Ultimate Golf Blog

If you take the time to read the comments left by readers of this blog, you might wonder what my instruction has that other instruction doesn’t.

Well, here’s your answer  - and the secret that makes Golf Swing Control work like magic:

GSC shows golfers how balance works and how to make it work for them so they don’t have to work at their golf swing.

But it doesn’t stop at the golf swing…The most important 6 inches in golf is between a golfer’s ears.

Balance will help there as well! Please allow me to explain…

The very first rule you need to know before you will ever master golf or the golf swing is the rule of Dynamic Balance.

Dynamic Balance states that the brain’s first priority when your body is in motion is to keep your body in balance so that you don’t fall and hurt yourself.

So why is this so important? Good question!

If you start your golf swing from an out-of-balance stance, your brain’s first priority will be to try to get your body into balance. By doing so, it will REDIRECT THE GOLF MUSCLES IF NEEDED - whether you like it or not.

But the fight to keep your body balanced gets into physics and Newton’s laws of motion, so the body has a tendency to over-correct for the original imbalance, and then re-correct for the over-corrections.

It can’t just fix the situation and be done with it, so the out-of-balance pendulum is swinging back and forth in smaller increments while you’re trying to swing a golf club.

Even if the body gets balance, the club will not be in the position it started, so who knows what will happen when the club gets back to the ball.

Here’s the rub, most golfers (even pros to a lesser degree) start their swing from an out of balance position, which means that their body is actually FIGHTING AGAINST THEIR GOLF SWING the whole time they are moving.

Doesn’t sound promising, does it?

Here’s why balance is so important: If you start movement from a balanced position, your brain WILL FIGHT TO HELP YOUR GOLF SWING accomplish its goal.

So Balance can be your best friend or your worst enemy…

But getting into balance isn’t as simple as it might seem at first.

Ask any guru HOW balance works in the body and you probably won’t get an answer that will help your golf game. You could probably hold a million dollars in front of them and they wouldn’t be able to answer the question properly to get the money.

Why? Because they take balance for granted and most of the pros are in pretty good balance… most of the time… And they have drills you can use to get into balance, so it doesn’t matter.

But it DOES MATTER, and I’ve proven that with the results of thousands of golfers around the world who play better just because they understand balance and how to use balance in their golf game. If you go to just about any golf instructor and he sees that you are woefully out of balance (and unfortunately too many don’t because they don’t recognize balance issues), he may try to correct the balance situation with a simple drill.

He’ll give you the drill because it gets results, but he won’t be able to explain what the drill is really doing for you or how you know its working. So, later when you get on the golf course and the old habits start to creep back in, you can’t see the problem, you don’t know how to recognize the problem any other way, and you may or may not have the mental clarity to try the drill he gave you to hit the ball better.

The result is a bad day on the course with no idea of why, and no idea as to a way to correct it. Sound familiar?

But what if instead, you were able to tap into a reliable feedback in your own body that would tell you exactly what is wrong?

Better yet, what if that same feedback gave you the means to fix the problem right there?

But what feedback can do that? NOT MUSCLE MEMORY…

Why? Because as you warm up or cool down, your muscles change the feedback they send to the brain. Since the feedback is always changing, there’s no way to know just what your muscles are trying to tell you.

For example: When’s the last time your backswing felt fine, and then an instructor told you that you were flat or too upright, maybe sliding or reverse-pivoting?

The feedback I’m talking about is balance feedback and you already use it 24/7… to keep yourself in balance. You just don’t realize it yet because it is used “behind the scenes.”

When’s the last time you tripped and instantaneously threw your arms or legs out to catch your balance? That was balance feedback and dynamic balance at work.

Balance in the body is not the simple as balancing a stick on a pivot. The stick doesn’t have the ability to change relative shape as the human body does by throwing out arms or legs. Balance in the body is satisfied when two requirements are fulfilled.

First the whole body has to be balanced as a stick would be on the points of contact. But the complicated part is that each muscle and its opposing muscle must be working evenly.

If one muscle is pulling more than its opposite muscle (all muscles work in pairs - like your bicep and tricep in your arms) then when the muscles are relaxed, the body will change shape (arms drop for example) and the basic balance will be lost.

It is this principle that makes the golf swing such a challenge.

For example; If you are set up and your lower back is getting tight, it’s because those muscles are out of balance with their opposing muscles in the core. If you take the time to feel your leg muscles, you’ll find that the muscles in the backs of your legs are probably real tight also.

Even if the weight feels balanced in your feet, you are still out of balance because your muscles will want to even out with their opposing muscles as soon as you start moving. If they can’t move because they are too tight, you’ll lose the use of those muscles and their opposing muscles in the golf swing.

So step one - and the most important step in golf for a consistent swing - is getting into a properly balanced setup.

Doing so makes the golf swing work much more efficiently with less effort and better results.

But the setup and the golf swing the golf aren’t all there is to golf. No, each shot has certain obstacles to overcome, such as the elements, and to make matters worse; the mind is constantly getting in the way of doing it properly… But as I said before, balance can fix that…

How do you fix the mind with balance? Glad you asked!

First the problem: If the mind is in the way, any golf psychologist will tell you to quit thinking.

RIGHT! They’ll tell you that if you just focus on your target, your swing will take care of itself.

But does it?

You have to think on the golf course. You have to consider the parameters of each shot and adjust the plan for each shot accordingly. You can’t “not think” on the golf course.

The problem is that you can’t “think” your way through a physical motion either.

When you trip and your arms or legs suddenly shoot out to keep you from falling, do you think about it?

Do you think about your arm movement when you turn the steering wheel in your car? So how does it work?

The answer to the brain-in-the-way problem is again, an understanding of how the brain works with body motion.

Here’s how it happens:

Before you move any muscle, the brain creates a visual signal; a map of sorts to guide the movement.

That picture is based on two types of input to the brain; the external forces acting on the body or around the body, and your balance feedback.The brain has to check balance feedback because it must create a balanced movement if possible.

When you monitor your own balance feedback, you’ll start to see the pictures the brain creates for movement. Once you see the picture, your mind will focus better and the movement will be more accurate.

So balance feedback initiates visualization.

Let me prove it with a simple exercise: Take a walk. Every time you set a foot down, try to get an exact idea of where the greatest amount of pressure is felt under the foot.

As your body moves on the foot, try to get an exact idea of where the weight moves along the foot; i.e. along the outside of the foot, inside the heel to the outside of the toe.

Do you push off of the big toe or the smaller toes? Keep working on this until you know exactly where the foot has the most pressure for each moment that foot is in contact with the ground.

If you are relaxed, you will see a picture of this pressure map in your mind.

Now change the patterns by changing where you want the weight to be felt.

You’ll see that your mind will change the picture and the body will follow. That is what we are doing with the golf swing.

If you can feel and control how you walk on your feet, you can feel and control how your body makes the golf swing.

Here’s a bonus nobody realizes until a friend compliments them on how their swing looks…

By making the golf swing in balance, your swing will naturally adjust itself to match your body structure. And YOUR SWING PLANE?… That’s decided automatically by balance as well!

One less thing to think about.

The last step is using this visual thought to increase focus on the course.

Focus will automatically be increased, but there are some tweaks I do for competitors that increase it further.So can you see why it’s so important? It’s all in the Golf Swing Control course and that’s why so many golfers are playing so well by studying it.

Please post your comments below - let me know what you think!

Hit’m well,

Tracy

To learn how to find a perfectly balanced setup, click: Setup Routine Video

To quickly gain confidence and accuracy in your swing, click: Golf Swing Control

Popularity: 11%