Welcome to Isleworth Golf and Country Club in Windermere, Florida.
This is the first of two golf instructional videos entitled, Arnold Palmer Play Great
Golf.
This video is being created to help golfers of all abilities play their best.
This volume focuses on the basic fundamentals of the game.
Volume 2 will cover course strategy.
Arnold Palmer has won 8 major championships and 61 PGA Tour events.
He's considered by many to be the most popular figure in the history of the game.
Welcome to Play Great Golf.
Golf is a deceptively simple, endlessly complicated game.
I believe that anyone can shoot in the low 80s or the high 70s with a little effort.
My father taught me the basic fundamentals of the game.
That's what I'm going to try to teach you.
The basics of the game.
There are five fundamentals.
I'm not going to try to teach you to swing a golf club like Jack Nicklaus or Gary Player,
Lee Trevino or any other professional golfer because if you've watched them, you've seen
entirely different swings.
What I am going to try to teach you are the basic fundamentals and how you can make your
own golf swing.
The grip, the setup, the takeaway, head position is very important and certainly accelerating
through the golf ball will help you hit it the way you'd like to hit it.
Let's start with the left hand and getting the club and the hand on the club properly.
First of all, the club lies diagonally across the hand.
It will stretch from the index finger of the left hand right through the palm to the heel
of the hand so that when I close my hand on the club, the thumb will be just slightly
to the right of the center of the shaft as you can see here.
The index finger will stretch under the shaft so that a V is formed between the index finger
and the thumb and when I address the ball properly, that V will point to the seam in
my right shoulder.
The back three fingers, the back three fingers of the left hand, pressure points we call
them, that's where you're really kind of holding the golf club.
You're holding it there firmly enough so that when you take the club back and you bring
it through, the club will not turn or twist in your hand or as a matter of fact change
position in any way.
The index finger and the thumb, they're also helping to hold the club but they're also
doing another job and that is giving you the feel of the golf club and that's your communication
to the golf ball as you hit it.
It's important that you have that feel with the thumb and the index finger.
As I address the golf ball and look down again, you will see the V coming to the seam in the
right shoulder.
Now let me say at this point in time, everyone has different size hands and some people may
have a little trouble with getting that V up there.
Let the club slide down in the hand so that that V will come right here.
You might have very large hands and the V will come over too far.
Let it slide back in the hand just a little so that again that V will come to the seam
in the right shoulder.
Okay, so much for the left hand.
Let's go to the right hand now and it's almost like we were going to shake hands with someone.
We're going to put that hand out and we're going to put it on that golf club just like
that and it is going to be in the fingers of the right hand.
That is where you want the club, stretching across the fingers of the right hand so that
when I close the right hand on the club, all of a sudden that thumb and index finger of
the right hand are forming a V again.
That V, oddly enough, is pointing to the seam in my right shoulder.
It will be paralleling the V in the left hand.
Why is that so important?
It's important because it's going to make those hands work together in the golf swing.
It's going to keep them cooperating with each other as you swing the club.
We spoke about the pressure points in the left hand.
Let's talk just a little bit about the pressure points in the right hand.
The middle two fingers.
This is where we are holding the club.
We're applying about the same pressure here in the right hand as we did the back three
fingers in the left hand.
They are holding the club so that as we swing the golf club, it isn't coming loose.
Our hand isn't flying loose.
It's staying right in the hand.
The thumb and the index finger of the right hand are doing exactly the same job as the
thumb and the index finger of the left.
They are holding the golf club, but they are also giving us a feel for that golf club.
And again, that's how we're going to hit the golf ball.
Okay, in the Varden or overlapping grip, which is the most common grip used on the tour or
anywhere today, we simply take the small finger of the right hand and overlap the index finger
of the left.
Once again, over the index finger of the left.
Now for a moment, I'd like to just point out that there are other grips used today.
All the things we've talked about, such as the pressure points in the right hand, the
pressure points in the left hand, the index finger of the right and thumb, index finger
of the left and thumb are the same.
But there is an interlocking grip, which is also a common grip today.
And that is we merely interlock the index finger of the left with the small finger of
the right.
