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book reviewBook Review: Stop Slicing,
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The book becomes much more interesting when Sullivan eventually begins elucidating his simple, consistent anti-slice mantra of "steep, then shallow" or "outside, then inside" (same difference). Sullivan's thesis is that 90% of slicers do so because they attack the ball from too steep an angle, resulting in a glancing blow in which the club slides across the ball, creating a slicing ball flight.
To counteract this swing plane, Sullivan presents an original instructional method (The SELFish Four(r)) and a number of drills, all of which promote a wide take-away, followed by a dropping of the club into what is sometimes referred to as "the slot," and finally a shallow, inside-out swing.
Sullivan argues that this swing path is of paramount importance for slicers, and he almost completely discounts all other standard advice regarding grip, stance, tempo, balance, etc., etc. This simplified approach is in fact an appealing feature of the book, since it can be argued that too many swing thoughts spoil the swing (in fact Sullivan does argue this point at length).
He also presents pictures and analyses of the swings of dozens of touring pros to illustrate that nearly all of them incorporate this same "outside, then inside" feature in their swings, while all of the other various aspects of their swings differ rather dramatically.
All in all, Stop Slicing offers sound advice for correcting an over-the-top slice. If this isn't your problem, however, there's not much in it for you.
One disconcerting aspect of the book is Sullivan's own recounting of his experience with the Colbert-Ballard golf schools. One wonders how Sullivan could have been so taken in by them for so long if they were truly as ineffectual and abrasive as he reports.
Another weakness is a prose that teeters occasionally between awkward familiarity and forced formality, and lacks a certain precision when describing the intricacies of some of the drills.
Nonetheless, Sullivan has written an instructional book that stands out from the others on the shelf: A regular guy describing in painful detail his descent into golfing hell, his self-affected redemption, and his own home-spun ministry about how other slicers can find salvation, too.