The Huge Break

View from TPC Scottsdales 16th Tee

Tue, 25 Dec 2012 19:41:00 -0700

Ready for the 2012 Waste Management Phoenix Open? I played TPC Scottsdale today, here is a shot from the 16th tee box. The colosseum is taking shape!

Update from Norm Dec 2011

Sun, 18 Dec 2011 21:56:00 -0700

After a day I'd like to forget at the golf course I made a discovery that I believe will take me to the next level as a ballstriker. Recently I've been working on balancing myself, and in doing so I now have more weight toward my heels. I've always had too much weight on my toes, and as a result I've always had poor balance (falling forward). By moving my weight back toward my heel to balance myself there was an unintended consequence. I've never been a shanker of the golf ball, but recently I've had my fair share! In balancing myself I had unintentionally also pulled my hands closer to my body at address. This caused me to be way too close to the golf ball. As you can imagine, there were many ballstriking consequences to this, with the most humiliating being the dreaded shank.

I discovered the root cause of the problem while doing some mirror work after the round. My hands had gotten so close to me I couldn't get a full fist between my belt buckle and my hands. One quick adjustment, getting my hands hanging where they need to be, while also being balanced, and I had the best range session I've ever had. It also carried to the course today, so problem solved!

Below you see Alvaro Quiros. I've clearly outlined his excellent setup to the ball:

Norm's Fall Swing Update

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

I've spent a lot of time the past couple of months working on:

* Balance (not falling forward, especially on downswing)
* Tempo
* Shoulder Plane (I've always turned my shoulders too flat, finally making progress, about 1/2 way there now!)
* Level (I tend to dip down on the backswing, rise up at the top, fall down again into impact, then up again)
* Clearing my right side (Making sure the downswing is driven by the lower body, hips clearing, shoulders and arms whipping through = eliminates left misses!)

The following swing video illustrates the changes nicely:

This driver video also shows some improvement, especially in the lower body action. I still need to work on getting my right knee back into my left knee however...

Here's an 8i, you can see the changes are for the most part consistent through the bag.

TheHugeBreak - The first 4 years in pictures!

Sun, 06 Nov 2011 15:14:00 -0700

It all started with the first trip to Tucson in 2008 to the Accenture Match Play World Golf Championship. We've been back every year since!

Here we are with Tiger in 2008! This was at "The Gallery", El Tigre went on to win.

Here's a nice obligatory range shot of Trevor Immelman:

More Tiger, this time from Dove Mountain:

Norm was on "The Golf Fix"!

We had a blast in 2010 at the matchplay!

Steve built his own putting green in his backyard:

Then there was the trip to Pebble for the Open:

Ever seen this guy? Not too shabby for an old man. Cold Monterey conditions? No worries. 290 down the middle.

Guess which group we followed on picture day?

Ok, here's a couple of nice shots of Ishikawa to top it off:

Steve managed to get a nice pic on the 6th fairway:

And here I am this spring, much better positions! I'll have you know this shot was 12 feet :)

TheHugeBreak.Com Relaunched!

Sat, 05 Nov 2011 20:01:00 -0700

Due to some issues with our hosting provider I am sad to report that ALL of TheHugeBreak history was lost! Moral of the story: Back your own database up, don't rely on the hosting provider to keep the backups current, or have any amount of reasonable retention. However, the videos are all still on YouTube! We are taking this opportunity to start from scratch on this blog site, and enter phase II of this "project". -Norm