It all comes down to getting the fundamentals of your swing right. The more correct they are, the more consistent you will be, and more confidence you will have with your swing because of it.
Concentrate on the arc of your swing, your wrist action & the position of your head. All this will improve your hitting of the ball.
And if you can get those correct, then you can gain confidence hitting the ball with some practice.
How Do You Gain Confidence With Your Ball Hitting
Transcription
How do you gain confidence with your ball hitting? I think to be honest, you've got to get the fundamentals, right. I mean, Rob, you and I worked so hard on this together and we put together that stages video, you know.
I think one of the biggest problems is that people don't pay enough attention to the arc of the swing and how the wrist works. Because that wrist has got to start and right angles.
If you got that correct, you've got to get, remember this tendon, the flexor tendon is a strong tendon of your arm. Now if you flattening that wrist behind you, and you're not using your wrist. You're never going to have, and your mallet is then always outside the mallet head, outside the plane.
As we tried to show in that video, Rob, you know, it's the mallet head has got to be vertical at the back, and you can only do that, if you, when your arm is hanging straight down, the mallet itself is parallel to the ground.
Now, if you just practice that and then take that hand up and use the wrist back, to flat, coming back. And the big thing is that when we talking about this, what I'm finding a lot is that when I'm trying to coach people like that, what they're doing is when they get to impact, they're doing that with their wrist.
Now, if you can pretend or hold a whip, okay? With the lash end up, sticking up about that high, with your mallet, when you've got that wrist angle correct, that whip is pointing obviously forward, also parallel to the ground.
Now as you come in and your use your wrist, that whip comes back and it hits against your forearm. That's as far as you want your wrist to turn through. Now, your shoulder's traveling and you turn your wrist after that. Okay? So, you've come to a lock here.
Now, turn your wrist to drop that whip again, away. So, the end of the whip is sticking up above your, above your handle of your mallet. And just get the feeling of that wrist working like that from right angles, to straight, to where that whip is against your forearm.
Now let your shoulder travel with and let your hand turn. And your mallet starts vertical, behind you, and you hit the ball with it, facing, the mallet face facing, where you want it to go. And it's got to end up, after that, vertical.
But now there's another thing that so many people are doing is that, in the swing itself, as they get to here, they bending the arm here. So, the follow through feels like it's going up all the time.
And if you were to get a foot mallet to start with, and then your mallet, make that swing and let the shoulder travel. And as you hit the ball, throw the mallet out. It's got to travel in the arc that you would want the ball to travel on.
If you're bending your arm like this, you'll find, as you let the mallet go, it goes up like this, and you've got to look around and really run. Cause that dam things going to hit you on the head.
But what that does is it gets you to follow through, which is long and low. Okay? So, your swing is coming nice and steep to the ball. Your wrist is working late and now that follow-through is going with the shoulder.
So, it's not arm swing, it's not shoulder centered swing, it's a spine centered swing. You turning the shoulder back and it's coming through, okay? So, you are pivoting around your spine.
Now, all those things are working for you. And if you're not working with them, they're working against you. If you, when you get to the back, allow your wrist to flop open like that, that your palm is facing upwards.
The mallet is behind your head. It's not longer in the arc. If you were to open your hand, if your wrist is correct, then your palm would be facing out at right angles to the ground, parallel to the ground. Not flopped up and not pointing to the ground because that's when you've got the mallet head hooded, and you've now got no wrist, you're going to push the ball.
So, if you want to hit the ball cleanly, you have to pay attention to the basic fundamentals of the swing. Okay? There's no other way to get confident with it.
And to me, go to that under-hand take away, until you really feel it. And remember also that you've got a photographic memory. You might not think you do, but if you were to look at something over here, and look back, and point at it.
Look back, you'll be pointing directly at it. Okay? So, what I'm wanting is when you take that underhand, take away, get that wrist cocked correctly. And in your mind, just take a picture of that. 'Click', Okay?
Now, when you start to go to this takeaway, it's a shoulder turn. You're turning with your hand. The mallet hand, one hands width away from your shoulder. When you're taking that mallet back, you taking it with your body. You're not taking it independent of your shoulders.
So, it's the shoulder turn,and then an extension, that's the takeaway. And you want to go to that 'click' position, that you took a photograph of. Because if you go underhand, you get the plane of the swing much more simply.
And if you get that feeling right, and then try and get to there, and make the swing, okay. And you will find that if you really pay attention to those basics, it will help you hugely with the confidence of your ball hitting.
And the other thing that, the one thing that, everybody's telling you is watch the ball. So, what happens is people drop their face to watch the ball like this, but from the front, they looking at the top of your helmet. You're looking at the top of their helmet, and the face is facing the ground.
Now that drops their body too far. And you find them hitting the ball way back behind the stirrup, because they can see the ball there. If you're where my face is here. And you're looking at the ball, here, not here.
Now it makes you hit the ball in the correct place. Remember, if it's going to be correct contact, it's going to be sternum, knee, toe, ball. There's your line. So, you are turning there and if your face is facing forward, okay, that's anchoring your back swing in the arc.
If you turning your face back, so that from the front I can see your ear, now what's happening is you over-rotate. So that arm goes behind you, you've lost the plane again.
So, if you want confidence with ball hitting, go back to those stages videos. You know, obviously many of you haven't seen them yet because you're just joining the pre-workshop, but they are what will change your life. Honestly, if you get that those principles, correct, you've got to be on plane.
You've got to use a wrist. You got to use it late, and that will slow your arm down. You've got to take the mallet back with your body, not your arm. Okay? All of those things will help you so much with the confidence of hitting.
Gav, one thing I love about it when we, when you ask you questions, you always over deliver and give so much. That was awesome. Absolutely awesome.
You know, it's on gaining confidence with the hitting, but you've given a full instruction on how to hit the ball there, which is, which is brilliant because actually that is, it's, you've answered it so well because you know, someone is... like I was thinking for some to gain confidence, they need to actually just get out there and just get practice, lots of time hitting the ball.
But if they're not hitting it consistently because of an error, a fundamental error, in their swing, and the basics of their swing. They're never going to gain the confidence, because that's that inconsistency is always going to take away their confidence with hitting the ball.
So, actually getting the basics right. And getting that consistency will then help with that confidence. So, everybody, practice doesn't make perfect, perfect practice, that makes perfect.
Cause if you practicing mistakes, you're making them your default setting, you know. You've got to get each part of this correct. And that's the only way to get confident with your ball hitting. Yeah.
