Golf is tougher to learn than it looks, which many new golfers learn early on in their game. Many factors in your body movement, weight shifting, and foot pressure can affect your shot. Teaching aids such as a golf pressure plate can help you to correct these finer points of your golf swing.
A golf pressure plate is an unevenly balanced board that you stand on while practicing your golf swing. It will teach you what it feels like to shift your weight, balance, and foot pressure on your backswing, strike and follow through. The board helps improve your strike spot on the ball.
A golf pressure plate is a great tool to help any player improve their weight and pressure distribution during the swing. How does such a simple tool work to make such a big difference in your golf game?
What Does A Golf Pressure Plate Do, And How Can It Help Your Game?
Golf is a game of many nuances that a player must work on to improve their technique and overall game.
Many aspects of your movement and technique are difficult to work on without positive feedback to let you know when you are getting it right and when you are not. A golf coach can help you with many aspects, but sometimes a teaching aid is more productive.
Teaching aids allow you to work on various aspects of your golf game when you have a free moment and at your own convenience.
If you only see your golf coach once a week, it is difficult to know whether you are practicing correctly or if you have fallen back into old habits when you practice without your coach present.
A golf pressure plate is such a teaching aid, and it is useful to teach golfers how and when to shift their weight during their swing.
Learning how to shift your weight balance before, during, and after your swing is important for your golf game’s accuracy, power, distance, and stability. It will also help you to hit the ball in the sweet spot instead of topping it or hitting the ground before the ball.
You will hear golfers and coaches talking about shifting weight and pressure during your swing. The balance of pressure between your back foot and your front foot is a precursor to shifting your weight.
The pressure plate teaches you how the pressure should feel between your back and front foot and how this changes throughout the progression of your golf swing.
How Does A Golf Pressure Plate Work?
The off-center camber on the underside of the board is designed to give you the right feel of the amount of pressure that should be on your back foot during the back swing. Likewise, as you progress through the swing, you will feel the pressure and weight shift to your front foot.
If you do not shift your weight or the pressure of each foot correctly during your swing, you will feel the board move under you, making you feel off-balance.
The idea is to learn to exert the correct pressure with each foot at the right time to drive the board rather than the board prompting you to move.
As you gain experience using the pressure plate, your muscles will begin to learn the right movements, and the muscle memory will carry over to when you swing on the course without the pressure plate to guide you.
Regular practice with the pressure plate will help you to make rapid progress in perfecting your swing due to the positive feedback offered by the board on every swing.
If you regularly hit the ground before hitting the ball, hit the ball thin, or scoop the ball, the pressure plate will help you time your weight and pressure shift correctly and apply the right amount of pressure to hit the ball in the sweet spot on every stroke.
[Embed YouTube Video: https://youtu.be/7JEXBVwtYiA ]
How To Use A Golf Pressure Plate
A golf pressure plate is a board made from ridged plastic, which you stand on while practicing your golf swing.
The board has directional arrows on its upper surface, indicating the board’s orientation for the direction of your swing. Left or righthanded golfers can use the board; simply ensure the arrows are correctly oriented toward where the ball should go.
The underside of the board has an uneven camber designed to mimic 60% of your backfoot pressure to tilt the board on your backswing and 70% of your front foot pressure for the strike and follow-through.
Place the pressure plate where you would normally stand in your approach to the ball. Stand on the board with both feet in your typical stance. The board should be level when you stand in this position.
As you take your backswing, you will feel the board tilt down under your back foot. The shift in the board’s balance will prompt you to shift your weight. As you progress through the swing, you will feel the board tilt toward your front foot, prompting the transfer of pressure to this foot.
As you practice with this teaching aid, you will learn to drive the plate by applying the right pressure with each foot during the appropriate part of your golf swing.
[Embed Yotube Video: https://youtu.be/4taBa05okBo ]
Where Can You Practice With A Golf Pressure Plate?
The golf pressure plate can be used almost anywhere where you have space to swing a club and a surface for the board to grip properly.
The aspect I like about the golf pressure plate is that it is not just for taking practice swings in your backyard but can be used to hit balls. Take your pressure plate to the driving range and use it to work on your weight and pressure shift while you hit balls to see the effect of the changes.
You can also take the pressure plate to a practice course with real grass or artificial turf, and the board will perform well. The spikes on the board’s underside grip the substrate to prevent the board from sliding or twisting during your golf swing.
If you have a golf net at home, you can practice hitting balls into the net in your backyard while standing on the pressure plate.
The pressure plate can also be used indoors at training centers with space to execute a full swing and artificial turf to keep the pressure plate securely in place.
Conclusion
A golf pressure plate is an excellent training tool to improve your weight shift, foot pressure balance, and the dynamics of when these changes must occur during each part of your swing.
Practicing with a pressure plate will help you to hit the ball consistently on the sweet spot rather than hitting the ground before the ball or striking the ball thin. This will improve your golf game’s accuracy, distance, and power.
References
https://www.sportsunlimitedinc.com/whygolf-swing-pressure-plate.html
https://www.pga.com/story/the-best-training-aids-to-try-at-home-or-on-the-range
