October 22, 2021- I achieved my swings goals today (full story here)
October 8, 2021- My balls were landing at that water fountain, which is 269 yards away by laser. There was a slight headwind. Most importantly, the golf balls float, and I have been told they go about 20% less far. Therefore, these were 290 to 310-yard carries. That is club speed well over 120 mph. Just 24-hours ago, my good shots went only 250-yards (or about 270 adjusted for real golf balls).
For the last several months, as I have been working on my swing, spinning the feet like Colin Morikawa instead of using the ground like Viktor Hovland. I think my average carry was about 250 or 260 yards. George Gankas witnessed me out at his place hit pretty good shots that were not going anywhere. Here, overnight, literally, I gained 30 to 50-yards by using ground forces.
This has happened to me before. At my old house, I would occasionally hit shots that would go 50-yards farther than the rest. I now know why.
With my body, I have to use ground forces to get speed. If I stay on my toes and don’t push down into the ground, I lose about 30 to 50-yards of distance.
I have flip-flopped about what style of swing to strive for. I think this is definitely telling me I need to continue down this path.
The problem has been that I could only occasionally do this ground force movement. However, this new “Tall, Fall, and Fire” drill I am doing has finally changed my muscle memory. I know how to do it now.
I will start playing golf soon.
October 7- This is the new Greer “Tall, Fall, and Fire” drill. Step 1 is to get the right hip back with a straight leg, or get tall. Step 2 is to fall or squat onto your heels, not your toes. Step three is to fire the hips left.
This is helping me get past this “Lori Lightfoot Syndrome” where I swing on my toes and get no ground forces. You have to swing from your heels and plow dirt.
October 6, 2021- After a week of the Greer P6 Drill
September 29, 2021- The Greer P6 drill to take the arms out the equation and force a pure body turn. Doctor, heal thyself
September 23, 2021- When I was in California, George Gankas made an observation that helped me diagnose what the heck goes wrong when I get that frozen leg feeling. I stiffen the left leg too soon, stalling the hip turn.
Today, I was working on keeping a soft bent left knee as I roll the hips to get the weight onto my left heel (like Nicklaus below). Note the much better left hip position at impact.
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September 15, 2021- After good progress with getting the hips turned at impact, I am trying now to get the right leg to whip around.
September 13, 2021- I got that final bit of hip turn by flexing the left wrist as Collin Morikawa, Jon Rahm, DJ, etc., do.
August 29, 2021- Breakthrough. I can get to P4 in proper position now. I still have to do it in paused sections. Stay tuned.
August 12, 2021- by Steven Greer
I put together two big fixes George Gankas pointed out. I am rolling the left hip all the way around while not prematurely extending the left knee and jumping too soon. I have always stalled the hip turn with a premature jump.
Simultaneously, I am extending the right elbow flexion to let the club fall lower so I do not have to topple the torso to the right to reach the ball.
Now, I will work on better shoulder plane at the top with more left side-bend. I will also get the left shoulder to roll around more like the left hip is doing here. My upper body is still lagging the hips.
July 27, 2021- Lesson 3 with Willy P. Today, he got me to drop the hands from P4 to P5 instead of pushing them out over the top. Huge improvement.
July 25, 2021- Today, I added the P4 to P5 shallowing move of throwing the center of gravity of the cub backward as I turned the hands.
Here it is. After breaking down the swing with drills, I put the full swing together. In just 15-days, I broke it all down and fixed P1 to P8. Note the sound of the PW compression in the second swing and the driver swoosh-crack.
On July 10th (see below), I was paralyzed at P2 because I was so far inside the plane. I was hinging the wrists all wrong, etc.
Now, I need to squeeze a few more drops out of the downswing and get more body turn to the left. Stay tuned.
July 19-24- I spent the week doing this drill inspired by the TourStriker ball. I realized that those gadgets really just get the arms int he position I describe in the video. So, I broke it down and trained my brain to feel these new movements.
July 18, 2021- We did it. With the help of Willy Pumarol, I have been working in blistering heat to figure out how my arms and hands need to behave to get to P4 properly. I had serious doubts and was about ready to quit. But I think I figured out all of the different combinations of things I need.
A) I do need a slightly stronger grip.
B) I don’t hinge my wrists until after P2.
C) And I do this little pre-swing move where I arc the club 90° back to P2 and then back to P1.
