Why Handicaps Remain the Same Year over Year

Hi. I am Coach Erik Schjolberg, owner of EJS Golf located in Scottsdale, AZ at McCormick Ranch G. C. I would like to share some thoughts about why golfers’ handicaps remain stuck despite the constant flow of new equipment, advanced analytics, training aids, technology, 3D and seemingly endless quick-tip resources.

Over many years of coaching, I’ve watched players chase everything from top-of-the-line drivers to secret hacks they find on social media, all with the hope of dropping scores quickly. Yet, for most golfers, handicaps remain stagnant and higher than they’d like, and frustration sets in when repeated attempts at improvement fizzle out. Today, I want to tackle this issue from my own experience and perspective—why does the average golfer not see consistent progress? Why do handicaps seem to plateau, sometimes for years, even with modern breakthroughs in technology and coaching? You can find me for Scottsdale Golf Lessons by clicking on the link and the same for Online Golf Lessons.

I’ve come to believe the core problems are deceptively straightforward: correct practice techniques, mental fortitude, an efficient and powerful pivot with club face control. Everything else—technology, new clubs, gadgets—can help, but only if you address these universal fundamentals. That’s what I emphasize through my brand, EJS Golf. I want to help both golfers looking to improve and fellow golf coaches understand why so many players stall out completely.

Back in my early days of teaching, I would hear that better clubs alone could provide big leaps in performance for golfers. After all, if a driver has a hotter face or a lower center of gravity, you’d think it would automatically produce straighter, longer shots. But I kept seeing the same phenomenon: new clubs made little difference once a golfer had grooved the same flawed technique into muscle memory. In other words, if you’ve practiced with a chronic slice for months or years, you’ll simply adapt that slice to your new driver. The ball flight may look a bit different at first—maybe you slice a tad less—but often, you revert right back to the same old patterns. And if you haven’t addressed your root causes, changing your equipment is like rearranging the furniture in a house with a cracked foundation. Golfers love going to the range and beating a bucket of balls, because it feels fun and productive to see that ball fly off the club face. But there’s a huge difference between targeted, deliberate practice and random range sessions.

When you drop a large bucket and swing without any feedback or a plan, you are reinforcing the same poor mechanics over and over. So many golfers come to me, brandishing fancy training aids they saw on TV and telling me about all the quick tips they read online. Yet they remain stuck at the same handicap. Why? Because they never zeroed in on a structured protocol, their practice was basically a hopeful guess session.

Overtime, I started coaching with a more measured, feedback-driven approach. I’d film their swings, show them the positions they needed to adjust, and map out short, repeatable drills. Instead of hitting 100 balls aimlessly, they might hit 10 purposeful shots, pause, rehearse the correct pivot or face alignment, then proceed. I also discovered the value of slow-motion practice as a powerful way to rewire muscle memory. At first, most golfers hate the sensation of swinging slowly, because it feels unathletic and awkward. But that awkwardness is actually a sign that your body is finally stepping outside its old habits. By controlling each piece of the swing at half speed, you can highlight precisely what’s going wrong. Maybe you’re overturning your hips, letting your arms get pinned behind you, or rolling the clubface wide open at the top. Through slow-motion reps, you retrain your pivot to be stable and your clubface to stay in a safer position.

Once I recognized how important structured practice was for addressing pivot and clubface, I also broadened my perspective on the mental side. Many players only measure success in big leaps, like taking six strokes off their average round in a single weekend. In reality, progress often comes in smaller increments: you might eliminate that slice from your tee shots but lose consistency in your short game for a few weeks as you adapt. Or you may fix your early extension only to discover a new problem with your transition. I found that golfers who accept these ups and downs stay on track more effectively than those who expect instant transformations. As a coach, I began to stress the idea that mastering pivot mechanics—coordinating your hips, torso, and arms cleanly—and controlling the clubface through impact is a process. It’s not a quick tip scenario. Instead, it’s about layering improvements steadily, then letting them lock in through thoughtful repetitions.

