Almost nothing in golf feels as satisfying as watching a perfectly compressed iron shot launch toward the pin, leaving a neat, a bacon-strip divot just ahead of where your ball used to be. But if you’re consistently looking back at spotless turf after your swing, you’re likely feeling frustrated and losing distance. This article is your guide to understanding exactly why you're not taking a divot and provides a clear, actionable plan to fix it, helping you achieve a a powerful, downward strike on the golf ball.
First, let’s clear up a huge misconception: a good divot is not the result of digging down and behind the ball. Many golfers mistakenly believe they need to "scoop" or "lift" the ball into the air. In reality, that’s the a major reason for thin shots, topped balls, you're not getting good height on your clubs. In other words -- the opposite of what good golf wants.
Think of it this way: your irons are designed with loft. That angle on the clubface is what makes the ball go up. Your job isn’t to help the ball into the air, your job is to deliver the clubhead downward, so the club can do its job. A proper divot is the result of this action, not the goal itself.
On a well-struck iron shot, the club contacts the ball first and continues its downward arc, taking a shallow slice of turf after the ball. This is what a golf instructor is describing as ball-then-turf contact -- the secret to pure compression and maximum distance for your iron sand wedge shots. When you fail to take a divot, the opposite is happening. Generally a golfer who doesn't take a good divot, has a shallow swinging form -- making their low-point happening too early - which generally results in them having what is considered 'scoopy swings' on the golf ball at the impact position. But there's good news, it's not all that hard for regular players to fix.
If you're not taking a good divot on the golfcourse, you’re almost certainly catching the ball with an an extreme angle -- generally too shallow, what we in the coaching community describe of an attack angle at impact -- hitting it on the upswing rather than the downswing. Your divot is a fingerprint for the low point of your golf swing -- the lowest point in the arc your clubhead travels.
For players who don't take divots, their low-point is likely occurring before the golf ball and not at contact. Let's break down the three most common swing flaws that could be causing this problem at impact.
This is by far the biggest contributor to swing bottom issues for beginners who struggling at the impact position. As we discussed earlier on in this post, a players an have an instinctual urge todrive upward through impact, they believe doing so would 'assist' the balls natural upward trajectory.
This is why having an upward angle of attack causes a couple destructive chain reactions - the very first one being that we're adding extra loft onto the club head meaning any swing path inconsistencies or club face inconsistencies' impact are also likely going to impact on distance and control. Remember our rule from earlier in this page about making sure you "stay down through contact" -- it's how you ensure that our low-point, stays ahead of your ball after impact, allowing you to correctly apply enough pressure behind the swing to create the perfect shot every single time no mater where we play it from at the tee.
Your golf swing makes an arc your club travels around, the perfect placement makes your golf ball go straight. For beginners who tend to take a flatter swing angle when striking the golf balls we should be standing slightly behind the center of our swing paths trajectory arc in golf.
How do we do so?. By putting our shorted balls in the middle to your position at the mound (wedges and shorter clubs)-- whereas mid rang length iron in your bag should have a one golf cart ball sized length in distance -- ahead our swing position. If a club's in an unusual position for making a clean shot, such as to far from the middle position your golf balls placement naturally sits, try adjusting it outwards from inside a bit while checking on alignment of everything to maintain its original placement.
Imagine your downswing as a process - with first starting by transferring all yor kinetic power downward toward leading side. But many amateur players unknowingly sabotage their game with the dreadful "reverse pivots." instead keeping their power focused forward towards one spot causing many an awful bad throw.
What can you do instead - once we hit top back swimg - get that bit forward, but then unleathe our power towards any object. What i mean by that is... all that toral body momentum that we generate, while staying inside your cylinders. We just got un-tap. Unleth yourself free from this tension filled space. I just let that go for a minute cause this can lead a great golf course game changer when practice correctly.
Now let's finally talking about getting to what we want - generating the best force when i making a clean swing by using drills. Getting down the form is great -- but nothing reinforces your new movement an down swings and helps our mind understand it more clearer - than drills for developing our minds-eye for getting better form down so we take them to my courses without stress or overthinking causing them a stroke next time out practicing on the green. Using my simple training I've outlined with a couple good golf tips help make that shot making cleaner and take that pro level game to my backyard course.
These drills are not a one and do your better solutions in order getting to perfect our game takes discipline in our self and being persistent so i urge we take time with our game, keep on drilling these easy forms consistently so our game is built on great swings with better skills rather than 'shot and guess techniques' that plagues so many amateurs on the range...
The goal hear our simple - take one your best ball for training or your used ones - put your golftee over some tape and just place a inch ahead is where your aiming towards making your balls to shot - this way -- forcing your eyes into having a downswing where my club just touch'n grass just ahead where it use 2 be placed -- reinforcing better muscle memory for your backswings, making our better forms more consistent. Your ball should'na moving much past this set point either so be checking on your line ever few shot.
Take one good back swinging and starting down our swing now lets moving out and up front as down our foot. Thats how proper force transfer happening... thats our training in for better body motion from hips into swing when finishing on a leads heel which you an checking yourself having good a balancy for next up shot. This forces our weights go forwards generating perfect contact in ball striking so practicing every time when warming on ranges. My finishing points when i practice a good back swing is when taking a break while a looking on our pin where our game goes with our next shot... our feet won't need adjusting much. So my eyes just ready and my game just a waiting on its time 4 great making's on ground... so let take my easy down swing and win more!
Getting clean ball strikes with our irons about knowing one easy a thing in common as coaches like my is seeing more bad swings than any thing else... And most bad habits like dropping a shoulder cause one or many more faults causing many points of inconsistent game play... its having poor a low point on golfswings.
But when building fundamentals with right practicing and mindset changes - its easy taking shots with more powerful downswings like a better PGA pro. Try practicing one or more this article drills getting clean points a making and using the last of a check listing for a good pre shot ritual.
Wrapping all our talk in a good a mind set. having low divots happen for a shallow, low swing is not getting the downward strike its want. By knowing how downward strikes are happening by correct setups an weighting yourself into the power from the ground our body takes to hit balls cleanly having good divots everytime our out the course getting better at a good golf gaming day.
To help translate our practice from range to course, sometimes a quick reminder can be your saving grace to a great low score. Our app takes your phone in for having a coach at any needed an time anywhere on any a place in world to ask. When caught inside some thorny lies or you need a club guide for better lies, get my app, Caddie AI. When on the grounds just open my app -- just use my on-course GPS for any course to know where anything you might need where to look up anything, my club suggestions for easyer games to my in course library of faults to fix, so taking our doubt to win more plays on every round of golf!
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