At one time or another, we’ve all pulled up to a golf course or a driving range ready and excited to work on our game, only to find out it’s a “mats only” day. Talk about a buzzkill! Golf isn’t played off a mat.
It can be pretty frustrating, but according to Golf Digest Top 50 Instructor (and Golf Academy National Advisory Board member) Todd Sones, there’s actually a benefit to practicing off mats if you’re forced to. They can help a player find the bottom of his golf swing. In the winter months, when Todd’s not teaching outdoors at White Deer Run Golf Club outside Chicago, he’s teaching indoors at the Buffalo Grove Dome – a limited distance, mats only facility.
Because of it’s size limitations, Buffalo Grove in the winter months is a great place to work on one of the most neglected aspects of the game: the short game. But you can work on your short game anytime and anywhere you’re forced to hit off mats, and it can really help you learn where the bottom of your swing is.
Todd says when people hit fat or thin shots, it’s very simple. It’s because the bottom of their golf swing is too early. He says the golf club swings in an arc in relation to the ground and compares the arc to a plane coming in for a landing. When the plane lands too early, it accelerates and ascends by the time it gets to the golf ball.
One of the reasons the swing may be too early is because the spine is tilted back at impact. There’s not a lot of lateral drive in the short game, so if your spine is tilting back without the lateral drive, which produces too much power for a short shot, you’re going to hit the top of the ball or the ground right before it.
In this video, Todd explains the secret to help ensure the bottom of your golf swing is in front of the ball: listening. Just by listening to the sound, you can tell if you’re doing it properly. If you’re early, you can hear the club bounce off the mat and into the ball. What you want to hear and feel is the club hitting the ball first and then the mat. The key is to make sure your shoulders are neutral, pretty much level, and that your spine is at a 90-degree angle to the ground. You don’t want a high left shoulder and a tilted spine.