If you’ve ever wondered what was the cause if your inconsistent golf shots, you might not have to look any farther than your right elbow.

There is a very natural motion happening, and if you manipulate it in any way, you take your swing off plane and make it very difficult to come back to impact in the correct position.

So the goal is to understand your right elbow movement in golf, and if you want to see a video that will help you understand this better, click on the image below.

I have worked very hard on correcting how my joints and body (biomechanics) move in the golf swing, and my goal is to save you the 12 years I spent figuring it out, and get you playing better golf fast.

You’ve most likely heard the phrase “impact is everything”, but I’ll go one step further and say your release in your golf swing is everything.

I know for me personally I still struggle with an inconsistent release that results in mishits and sometimes a loss of distance. Sometime I “early release”, other times I have a perfect release and really compress the golf ball.

Learning the correct hand action through impact is crucial to better ball striking. If you are struggling with a lack of consistency and distance, you can most likely trace it back to your release.

The most common fault among high handicap golfers is the early release, which results in a flip at impact. When you flip (and I fight this a lot) you cannot compress the golf ball, and your contact can be anything from a thin, chunk, toe or even topped shot.

This is why it is so important to “educate your hands” in your golf swing. The correct feeling is very different than you think. It’s counter-intuitive to what makes sense in our minds.

When you finally learn the proper release, your golf ball will be jumping off the face of your club, and you’ll sit and watch as your ball goes piercing through the air towards the hole.

That hump is a power-zapping issue!

If you’ve been wondering why you’re not hitting the ball as far as you use to, this could be it. I know for me, I catch myself hunching over in my swing, and when I do I make a conscious act to straighten back up.

To get the correct golf posture is easy once you know what to do. But if you ignore this, your hopes of hitting it longer are pretty much out the door!

Most high handicap golfers are off plane either in the backswing, or coming down. In either scenario, this is a killer to your swing, and results in many bad golf shots, as well as a massive loss of distance.

There are several methods that are being advocated right now. Many instructors refer to them as 1 plane, single plane, and 2 plane swings.

I don’t want you to become too unclear, so what I have in this article should make it quick and easy to understand.

Simple Stategies To Help Your Swing Plane

To accomplish the best golf swing plane, it’s important to first understand where your hands and club are when you start your swing, because you’ll want to get back to that position, or as close as you can at the moment of impact.

Every golfer is not the same, as some have long arms that hang lower, generating a lower angle to the shaft plane (like me), at your starting position, and other golfers who have short arms, which will give them an upright, vertical shaft plane at address.

It’s possible you have heard this before, but impact and address are very similar. They are not exact, yet if in your head you can get back to impact, from your beginning point, you are going to be striking your ball with power and authority.

Keep the hands and wrists out of it!

You discovered it here! Your hands make or break your golf swing. I know in my situation, I’ve experienced incorrect movements of my hands, which greatly impaired my swing plane, therefore it took hours of watching swing videos, and training to fix it. I haven’t quite got it yet, nonetheless the improvement has been to my liking so far.

When you start your golf takeaway, both hands should go in a straight line back, without the need of manipulation of your hands with the club. All of it starts back connected (hands, arms, club and shoulders). You’ve probably read about, the one-piece takeaway, and that is exactly what I’m referring to here.

Halfway Reference Point

When you’re half way back in your backswing, your left arm will likely be parallel to the ground, and also parallel to your target line. At this moment in your swing, you have cocked your wrists right up, and simply begun to fold your right arm (just a little).

At this moment, the grip end of your own golf club must be pointing directly at the target line. Should you have a lazer at the end of your own club (grip end), it’s going to point right at the line, about 2-3 feet right behind the ball, but right on the target line.

If you can hit that line consistently, you’re on your way to an exceptional golf swing.

All you have to do now is continue your shoulder turn, as you continue folding your right elbow to 90 degrees. Now your’re towards the top of your swing in fantastic placement to come down on plane. This is a beautiful thing!

Hunter Mahan Halfway Down On Plane

Here’s where I am certain for myself, I screwed this up everytime! When you’ve performed your backswing like stated above, all you need to do is mimic it coming down. Pull both your hands right down on the very same path that you did approaching the top of your swing.

Never manipulate your hands in the downswing, as that is going to instantaneously change your swing plane. My fault was coming down way steeper than when I went back. It’s a destroyer in your golf swing, and therefore I worked really hard to resolve it.

Another checkpoint is midway coming down (see picture to your left).Simillar to halfway back, the butt of your club must really be pointing at the target line, in essentially precisely the same spot as when you were going back.

Check out how Hunter’s shaft is perfectly parallel with the plane line. He’s going to get into impact exactly on the proper golf swing plane.

There are many other quite effective golf swing plane drills that I’ll cover in a future post, but my goal with this article has presented you a more appropriate perception of your golf swing plane.

Training To Achieve Proper Swing Plane

For numerous golfers it is difficult for them to acquire the ideal feel of the on-plane swing, which is when the use of a golf swing plane trainer is needed.

