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    2 Most Common Causes Of Penalty Strokes

    Aside from knocking your ball into a hazard or out-of-bounds area, the two ways most commonly found to pile up the penalty strokes are from lost balls and unplayable lies.

    When you hit the ball in a wooded area on the side of the fairway, and the location is not considered to be out-of-bounds, you can dig around and try your best to find the ball. In doing so, one of the following three things is bound to happen:

    1. You may find the ball and then attempt to hit it onto the fairway.

    2. The ball might be located in an unplayable lie, which means that there is no chance to make a shot. You're only two options are to pick up the ball and move over by two club lengths or hit the ball again from where you originally took your last shot. Either way, you pick up a one-stroke penalty.

    3. The ball may not be easy enough to find, and can be declared lost. This means that you have to go back to the area where you hit your last shot, shoot over, and take a penalty stroke.

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    • « The Slice Shot Nightmare And How To Stop it | Home | Keep The Game Of Golf Stress Free »

    The Embarassing Shank Shot

    By Foursome | February 15, 2008

    Golf takes time and practice, especially when you are just starting out with the sport and are frustrated by common flawed shots, like the annoying slice or the dreaded hook, which essentially causes the ball to veer off severely left or right, instead of straight towards the intended target.

    Then there is the “shank”. The shank has got to be one of the most embarrassing shots a golf player can make. Look at it this way, hitting a shank is worse than missing a one or two-foot putt. This is one experience that you want to avoid at all costs!

    What Causes The Shank?

    You create a shank whenever you hit the golf ball with the “hosel” portion of the club, instead of the actual club face. When the ball hits the hosel, which is a thin and round surface, it is sent sharply to the left, or right, and hardly becomes airborne, traveling at the most 25 to 35 yards.

    If you are shanking the ball too often on the golf course, the odds are very good that you are probably extending (pushing) the club out and away from the body on the downswing portion. Or you may be coming into the ball with a severe outside-in movement, which causes the hosel to come forward and hit the ball before the clubface can reach it.

    In order to fix this problem, the first thing to do is be sure that your swing path is coming from the inside. By practicing this adjustment in your swing, the toe of the club will lead the hosel and your swing will come inside and out, producing a properly released clubhead, and the end result is a shankless shot.

    Try This Practice Drill

    You can easily train yourself to avoid hitting a shank with this simple, two-step drill:

    1. Using 2 tees, place one into the ground where your ball would be placed. Take the second one and place it approximately 2 inches outside of the first tee.

    2. Now you simply swing and aim for the first tee. Keep your swing easy and try to hit the first tee on target while completely missing the outside tee. If you are hitting both tees then you are pushing the club out and away from you. Keep on practicing until you are only hitting the first tee at each shot, thereby eliminating the shank with consecutive in-to-out swing paths.

    Topics: Fairway, Tee Box, Tips & Practice |

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