Why would we do this?
Very simple.
Some people do not have meat hooks or big hands.
Some people have smaller hands and it gives them a little better opportunity to hold on
to the golf club.
And there's certainly nothing wrong with that.
The other grip that is a common grip and we see it used a lot is the full finger.
And that simply means that the left hand is on the club exactly as you see it here.
The right hand, all the fingers, all the fingers of the right hand go on the club.
And in each grip, as we address the golf ball, whether it be the interlocking, the full finger
or the overlapping, the V's do the same thing.
The pressure points are exactly the same.
But it gives those of us with smaller hands or larger hands an opportunity to go away
from let's say the overlapping grip, which is the most common grip used today.
Let me for just a moment talk about the weak grip on the golf club.
And that is merely the hand or the left hand now is going up and down the shaft with the
thumb going right down the center of the shaft.
The V is coming to the V in my sweater moving it from the right side to the middle.
The right hand, the V is also straight up and down.
Now what happens when we do this?
We hit the ball to the right.
Let me demonstrate.
This will cause the club face to open at impact and make the ball go to the right.
Now let's for a moment talk about the stronger grip and what happens when we use the stronger
grip.
First of all, at address, the V in the left hand is outside the seam in the right shoulder.
The V in the right hand is outside the right shoulder.
And as we hit the golf ball and I'll demonstrate again, the club will close at impact causing
the ball to hook or go to the left.
One more very brief point about the grip.
We do not hold the club so tightly that we cause tension in either arm.
We want to keep the club firm in the hands so that it won't release as we go through
but not so tight as to cause tension and restrict the swing.
So much for the grip.
The second of the basic fundamentals of golf is the set up.
How do we get to the golf ball?
Let's just get in the position that we want to be in to hit a five on.
And I know many of you have walked out on the golf course and you've seen people address
the golf ball.
And you see them way out here and you see them way in here.
And those really are not the positions we want to be in.
We want to be in a position where we can get the most flexibility out of our body.
So that's what we're going to talk about right now.
Set up.
Getting in that position.
First of all, let's just assume the position that we would assume to hit a five on.
The feet are not too wide apart.
About normal.
The arms, the arms again are hanging straight down.
We're flexing the knees just slightly.
We're flexing the hips so that we have the most flexibility in our entire body and strength.
And I might add strength because you want to hit the golf ball hard and you want to
hit it good.
So we need a little flexibility here and here.
As we do that and we let our arms hang down, that will determine how far we are from the
golf ball.
Again, I'm not back here and I'm not in here.
I am that happy medium where my arms are hanging straight down and I can get my club right
to the golf ball with the best flexibility in this golf swing.
Now you will see the weight is not back on my heels and it's not a way up on my toes.
It is at a happy medium on the balls of my feet.
If I had a preference, maybe just a little bit back to the heels.
But on the balls where I can get the best movement of my knees and my hips, where I
have freedom to take the club back and get it in the best position with a five iron.
I've got the inside of the left arm right down through the hands and the inside of my
left heel.
As I address the golf ball, I feel the weight, I feel the position very well.
I can now get the best result with a five iron.
So much for the set up.
Another of the basic fundamentals is the takeaway.
One that can set up the entire golf swing.
By that I mean it is going to start the movement of the body, the hands, all the things that
are important to hitting a good golf shot.
Let me demonstrate just a little bit about the takeaway and what happens as you start
the club away from the golf ball.
Now we have assumed the address.
What are we trying to accomplish with the takeaway?
Okay, if the club should go away from the ball that way, that isn't really what we're
looking for because if we take the club that way away from the ball, then it's going to
come back that way.
However you take the club away from the ball, that's the way it's going to come back.
So if we take it in here, it's going to come back from in here.
If we take it out here, it's going to come back from out there.
So what are we trying to do?
We're trying to get it away from the ball smoothly, deliberately and in the first six
to twelve inches without a break.
And what do I mean by a break?
Well I can stand perfectly still right here and do that.
Look at my body, it hasn't moved, not one ounce.
And then I can go from there into the golf swing.
But can I get it back to the ball?
