Barefooting
For the more mature reader amongst you and particularly those with nimble feet this article is not about a dance from the 60’s or about Sandie Shaw who won the Eurovision song contest singing puppet on a string wearing nothing on her feet.
This article is for those weight watchers amongst you and I do not mean those of you who pile on extra pounds simply by looking at a gateaux.
We are talking here about the positioning of your body weight through your full golf swing.
To re-confirm what many of you already know, at the address position your weight should be evenly distributed between both feet but then moving more to your right foot on the back swing and transferring to more to your left foot at the point of impact and to the follow through.
Clearly these instructions apply when you have a perfectly flat lie on the tee or through the green.
However course architects have this habit of putting slopes, hills, humps and hollows in your way and these can affect your weight distribution.
For example if your ball is on a lie above your feet you must place more pressure on your toes at the address position to prevent you ‘falling’ back down the hill during your swing.
Obviously for a lie with the ball below your feet you do the opposite and place more weight on your heels to prevent ‘falling’ forwards down the hill during the swing.
For uphill and downhill lies it is most important that your posture is correct and that you keep your body perpendicular to the slope and try not to ‘lean’ towards or backwards from the slope.
Then of course there are the uphill and downhill cross-hill lies…….
Just where do you put your weight then?
One of the best golfers of all time was Sam Snead and to gain a better understanding of where his weight was located during his swing he used to practise barefooted.
Obviously this is better conducted off grass rather than those horrible mats at the driving range but give it a try off various type of lie and you will notice that you have a heightened awareness of your body weight position and distribution during the swing.
Go on give it a go what is the worst thing that can happen, ant bites or blisters maybe but what happens if your golf gets better?