Weisheiten von Top-Spielern sind oft hervorragend geeignet in Dein eigenes Spiel einzufließen. Geniere Dich nicht, auch als junger Spieler, einen Rat eines älteren, erfahreren Spieler anzunehmen.
01 from LEE TRIVINO
Simplify draws and fades
Jack Nicklaus liked to curve the ball by opening or closing the clubface at address. I never felt I was good enough to do it his way. I didn’t like changing my swing path, either, which some guys do. There’s only one really reliable way to curve the ball: Change your hand position at address. If you want to hit a draw, move your hands forward, toward the target, so they hide your left shoe when you look down. Make sure the clubface is square to the target, and then make your normal swing. When you get to impact, your hands will naturally be farther back than that exaggerated position they started in. When the hands move backward, the clubface closes. You don’t have to do anything. To hit a fade, do the opposite: Set up with your hands back, behind the ball. At impact they’ll be more forward, and the face slightly open.
02 from JONNY MILLER
Get down on it at impact
I’m a swing-sequence junkie. I love poring over sequence photos of the best players. The feature all great iron players have in common is that their heads are lower at impact than when they were standing tall at address. They really go down after the ball, not by bending at the hips or dropping their head but by increasing the flex in their knees. They sag their knees down and toward the target at the same time, moving on a downward diagonal line. Now, you’d think this would make you hit the ball fat. But if you lean the club forward, toward the target, so that the shaft is angled ahead of the left arm, you’ll absolutely pure it. Which leads to the next rule.
03 + 04 from MARK CALCAVECCHIA
Distance is overrated
Last time I looked at the stats, my driving average was 283 yards. That’s popcorn distance. I rank 140-something in driving, and it hurts, because I used to be pretty long. But losing yards as you get older is a fact of life, and you’ll never hear me complain about it. If you find yourself thinking how much better you’d be if you hit it as far as the big hitters at your course, that negativity will hurt you. Distance is important, but you’ve got to convince yourself that it’s overrated. You won’t be far from the truth, because not many guys at the amateur level hit their pitching wedges 150 yards from the rough like the guys do out on tour, so accuracy still counts for something. Work on the areas you can control, like putting and the short game. They’ll level the playing field for you.
Try a different putting style
When I came down with a mild case of the yips a few years ago, I tried all the usual remedies. I putted cross-handed, split-handed, then tried the long putter. Those styles helped my yips but didn’t cure them. I’d watched Chris DiMarco putt great with what’s known as a claw grip, but I couldn’t bring myself to try it. It looked goofy, and I didn’t see how I could putt that way. I put off trying it for a couple of years, and I regret that, because when I finally did go to the claw, I went from being one of the worst putters on tour to one of the best. It saved my career. The moral is, if you think a radical putting style might help, don’t let pride or stubbornness stop you from trying it.
05 + 06 from ARNOLD PALMER
Be a silent partner
During one of my last tour events as a player, I noticed another pro making practice swings in my field of vision as I was getting ready to hit a shot. I stopped, walked over and reminded him (maybe too sternly) that it was my turn to play. The point is, stand still from the time a player sets himself until the ball has left the club.
Turn off the cell phone
Nobody knows less about technology than I do. But I know enough to recognize a cell phone when it rings in my backswing. If I had my way, cell phones would be turned off at all times on the course, but most clubs have given in to the fact that people are going to use them. I don’t know all the gadgets and settings on those phones, but do whatever you have to do to keep it quiet. And if you absolutely have to make a call, move away from the other players. And keep the call so brief that they don’t even know you made it.
07 from NICK PRICE
Buck the trend: Use a waggle
If there’s a trend on tour I hope doesn’t trickle down to the grass-roots level, it’s a preference for not waggling at address. Tiger and Phil have only tiny waggles, Aaron Baddeley has none at all, and more players are swinging from a static start. The waggle is more than just window dressing. It’s crucial, because it relieves tension. It establishes a sense of rhythm and acts as a preview of the swing to follow. Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Ben Hogan and Sam Snead had distinct waggles, and all were fantastic drivers of the ball.
08 from ANNIKA SORENSTAM
Follow your dreams
Some are fortunate enough to have lived their dreams. I am one of those. I won a lot of golf tournaments and earned a lot of money. And although it was very gratifying that my sponsors stuck with me when I stepped away from competition, for me golf was never about the money. It was always about achieving excellence and succeeding. If you have a new dream and begin the transition into the next challenges of your life, find a great support team to help you determine the right path. I have new dreams to chase and a great team supporting my efforts. One thing I’ve found is that the formula for success in business is the same as it is in golf or anything else: Never try to find a shortcut to success!
09 from SEAN O’HAIR
Listen to the sand.
I remember the first time I saw Jose Maria Olazabal, who is maybe the world’s greatest bunker player, practicing sand shots. His club made more of a thump than a splat sound at impact. I don’t know what his technique is, but every time I practice I just try to re-create that sound. Once I hear it, I know that whatever I’m doing is right.