It's doubtful.
So what do I want to do?
I want to take the club and I'll go slowly.
This knee, this knee, my shoulders, my hips, everything starts together.
Watch.
Everything moves.
My knees, my hips, my shoulders, everything is moving into the position to hit the golf
ball.
My left heel, my right is accepting the weight from the left and it is because I got the
club away properly.
And then I can come back and through and accelerate through the golf ball.
Next in the basic fundamentals is the position of the hit.
We've heard thousands of times, keep your eye on the ball and you'll hit it.
Probably one of the biggest fallacies in the game of golf.
Keep your eye on the ball and you're sure to hit it.
Let me say, I can keep my eye on that golf ball, if you will, and watch my head.
Now just imagine what is going to happen as I come back.
To hit the golf ball, I have to get everything back where I started, including this, which
simply means again.
Now imagine how difficult that's going to be.
The club doesn't know where it's going.
It's wandering all over the place.
Everything's going all right.
My arms are out of position.
So again, the head.
Here it goes.
Everything's going.
I can't get it back.
I'm going to hit back here or maybe I'm just going to do that because the head is back
here where it is not supposed to be.
Position of the head right here.
Now watch what I do.
Keeping this right here, the average is going to be pretty good that I'm going to take the
club back the same way every time into that position simply because I'm keeping my eye
on the ball and I'm not moving my head laterally or if you wish, I'm not moving it forward.
And let me show you.
What can happen?
I want to hit the golf ball pretty hard.
I get a little quick so I start the club fast and all of a sudden to get the speed up, here
I go.
My head is starting down.
Uh oh, I'm still looking at the golf ball but look at me.
How am I ever going to get back up here where I want to be and swinging the golf ball?
This keeping it in the right position.
Again, got my chin up.
Watch my left shoulder as I take the club back under my chin.
Now I am going to be keeping my eye on the ball, my head in a good position.
As I take the club back, my left shoulder comes right under my chin and the club falls
right back in the position I want it.
As I come back through, keeping my head in a good position, you will see that my right
shoulder is pulling my head off onto the line that I want to hit the golf ball.
Acceleration in the golf swing is very, very important.
What that simply means is that as we come to the ball, we're not decelerating.
We're letting the release of the club take the club through at a speed that will be faster
than any other part of the golf swing.
Something that must happen for you to hit the kind of golf shot you want to hit.
What do I mean?
Again, as we come through the shot, a lot of the time when we get a little bit doubtful
of how that shot is going to come off, we have a tendency to let up or decelerate and
that can be disaster.
One of the things that I have watched through the years of the great players is, and it
didn't matter whether it was Hogan or Nicklaus or you name it, Trevino, as they come through
the ball and particularly when the pressure is on, when they're coming down to those final
holes and they want to hit those good shots, they accelerate through the ball.
They do not decelerate.
People have said, why didn't you play more safe shots when you had a tournament in your
hands?
I suppose I could answer that question by simply saying, you know, when I started thinking
about safe for some reason in the back of my mind and I didn't know whether it was
accelerate or decelerate, but there was something that caused me to decelerate a little bit.
So if you often wondered why I kept going at it all the way, it was so I could accelerate
that club through the ball every time.
It's so important to hitting a good shot.
Let me demonstrate.
Now that Arnold has covered the five basic fundamentals of the game, he turns his attention
to playing the various clubs in the bag, the short, medium and long irons, the fairway,
woods and driver, and finally the putter.
We're now going to talk about the short irons, the accuracy part of the game.
This is where the major part of the scoring is going to come from.
Getting these irons in for that one putt for a birdie.
What is happening when we're hitting short irons?
First of all, let me explain the open stance.
An open stance is sometimes misunderstood.
People seem to think that if they turn the left toe out, they have an open stance.
Now that is not the case.
If they pull the left foot back from the line, and of course if I put the club up, I would
be aiming to the left of the target.
Okay, now that is an open stance.
Let me just show you in another way.
If I turn the left toe out and take the right foot back, now I'm aiming across the line
and I have a closed stance.
The left toe is not going to determine open or closed.