Having the ability to use this kind of trainer, and hit the golf ball, will provide you with immediate feedback. You’ll know after the first shot if you did it correctly or not, and be able to fix it right then and there.

All the talk about right now is Bubba Watson winning the Masters and how he has never taken a golf lesson and just “plays golf”. Can we learn something from this?

I know for me, I’m a very analytical guy, and have spent 20 agonizing years in this game taking lessons, banging balls, etc…Am I happy where I’m at? No. But that’s just me.

But it got me to thinking about the free attitude Bubba has about golf. Step up and rip and deal with it after. Will he win a lot more majors? We’ll never know, but his style of golf is very unique.

If you didn’t know him, and you say his golf swing, you’d think that ball is off the planet, and definitely not in the fairway. And definitely not long like he is.

If you want to give him a quick congrats on winning, he is huge on Twitter, and will most likely respond. You can find him at @Bubba Watson on Twitter.

Give me your thoughts on this below.

I recently came across a really cool sports site called Bleacher Report. This site covers every major sport, and is written by people with a personality. It’s a “one-stop” spot for everything you want to get our of your favorite sports team or athlete. And it’s current up to the day. The hour actually on some occasions.

If you want to check just golf, then the Bleacher Golf Report is where you’ll want to go to.

I just created my own profile, Mike Pedersen on Bleacher Report and plan to join in on the conversation.

If you head over there, give me a shout!

The odds on the Masters is pretty cool.

This is setting up to be a phenomenal 2012 Masters Tournament! Tiger is a 9/2 favorite with Rory a close second, along with Lee Westwood, Phil Mikelson, Luke Donald and Hunter Mahan.

We all know Tiger plays Augusta very, very well, and seems to have peaked at the right time after winning at Bay Hill. His swing looks as good as it’s looked in a long time, and his putting is coming around.

On the other hand, Phil’s putting is not too good at all. Going to the belly putter, then back to the short one tells me he’s not too confident at the moment.

And then there’s Rory McIlroy. Had the tournament in the palm of his hands, then blew it. Could this be his redemption?

I want to know what you think, so comment below and lets get some chatter going!

Tiger Woods Wins At Bay Hill

There were many people who thought Sean Foley was over-rated as a coach. Even though he has Justin Rose, Hunter Mahan, and many other top-ranked players; people have been watching closely to see if he can get Tiger winning again, and it happened today! His driving was impeccable! When Tiger hits the fairway off the tee, he is nearly impossible to beat.

With Tiger winning at Bay Hill it now makes the Masters a heckava lot more interesting. Tiger has done well there, and he knows the course inside-and-out. If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on Tiger.

As his caddie Joey LaCava said, “”He was a man on a mission today, he was pretty jacked up. He was out there to prove himself.”

You can’t help but really like Graeme McDowell. He did not bring his best today, but had this to say, “”I think he really just kind of nailed home his comeback. “Great to have a front-row seat watching maybe the greatest of all time doing what he does best — winning golf tournaments.”

How classy is that?

Check out this video of Tiger Woods on 18, celebrating his win at The Bay Hill Invitational.

Let me know what you think about Tiger winning; if you think he has a shot winning The Masters; and if he’s going to go on a run now, by commenting below.

Watch the video!

One of the fastest ways to increase your swing speed and driving distance is to use resistance tubing while making a golf swing. This is the equivalent of the baseball batter using a doughnut on his bat and swinging it.

When you can do indoor golf training with a tool like the Golf Swing Tubing Trainer, you speed up your progress, as you do not have to weight to go to the range to pound golf balls.

Just imagine on a daily basis how you can pull it out, make 10-15 swings in less than 2 minutes, and know you are strengthening and stretching your golf muscles, in the convenience of your home (or office).

It amazes me as every golf tournament on the television, whether it be a PGA, Champions or LPGA event, mentions fitness EVERY single time. I’ve always had the approach if you want to get better at something you must model someone who is at a higher level, and do what they do.

I’m not going to sit hear and say fitness is the “cure-all-end-all”, but for the senior golfer it should be a major focus as this golf demographic has typically seen a massive drop in physical capabilities, both in regard to strength and flexibility.

If the senior golfer does not improve this declining element of golf, they will continue to see a decrease in their performance, which for many also experience a lack of enjoyment for the game they’ve played and enjoyed for decades.

The golf swing requires a certain level of both flexibility and strength if you want to maximize your distance, accuracy and consistency.

For example, if your muscles are tight, and it restricts your ability to make a full backswing, you will have a poor swing sequence, and tension will creep in, creating a quick, short swing that does not all you to hit the sweet spot of your club, resulting in mishits, poor distance and difficulty making pars.

On the other hand if you have a lower level of strength, lets say in your core area, you will not be able to swing the club at a high enough speed to have any amount of distance with your driver. So even if you can make a full backswing, if your core cannot store up that energy (stretch of your abdominals), you will not be able to come down into the ball with any torque (speed).

There is more information than ever for the golfer to be able to do many simple golf exercises, stretches and fitness programs right in their own home with minimal equipment. So there is no excuse to ignore this very important factor of golf improvement.