Welcome to Play Smart, a regular GOLF.com game-improvement column that will help you play smarter, better golf.
The direction your ball travels is contingent on two factors: club path and face angle. Club path is the direction the club is traveling through the impact zone, while face angle is how open or closed the club face is at impact. Today, we’re going to discuss the former.
Getting your swing moving in the right direction is crucial for hitting the ball straight. If you’re cutting across the ball — in either direction — you’ll have to make compensations in other areas of your swing to make up for it. But if you can get the club path close to neutral, those compensations won’t be necessary.
So how do you make sure your club path is moving in the right direction? Doing some drills will help. And in today’s edition of Play Smart, Bryson DeChambeau shares a great drill for improving your swing path.
Bryson’s path drill
The golf swing can be complex, but ultimately all you’re trying to do is get the club face to hit the ball square at impact. During the backswing and downswing all sorts of motions occur, but the goal remains the same.
When DeChambeau is working on his swing path, he keeps things simple. He sets up with a ball on the ground and then places tees on either side of his clubhead at address, forming a gate. Then he makes his normal swing.
If his club path is too far to the outside, he’ll hit the outside tee with the toe of the clubhead. While if it’s too far inside, he’ll hit the inside tee with the clubhead.
“I used to do this as a kid for hours,” DeChambeau says. “It’s a great drill if you’re just warming up or getting started, trying to get comfortable with where the face is.”
If you can get the clubhead to travel through the tees consistently, you’ll be well on your way to making solid strikes with your irons. Then all that’s left to do is worry about the face angle — but that can wait for another day.