It is the position of the left foot that is going to make that determination.
So much for the stance.
We are now going back and assuming an open stance.
The body is pointing to the left of the line.
If we went to a neutral position, maybe to even better explain it, we pull the foot back
up and we now stand and the club is pointing in the intended line of flight.
That would be a perfectly square stance.
Again, back to the open stance.
The club is left of the target.
As we address the golf ball with the short irons, you will notice that we have a line
from the inside of the left shoulder right down through the arm and hand to the inside
of the left heel through the inside of the left knee.
As we address the golf ball, you can see I am in an open position or open stance.
What does that do to me?
It restricts my backswing number one, simply because to get the club back as far as I might
want it, I would have to change that position.
In this case, I'm not going to do that.
Why?
Because if I can't reach the green with a wedge, I can go to a nine iron.
And if I can't reach it with a nine and so on, to the eight and seven.
So what does this create?
It creates a compact swing.
I'm only interested in getting the club back to where I can come down and through the shot
and take the club right onto the target.
This will give me the accuracy that I'm looking for in the shorter irons, not the long swing
to hit the ball a big distance, but the shorter swing to give me the accuracy that I'm looking
for.
Let's just try one.
I'll take it.
The mid irons are the six, the five, and the four.
These clubs, again, are in the accuracy zone.
Certainly not as accurate, let's say, as the seven, eight, nine, and wedge, but in an area
where you want to get the ball up and reasonably close to the hole all the time.
What is going to happen?
The swing is going to increase.
Every time you increase the length of your swing, you are going to allow for a little
more error in that swing and, of course, take a little of the accuracy or potential accuracy
away from that shot.
For the middle irons, we want to look at the stance for an example.
Let's just look at the position we are in.
The left foot is slightly withdrawn from the line, creating the open stance.
As we address the ball, the ball is lined up almost in the middle of the stance versus
the back of the stance with the shorter irons, the middle of the stance with the mid irons.
What has happened?
Again, we were back here a moment ago, we are up here now, which is allowing us to turn
or to make a bigger turn with the body.
And of course, hit the golf ball further with the middle irons than, let's say, we did with
the shorter irons.
Okay.
Let's give it a go with the five irons.
Well you have just seen me hit a shot to the green.
Now let me talk about what I was thinking about before I hit that shot.
And this applies not just to mid irons, this applies to all the shots that we hit.
Visualizing the shot before you hit it is just vitally important.
Knowing and feeling that you can see what is going to happen to that golf ball as you
hit it.
Every great professional, when you see him look at the hole, in his mind he is visualizing
what he is going to do when he hits that shot.
Let's just run through that shot in slow motion and we'll try to give you some feeling as
to what is happening.
We're at address and we are thinking of hitting the golf ball.
Getting the club back to the right position on the take away.
Now we are starting back down through the shot, releasing the club as we come into the
golf ball.
Taking the club right on through to the target, moving our head along with it.
The ball is now in the air and it's slightly to the right of the target.
The wind is pushing it back and there it lands on the green and rolling up fairly close to
the hole.
Not too bad.
We've made our way through the irons and now we are up to the long irons.
Now these clubs are difficult because we try to create, we try to put more loft on the
club than there really is.
When we should be just allowing the loft that is there to create the trajectory that we
are looking for.
I'm sure many times you've seen people get in this position to hit a long iron, trying
to create loft on the club so that they can get the ball up off the ground.
It really isn't going to help them and they've taken themselves out of position totally.
Let's first of all assume the proper position with a two iron.
As we address the golf ball once more we will see many of the things that we saw in the
other irons.
First of all if we look from the inside of the left shoulder right down through the inside
of the arm, right down to the ball, we will also notice that the ball is lined up just
off the inside of the left heel as it has been with each of the other categories of
irons.
That has changed then.
We have gone to a wider stance.
We have taken the left foot from what was an open position to now a square position
allowing more freedom to turn or to get the club back in the swing as we hit the golf
ball.
So let's take the address again.
Now once more the line is there, the ball is just off the inside of the left heel and
as we take the club back we have more freedom on the right side because we are not setting
it open as we take the club back.