If you’re reading this as a golfer intent on lowering your handicap, I’d wager you’ve tried at least a few “miracle” solutions: a glowing ad for a new driver, a secret tip from a golf forum, a specialized training gadget that’s supposed to fix your slice. But if you still slice after all that, it’s likely you never truly diagnosed the underlying cause. Slicing, for instance, often ties back to an over-the-top pivot move or an open clubface through impact—or both. No matter how fancy or costly your driver is, if you don’t neutralize that path and square up the face, you’ll see that curve off to the right. You might momentarily reduce it, but it will creep back in under pressure or default swings. The real solution is to systematically break down your pivot and face control so that your new equipment actually complements better mechanics. That’s the essence of my approach at EJS Golf.

Let me also highlight something I’ve learned from watching top professionals. They dedicate an extraordinary amount of time to repeating the same fundamental moves, day after day. Their pivot is rock-solid: they stay centered or make a controlled shift, but rarely do they let their hips sway too far sideways or their shoulders spin out of control. And the clubface is rarely flailing aimlessly. It’s stable, rotating in time with the arms and torso. The notion that sitting on a range for hours on end automatically leads to improvement is half-true; it’s only valuable if you’re reinforcing the right moves. Professionals, especially those who continually refine, have meticulously shaped that practice environment to ensure every ball they hit has a purpose. I wanted to bring that same clarity to amateurs. So I drill down particularly on pivot stabilizers and face awareness.

Pivot, as I see it, represents the body’s engine—how your hips, core, and shoulders work together to produce a fluid turn. If the pivot breaks down, you might lunge from the top, spin your shoulders open prematurely, or pop up out of your posture. Each of these pivot faults drastically affects the path of the club. When that path is mismatched with the clubface angle, you’ll either slice, hook, or hit it all over the planet. That’s why the pivot is often the first thing I want to check. Are you staying relatively centered? Are you transferring weight correctly? Do your hips rotate or are they sliding? It’s such a big piece of the puzzle that you can’t skip it if you want to flatten your handicap.

The club face is equally crucial. Simplistically, the clubface has to be square (or appropriately closed/open for shot shaping) at impact. But how you arrive there depends on grip, wrist angles, arm structure, and how you coordinate the face with the pivot. When you see players who consistently strike the ball straight or with a subtle draw, it’s because their face angle and path are in harmony. As soon as those angles fall out of sync, the ball flight wanders. For example, if the face is open relative to the path, you’ll slice. If the face is closed, you’ll pull or hook it. While it sounds simple, controlling it under real game conditions is a test of muscle memory and mental focus. That’s why slow-motion training can be a game changer. By going at a fraction of normal speed, you develop a new appreciation for where the face is relative to your wrists. You also see if your pivot is pulling the face wide open or slamming it shut.

If you’re a coach reading this, you know how challenging it can be to convey these concepts to students without overwhelming them. Early in my career, I might have thrown six or seven changes at a student all at once. You can guess how that went—they’d leave the lesson more confused than when they arrived. Over time, I learned to isolate the single biggest pivot flaw or face flaw and fix that first. Sometimes that alone transforms a golfer’s consistency. Then, once they’ve absorbed that change, I’ll move on. It’s easier said than done, because golfers often want to fix everything simultaneously. But that scattershot approach rarely succeeds.

Another contributing factor to stagnant handicaps is that many golfers, even those living in perfect golfing climates like Scottsdale, treat practice as a purely recreational activity with no structure. They’ll show up, order a large bucket, and smash each ball without stopping to evaluate if they’re performing the movement they intended. I discovered that real transformation starts when you commit to a plan. Hit five shots focusing on your pivot, then pause to do a rehearsal drill—maybe a slow takeaway that keeps your arms in sync with your torso. Then record or check alignment again, and proceed consciously. This might sound tedious, but it’s wildly more productive. You’re effectively turning each range session into a mini-lab, where you measure results against a specific goal. That beats blindly hitting 90 balls in 10 minutes and heading home.

