Hook and Slice Explained

Difference between a Hook and a Slice

Have you ever watched or played tennis before? Hopefully you’re familiar with it a bit, because this analogy will really help illustrate a point and hopefully you’ll see the correlation between golf and tennis and be able to translate it to your thought process.

I would liken the golf slice to the “drop shot” in tennis. During a long volley one player sometimes attempts a drop shot if their opponent is deep on the baseline. They do this to hit the shot shorter and to stop the ball quicker with the slide/back spin they put on the tennis ball. Likewise, the golf hook is very similar to the “topspin volley”. Generally volleys hit from the baseline in tennis have topspin on them and spin forward when they hit the ground making them bounce further and get deeper into the opponents court. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to hit those topspin volleys on the golf course and make your golf ball spin forward when it hits the ground instead of backwards? Well by learning how to eliminate the slice and instead have a bit of a hook or draw on the ball, you will in effect be able to do that. There is certainly still a time and a place for the “drop shot” (slice or cut) on the golf course, but not every shot.

Getting back to the golf side of things, let’s discuss briefly how a slice and a hook come to be. Where does that spin originate? Obviously you know that the only contact your club has with the ball is at impact, correct? And the only time you can impart spin on the ball is at that impact point. So the problem lies in the angle in which your club face strikes the ball and the direction in which your club is swinging (inside or outside) through the ball.

Let’s first start with the “outside-in” swing path. You’re most accustomed to this anyway if you’ve read this far. But let’s define what we mean by inside and outside so that we’re all in understanding. When you address the ball, the space between yourself and the ball is referred to as the inside, while the space on the opposite side of the ball from yourself is labeled the outside. And if you were to draw a line directly from the ball to your target and extend that line in the opposite direction behind the ball, this will determine whether you’re on the inside or the outside of the ball.

On the “outside-in” path, you can probably imagine that your club head during your downswing toward the ball is on the outside of that imaginary line we drew and then strikes the ball and then your club head finishes through the impact zone on the inside of the ball. This seems like the correct remedy to hit the ball to the left doesn’t it? Most golfers believe that. But most golfers don’t understand the physics and the science of the golf swing. Contrary to what most golfers who slice the ball believe, by hitting the ball with this approach, this ultimately sends the ball to the right. It may seem that by cutting across the ball (another term that is used in conjunction with slicing or the “outside-in” swing) you will hit the ball to the left. Many of you are able to start the ball toward the left, but the spin that is on the ball ultimately curves the ball to the right leaving you with a shot that is short and in the rough on the right side.

Now let’s explore the “inside-out” approach. This is the ideal approach to the game of golf when viewed through the eyes of a notorious slicer. You may not understand it quite yet, but you soon will. The belief that many golfers have is that by hitting the ball from an inside to out path, they will hit the ball further to the right because that’s the way the club head is traveling through impact. If you think this way, you’re not alone. But the exact opposite is true of what we talked about in the previous paragraph. As you approach the impact zone of your swing, you will ideally want to have the club head traveling from the inside, then striking the ball and finishing on the outside of the ball. By doing this and supplying the correct wrist turn which we will talk about later, you will impact the ball just so that results in the right to left spin (hook spin). So even though your ball may start out to the right, it will spin back to the left more often than not.

The ball is sitting completely still just before impact. And the club head speed you generate during your swing will cause that little golf ball to do exactly what your swing tells it to do. And the closer you can make your swing to being right on line (on line with that imaginary line we drew through the ball earlier that points right at your target) the straighter you will hit the ball. If golf were this easy, it would be great. But there are a couple of other major aspects of the swing that we will discuss later that will make it all come together.

The diagrams on this page are courtesy of:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/augusta/cool_stuff/physics/index.html

... Are you tired of dealing with a nasty slice when you go out to play a round with your friends, family, or co-workers ? Not to mention the embarrassment ?

... Or are you the type of golfer that wants to get better, spending countless dollars on lessons and expensive clubs, but nothing seems to put a dent in your Golf Slice ?

Dave,

The Dave Way is awesome and well worth the purchase. I now hit my drives with a little draw and they are nice and long. After years of playing golf I now shoot in the low 80's.

Thanks.
Harper V. - Nashville, TN

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