And of course that will allow us to get the club back to the ultimate position to hit
this shot.
Another very important factor with all clubs, keep in mind that we want to hit the ball
first and the turf after.
We cannot make a golf ball fly in the air without putting some backspin on it and if
we don't hit the ball first we are not going to get that backspin.
Getting ready to hit a fairway wood we will see the ball is lined up off the inside of
the left heel once more.
We'll also notice that the hands are right on that line between the inside of the left
shoulder down through the inside of the left arm down the shaft to the ball.
We'll also notice that the stance is almost square, dead square to the line which is going
to allow us to keep that club on the plane that we are looking for to hit the golf ball.
Okay keeping the head still, keeping the hands right up even with the ball, take the club
back in one piece, not too quickly, keeping the head still and hitting right through the
shot.
I wish I could hit them that way every time.
Now we are talking about a fairway wood and how much turn do we make?
We are making a maximum turn here, a full turn to hit this shot.
Getting the club back to the maximum up at the top, getting it back through and following
right on through and most definitely accelerating through the shot.
You know we are all out here to enjoy the game of golf and if a five wood or a six wood
makes the game a little more enjoyable to you and I am talking versus a three, four,
five iron then grab that wood, put it in your bag and go enjoy the game.
In this segment Arnold Palmer teaches us how to play his favorite club the driver.
Arnold hit perhaps the most famous drive in the history of the game when he drove from
the first tee in the final round of the 1960 U.S. Open at Cherry Hills in Denver.
He drove the green on the 346 yard par four which led to a birdie which in turn led to
a final round 65 and victory in that U.S. Open championship.
Let's talk a little bit about the driver and how I feel you can play a driver and do the
very best with.
First of all the position, you will notice the feet, the toes are even.
You will notice the body is in a square position.
It's not open blocking my turn back and it's not closed getting me too far closed to get
back to the left side.
So here we go.
We're going to just check some of the basics again.
The hands, if we dropped it right down through the middle it would come down the arm, down
the hands to the ball.
You also see that we still have that line and it's all a straight line.
A very important factor here is that I see some people every once in a while, they have
a tendency to get the club in the position that they like the best they'll move their
hands back.
That is a weak position.
That is going to cause a lot of trouble in a golf swing.
It's going to be difficult to accelerate from that position as we get too far forward.
I call these positive and negative positions.
This being negative, this being positive.
Either one can cause you trouble.
So if I had my choice I'd take the slightly positive position rather than the slightly
negative position.
What that means is my hands, according to that line, are on it or slightly ahead of
it.
And only when I want to play, and this will happen, I might change that position to play
a particular type shot.
We'll talk about that a little later.
Right now what we are interested in is the ultimate position for driving the golf ball.
Here we are.
The feet, the position of the hands, the position of the head, and away we go.
We're going to turn it back, get it back to the ultimate, and then we're going to accelerate
right through the golf ball, getting the best out of it we possibly can.
Let's talk for just a second about teeing the golf ball up and how high to tee it.
Now certainly you've watched professionals tee it very high and tee it very low, some
just right in the middle.
I think that depends on the individual to some degree.
I always felt like for just the average shot, let's say a normal drive, that I could put
my fingers on the golf ball, just as you see, and put the ball in the ground.
And as I did when my fingers touched the grass, I knew that that ball was at the height for
a normal tee shot.
There's no question about the fact that if the wind is blowing, you'd want to go a little
lower with it.
And then you're going to hit the ball just a little lower into that wind.
But on the other side of that, if you were downwind and you wanted to hit a little longer
drive, certainly you'd tee it up just a little higher.
That's going to make the difference.
Well, we've talked about a lot of things with the driver.
We've talked about teeing the ball up.
We've talked about the position of the hands and the head and all the other many things
that are going to affect how we hit the golf ball.
Now that we're ready for that, how are we going to hit it?
Well, you know, I see people, and I'll just give you a little demonstration here.
Come up on the tee, and there's a par 5 hole, and boy, I'm going to get on this green in
too.
And the first thing they do with the driver, oh boy, and they take that wide stance because
they're going to give it all.
