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Trending golf faults
Nothing is ranked yet. A ranking only means something once enough golfers have been through the site, and rather than dress up a handful of visits as a trend, this page waits until it can. Until then, the faults below are where most golfers start.
A symptom needs at least 10 visits in the window before it can be ranked, and the list appears only once 3 of them do. The page is rebuilt every hour.
Where most golfers start
Not a ranking, and not counted from anything. These are the symptoms the site was written to answer first, because they are the ones most golfers arrive with: the shots that cost the most strokes and turn up on every range.
Slicing the ball
The ball curves hard to the right and finishes well right of where you aimed.
Ball flight
Topping the ball
The club catches the top of the ball and it scuttles along the ground instead of climbing.
Contact
I can't hit a draw
You set up to curve the ball from right to left and it fades anyway, or it starts right and never turns back, so the draw is never there when you want it.
Ball flight
Coming over the top
Someone has told you, or the camera has shown you, that the club swings out and across the ball from the top, and your shots pull left, slice right, or do both.
Ball flight
Hooking the ball
The ball turns hard left and runs a long way after landing, whether it starts left and dives further left or starts right and crosses back over the target.
Ball flight
Losing distance
Shots carry noticeably shorter than they should with the same club, sometimes even when the strike felt solid, and a shorter club goes as far as a longer one.
Ball flight
Misses go both directions
One shot goes hard left and the next goes hard right, so there is no reliable side of the hole to aim away from.
Ball flight
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
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.
Contact
I don't aim where I think I do
The strike feels fine but the ball finishes offline, because your feet, shoulders or clubface point somewhere other than where you think they do.
Setup
I never know where the ball should be in my stance
The ball sits somewhere slightly different each time you set up, and the strike changes along with it.
Setup
My grip is too strong or too weak
Your hands sit turned too far one way on the handle, the face keeps arriving open or closed, and the ball misses to the same side shot after shot.
Setup
I never know how high to tee the ball
You guess the tee height, or it changes from hole to hole, so teed shots come off the crown, the top edge or the bottom grooves, and the miss changes with the height.
Setup
Blading chips across the green
The leading edge catches the middle of the ball on a chip or pitch and it shoots off low and hot, running across the green and well past the hole.
Short game
Chunking chips and pitches
The club hits the grass before the ball on a chip or pitch, so the ball pops forward a fraction of the distance you wanted, sometimes only a few feet.
Short game
No distance control on partial swings
Anything less than a full swing finishes well short or well long of the number, so the in-between wedge yardages are the least predictable shots you have.
Short game
The ball won't come out of the bunker
It takes two or three swings to escape: the ball moves a few feet in a spray of sand, or comes out low, hits the face and rolls back to your feet.
Bunkers
Missing short putts
Putts from three to six feet, the ones you expect to hole without a second thought, keep sliding past the edge or lipping out.
Putting
No distance control on the greens
Long putts finish well short or well past the hole, so the first putt seldom leaves you a tap-in.
Putting
Three-putting too often
Too many greens take three putts or more, usually because the first putt leaves a second that is longer or harder than it should be.
Putting
Great on the range, lost on the course
You strike it well ball after ball on the range, then the same swing starts topping and chunking it, or sending it sideways, as soon as the round begins.
Tempo and pressure
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