Why You Need This: In this video, "How Close Should You Stand to the Golf Ball?"...

You'll find out the answer to this age old question.

Everybody has their own take on it, of course...

So, I'm gonna give you some basic principles to remember if you feel you're struggling here.

Keep the simple rules I'll teach you in mind as you address the ball...

Not only will your stance improve, but your swing should as well.

In fact, this could help any slicing or hooking issues you've been experiencing.

Watch this video now to get more comfortable over the ball and hit straighter shots more consistently!

Golf Pros Featured:

Instructors Featured: Clay Ballard    

Video Duration: 2:54

Video Transcription:

All right, so one of the most common things is getting comfortable over the golf shot. If you’re comfortable, you feel good over the ball, you’re going to be able to hit some really good, solid shots.

A question that I get all the time is how far should I stand from the golf ball? Sometimes what I’ll see people do, and probably the most common thing is getting too close to the golf ball, and you can see that my hands are almost right against my legs.

As I try to hit this shot, I’m going to be coming down and almost swinging out away from my body to create space, and swinging across the ball to create space in the downswing, and I get this right to left across the ball slice motion, which is very, very common.

If you’re hitting a slice, you’re coming over the top, that could be something that you’re doing, you’re a little close to the ball.

Another thing that happens is sometimes people get so far away, and now their arms are completely extended out from their body.

You can see how much space I have here now, I’m really out stretched and reached away like this, and now the problem with that is, I feel like my arms and my body are disconnected, and they’re not working together as one unit.

So I want to find a balance, and that’s going to help me to get comfortable over the ball to feel good over the ball, and that way I can hit a lot better shots.

So very, very simple drill I want you to do for this, we’re going to go ahead and actually lose the club here for a second. I’m going to stand straight up and down.

Now as I get into my posture, I want to make sure that I’ve dropped my hips back, so I’m taking my hips and I’m bending from my hip socket, and I’m going to bend enough until I can let my arms hang down straight from my shoulders, and there’s still going to be about five or six inches in front of my legs.

You can see if I don’t bend very much, and I just kind of round from my shoulders like this, I don’t have very good posture, now if my arms hang straight down they’re going to be right against my leg. That’s probably the most common mistake that I see.

Or if I bend a lot, and I’m letting my arms hang down, now they’re way out away from my body, and you can see how close they are to the ground, that’s obviously not correct either.

I’m just going to hinge from my hips enough until my arms can hang down straight from my shoulders, and I can grip the club, and I’m about five or six inches from the back of the club to the front of my thighs here.

That’s going to give me plenty of room to swing back and swing through, and have tons and tons of space. So now, let’s go ahead and demonstrate this.

I’ll hit a shot, again I’m going to hinge forward from the hips. Let my arms hang straight down five or six inches of space, now I’m going to go ahead and swing. There we go. Hit that one pretty solid.

One last tip here, if you’re going to hit a driver, you’re going to be a little bit farther away from the ball. Exact same posture, maybe just a touch more upright, and instead of your arms hanging straight down, they’re going to be slightly more out.

Here’s an iron, and then here’s the driver. Because the driver is a little bit longer. So very small change, easy to do, take that, work with that on your game. Get comfortable over the ball, and you’re going to hit a lot of good shots.

Good luck to you guys, I’ll see you all soon.