Use a tennis racket to teach yourself optimal clubface control

Ed. Note: This edition of Play Smart was published in partnership with XXIO.

Having a square clubface at impact is crucial if you want to hit the ball straight. If you’re a few degrees open or closed, the ball can miss your target by a wide margin.

But clubface awareness is not something most recreational golfers possess inherently. When they go through their swing, the clubface does all sorts of things, and it rarely results in a shot that’s hit on line.

Working on clubface awareness is quite easy if you have the right equipment. And in this edition of Play Smart, XXIO ambassador Nathalie Sheehan shows us how.

How to work on clubface awareness

A tennis racket might seem like an odd thing to bring to the golf course, but it can actually be a useful tool for working on clubface awareness.

The surface of a tennis racket is much larger than that of a golf club. And when you swing it around, you can easily see which direction the face is pointing when you hit the tennis ball. If you can attach the tennis racket to your golf club, you can then see how the same principle applies to your clubface.

“If we picture what we would want to do in tennis and return the racket back to square,” Sheehan says, “you can see the clubface is extending and see that the clubface is square.”

If you’re someone who struggles with a slice, you’ll see the face of the racket open and point toward the sky at impact, while the opposite is true for a hook.

“That’s a really great visual to fix some of the things that may be going on in your swing,” she says.

If you’re struggling with clubface control, grab a tennis racket and head to the range. If you can get the tennis racket square at impact and apply those same principles to the golf swing, you’ll be hitting it straight in no time.

Zephyr Melton

Golf.com Editor

Zephyr Melton is an assistant editor for GOLF.com where he spends his days blogging, producing and editing. Prior to joining the team at GOLF, he attended the University of Texas followed by stops with the Texas Golf Association, Team USA, the Green Bay Packers and the PGA Tour. He assists on all things instruction and covers amateur and women’s golf. He can be reached at zephyr_melton@golf.com.