Contact

Symptoms in this group

Each one starts from something you can see for yourself. Open it to find what that shot can come from.

• Topping the ball

  The club catches the top of the ball and it scuttles along the ground instead of climbing.

• I strike it well off the ground but badly off a tee

  Shots off the turf behave, but once the ball is teed up the strike, the height and the direction all fall apart, because nothing in the setup or the delivery changed for a ball sitting above the ground.

• Hitting it fat

  The club hits the ground before the ball and takes turf first, so the shot comes out heavy, weak and well short of the target.

• Hitting it thin

  The leading edge catches the ball near its middle instead of the face meeting the back of it, so the shot comes out low and hot and stings your hands.

• Lifting your head, or being told to keep it down

  Someone tells you that you looked up or lifted your head, almost always after a topped or thin shot, and the advice that follows is to keep your head down.

• Losing posture: standing up or dipping in the swing

  Your body does not finish the swing at the height it started it: you rise up out of your address posture, or sink down toward the ball, and the strike moves between thin, topped, heeled and fat as the bottom of the arc moves with you.

• Can't compress the ball

  Contact feels soft and glancing instead of crisp, the club sweeps the ball off the turf without leaving a divot after it, and the flight is high, floaty and short for the club in your hands.

• Shanking the ball

  The ball meets the hosel instead of the face and squirts away low and almost sideways, sharply right of where you aimed.

• Skying it off the tee

  The top edge or crown of the club catches the ball, it pops almost straight up, lands a fraction of its normal distance away, and leaves a scuff mark on top of the head.

• One fat, the next one thin

  Contact never settles: one shot is hit behind the ball, the next is caught thin, and only a few come out of the middle.

• Chicken wing through impact

  The lead elbow bends and pulls up and away through impact instead of extending, so the club rises early and shots come out thin, weak and often curving right.

• Divots pointing left or right of the target

  The divot after the ball angles clearly left or right instead of running along the target line, which is the plainest record on the ground of which way the club was travelling.

• Divots that are far too deep

  The club digs a deep gouge out of the turf instead of a shallow strip, so even a small error in where it bottoms out turns into a heavy, short shot.

• Fine off a tee, hopeless off the turf

  The same club is playable when teed up but gets topped, thinned or chunked from a fairway lie, and the longer the club, the worse it gets.

• Hitting it low on the face

  The marks sit below the centre of the face, in the bottom grooves or on the bottom edge, and the shot launches low, spins too much and falls well short of the club's distance.

• Good off mats, bad off real grass, or the reverse

  Contact that looks fine off a range mat, a home mat or a simulator turns fat or thin off real turf, or a golfer who strikes it well off grass cannot hit off mats at all.

• Perfect practice swing, bad real swing

  The practice swing brushes the turf in the right place and finishes balanced, but with a ball in front of you the strike turns fat, thin or topped.

• The strike is in a different place every time

  Impact marks land in a different spot on the face with each swing, so the same club flies a different distance and bends a different amount from one shot to the next.

• Suddenly can't strike it at all

  Ball striking that was reliable last month has collapsed on the range and on the course alike, with a new miss such as a shank, a top or a chunk that was never part of your game.

• Toe shanks

  The ball comes off the very end of the face and shoots low and sharply right, or simply squirts away weak and short, and the mark is out on the toe rather than on the neck of the club.

• Hitting it off the toe

  The ball comes off the end of the face with a dead, hollow feel, flies shorter than it should, and off a driver or wood it often curves left.

• Hitting it off the heel

  The ball comes off the inside of the face near the hosel with a clunky feel and less distance, and off a driver it tends to curve right.

• Hitting it high on the face

  The marks sit above the centre of the face, up toward the top grooves rather than on the crown, and the shot climbs higher than it should and still comes up short.

• Missing the ball completely

  The swing goes past the ball without touching it, and the ball is left sitting where it was or topples off the tee.