiar with the work of Mel Brooks in the movie “Blazing Saddles”, “Harumph” basically means “I agree”...and you really need to see “Blazing Saddles”.
Start off by standing behind the ball, with the ball directly between you and the target. Next, draw an imaginary line from the target back to the ball. As your eyes come back to the ball on that line, look out for something that stands out on the ground, no more than three feet in front of the ball. You are looking for something that is fairly obvious and precise. Things like the edge of a divot, a blade of grass that is taller than the others, etc. make for good alignment assistants. These are part of the golf course and are allowed by the rules to be used to help you get square.
*NOTE: When you are playing the game, if you throw down a tee or some other object “pretending” to have accidentally dropped it and then use it as an alignment aid, this would be against the rules. No one would know but you, but then you would have to deal with that pesky conscience of yours at night as you lie in bed contemplating your heinous crime against the game of golf.
Once you have your spot picked out, walk into the general area where you are going to take your stance with the club in your right hand.
