Towel Drill for Solid Contact

3 min
Added on March 13, 2025
To be a good ball striker you need three basic things. In order of priority, you need to hit the ball solid, you need to hit it straight and you need to hit it far. One of the key ingredients to hitting solid iron shots is making contact with the ball first, then the turf. This ball-first contact is what allows you to catch the ball cleanly and put the center of the club face, the sweet spot, on the golf ball. But as anyone who has ever chunked or thinned an iron shot can tell you, hitting the ball and THEN taking a divot is much harder than it looks.

To find out how to make this skill easier to acquire, we reached out to Titleist staff member Tom Patri. In this video, he shares a simple drill that you can use every time you practice your iron game. Tom's towel drill will give you instant feedback as you learn to move into your lead side, lean the club shaft forward and strike down through impact with authority. You'll see immediate results as your iron shot take of with more speed and a piercing, consistent trajectory.

Instruction

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  1. Categories
  2. Long Game
  3. Iron Game
  4. Wedge Game
  5. Putting
  6. Mental Game
  7. Course Strategy
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  1. Instructor
  2. Brad Faxon
  3. Dr. Mo Pickens
  4. Me and My Golf
  5. Peter Finch
  6. Cameron McCormick
  7. James Sieckmann
  8. Mark Blackburn
  9. Michael Breed
  10. Trillium Rose
  11. Jonathan Yarwood
  12. Dave Phillips
  13. Brandon Stooksbury
  14. Justin Parsons
  15. Phil Kenyon
  16. Joe Plecker
  17. Layne Savoie
  18. Dr. Rob Neal
  19. Dr. Greg Rose
  20. Skip Guss
  21. Jason Baile
  22. John Kostis
  23. Jennifer Hudson
  24. Ryan Hager
  25. Corey Lundberg
  26. Tom Patri
  1. Drill
  2. Speed and Power
  3. Fundamentals
  4. Swing Biomechanics
  5. Clubface Control
  6. Turf Interaction
  7. Consistency
  8. Trajectory
  9. Shot Shaping
  10. Bunker Play
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