Paul Waring
The Englishman, who finished a career-best 22nd on last year’s Race to Dubai, gives us his favourite tips from tee to green
1Beating a slice A lot of handicap golfers come over the top and across it and hold the face off. If you let the club drop underneath you and ensure the path through the ball goes to the right, rather than pulling across and hitting down at it, that can help.
2Reading greens I use a bit of Aimpoint. Sometimes when you look from one side of the hole it looks right-toleft, and from the other left-to-right. It can trick your eye, so I tend to use my feet to feel it, and I don’t think that tricks me too much then.
3Match play I always try to imagine my opponent getting out of trouble, never believing they’re going to keep messing up. That keeps me concentrated. If you think you’re going to win a hole and they then drain a 30-footer or something daft, that can knock you out of your flow a little bit. Expect the unexpected.
Next shot after a shank
Try and hit another one! Actually, no. Stand further away.
Holing out from three feet I would suggest lining up and closing your eyes. When you’re over a three-footer, you can see the hole in your periphery and the clubhead as well, and your eyes start going everywhere. Some people could definitely benefit from closing their eyes. I close my left eye a lot when putting.
6Increasing power Use the ground better. You should be really pressing in on your right side on the backswing and then, with the transition, making sure you’ve got the weight pushing hard into that left foot. It’s changed in the last 20 years. People are talking about ground force more at the moment – I know Rory talks about it a lot.
7Bunker play Commit to it – you’re meant to take a little bit of sand between club and ball. You’re not trying to physically scoop the ball out, you’re almost trying to hit down at the sand behind the ball a little.
8Better ball-striking People physically try to hit the ball in the air – they’re trying to help flight it. But clubs are designed to be hit down with – especially irons. To hit down more, look at ball position. Some people have it a bit too far forward, whereas if they put it a little further back, they could actually find the bottom of their arc.
9Creating more wedge spin It’s down to strike and speed, and also the way the wedge is delivered to the ball. You need speed and power to create spin, and full shots will spin a lot more than half shots because you’ve got more speed and more compression. Taking spin off is actually more of a problem for me, so I’ve gone to hitting softer shots to do that.
10How to practise Time spent in different areas is massive, especially when you consider that golf is based around 70-odd shots in a round, and half of them are putts. You should definitely spend more time at the putting green and short-game area.