Are golf courses open yet???

The weather where I am in southern Canada is very mild for early March. My golf clubs are rattling in the garage, calling out for me to start playing golf. In fact, a few courses around here are open. Just not mine.

I’m regripping my clubs to get them ready for the 2024 golf season. I find that simple activity very calming. When I’m facing that first 10-footer for par, I’ll try to call on that calmness.

In the meantime, here’s this week’s issue of Finding the Tips.

In this issue

• Swing slower, hit farther

• How the trail arm actually works

• Hit the brakes to speed up

• First time golfer

Swing slower, hit farther

There’s a position you need to get into to hit the ball longer. If the start of your backswing is on point, you have a great chance at finding that position. Danny Maude shows you how to find it and how to get more distance while feeling like you’re swinging slower.

If you ever played baseball, Danny gives you a great drill to show you the way to more distance.

How the trail arm ACTUALLY works

If any of us compared our swings with the swing of any of the best players on the planet (pick your millionaire), the most important difference would probably be the position of the trail arm.

Chris Ryan shows us how to address the ball and how the trail arm must react as it moves from the top of the swing to the impact position. Further, Chris gives us a great drill to train your trail arm to get in that powerful position.

Hit the brakes to speed up

Slow down to speed up? That’s exactly what Chris Tyler at MyGolfDNA wants us to do. And he wants us to visualize three areas of the swing to do it.

At address, imagine a line at your belt buckle that extends down the target line behind you about a club’s length and the same distance in front. Chris calls this box the Speed zone. In this zone the golf club is released and moves VERY fast while the body moves VERY slow.

A box just above Speed zone starts at your chest and goes down to your belt buckle with the same forward and back dimensions. This is the Acceleration zone and it’s where we get the hands and arms moving very fast down from the top of the swing.

A third box lays on top of the Acceleration zone, and it defines the Slow zone. This is where the club reaches the top of the swing and where the transition to the downswing starts. There’s no rush in the Slow zone.

Chris then gives us drills to feel how we start the downswing from the ground up.

We’ll benefit from this tip by following the drill progression that Chris outlines. This isn’t a quick fix. But if we work at it, we’ll have great swing feels ingrained in our games and we’ll enjoy better golf long into the future.

First time golfer

Everyone has their own reasons for playing golf. Here’s a new one. Or is it?

For now, let’s hope more golf courses open ASAP and we can put to the test the tips you’ve found here.

As always, feel free to forward this email to any fellow golfers who might want to improve their games.