I was having a quarterly lesson with Bill from far up north on one his Southern getaway trips to see me and play a little golf for a few days. He told me he had not played or practiced much because of bad weather and a bad economy. He did say he was practice swinging and was confident the swing was OK.
We went to the range to warm up before playing and his first few swings did look real good. His backswing was just about PPGS text book. His knees were wide and the left resisted moving in the takeaway and on up into the backswing. He lifted the club nicely toe up into the mitt and then up the tree, with a limited turn and the left arm over the toe line. He finished the backswing with the club ¾ and vertical, just as the DVD's and swing manual say and show.
But that is where the textbook ran out of correct chapters, as his downswing was over the top. It started with his left foot lifting a little and turning or sliding left, opening his body way to the left. He swung down and around to a 'Huggy Bear,' arms collapsing and wrapping around the body at or lower than chest high and he was struggling to not fall backwards. His divots were deep and aiming way left of the target. His ball flight was left to right fades to big slices with an occasional low pull and/or hook and all lacking distance.
One look was all I needed to see the cause. Bill was aiming at least 50 yards right of his target. The left foot raised and slid left to allow his body to slide/turn out of the way to clear his body so his arms could swing down the aiming line, trying to hit it straight. The only problem, as happens with aiming right and clearing the body to swing the arms down the line, is that the arms and club are pulled up and thrown out and then pulled down and across the aiming line, causing the outside to in swing path and slice.
The cure started with adjusting his setup routine. His walk in routine was pretty good but Bill had a habit of over swinging his left/front foot past parallel to his aiming line causing the closed stance. I recommended he practice setting his left foot and also his right with a club or stick parallel left of the aiming line on the ground to get the correct movement or swing to toes parallel left of the aiming line down pat. Next, I advised him when both feet were set to have his eyes run his toe line to be sure that his toe line was parallel left of his target. I have come to find that we get so focused on the square clubface and aiming line that we almost never ever look down and check to see where our toe line points. Checking where the toe line points will greatly help reduce aiming right.
The final correction needed to cure the outside to in downswing was to get Bill to swing up to the T ' Finish with his hands finishing over his left shoulder and close to his left ear. Swinging up to the T ' Finish is the real deal to correcting and changing the swing path in the downswing to an on line path to impact, then up to a square finish. This will make impacts more solid and straighten out the ball flight. Bill didn't get to dead straight, but he began hitting it much more solid and his soft cuts were going considerably farther, which pleased him immensely.
It is really amazing how many swing problems are the result of bad alignment. Remember, my Surgism for alignment states that 90 to 95 % of all swing problems arise out of alignment. So when you are hitting big slices and pulls and impact is not solid, place your club across your toes before walking out of your finish and step back and check your alignment. If it is wrong, you have to correct it to parallel left for swing corrections to work. When the alignment is correct, the PPGS falls right into place and ball striking will improve quickly, as it did with Bill.
The Surge!