Let me give you a personal anecdote. One of my longtime students was deeply frustrated with his slice. He’d replaced his driver three times in two years, spent hundreds on various training aids, yet rarely hit more than a gentle fade. After a few lessons, I realized his main problem was an over-the-top pivot move that caused an out-to-in path with the face slightly open. It was basically slice city from the top. We tackled that by having him hit half-speed wedges, focusing on feeling the club drop from the inside while rotating his hips more smoothly. Initially, he hated the reduced speed and the feeling of letting the club “fall” behind him. It felt unnatural. But I asked him to trust the process. After a few weeks, his path improved, his club face started squaring, and he finally saw drives that were mostly straight, occasionally even drawing. Once he overcame the need to swing at full tilt every time, he discovered that the correct pivot sequence was the missing link. That slice he’d battled for years began to fade away—pun intended.

Moments like that illustrate why handicaps remain stagnant for so many people. They try everything except the unglamorous, methodical approach to building a stable pivot and mastering face control. If you correct those, the other areas—like contact, distance, and accuracy—tend to get much better. Suddenly, that fancy new driver starts to really shine because your mechanics are consistent enough to harness its technology. The ball flight becomes more piercing; your misses are manageable. That’s when you finally see your handicap trending downward.

I also want to touch on the emotional side of improvement, because it’s another hidden culprit behind stagnation. Golfers get disheartened when they put in a bunch of range time and don’t see immediate payoff on the scorecard. Then they might revert to old habits. Yet, in my experience, real improvement sometimes lags behind mechanical changes you’re making. You might correct your pivot and face alignment on the range, but it takes more time before it shows up in actual rounds. You have to let those changes become second nature, so that under pressure—which could be anything from your weekly money game to a big tournament—you still maintain the new motion. That transitional period can be tricky, and many players abandon progress just before the breakthrough. As a coach, I always try to keep them motivated through that awkward phase. I’ll remind them of the evidence in practice sessions: “You’re already hitting it better—believe in that progress and let it evolve on the course over a few weeks.” Once they have that psychological safety net, they’re less likely to give up so quickly.

Another prevalent issue is that golfers often measure success only by distance. They assume more yardage translates directly to better golf. Certainly, more distance is nice. But if your pivot is flawed, adding speed can magnify your misses. That’s why I usually focus first on controlling face and path. Once those are stable, we can ramp up the speed without scattering the ball everywhere. Distance comes as a secondary benefit; consistent ball striking is the primary aim, especially if you want to score well. I’ll often encourage players to scale back to 80% of their maximum swing speed just to dial in control. Many discover that ironically, they end up hitting it as far or farther than before, simply because their contact is more solid and they’re hitting with a square face. When you stop glancing off the ball with a glancing blow, you transfer more energy. Better pivot, better face angle, better compression equals better distance. That’s a far cry from trying to muscle the ball blindly.

To fellow coaches, I can’t stress enough how essential it is to keep lessons simple. Talk about pivot. Talk about face control. Evaluate the strongest breakdown in a student’s swing. Is it a pivot miscue—like a reverse pivot, sway, or early hip extension—that’s leading to poor path? Or is the path decent, but the hands are rolling the face open or shut too abruptly? If we try to fix it all in one shot, students can get overloaded. Simplifying the approach by focusing on the biggest flaw leads to faster results and more trust in the coaching relationship. This is something that took me a while to refine in my personal style, but it’s helped me produce better outcomes and happier golfers.

Throughout my teaching journey, I’ve built a system that merges advanced technology, data-driven insights, and structured drills. I do love tech—launch monitors, high-speed cameras, and so on—because they give instant information about path, face angle, and attack angle. But the real magic happens only when we interpret that data cooperatively. Instead of bombarding a student with random metrics, I’ll show them maybe one or two that matter most at that moment, like “Look how your path is five degrees left with a clubface that’s three degrees open. That’s a slice waiting to happen.” Then we talk about how to reorganize the pivot or manipulate the face. Once we see those numbers shift in real time—and the resulting ball flight is straighter or drawing—it crystallizes the coaching point. That tangible feedback is a powerful motivator. The student isn’t just trusting my eyes; they see the data confirm what I’m saying.

