OH NO! THE SHANKS!
Tony Roberts
I was walking through the shop on yet another cold “spring” Saturday morning and I made the mistake of asking one of our Annual Pass guys what I should write this article about. The gentleman responded with, “Well, I’ve never read a good article about curing the shanks.” I assured him he could probably say the same thing in another 30 days when this comes out but, by gosh, I was going to go tackle shanking.
Nothing scares me more on the lesson tee than the guy hitting it on the hosel. No single fault in the golf swing comes to us quite so mysteriously. Certainly nothing else can be as devastating to both score and the amount of fun we’re having while playing the game. If you’ve been cursed with this dreaded malady, you’ve undoubtedly been the recipient of many suggestions. Some wanted, but most are unsolicited. Seems like everybody’s a pro when you’re hitting them sideways, doesn’t it?
For those of you unfamiliar with the shank . . . put the magazine down now and walk away. You don’t want to finish the article, you don’t want to use the word and you don’t want anything to do with the whole subject. I’m not kidding you, walk away now. For the rest of you, I’m sorry. Let’s look at it and try to beat it.
You shank the ball when the hosel contacts the ball before the face has a chance to get there. The ball takes off almost straight right. Looking closely at the club you can see why.
I’ve seen and heard many explanations and theories on the cause of shanking and an equal number of possible cures. My best results have come by taking a three-pronged approach. If I can’t fix it within these three categories, then it’s a mystery to me.
Once in awhile it’s the easy fix. If you are just plain standing too close to the ball, you can see how your arms might ask for a little more room on the downswing and return the club extended outward ever so slightly. Doesn’t take much outward extension to move from the center of the face to the hosel. So unless you feel you’re a golfer that already stands far from the ball, back away from the ball a little and give it a try.
Not usually that lucky though, so on we go. The second thing to investigate is a spine angle change. You know from other instruction that we need to keep the spine angle constant (maintain the angle you set at address throughout the swing) in order to hit our best shots. Most of this work is done to correct people who lift up, “standing up out of the shot.”
The other spine angle change can cause a shank. If you lower your spine, you will scoot the club outward and potentially expose the hosel. This problem can occur on the backswing by exaggerating the vertical tilt of the shoulders or on the downswing by diving down to the ball. Spend time feeling the exaggerated opposite of this by hitting shots where you feel as if you are raising the spine instead of lowering it. You’ll know you are overdoing the correction if all you hit are ground balls. Just play with it a little.
If you yank the club too quickly and too much to the inside on the backswing, you’ll arrive at a position at the top of the swing that is low and behind you. From there it’s difficult to get to the ball without “throwing” the club out. Instead of turning through the shot and getting your body moving to the left, you’ve created force that moves the club away from you. Again, it’s not the face that approaches the ball now, it’s the hosel. Try taking the club back a little straighter, a little more upright. The downswing should take care of itself from a better spot at the top.
Each of these answers to the shank deals with the simple concept of returning the club to impact with the ball positioned in the center of the face. That’s what we’re trying to do with almost all shots, we’re just forced to look at it a little closer when we’re shanking. When all else fails, set up with the ball as far out on the toe as you can. Go ahead and hit from there; sometimes simple works.
Here’s hoping you never need to try any of this. The most devastating part of getting the shanks is what it does to our confidence and ability to hit even the simplest of shots. The psychological damage to our game when we get so gun-shy that we can’t even pull the trigger can be enough to make even the ardent player ponder hanging ‘em up for awhile. We can’t ever let that happen, now can we?
Tony Roberts is the PGA Pro at WinterStone Golf Course
and MidWest Section PGA Teacher of the Year for 2001
Get in the Groove
Karen Davis
Have you ever had the experience of starting the season strong, playing your best golf before you’ve had time to start working on your game? Then somewhere along they way it happens . . . a missed shot, a bad hole, or maybe a bad round. You begin to analyze what’s wrong and start trying to fix it. Pretty soon you’re tied up in knots wondering what happened to that great start. Here’s the good news – it doesn’t have to be that way!
Like so many things in life, playing great golf requires balance between the Yang (physical/technical) components of the game and the Yin (mental/emotional) components of the game. Most golfers put all the focus on the Yang, and the Yin tends to get much less focus, if any at all.
The Yang parts of the game include technique, equipment, physical fitness, nutrition, and even things like statistics and the analysis of the game. All very important, but only half the picture. These parts of the game should get half your focus, but for most golfers they get nearly 100%.
The Yin parts of the game include things like emotional management, creative thinking, decision-making, confidence, beliefs, and organized thinking. When things go wrong in the Yin side of the game, it shows up in the swing. Instead of addressing the root cause, most golfers immediately try to see what went wrong in the swing, putting the focus back on technique and failing to address the real problems.
Perhaps it’s harder to think about things like emotional management and clear decision-
making as skills the way you think of the skill of swinging the club. They are skills, and like any skill they require awareness, instruction, practice and focus to improve. These areas have just as much influence on the outcome of each swing in golf as the more visible Yang components do. If you learn to address them you can make quantum leaps in your results.
One area that is particularly under-addressed in golf is emotional management. If I were allowed to coach only one skill in golf, this is the one I would choose because I think players of all levels get a high return on investment here. Big results are possible with a small amount of practice-time investment.
Players who are great at emotional management see these and other
benefits:
- They make better and clearer decisions.
- They are more creative at finding ways to get the ball in the hole.
- They are better able to focus on the shot at hand, not letting what has happened previously in the round (good or bad) interfere with the current shot.
- They have more energy and perform better at the end of the round.
- They create their own confidence.
- They recover quickly when something does go wrong.
How do you become an expert at emotional management? The first step is to become aware of your emotional state at all times. Any negative emotion – from the low end of being a little anxious because of stress and frustration, to the high end of anger – will degrade your ability to play good golf. The faster you can identify a negative emotion and shift to a positive emotional state, the better your results will be. Speed of recovery matters immensely to performance.
There are some great tools available from a company called Heartmath that can help you take the first steps. They provide books (such as Managing Emotions: Golf’s Next Frontier) and tools like the emWave Personal Stress Reliever that allow you to see your state and practice shifting to a higher performing emotional state. Personal coaching can help you improve your skill and learn how to best utilize the skills and techniques while playing golf for great results.
For other ideas on how to balance the Yin and Yang components of your game, I recommend reading The Game Before The Game by Lynn Marriott and Pia Nilsson.
Keep your game in balance and enjoy your best golf ever!
—Karen Davis
Karen Davis is the owner of Full Circle Coaching (www.fullcirclecoach.com). She is a PGA Professional, LPGA Member, TPI Certified Golf Fitness Instructor, Licensed Heartmath Provider and a coach in the VISION54/Integrated Fundamentals program. You can reach Karen for instruction at 816-729-2000 or Karen@fullcirclecoach.com.
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