Hi. I'm Johnny Miles, PGA golf professional at the Lake Powell National Golf Course in Page, Arizona, and I'm going to give you some tips on how to cure a shank. Most players don't even like to hear that word. In fact, once you get the shanks, all of a sudden your buddies start playing with other people. But I'm going to show you how to get those friendships back. First thing we need to talk about is what causes a shank, Well, what causes a shank is very simple. You set up with the ball in the middle of the clubface, and when you swing, the club moves outside of that and you catch the ball in the shank of the club. That's a shank shot. If you hit it off the toe here, that's a toe shot. But the shot that just kills players is the shank shot. Because once it hits that shank, that ball goes dead right like an Oklahoma lateral. And sometimes it goes out of bounds. Now, the two things that probably causes you to shank the ball, first one's pretty simple. Your hands are too close to your body when you set up. If you get your hands too close to your body, when you swing, the club moves to the outside. Now, you've already set it up in the shank of the club, okay. You're dead in the water. Cure it, very simple. Work on natural arm position. Let your hands get away from your body, so that when you swing, the club doesn't go outside, it goes back on the proper point. The second thing that can cause a shank is what we call poor weight distribution, especially when you swing the club. If you set up, and maybe you're reaching a little too much, and when you swing the club back, if the weight transfers to the toes of your feet, again your body and the club are going to move outside; you're going to catch it in the shank. So, what you want to do, if that's the problem, you want to get in a balanced set up, and maintain that set up when you swing the club. Don't let your weight go forward on your forward swing. Very simple. Now, you're out playing golf, you got a little money game going, and if you don't cure this shank real quick, you're going to lose a fortune and your wife isn't going to be very happy. So, I'm going to show you what I call the quick fix to get it to the club house. Instead of setting the ball up in the middle of the clubface and you shanking it, set it up toward the toe and live with it. Because now when the club moves, it's going to move to the center and not the shank. So, if you're shanking the ball when you're playing golf on the golf course, and it looks like it's going to be a bad day, just to get to the clubhouse, play the ball out toward the toe of the club so that when it moves it out, it moves toward the center of the club face. When you get to the clubhouse, book a lesson with your PGA golf pro. I think he might be able to help. I'm Johnny Miles.
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