UNEVEN LIES

PGA Professional Mark Officer illustrates how training from uneven lies can improve your golf swing.

HITTING ball after ball from the perfect lie on the practice fairway is the most common form of practice but fails to reproduce the challenge of the golf course where lies are rarely perfect.

Sloping lies can be difficult to find on a driving range but if you do get the opportunity to hit balls from them it can be extremely beneficial to develop an understanding of how the ball is going to react when the ball is above your feet, for example.

Generally the tendency is that the ball being above your feet is going to draw and the ball below your feet is going to fade. An upslope means your body slows down and your arms go past your body causing a draw shot that is also shorter. A downslope results in hitting the ball lower, flatter and a little longer as it’s easier to get the body out of the way.

While knowing there is going to be common results for shots hit off slopes on the golf course is a good start, knowing how much it is going to change your carry distance or the amount of curvature it will cause is also extremely beneficial and practicing on sloping lies can even be helpful for players with certain types of swings trying to implement changes.

For a slicer, it’s a huge advantage to be able to hit practice balls with a ball above their feet (pics 1 & 2) because, as we know, the ball will tend to go left because the lie angle is actually facing left. With a ball starting left and curving further left, if you continue to hit shots

off that slope you will realise there is no need to swing the club to the left, one of the most common causes of a slice.

If you were to hit 30 or 50 balls with the ball above your feet, the swing path and plane will start to change to straighten out the ball flight and you will get an understanding of the feel you are after in a normal swing.

Greg Norman practiced just that for a summer in the 1980s after realising he wanted to hit more of a draw shot, hitting balls above his feet to flatten out his swing plane to achieve his desired ball flight.

Hitting shots from a downslope (pic 3) is useful for someone who doesn’t transfer their weight well. Downslope lies are going to help get your weight off your right side and towards the target (pic 4) in the forward swing. Force plates and balance plates show people who hit shots on a downslope get their centre of pressure trace going more directly towards the target, which is important and helps with swing path direction.

There is even some benefits to hitting some shots on an upslope (pic 5) if you struggle with the timing of your arm swing and body turn. If your body gets out of the way faster than your arms in your normal swing it might be beneficial to hit shots on an upslope where your body is going to slow down and your arms are going to catch up and you will find it easier to hit a draw, something players whose bodies get ahead of their arms can struggle with.

GREG NORMAN PRACTICED JUST THAT FOR A SUMMER IN THE 1980S AFTER REALISING HE WANTED TO HIT MORE OF A DRAW SHOT ...