Mark Crossfield is a golf guru. He offers many common sense tips that amateurs can understand and emulate. His recent video is one that I never clued in on until he started talking about our weight shift with the driver. After watching the video, it makes perfect sense and I am surprised I never thought of it before. I guess you can teach an old dog new tricks.
What I like about the video is that it is simple and repeatable. Crossfield covers a fair bit of data, but the end result is very achievable. Before offering my two cents, lets take a look at what he has to say:
The loading of our front foot before starting our back swing makes sense. He is not trying to create a rocking back and forth motion, but to establish the understanding of a weight shift during our golf swing. The intent is for us to develop that feel that will enhance our swing motion. It is definitely something I am going to try in my DIY driving area in my garage.
The one point that was quickly glossed over in the video has to do with maintaining your same level accuracy. This point is very important to all our games. Gaining distance, yet still hitting the ball straight is a very challenging process. Many of the tips I have watched involve more changes than slightly adjusting our weight shift. The multiple changes offered by other instructors cause cascading effects to our overall swing. Additionally, they are more complex and harder to emulate. The advice my Crossfield is something that is very intriguing and worth further investigation.
Gaining more distance by adjusting how we apply our weight shift seems simple. After I give it a try in my garage, I will let you know how things work out.
I am a grateful golfer! See you on the links!
The Grateful Golfer 
Update…we played a tough course today. Just shy of 6600 yards from the tee box we chose. I got there early to hit a bucket and try putting a lot more weight forward. It took a few swings but I got it. And used it all through the round. It worked great for me. I hit a ton of great shots out there today.
I stuck with fairways and down with the weight movement. I didn’t trust it with the driver. I got it finding fairways right now and don’t want to adjust anything. And I’d say I saw the best improvements come from the hybrids with that weight shifts. But I was impressed with what I was getting for sure.
I found it kept me covering the ball better and making it easier to get a clean ball first strike. It worked especially well when on 18 I had to hit a shot from just out of a fairway bunker. I had to stand in it and choke up on my 4 hybrid and hit it off a mix of sand and grass above my feet. I’m sure that added weight forward move before starting my swing is the only reason I hit that ball 190 yards straight up the fairway.
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Kevin,
Sounds like an interesting round of learning. I sounds like the weight shifting did not affect your accuracy very much, which is very important. Our snot is receding quickly. I am hoping to be on the links in a few weeks.
Cheers Jim
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Mark’s a great teacher I think. Been watching his video’s for years. The video’s he put out about his own search for more distance last year were awesome in the detail and ease of understanding. It also highlighted the fact that we are at a disadvantage. The pro he saw that put him on the path to gaining 40 yards was very, very well equipped and of course knowledgeable about body mechanics.
You and I can follow along. We can take it in. We can practice and experiment. But we can’t progress nearly as fast as Mark was able to without the help. But that said, I’ve seen gains since I began working on the things Mark has shown in his video’s for sure.
Shut the guys down pretty good tonight. Went 4/0/0/0 thanks to my putter and wedges. And I’d say a couple of shots I hit tonight were possible thanks to Marks distance search. I hit my longest drive in 900+ attempts on #8 tonight and without much breeze this time thought what we had would have been helping with the little fader I hit. It was coming in over my right shoulder as I was looking down the fairway.
In this video he’s getting us started right. The bigger weight shift forward helps keep us from swaying when we shift back. Just knowing the weight should stay on the inside edge of the back foot wasn’t enough for me. This helps. The other side he doesn’t get into here is where we get the max speed boost. It’s in moving the weight back forward earlier than we tend to. Getting the lower body to start the turn back to target while the upper body is still not quite finished getting to the top generates stretches the lateral muscles and gets them primed to help pull the body around. So we turn faster and we create more club head speed.
For me, that’s been the hardest part. That timing. I tend to get it right more often by surprise still. lol But at least it’s something I can feel and gauge. So I have some metric to work with.
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Kevin,
Congrats on your skins game win. Yes, the proper weight shift is important and does take some time to develop. I have a tendency to stay neutral through my swing, hence Mark’s video is very helpful. I will find out more once golf starts.
Cheers Jim
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