Understanding The Golf Swing: Today's Leading Proponent of Ernest Jones' Swing Principles Presents a Complete System for Better Golf

"Hank knows more about ball flight and what controls it than anyone in the game." -Masters and British Open champion Mark O'Meara

Get back to basics and build your best possible golf swing

Lots of golf instructors can show you tricks to correct a hook or to stop hitting the ball fat, but these are just quick fixes that leave you with a swing built on mistakes. In Hank Haney's Essentials of the Swing, the world's premier expert on the golf swing takes you back to step one to master the essentials and build a complete, powerful, and consistent swing that will improve your game quickly and keep you playing better for years to come.

This step-by-step guide brings you the same careful analytical approach that Hank has shared with the hundreds of touring pros who have been his students - including the world's #1 golfer. It walks you through every aspect of your swing, from grip to contact to follow-through, and shows you how to analyze ball flight to shape your shots and put the ball where you want it more frequently and with much more consistency.

Groundbreaking studies show that the adult brain can learn only one new motor skill at a time. The golf swing is a series of fundamental motor skills, all simple to learn, but not easy to master or combine. Mastery of these fundamentals is the key to consistently good golf, round after round.

In Golf from the Ground Up Bob Mullen emphasizes the critical importance of the "platform," the synergy of grip, stance, footwork, rotation, alignment, and ball position. A repeatable swing cannot happen until the fundamentals of the platform are mastered. Errant shots come from errors in the platform, not the swing. "Get your platform fundamentals correct, " writes Mullen, "and the swing corrects itself."

This book also addresses the slice--"the number one fault in golf"--with a fresh analysis of why the slice occurs and how to cure it. The Author's Note's section breaks new ground on one of golf's perennial questions, "Hogan's secret," with Mullen's insighful analysis of how Hogan achieved his remarkable clubhead speed.

With clear, detailed explanations of skills golfers need to know, and drills and exercises to make them permanent, this book will help all struggling golfers take their games to a higher level.

Hank Haney believes that a "flawed swing" that still produces a good shot is a good swing. By focusing on the outcome of your swing first, rather than on the swing itself, he believes you can often avoid making the awkward and unnatural changes to grip, stance, posture and alignment that many golf instructors ask of their students.

The Only Golf Lesson You'll Ever Need will help you straighten your hook or slice, add distance to your drives, identify and fix the flaws in your swing, and become a wizard around the greens.

"I'm proud of the way my swing holds up ion all kinds of conditions and under the severest pressure. Both are a tribute to Hank Haney and his teaching. Hank knows more about ballflight and what controls it than anyone in the game. And if you understand that, you're on your way."
-- Mark O'Meara from the Foreword to The Only Golf Lesson You'll Ever Need

Now, after sixty years of keeping notes on the things he's seen and learned and on the golfing greats he's taught, Penick is finally letting his Little Red Book (named for the red notebook he's always kept) be seen by the golf world. His simple, direct, practical wisdom pares away all the hypertechnical jargon that's grown up around the golf swing, and lets all golfers, whatever their level, play their best. He avoids negative words; when Tom Kite asked him if he should "choke down" on the club for a particular shot, Harvey told him to "grip down" instead, to keep the word "choke" from entering his mind. He advises golfers to have dinner with people who are good putters; their confidence may rub off, and it's certainly better than listening to bad putters complain. And he shows why, if you've got a bad grip, the last thing you want is a good swing.

Throughout, Penick's love of golf and, more importantly, his love of teaching shine through. He gets as much pleasure from watching a beginner get the ball in the air for the first time as he does when one of his students wins the U.S. Open.