One of the most common problems golfers’ have is the slice. Fixing a slice in a golf swing is not easy but if you understand the factors that contribute to the golf slice you can reduce it or cure it.
Below you’ll find our best golf swing tips on how to fix a golf slice. Let’s first start off discussing what is a golf slice and what causes it to occur. Then we’ll share solutions for how to correct a golf slice!
And at the very end you’ll find several golf practice drills and routines we put together!
Resource: Golf Practice System (Practice Plans + Videos + Worksheets)
Fix Your Slice Video Lesson
What is a Golf Slice?
The dreaded golf slice is when your golf ball moves away from you outside of your stance line and target line.
For right hand golfers, this is when the ball starts left and does a big banana to the right. Lefties would see the ball banana right to left.
Then it breaks down to more technical types of golf slices. Your ball can start straight and slice which would represent the normal term slice.
You have pull slices, where your ball starts inside your target line and curves back across your target line to the outside.
Push slices are where your ball starts outside the target line and continues going further away to the outside. Here’s a photo to illustrate all the different types of golf slice you could have in your swing.
What Causes a Golf Shot to Slice?
So what exactly causes your golf ball to slice after contact with the golf club sends it on its way into the air? There are a few main reasons that could be causing your golf slice such as:
- Swing Path
- Club Face
- Body Motion
Swing Path
Swing paths vary among all golfers. Two golfers can have different swing paths and still hit the ball straight because hit the ball straight relies on the combination of factors above.
One golfer can pull-fade a golf ball straight down his target line and another can push-draw the ball to make it end up straight down the target line.
Ideally, if you are slicing you first have to determine what swing path you have that’s affecting your slice. Are you pull slicing, straight slicing, or push slicing.
Resource: Golf Practice System (Practice Plans + Videos + Worksheets)
Pull slicing
If you pull slice often then you likely have an OUT to IN swing path. Imagine a clock lying on the ground instead of a golf ball on the driving range.
The center of your clock is where the golf ball would rest if you placed one on top of the clock. If you draw a horizontal line from the 3 to the 9 this would be your target line.
Right handed golfers who have a straight swing path would swing from 3 to 9 on the clock. Left handers would swing 9 to the 3 for a perfectly straight swing path.
A slicer’s clock swing path is OUT to IN so this would be like coming into the clock from the 1 or 2, hitting the ball, and then the swing path finishes at around the 7 or 8. For lefties it would be the opposite so 10 or 11 to 4 or 5 on the clock face.
How to Correct a Golf Slice
To correct this, we need to get your swing path to an IN to OUT motion where you would start at the 4 of the clock and finish at the 10. You’re even better off if you can start between the 3 and 4 and finish between the 9-10 range.
A normal golf swing should be an arcing motion from inside (start) to square (ball contact) to inside (finish).
Now that you see how an out to in swing path looks and how inside out and inside square inside swing paths look you can get to work correcting your swing path. It’s possible your out to swing path is caused from body motion such as an over the top movement by your body. You’ll see more on body motion shortly.
To swing inside to out we recommend getting some pool noodles and finding an open area in your yard to set up or at the driving range. Set the noodles parallel to each other and angled inside to out.
Then, practice 100s and even 1000s of dry swing reps, focusing on forcing your swing path inside out. If you revert to an outside to inside swing you’ll hit the noodles. This is a great drill to get feed-back on every swing because you’ll know if you hit the noodles or not.
You can also set up a video recorder that records you for the 20-30 minutes you are performing inside to outside swings and review the film after to see your body’s motion as well as see what went wrong when you hit the noodles.
Straight to Slice Shots & Push Slice
If you have a straight ball flight that starts slicing mid-flight then more times than not your ball ends up in the right side rough or right side of the fairway.
Extreme slicers may see their golf balls go far enough right that they land out of play. Left handers of course would see the opposite where most of their golf balls land left rough and left out of bounds.
The good news is your ball starts straight so your swing path doesn’t need much work probably. Your slice is probably being affected by the club face angle at impact.
If your club face is square at impact the ball theoretically should travel straight while an open face would fade/slice the ball and a closed faced would draw/hook the ball.
Face angle is tough to fix because tiny margins of degrees of the face angle can change the spin placed on a golf ball. It’s a timing issue with your hands and wrists releasing the club face into the ball. Releasing early causes a closed faced at impact and releasing late (also known as holding the face off) leaves the face open at impact.
For a slicer we established you are probably leaving the face slightly open or wide open depending on how bad your slice is.
To practice closing the face at impact we recommend getting a smash bag to aid you in the following drill but a pillow will work as well.
For this drill you want to put the smash bag where the golf ball would be and perform your normal golf swing so that you hit the bag. On the bag is a target circle to help you hit it as if it was a golf ball. Slicers who have open club faces would experience a swing where the heel of the club is the leading part of the club that hits the bag first.
We want you to intentionally close the face so that the toe part of club face leads the club in hitting the smash bag first. This will muscle memory in a closed face angle and help cure your open face problem.
You’ll have to work at releasing your hands to turn over sooner but again it will be marginal milliseconds which is tough to do perfectly on a consistent basis.
Resource: Golf Practice System (Practice Plans + Videos + Worksheets)
The Body Motion in the Golf Swing
Depending on your swing sequence, different body parts will lead the swing and finish the swing. Because the body motion is complex and everyone starts their down swing motion differently it’s too tough of a subject to cover in this article. Therefore, we will post a future article solely covering the golf swing body motion in depth.
Until then, you should really focus on the first two factors because they will most likely be the best and quickest fixes to your slice.
To review our tips on how to fix a slice real quickly, you want to set up some noodles and work on establishing a slightly inside to outside swing path. You also want to have a square or slightly closed club face at impact which can be achieved through many repetitions of intentionally shutting the face into a smash bag or pillow.
Hope this helped improve your understanding of a golf slice and the steps that can cure it. You’ll need to perform many repetitions on a consistent basis for a while until you train your muscle movement to ingrain your new swing path and face.
Thanks for reading and if this works for you don’t hesitate to share our article using the big share buttons below or the side floating buttons.