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I recently started working with professional Ben Silverman, a Canadian who now lives in south Florida and plays regularly on the GolfSlinger.com Tour. Ben has already shown some nice success, having recently won a two day event with a $10,000 first prize, and amassing over $50,000 in earnings this year. Ben is a talent, as you will see by his ability to change his swing in a short period of time, and is open to making his swing simpler for the long run, as he hopes eventually to try for the PGA Tour and to represent Canada at the 2016 Olympics. I have played with Ben twice, and I am impressed by his abilities and his attitude. He had a number of things he told me he would like to improve, especially his short and medium range pitching, and was open to suggestions as to how to tweak his swing so that he could learn to move the ball both ways and keep the ball down in windy conditions.
When I first saw Ben’s swing I noted a familiar pattern whereby the right arm pinched early and moved much deeper late in the backswing, causing the club to cross a good deal at the top. From there his hands dropped almost straight down, and his release, especially with the longer clubs, was well out to the right. It turns out that he had been taught most of this, starting with keeping the right arm in early in the backswing, then the idea of dropping the arms and hands “into the slot”. If you have watched some of my videos you will find that most (not everyone) who pinch the right arm in early end up lifting and pulling it back at the top, just as most who then drop the hands come in high and release out to the right. Letting the right arm bend and stay away from the body in the backswing was a new thought for Ben, and when we added the idea of throwing a bucket of water over his should to the mix he began to rework his backswing right onto the swing plane, which I felt would make his transition much simpler and easier to accomplish. Next in line was getting the hands to move less downward and more out toward the ball in transition, and he was able to accomplish this as well, although we are expecting that to be more of a long term project. It is always nice to work with someone who can incorporate what you tell them in short order, and it will be interesting to see if Ben can continue to improve as a result.
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