Top gear posts of 2021: An unbelievably simple trick to hit more fairways
It's time to hit it straighter.
Andrew Tursky
Happy Holidays from our gear team at GOLF.com. To bring you into the New Year the right way, we’re counting down our top 21 equipment-related stories from 2021. For the latest gear news, check out our dedicated equipment section, and click here to listen to GOLF’s Fully Equipped weekly podcast.
Most golfers know the benefits of drawing a sharpie line on their golf ball when it comes to putting. You simply draw a perfectly straight line on your golf ball, aim the line directly at the intended starting point when putting on the green, and try to putt the ball along that line.
It’s a fool-proof trick, and surprisingly effective.
Did you know that drawing a sharpie line on your golf ball can be useful on more than just the putting green, though?
In one of our most-read equipment posts of 2021, GOLF’s Game Improvement Editor Luke Kerr-Dineen explained how aligning a sharpie line on your golf ball can be beneficial off the tee, not just on the greens. PGA Tour players Bryson DeChambeau and Maverick McNealy both use a line on their golf ball to align themselves to the target when hitting drives to improve accuracy.
This is a Tour-proven accuracy strategy — so why don’t amateurs do it?
“I use the line on the tee to make sure my eye line is square and my alignment is good,” McNealy told GOLF.com. “A lot of tee boxes aren’t always aligned. Some are aimed left; some are aimed right; if your body alignment is off, that’s a big miss.”
Since you can place the golf ball in any orientation you please when you put the ball on a tee, you’re completely in control of how the golf ball is aligned.
So, to employ this simple trick, just aim the sharpie line on your golf ball exactly where you want the flight to start, and swing along that line. It will help you align your body to the target line, and possibly help out your golf swing out, too.
“Once you have a better handle on where the target line is, you’ll have a better sense of your swing direction and, hopefully, find more fairways along the way,” Kerr-Dineen says.
If all it takes is a sharpie marker and a couple extra seconds on the teeing grounds to hit more fairways, this tour-proven trick is certainly worth a try. To read the story in its entirety, check out the link here.
Want to overhaul your bag for 2021? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf. For more on the latest gear news and information, check out our latest Fully Equipped podcast below!
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