Now, for those of you who want to accelerate your journey, I’m inviting you to join me at EJSGolf.com, where I offer direct coaching, including Scottsdale Golf Lessons for those in the area (ejsgolf.com/scottsdale-golf-lessons). For those who prefer flexibility, I have Online Golf Lessons available (ejsgolf.com/online-golf-lessons). And I’m truly excited about launching TheScienceOfBetterGolf.com, where I’ll be offering in-depth training programs. In February of 2025, I’m opening up a membership opportunity for 50 founding members—an exclusive chance to be part of a focused improvement community. I’ll be taking you through how to structure your practice, how to stabilize your pivot, and how to manage the clubface with precision. It’s a place to learn about the mental game, too, because controlling your nerves and expectations is critical.

The reason I’m so passionate about this membership idea is that I see far too many golfers get stuck in isolation. They show up at the range alone and try to self-diagnose. They might watch swirl after swirl of conflicting YouTube videos, never sure which tip applies to them. Having a guided pathway, consistent feedback, and a supportive group of like-minded learners can make all the difference. It’s the same reason pro golfers have a team behind them—someone to say, “No, you don’t need to overhaul your entire swing, let’s fix that pivot glitch.” Or to provide the angle numbers that confirm you’re on track. Being a founding member means you’ll get that level of direct involvement early, plus you’ll be shaping how the program evolves. I’m dedicated to providing that structure so you can finally see your handicap move in the right direction.

From a broad perspective, I’ve always believed that golf’s enduring difficulty is part of its charm. It’s a puzzle that nobody fully solves. But I also believe it doesn’t need to remain an endless grind. The reason so many handicaps stay stagnant is that players don’t get to the heart of their swing issues and practice the fix with discipline. Pivot, face control, and mindful, targeted practice: that trifecta holds the key. If you keep ignoring one of those pieces, you’ll see improvement stall. If, however, you systematically check your pivot alignment, ensure your face is functioning properly, and put in methodical reps, you can break out of that plateau that’s frustrated you for so long.

I want to circle back to the emotional payoff of seeing your handicap actually drop. When you finally string together multiple rounds where your drives find fairways regularly, your iron shots pin-seek more often, and your short game hits a new level of consistency, you start to feel not only more confident but genuinely excited to keep refining. It becomes a virtuous cycle of improvement and satisfaction. You’re no longer stuck in that circle of disappointment, where you try random solutions, suffer minimal results, and give up for a while. I’ve witnessed transformations in students who once thought they were “doomed to be 15 handicaps forever,” but after a few months of pivot and face re-engineering, they saw that number drift into single digits. It’s thrilling for me as a coach, because it reaffirms that the path works.

In truth, the process can begin as soon as you commit to evaluating your practice habits. If you’re reading this and realize you’re guilty of “bucket dumping” at the range—just slogging through golf balls rapidly—try setting up your next session with a purposeful plan. Spend a few swings specifically focusing on your takeaway pivot. Pause, check your alignment. Maybe record your swing with a smartphone. Watch the replay. Are your hips swaying instead of turning? Are your hands rolling the clubface open early? Then do a slow-motion rehearsal to correct it, and only after you feel a difference should you hit another ball. It might slow down your practice, but you’ll learn more from 30 good reps than from 90 random ones.

When you add a professional coach’s eye to that method, it becomes even more powerful. Sometimes what feels right to you might still be off track. And that’s not your fault—golf is a game of subtle movements. A skilled coach keeps you honest by pointing out that what you believe is a “centered pivot” is actually a big sway, or that your “square face at the top” is actually wide open by 20 degrees. Those details matter, and they’re easier to fix when identified early. This is why I lean on technology to confirm changes—numbers and video don’t lie. They reveal exactly where you stand so you can’t revert to old illusions of correctness.

I also believe in balancing technique changes with genuine play. I encourage you to get on the course and test the new pivot or face adjustments. Perhaps you have to slightly adjust your alignment or your shot pattern. Don’t expect instant miracles. You might see some sideways steps along with progress, especially as you get used to the new motion under real-world conditions like uneven lies and in-round pressure. If you see a few bad holes, that’s not a reason to abandon a technique. It’s an opportunity to get more comfortable with it. Over time, integrated changes become second nature, and your scores reflect that new normal. That’s when you start dropping strokes for good.

