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During the 3rd round at Riviera on 2/21/09, Phil Mickelson's swing was analyzed by Peter Kostis after an errant shot. Kostis pointed out that Phil's shaft angle on the downswing was more upright than it had been on the backswing, and he had not been able to square up the clubface at impact. The high speed camera clearly showed Phil's hands rapidly rolling over towards the target through impact, but it wasn't enough rotation to square the clubface.
Kostis explained that, "..it requires a tremendous amount of hand rotation and lower body work through impact to square the clubface up. When the timing is there, the shots are wonderful."
Phil Mickelson is one of the most highly skilled players in the game, and he is still vulnerable to misjudging the timing of his hand rotation through impact. He can recover from a timing mistake in the 3rd round of a tournament. He will never recover from a similar mistake on the 72nd tee at the US Open at Winged Foot in 2006.
If Phil hadn't needed a "tremendous amount of hand rotation", he would still have needed a normal amount of hand rotation. In either case timing of hand rotation through impact is a critical issue in controling the clubface angle at impact.
Hand rotation through impact is a combination of supination of the leading hand and pronation of the trailing hand towards the target. If there is not enough rotation at impact, the clubface will be more open than desired. If there is too much rotation, the clubface will be more closed than desired.
The address position of Phil Mickelson, and any golfer using traditional pre-shot alignment guidelines, allows a significant amounts of potential pronation and supination motion to be present in the hands, wrists, and forearms. The clubface alignment that the golfer sets at address can vary greatly during the swing when the potential motion becomes motion.
The comment by Peter Kostis applys to anyone using traditional pre-shot alignment guidelines. "When the timing is there, the shots are wonderful." It is no different for any golfer whether you are on tour or just hitting balls at the range.
There is a method to reduce the amount of potential rotational motion of the hands, wrists, and forearms between the address position and impact. The method is called Dynamic Pre-Shot Alignment and can be found at www.dynaligngolf.com.
Dynamic Pre-Shot Alignment can greatly reduce the need for a golfer to correctly time hand rotation through impact, and it can produce a much higher instance of correct clubface alignment at impact. It works because the bones that control hand rotation, the radius and ulna bones in your forearms, are configured during a pre-shot routine so that they contain less potential motion at the point of impact.
An analogy can be made with a machine such as a parts feeder on an assembly line that is required to do accurate repetitive motion, and a golfer who's biomechanism includes hands that are rotating through impact.
The moving components of the feeder machine must be adjusted to remove excess motion so that the assembly line can produce accurate products. If it weren't there would be pieces all over the shop floor and production would stop. The assembly line can't afford to have a bad day when its timing is a little off.
It is possible to adjust the moving components of the golfer's biomechanism so that repetitive motion can be made more accurate, but not by using traditional pre-shot alignment guidelines of square feet, hips, shoulders, and two knuckles showing at address. From a traditional address position, the variation of the moving parts that control clubface alignment can make it very difficult to produce accurate repetitive results.
You have a choice when it comes to your pre-shot routine. You can use traditional methods, then hit thousands of balls and continually work on your timing. Or, you can improve the the accuracy of your biomechanism and gain control of your shots with dynamic pre-shot alignment.
Dynamic pre-shot alignment goes further than just reducing your need to properly time hand rotation through impact. It's improved address position also produces a more accurate back swing and reduces swing plane variation. If Phil Mickelson had been using it, his shaft angle on the forward swing would not have been too steep to being with.
There are further benefits to the accuracy of your short game from using dynamic pre-shot alignment. Find out more at www.dynaligngolf.com
