It had been 18 days since I had picked up a club when I went to my lesson this past Saturday. Not exactly the ideal situation for improving your game but I did have some good reasons. The first one being that the Winter Classic wiped me out, I was golf exhausted. I didn’t think that was possible, but come the Tuesday after we played I looked at my clubs and said “maybe tomorrow” and that exchange took place over the next 18 days.

Christmas and the New Years were the other reasons for the lay off and then throw in an abnormally busy work week along with my Daughter starting Basketball and it was easy to see why my clubs weren’t getting the attention.

Luckily that little down time came to end Saturday and I got back into the swing of things with this last lesson.

When I got to the Nicklaus Academy Dustin asked what I would like to work on and with no hesitation I told him I really would like it if he could figure out why I have such a difficult time hitting my 4 & 5 irons and my 3W and 3Hybrid.

After I got done warming up (which by the way went surprisingly well considering the 18 day lay off) Dustin had me swing a few with my 5 iron. I had explained to him that it was embarrassing that I can hit my 7iron just as far as I can hit my 5iron, and I didn’t disappoint when it came time to show him. It was three or four really bad swings with that club and the work began. He could see that I was hitting it off the toe and after putting on some impact tape to verify (hit two shots with the 5 iron that were WAY out on the toe) I took a few swings on Trackman and then a couple that were recorded so Dustin could see what was going on frame by frame.

He told me I had two choices; work on swing plane or work on release to get more distance. As much as I want to grove my swing into a beautiful work of art the testosterone inside me screamed out “DISTANCE, DISTANCE!!” so that’s what we worked on.

I was shown where my clubs position is on my follow through and how it was clear as day that I’m not releasing the club properly. When I was shown the video and the comparison to where my club was and where it should be it was a big eye opener. It brought me back to the first time I ever met with Dustin, when he not only showed me why I was going over the top he also explained it to me and pointed out what I was doing that was allowing it to happen. I’ve read hundreds of articles and watched countless numbers of YouTube videos trying to fix my over-the-top swing and I don’t think I would have ever found out the correct reason for why it was happening in “my” golf swing had I not got in contact with Dustin. Needless to say I was all ears when he started talking about how we were going to fix my release and get me some more distance!

There were actually two things that we worked on; the first was some drills to work on my release and the other was some drills to stop me from swaying on the down-swing. When the information was put in front of me and I was shown the video it was easy as hell to see that a swing without the proper release and a swaying motion on the down-swing will result in 150 yard 5iron shots!

The release drills I feel I picked up rather quickly and as I progressed through them I could really feel how the club was coming through the hitting zone a lot quicker but without more effort, by the end of the release drills I was hitting my PW130+, not to shabby!

The sway drill on the other hand beat me down. It was a lot like the first time I tried to hit the ball one-handed. Very humbling to say the least. It’s bad enough that this game is hard as hell, but then throw in a drill that makes you feel like you’ve never played the game before and it will take your confidence down a notch. The good thing about the difficulty of a drill is the ability to improve. Dustin has told me before if it was easy you wouldn’t need to work at it, just like the one-handed drills, and if you were to compare my one-handed swings now to the first time I ever did it you would see and improvement. So for the past few nights I’ve been back to work in the garage not only working on my one-handed drills but now I’ve added the release drills and the anti-sway drills and I like the way my swing is feeling.

By the end of the lesson I was hitting my 5iron like it is supposed to be hit. With some snap and a noticeable “gap” between it and the distance I hit my 7iron. I’m really hoping that working on the release is going to get me some more distance off the tee. I haven’t swung my driver yet with this new approach, that’s going to happen at the range this week, but I’m very excited to give it a go.

Two lessons down and I’m very impressed so far.  Before I even started taking the lessons I had an idea what it was going to be like, boy was I wrong. I know it’s only been a few lessons, but the information I’ve taken in has really changed the way I’m looking at my overall game, and I like it!