Playing from an uneven lie can be tricky for golfers, I mean we are spoiled rotten with practice grounds being flat and perfectly prepared.
But life on the golf course is very different and we are faced with very few perfectly flat lies.
Now unless you have a practice facility that is undulating actually getting the chance to practice is tough. But there are some very simple things to remember when faced with a shot from an uneven lie.
You must try to mirror your posture with the lie.
The reason for this is to give yourself the best opportunity of making your normal swing.
When we are faced with an awkward lie, we immediately try to modify our stance and swing to adapt to the situation.
I believe that this just creates more problems.
Instead we should simply look to match our posture to the lie, allowing us to make a normal swing, resulting in a more comfortable way of playing.
Now please don´t take this literally for all lies, there are times when the lie means we have to contort our bodies into some strange and alien position just to be able to make contact with the ball. I am talking here about when the ball is a few inches above or below our feet, or when you are faced with an uphill or downhill shot.
The key is about creating a solid, balanced base from which to swing.
So, for the following situation you will need to make the following adjustments.
If you find your ball a few inches below your feet your thought process must be focussed on altering your spine angle to match the angle of the slope. This will result in you leaning further forward to achieve the same spine angle in relation to the ground.
Your normal spine tilt is say 40º (on the flat) if you have a position where the ball is on an 8º degree slope below your feet you will need to achieve a spine tilt of 48º.
The beauty of this method is that the ball will continue to follow your natural shot shape, rather than slide to the right (for ball below feet).
It may seem a rather simple technique or way of dealing with some of the toughest shots in golf, but the method truly works.
Fitting perfectly into my philosophy that golf should be as approached as simply as possible to avoid too many issues.
Remember if you are playing from an awkward lie, match your spine tilt to the slope and you will hit more consistent shots.
For uphill lies add a club or two to compensate for the additional loft on the club and the opposite for downhill lies.
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