Willy had mentioned feeling in your hands the center of gravity of the club. That’s what I’m doing here. I have a light grip and I’m feeling the weight of the club. It tells me when to move to the different stages of the swing. You can also feel when the face is too open or shut.
Now, time to focus on the downswing. I’m close to wanting to actually play a round of golf
July 10, 2021- Lesson with Willy to start breaking down the swing and fixing all the problems.
June 29, 2021- Alright, making lots of progress. For the first time ever, I know how to curl the wrists on the way up to get a flexed left wrist, extended right wrist, and supinated/pronated forearms.
June 22- I got a new shaft, a 65 gram Tensei, with a new Titleist TSi3 head, and I was hitting everything off the toe. I knew I was still flipping. So, here I am working on left wrist flex, inspired by Jon Rahm. I was finally able to hit the face of the club.
June 13, 2021
May 26, 2021- I took a few days off (I actually quit). Then, as I was searching for water balls with an 8-iron, I threw them down and just swung without trying. It gave me an idea. I went to the range and emphasized the hip and shoulder turn with loose grip and passive hands.
It worked. I might take down the hitting net. It is bad for me.
May 8, 2021-
May 7, 2021-
May 5, 2021- Now, I am trying to swing hard and not think about it. It worked. My natural athletic leg moves came through.
May 4, 2021- Here, I am working on adding right wrist supination to shallow the shaft
May 3, 2021- Working on a higher right elbow in the downswing as I yank the torso around more too.
April 10, 2021- I narrowed my stance by 8-inches to allow my hips to turn. I got this idea from Kevin Sprecher. Then, I am back to thinking about the hands and ulnar deviation. I am dropping the left arm tight against the chest as I throw the club behind me.
March 27, 2021- I put it all together. After months of work on fixing the hips and shoulders, I added right humerus external rotation to drive the elbow down tight.
March 14, 2021- Clipping it off of tight lies
March 13, 2021 – My swing was feeling awkward so I went back to the Mike Adams pivot where my right hip joint goes towards the target in the backswing and then reverses. This is much better.
March 7, 2021
March 1, 2021- I was able to make a full swing without pauses.
I called this the Jack-Smack in honor of Nicklaus. Jack has long told people that he hits it the farthest when he makes a slow and big backswing. I am doing that here. It almost looks like my driver is in slow motion to start the swing.
I have found that fast backswings and anxiety are caused by the shoulders not turning properly. Your brain knows it will have to muscle past the kinks and grinding. However, if you are turning properly, it is slow and easy.
February 26, 2021- Today, I added left wrist flexion to flatten the shaft and reduce the centripetal force pushing me up. It allows me to swing at 110% now and not fall apart at the seams (i.e. my right elbow stays tight through impact).
I have it all figured out now. The experimentation phase of the Golf Project is over. Time to practice and ingrain this.
February 22, 2021- Big development: the “Turn TWO Corners” drill
February 17, 2021- I am “turning the corner” better, or getting that last 40-degrees of pelvis turn, by swing the pelvis to the left instead of just turning around a center point. I am also thinking of the swing sequence more. I want to start the downwind with the pelvis and no upper body muscles.
February 6, 2021- I am getting the shoulders turning properly. So, you see my hands getting into that elite impact position. See below for the full explanation.
February 3, 2021- I explain how I am getting really good shoulder turn that drives the proper hips and hands at impact. Be sure to watch this one.
January 29, 2021- Today, I was able to repeat on the actual range what I have done in the home lab. That alone is a big development, I have suffered from this weird full-body-yips on the range.
In addition, I think I have finally conquered this strong habits to stick to the right and flip. It took me 4.5 years (I started this in July of 2016 in Ohio).
This is what led to this milestone. First, I saw Adam Scott from a front view move his entire torso past the starting pint toward the target. I knew I was not doing that. Why?
So, I went back to the drawing board and fixed my sloppy arms that were going too far behind the plane in the backswing and getting stuck. I isolated that and did weeks of drills starting the swing at 12:00 with the left wrist flexed.
Then, I made my shoulder plane steeper. Another way of visualizing that is to have your left shoulder point down to the ball more. This freed up the arms to swing in front some more.
Then, I began to feel like I was rolling through the swing, rocking the torso past the ball toward the target. Brooks Koepka was an inspiration on this.
