The hook that won’t go away
I’ve practiced three times in the past week with my new irons, and I’m having a similar pattern each time. When I first warm up, my distances are a little shorter than average, but that improves as I warm up. Next, I hit a mix of long irons and the hybrid, usually pretty well. Then disaster strikes: I get out the 3-metal and driver. I almost never hit anything but hooks with these clubs. It’s gotten so bad that I put two swing-weights of lead tape on the toe of the driver and 1-1/2 swing-weights on the toe of the 3-metal. Unfortunately, that hasn’t helped the situation. The biggest problem I have, though, is after I hit hooks with the driver and 3-metal, all my other clubs then fail with hooks, ugly, low hooks. Except for the last practice, I was unable to get any good swings going after that happened. I need a pshrink!
An aside: On Monday, on advice from Alan, I went and got on the launch monitor at Golden Bear Golf Center to see if I needed a stiffer shaft. As it turns out, I’m hooking the driver so badly that the machine is unable to measure backspin: the line on the ball to show angle spins out of view of the camera! More side spin than backspin equals an ugly, ugly hook. The only good news: my club head speed averages 95 mph, which should equal 230-240 yd drives, if I ever get rid of the hook.
The 3i HALO hybrid is the only long club that I can hit well. I usually hit it straight. The failed shots are either pushes (most common), hooks and rarely, a slice. The hooks and pushes are closely related, of course, caused by an inside-to-outside swing. It seems that as the club gets longer, my swing gets more inside-to-outside.
On the other hand, with the short irons and wedges, my issue has been pulls, which is an outside-to-inside failure. I’m usually able to recover and hit good shots with these clubs, though.
It is clearly time to get out the video camera and figure out just what the problem that’s destroying my swing.