The Only Weight Shift that Matters

Weight shift. Bring this topic up among golf instructors and get ready to hear a whole bunch of differing opinions.

Some teachers will say that your weight should start forward, stay forward, and keep going forward. Others will advocate a distinct shift to the trail foot during the backswing, with a corresponding shift forward. Other still will tell you to keep your weight centered during the swing. How the heck is a golfer supposed to know what to do?

Its pretty clear that its possible to swing each of these ways and have success. Examples of players doing all of the above can be found on professional tours worldwide, having varying levels of success. There is a common denominator though. Any player that strikes the ball consistently exhibits the following: They gradually move their weight forward during the swing, reaching impact with the majority of their weight on their front foot, and continue moving weight forward into their finish position.

This allows a consistent impact position with the handle of the club forward, the bottom of the swing in front of the ball, and the club striking the ball first and then the ground. Any teacher will tell you that making impact this way is the only consistent way to strike a ball.

So for the average player, the answer is to keep it simple. Don’t worry about what you’re doing with your weight on the backswing, unless it affects your ability to move weight forward incramentally during the downswing. If you’re comfortable transfering your weight, do that. If you prefer not to, that’s OK as well. Just make sure that it’s moving forward when you make contact, like the world’s best players do.

Whose Game is it Anyway?

Are you competitive? In golf, just like in life, a lot of us have competitive tendencies. We want to be the best, to beat the best, to win. This can be a great motivator, and can drive people to do great things. But, sometimes it hurts us. The golf course can be one of those times.

Have you ever played with a guy you thought you “should” beat, who beat you instead? A tendency I’ve fought in my own game is to get caught up in the games of my playing partners, rather than focusing on my own. This is a no-win situation. Think about it: If your partner is playing well, the tendency is to start pushing to keep up, taking you away from your game plan. If your partner is playing poorly, sometimes you take your foot off the gas and get complacent.

Recently, I came across this great footage of Davis Love III playing a practice round at Quail Hollow in Charlotte, NC. Take a look:

What do you notice? Yes, DL3 has a great swing, blah blah blah. But notice the utter lack of interest that he takes in the shot of his playing partner. DL3 has placed his focus purely on his own game, his own process, his own shot. In this way, he has removed a source of distraction.

Take a tip from Davis and try to put this focus into your own game. Whether your buddies are having a hot round or a poor one, keep the focus the same: Your game, your process, your shot. You may find that this helps you to play your best more often.

Sean Foley Walking the Walk

As Sean Foley gains notoriety as Tiger Woods’ new coach, its interesting to see how the man himself swings a club. Here it is folks:

$50,000 for a Twitter Account?

Tiger Woods is just the latest tour player to jump onto the social media bandwagon as a way of connecting with fans. Lets take a look at one of the first, and still the most successful.

Stewart Cink is a pretty good golfer. He’s won multiple tournaments on the PGA Tour, most notably the 2009 British Open. But no matter how handy he is with his golf clubs, he’s even more adept with his smartphone. Every time Stewart tweets (his twitter handle is @stewartcink), his message is seen in its original form instantly by 1.2 million twitter users. Let that sink in for a second, 1.2 million. He’s been able to create this kind of reach largely because of the quality of his content. His tweets have included insight into the PGA tour life in a way that has rarely been seen. He even tweeted pictures of his trophy celebration with the claret jug. More importantly, he’s provided insight into Stewart Cink the human being, above and beyond Stewart Cink the golfer.

Now, it helps that Stewart is by all accounts the all-american nice guy. He has a thriving family and enjoys some pretty cool interests off the course. But the connection that he has with his fans through twitter is what’s beginning to define him as one of the most interesting sports personalities around. And he has used his platform accordingly.

One of his sponsors, Nike Golf, ran a contest during this year’s British Open in which Cink’s followers could tweet inspirational messages which would then be displayed on Cink’s golf bag during the event. The campaign was a huge success, and from the thousands of messages sent, a couple hundred were displayed on Cink’s bag. The campaign established Nike as one of the leaders in leveraging it’s players’ social media successes.

The website “Tweetvalue.com” places the value of Stewart Cink’s twitter account at over $50,000. But considering the relationship that Cink has been able to build with his fans, and its value to sponsors such as Nike, that amount is staggeringly low. Cink’s accessibility to fans has gained him exposure and the sponsor dollars that go with them, probably well over that amount. And it has established Cink as one of professional golf’s most interesting players. That puts the price tag just a little bit higher.