The funny thing is that the better my arms cleared the belly, the less hard I hit the ball. I developed this nice tempo with the irons you see today (I got a little crazy and was swinging too hard with the driver).
January 28, 2021- I tried feeling as if I have a steeper shoulder plane at the top, or as if I am flexed in the spine leftward more. It instantly gave me a more complete body turn at impact. But the pleasant surprise was extra club speed.
Look at the bowed left arm at impact like Brooks Koepka or Dustin Johnson. Wow. Stay tuned for a more proper video on this soon.
January 26, 2021- Here is is a mental thought for you to try that might become your actual new swing. Instead of putting effort into hitting the ball hard, just coil up in the backswing and feel as if the downswing is a passive uncoiling of the muscle tension aided by gravity.
I got the idea over the last week at the driving range when I would do slow-motion driver swings and the ball went almost as far as when I tried to swing like Bryson DeChambeau.
Great golfers who seem to swing like this are Rory McIlroy and Dustin Johnson. Those are just the two most popular who come to mind.
January 21, 2021- Today, I remembered to turn the sacrum in an arc away from the target to get great body turn and stable center of gravity. All of the moving parts are in harmony now.
I’m keeping the short backswing for now. I get the same speed. The appearance of the full backswing simply comes from separating the right upper arm and I don’t think that adds speed. It only adds room for error.
January 19, 2021- This is what I have done over the last couple of weeks:
I was making good progress with this body swing method of mine (see December posts below), where I really pulled hard and downward to the left. But I knew that my arms were still too far behind me and it was a sloppy swing.
So, I threw it all away and went back to the drawing board. I tried a radical new thing I have not tried much before, which was to emulate Dustin Johnson. The goal was not really the swing like him, but rather to experiment with different arm and hand positions. I think it has added a couple of things to my swing.
First, the realization that it’s OK to lift the right heel if you do a powerful spin off of the toes has made it easier for me to turn the body. I had been obsessed with a flat planted right heel.
I think I am also getting the elbow out in front of me a little bit better. For now, I start the swing with the club horizontal and elbow out front.
I am combining that with this new realization that the right upper arm has to externally rotate, which is how you get the elbow to come down nicely in front of the belly. I had focused on doing this before by supinating the right wrist. My mental image, or feel, now is higher up in the humerus.
Putting those things together, I am getting a pretty powerful swing.
It took me four days at the range to overcome the old muscle memory that wanted me to release early and flip. That is the opposite of right upper am external rotation. I just used slow motion drills to overcome those strong urges. Slow motion is so powerful for overcoming bad instincts.
I need to now work on letting the left shoulder clear more out of my peripheral vision. My old swing muscle memory has me afraid to turn and transfer to the left. Also, I can get more right upper arm external rotation for a better elbow-lead. Stay tuned.
December 23, 2020- Combining better hand position at top with the the nice power-flex body turn
December 18, 2020- I am back to the power flex, or the power dip, move. This is how my bones are made. Flexing the legs is the only way that I can turn the pelvis.
I was briefly able to do this in Arizona recently, but then forgot how to do it. My stiff-leg syndrome came back. Then, I saw a front view of Adam Scott transferring from his right leg onto downward onto his left heel and gluteus as he swayed toward the target.
So, I now think of flexing the knees in the transition, dropping the body from the highest point at the top of the swing downward left onto the left quadriceps and gluteus. It’s a power move where I am using the mass of my body to pull the club. It helps me do what you see above.
December 12, 2020- I am really pleased. I am finally getting transferred to the left.
This is what the problem was:
Wrong wrists in transition created steep shaft
Steep shaft pushes you left and lifts you out of the shot. Your torso is forced to hang back to the right to keep balance. You get stuck and cannot retraces the left shoulder.
I fixed that by realizing I need to load onto the right leg more (which means you also tilt the spine away from target at the top). I was overdoing this left leg pivot idea.
Then, I fixed the wrist action. I throw the club behind me now as the very first move and that sets the whole machine in motion.
December 8, 2020
November 30, 2020
November 24- Carrying the Arizona progress back to Florida. These are probably the best swings of my life. You can here the swoosh of the proper club path. I LOVE the right foot planted and pushing into impact as the hips get maximum clearance. I want to be called Gringo Trevino.
November 21, 2020-
November 8, 2020- Huge breakthrough. I am putting together the left arm pulling feel with the right elbow pushing feel.