What they've done is they've restricted their movements.
They have stopped the body from turning, and they really don't want a wide stance.
Similarly, your driver's stance shouldn't be much wider than the width of your shoulders.
That would be ample, and you're going to get the best results with that.
Some of the other things that I've noticed through the years, people get away from the
ball because they think they can hit it further.
That really isn't the case either.
You're restricting your movements.
I have that problem sometimes myself.
I get a little too far away because I want to hit it hard too, just like everyone else.
But what do I do when I want to hit a good drive and I want to hit a little bit harder
than I normally would?
Well, let's say that I have a pace that I set for a normal tee shot, and I come up to
the ball, and I'm fairly relaxed, and I check all the basic fundamentals, and then I'm ready
to hit the golf ball, and I'd like to get the club back and get my body back and everything
at the same time, and I hit it.
And let's say that's a normal pace.
But now I'm on that par 5 again, and I need a little extra.
How am I going to get it?
Well, first of all, I'm going to concentrate a little harder.
I'm going to put a little more effort into it, and I am going to be sure that I get that
club back, and by that I mean I'm going to take it back just a little bit slower.
And in doing so, it's going to allow me to get the club up a little further, and then
I'm going to do all those things you want to do.
I'm going to hit it hard.
How about one?
A good, hard tee shot.
This is on that par 5 we were talking about.
You know what?
I'm going to take that one.
I'm just off the fringe a couple of feet here, and I'm going to hit a pitch and run shot.
To hit that shot, I'm going to choke down on the club, and of course my goal here is
to pitch the ball just over the unpredictable part of the fringe of the green, and then
have the ball roll to the hole.
To do this shot, I will use the Varden or overlapping grip, and choke well down on the
shaft.
Now, I feel that I can get much more control with the 5 iron, and of course not lobbing
the ball too far, and again, not causing the ball to spin too much, which could give me
trouble on the roll out towards the hole.
Okay, my feet are close together.
I will do all the things that we have talked about in the past.
Flex my knees, my hips, and get very comfortable at this shot, keeping my hands slightly ahead
of the ball.
Now, my purpose is to hit the ball first and have it roll most of the way to the hole.
Another chip, and much the same.
My feet are relatively close together, slightly open stance, my hands are just a little ahead
of the ball.
Keeping the ball low to the ground, and of course getting that roll, gives you much more
control over this shot.
Now, let's suppose that we will go back just a few feet further from the surface, and when
we do that, moving back, of course we have now a little more of what we are determining
unpredictable fringe to the hole.
To play this shot, I've selected a 7 iron, and again, my purpose is to carry the ball
just over the fringe and allow it to roll to the hole.
Much the same stance, slightly open, feet close together, flexing my knees and hips,
setting down on the shot, keeping my hands just slightly ahead of the club head, keeping
my head very still, taking a short backstroke, and a follow through, and allowing the ball
to roll most of the way, giving me very good control over the shot.
Here we have a little different pitch shot, one that requires the ball to go up in the
air a little quicker, and again, carry the surface of the green.
Our purposes here will require a wedge, one that will lob the ball into the air and stop
it just a little more quickly.
We'll grip down on the club once again to gain control of the club.
As we address the ball, we will lay the club just a little bit open, and once again, noticing
that the feet are fairly close together, the stance is slightly open, we are using the
Varden or overlapping grip, keeping the head very still, and once again, visualizing just
what we want to do on this particular shot, meaning lob the ball up, it will have a little
spin to check its roll down the heel, and of course stopping it by the hole.
Again, we are not using a lot of wrist break in this shot, as some professionals might
say, dead wrists.
Okay, the club is open, we are going to accelerate through the ball, short back, and through
the shot, and stopping the ball relatively quickly as it hits the green.
Okay, a couple of other points that we want to mention.
Our hands are slightly ahead of the ball in this shot to create a positive action, and
of course, a descending blow is struck on the ball.
This is the kind of shot you need to get up and down to save that par.
As you can see, this is one of those dreaded shots across the sand trap, one that we just
as soon not have, but we have it, so let's see if we can't play it.