Often, people ask me how long it takes to see true improvement. It’s different for everyone, but I’d say if you’re practicing two to three times a week with genuine focus, you can see noticeable gains within a couple of months. That doesn’t mean you’ll become a scratch player overnight, but you might drop a few strokes, see more fairways and greens, and feel the game getting more manageable. The key is sticking with the process longer than you might think necessary. Practice logs or notes can help you see that you’re making incremental headway instead of expecting huge leaps from day to day. And if you have a specific pivot flaw or a severe face misalignment, you might see a big jump once that flaw is corrected, then a leveling off while you consolidate the new movement. That’s all part of the natural cycle of change.

I hope by now you appreciate that stagnant handicaps aren’t an unfixable quirk of the sport. They persist because many golfers aren’t practicing correctly, aren’t diagnosing pivot issues, or aren’t controlling the clubface. Take a thorough, structured approach—preferably guided by a coach who keeps it simple—and watch what happens. The game can become more predictable, and your potential expands. I love seeing the expressions on students’ faces when they realize they’re producing shot shapes they previously only dreamed about.

If you’re ready to commit and go deeper, I encourage you to check EJSGolf.com and TheScienceOfBetterGolf.com. In February 2025, I’m launching the first wave of membership for 50 founding participants. It’s a chance to dive into a systematic approach to mastering pivot, face control, and practice efficiency. I’ll be walking everyone through the same processes I’ve honed over the years, using technology, feedback loops, and mental training to make sure the changes stick. This membership is not just another program or tip aggregator, but a guided journey meant to uproot the reasons your handicap won’t drop and replace them with reliable, data-backed improvements.

Whether you’re a golfer aiming to shave strokes or a fellow coach exploring how to help your students, my largest hope is that you embrace the principle that mastery of fundamentals—pivot, face, practice—can drive real results. All the excitement about new club models, advanced golf balls, or fancy training gizmos won’t help much if you’re stuck in a flawed pivot or controlling the face poorly. I’ve learned this the hard way by observing, over and over, what yields tangible scoring improvements and what merely entertains us temporarily. My mission at EJS Golf is to combine the best aspects of technology, straightforward instruction, and a consistent game plan to push you beyond plateaus you may have thought were permanent.

I’ll end with one last reminder. It’s natural to feel frustrated if you’ve tried for years to break a certain handicap barrier without success. Plenty of players assume they lack talent or time. But I’ve seen transformations happen for people who once considered themselves hopeless. The key was confronting the real problem instead of throwing superficial fixes at it. So if you’re serious about scoring better, commit to diagnosing your swing properly, refining your pivot mechanics, stabilizing your clubface, and practicing in a deliberate, methodical way. I would love to be part of that journey with you, either through my local instruction or online golf lessons (ejsgolf.com/online-golf-lessons). And if you truly want a comprehensive experience, consider signing up to be one of The Science of Better Golf’s founding members in February 2025, where we’ll tackle these issues head-on and build sustainable skills for the long run.

Lowering your handicap isn’t a pipe dream. It’s an achievable goal once you move beyond superficial solutions and focus on the foundation. I’ve watched many golfers make that leap, and there’s no reason you can’t join them. Even if progress feels slow or disjointed at first, consistent practice and the right diagnosis will set you on a course toward genuine improvement. Let’s abandon the cycle of quick fixes and illusions, and instead lock into real practice, pivot control, and clubface mastery. If you do, years from now, you’ll look back and see that your handicap didn’t just inch downward; it took a meaningful dive, and you began enjoying golf on a whole different level. That, to me, is the goal: not just to lower numbers, but to spark a deeper, lasting appreciation for the game’s challenges and rewards. I look forward to guiding you every step of the way.

Coach Erik Schjolberg

The Science of Better Golf

EJS Golf

Scottsdale Golf Lessons

Online Golf Lessons