October 23, 2020- I have always had trouble getting a good squat in the transition and staying over the ball. Well, today, after seeing the Como Expedition episode with Terry Rowles, I pivoted around the left leg. I can now get some good Viktor-Hovland-like squatting action. Look at my bent right elbow at impact too.
October 15, 2020- After a couple of weeks of consciously and mechanically working on the moves described below, I am letting it rip without thinking about it. I find the trigger of a full-backswing right before I hit the ball to be useful.
October 9, 2020
September 23, 2020- Here’s me stripe-flushing 10 seven-irons in a row with ease. I finally found “my swing”. I do this with ease and no anxiety. I figured out which muscles should be the focus of my attention for the start of the swing, completion of the backswing, and then to twist downward into impact.
September 20, 2020- To get these high hands and full shoulder turn, I visualized flexing the right scapula muscles to get the final coil. For the powerful balanced lower body in the downswing, I am visualizing twisting the feet against the resistance of the ground
September 1, 2020- Now, I added left leg external rotation, or the Sam Snead move.
August 30, 2020- Great progress with simply thinking about flexing the right groin muscles as I snap the left hip back with the external rotators. This hip stuff is something I have never focused in before. I now think it was the root of all of my problems.
August 15, 2020- 85% fairway accuracy with good smash-factor. So, I was able to take the range to the course. I got the full-swing-yips with the irons though. Stay tuned.
August 14, 2020- better drivers, but the hips are still not turning properly. Stay tuned.
August 13, 2020
August 8, 2020
June 25, 2020- I am working on the proper hip rock and spine tilt
June 9, 2020- I am adding ulnar deviation to right wrist extension and getting great results.
June 4, 2020- This Precision Impact gadget was a breakthrough for me
May 31, 2020- I never could get the swing below to feel natural. I am sure it could have after a lot of work. But I decided to use this swing above and i had great success. The abbreviated backswing prevents me from coming over the top and I lose no distance.
May 25, 2020- The new swing is getting more natural to me.
May 24, 2020- The Greer vectors epiphany
May 23, 2020- Spine tilt
April 8, 2020- I am working on getting my right gluteal region past the mid-line, towards the target, at the top of the swing to offset the forces of the club that want to pull us to the right. To help clear the hips in the downswing, you will notice that I lift the left toes and spin on the left heel.
February 12, 2020- I found a new level of speed today. I could swing extremely hard and not have my shoulder gear tilt and get out of sync.
February 11, 2020- The drill below is working. My spine angle is much better. This is Tiger v Me front view. I am not turning the body in the follow-through, as you can see from my hands. I will work on that and get even better positions at impact.
February 10, 2020- Doing a drill to avoid the Deadly Dip (i.e. immediately tilting spine to the right, dipping shoulders, instead of turning shoulders around a stable upright spine-axis). I passively uncoil from the top to feel in my feet and see the position of the left arm out of my peripheral vision. This is biofeedback. I pump a few times then complete a swing at half-effort.
February 7, 2020- I am learning so much from studying the football throw. The torso and chest have to open up more. In other sports, our left hands are not tethered to the right hand, so opening up is easier. I golf, we have to fight this left arm.
February 6, 2020- We can learn so much by analyzing the arm and torso motion of throwing a football.
February 2, 2020- Alright, alright, alright. I am getting this to become a natural swing by visualizing heaving a heavy medicine ball down the line. All of the nice hip and body turn is automatic thanks to our vestibular system.
January 26, 2020- The mechanics learned from the drills, below, are becoming part of a natural swing by visualizing the hands. The rest of the body follows the hands. In the video above I am not thinking about the hips, legs, or shoulders, and yet they are all moving properly. That is the magic of our vestibular system.
January 25, 2020- by Steven E. Greer, MD
I decide today to debut my new swing for 2020 that I have been working on for months. I devised drills to isolate the transition and get the right upper arm to stay tight. I do this by extending the shoulder (i.e. pulling the right upper arm backward against the ribs) and extending the right elbow (i.e. straightening the arm and lowering the hands).
It seems to have worked. This is the first time that I have gotten such good weight transfer to the left side. With a tight right arm, I am not getting pulled to the right by the forces of the club.
I have some more work to do. But these balls were flying off the club like bullets.
(Note: I finally used my professional audio on this one. I am wearing a lavaliere mic so you do not hear that tin can echo sound. I even put on a shirt too.)
