Golf Like a Chicken
As an old golfer who has taken lessons from two different pros, I was both startled and amused when they both said that actually watching the ball during the golf swing is unnecessary! While I have heard that blind golfers may do very well, they also have a full-time attendant-caddy who sets them up for each stroke. One might even envision that after the proper set-up is achieved, actually watching the ball beyond that point is not really necessary. If watching the ball serves no particular purpose, then one must have a swing that grooves through pure habit without any distraction. I have yet to see a golfer with a pure groove. But then what do I know? Cluck! Cluck!
The notion smells like a preposterous and off-the-wall suggestion designed to startle the student or gain his undivided attention, right or wrong. It served its purpose in my case, and for the past decade the idea has been bouncing around in my mind like a ping pong ball. For better or worse, I have a totally different notion of its importance.
As a kid that grew up on, or visited farms on a regular basis, I take my first clues from watching and handling chickens. No, chickens don’t play golf, but when they are in the yard or the henhouse feeding, they always watch where they are pecking. Careful scrutiny of their uncanny accuracy suggests that they never miss their target. Each peck generates a winner, a seed, a grain of corn, a crawling thing, or a worm that strays into range. If it’s good enough for chickens, it is good enough for me!
Other birds are exactly the same. Hawks are able to skim a lake like a dive bomber and snatch a fish near the surface with incredible accuracy. It would be the wildest conjecture to suggest that the hawk was able to complete such a maneuver with his eyes closed, or that the target did not need to be in sight. Their target is always in sight!
The second thing of central importance is the automatic stability of the chicken’s head when the body is in motion. Because chickens are visually oriented, when you pick them up some bird-like instinctive behavior takes over when you move their body around somewhat randomly. This is not unlike the golf swing, as the body must rotate while the arms cock back into a full swing, then forward again tracing the route directly to the ball without error. When you move the chicken around in this manner, rotating and twisting simultaneously, the chicken’s head remains fixed like a rock on whatever is the focus of the chicken’s visual field.
I contend it is the object in the visual field that stabilizes the head from a full backswing through contact with the ball, exactly like the chicken. Close your eyes, alter your thoughts, or consciously and deliberately try something new with your swing, and whatever groove you have goes astray.
From years of dedicated focus upon the golf swing, I have noted one invariable rule. When the golf club begins the backswing, the eyes better lock onto the ball like a lazer beam. When they do, all other variations in the golf swing are minimized. One common tendency is to focus (the mind) on the backswing rather than the ball. When this happens there is a strong tendency for the head to go back with the club. This almost invariably produces a slice, because the swing is not fully completed. The eyes are not locked on the target, but rather is locked on some swing-thought attached to the club’s motion or action.
And what is the most common ball trajectory error? You know it! The slice is the most common swing error of duffers.
The answer: Lock your eyes on the ball, and golf like a chicken. Chickens are born with this talent instinctually. Man is not capable of pure chicken golf, but locking your eyes on the ball is the first step to keep the ball in the fairway.
Cluck! Cluck!