First of all, our feet are going to be close together for this shot, much the same as in
the other pitch shots.
We'll lay the club open so that as we come into the ball, we will put a very high trajectory
on the ball, and again, we are gripping the club well down the shaft so that we can have
control over that shot.
It's very important here that we accelerate through the ball and that we keep our head
very, very still.
So here we are, slightly open stance, the club is lying open.
We are going to go right under the ball and give the ball a very good trajectory to the
green.
And the ball will stop rather quickly.
Once again, the shot is a shot that we want to hit and get up into the air.
Very little divot taken, the ball of the club slides right across the top of the grass.
From the outside, slightly across the ball, giving the ball a spin from the left to the
right.
And the ball will draw up pretty quickly and end up close to the hole, we hope.
We have talked about the basic fundamentals of the game of golf.
We've gone through all the clubs in the bag, and now we're really going to get to the most
important one of all.
That's the putter.
Putting is such an individual part of the game.
We have many grips, as you know.
I use, and at the moment, am using the reverse overlapping.
Now that is the double reverse overlap, meaning I'm overlapping the small finger over the
middle finger and the index finger over the fingers of the right hand.
My thumbs are down the middle of the shaft, and in my left hand, the club lies diagonally
across the hand, much the same as a normal grip.
The big difference, of course, is that the thumb is right on top of the shaft, as you
can see.
So much for the left hand.
The right hand, the three fingers are on the club, and the small finger of the right hand
is overlapping the middle finger of the left.
Okay, and the thumb on the right hand is right down the center of the shaft again.
I am gripping the club comparatively light, not heavy, meaning I am not squeezing the
club.
I am squeezing it firm enough so that I feel the club, but not so firm that I lose any
touch that I might have with the ball.
My stance is normal.
It's not wide.
It's not very narrow.
It is normal.
The ball, again, is off the inside of my left heel, and my head is right down on top of
the ball.
My hands are very close to the seam in my left leg, just over the crease in my left
leg, and my hands are also slightly forward or even with the ball.
As I take the putter back, I try to move my hands back so that I don't go outside, but
I also do not go too sharply inside.
If anything, just slightly to the inside.
And as I come through the putt to hit the putt, my major objective is to keep both hands
moving to the hole.
There are many, many ways of hitting a putt, but there is one very particular thing about
a putt that we can't avoid.
We must accelerate as we hit that putt.
Hitting through the putt is the most important single thing we can do when we hit a putt.
Take the putter back and go through it firmly to the hole, keeping our hands moving, our
body still, and going at the hole.
Vitally important is that we do not decelerate on a putt.
Hit it firmly to the hole, and we'll make quite a few.
We have now reviewed the basic fundamentals of the game, and if I may for a moment, I'd
like to talk a little bit about how I started my career in golf.
It started when I was about three years old.
My father put a golf club in my hand, put my hands on the grip of that golf club, showed
me how to hold my hands on that grip, and said, go ahead and play.
The next time I really talked to my father about golf and the fundamentals of the game
was about three years later.
He looked at my grip, was satisfied that it was the way we started, and then said, keep
your head still, and go ahead and hit it hard.
And that was it.
That was kind of the way I got into the game of golf.
I hope that the basic fundamentals of the game and what we have just talked about will
help make you a better golfer.
which I hope will improve your golf and also your enjoyment of the game.
Learn to be a better, more consistent golfer with the definitive golf instructional videotape.
Now one of the leading golfers in the world teams up with his coach to give you an easy
to follow private lesson right in your own home.
Nick Faldo is famous for the daring change he made to his game in mid-career, a change
that has brought him phenomenal success.
With specific drills and techniques that can be practiced at home or on the range, Nick
shows you how to have a more enjoyable, more satisfying game by improving your skills.
You'll focus on specific areas of instruction, like the grip, alignment, backswing, driving,
putting, and everything else you need to know to be a better golfer.
Very important that we get the body to pull the arms into position rather than trying
to get the, put the arms into a position.
Nick Faldo's golf course.
That's the definitive golf instructional videotape.
A
.
.
.
.
.
.