Slicing Out Of Trouble

Video Transcript

Golf would be very boring if you landed in the middle of every fairway and the middle of every green. In fact, the best players in the world only hit about 13 greens in regulation anyway. Every round of golf, you are going to be in the trees or in the rough where you are going to have to shape the flight of the ball one way or the other. The shot we are going to look at here is the deliberate slice shot. To get the ball to slice, we need to create a clockwise spin on the ball. Now to create a clockwise spin, it is simply going to be a matter of having the clubface open, or pointing to the right of the path of the swing. If I can get the path of my swing pointing to the left of this tree in front of me, and I have the clubface open to that path, that is going to create a clockwise spin on the ball and the ball is going to curve from left to right. You don’t have to block your hands or do anything special in your swing, it is really just a matter of getting your setup correctly. The first thing I am going to do is take my normal grip but then I am going to open the clubface. Now opening the clubface also does something else to the club, it adds loft. I have a 4-iron here but by opening the clubface it is going to turn it into a 6-iron or maybe even a 7-iron, so make sure you allow for this by taking plenty of club. I then aim my bodyline off to the left. That is going to get the club at the moment of impact traveling left of the tree, getting the ball started to the left before the clockwise spin takes the over. I have got the clubface open, I am aiming left, my 4-iron is really going to be about a 6-iron, and then I just make my normal swing. That swing got the shot back on the fairway and from there at least I am back in play where I have a chance for par.

Steven  Bann
385 Centre Dandenong Road
Heatherton
Victoria Australia 3202
Tel: 61 3 9558 3688

Steven Bann is director of the Pure Golf Academy in Australia and instructor to PGA Tour Pros Stuart Appleby, Robert Allenby, and K.J. Choi.

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