I’d love for @Adamyounggolf to chime in here, because I’d hate to misrepresent his idea. But as best as I understand it: yes, focusing on the club face throughout the swing would be near external.
For me, I’ve found that I generally need some kind of internal focus to implement a swing change, but I need to play with either near external or far external focus.
I think clubface awareness is a very underrated skill. One of my main cues in my swing (if I’m struggling) is to get back to that “open” feeling at impact. If I’m closed, I’m 
Yeah it’s kind of bizarre- we focus on all this other stuff in our bodies, yet the club face determines what direction the ball goes. It seems so simple and obvious to focus on where the club face is and try to get it where you want it at impact. The simplest answer is often correct!
In the book, The Practice Manual, I discussed 5 different types of foci. I have since added another (or a sub-focus)
the sixth I added is a sub-focus of number 1. External movement. For example, placing an alignment stick through your belt loops and focusing on that, or focusing on the club movement in the backswing.
Most of the research has looked at internal vs external. However, I like to think of it more as movement Vs task.
When we hammer a nail, put a fork into our mouth, write our name etc, we are not thinking of the arm/wrist movements - we are thinking of the task. As a result, our brain encodes the information in a more adaptable way. For example, you are able to write your name in bigger and smaller sizes, which require different movement patterns from all the joints involved - but we can do it simply by focusing on the task and the desired outcome.
Adam, what accounts for the fact that so many of us suffer from the same flaw, for example coming over the top? It seems that focusing on the task doesn’t help cure this problem. Is our brain encoding this incorrectly?
Could be brain encoring (ingraining of a movement pattern)
Could be that people haven’t actually ever experienced the opposite motion
Could be a prior technical flaw (open face is a big culprit)
Could be that people are not aware enough of what they are doing
could be a physical limitation.
I’ll be honest, in a lesson with me, only 2/3% of people “can’t” do what I ask of them. I’m pretty good live at spotting why a person is not doing something, and usually it’s psychological.
If they can do it in a practice swing, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t be able to do it with a ball. I have specific processes outline (I also have these in my NLG program) that help identify why, and offer solutions to when a pupil struggles with change.
Thanks for the response.
Just had a mini revelation with this. Was practicing hitting some drives and was focusing on some body movements, and was hitting everything low and to the right. Happened to look at the clubface and noticed that all the ball marks were low on the face. That’s when I remembered Adam and hammering the nail. I changed my focus to just trying to hit it higher on the face, and just a tad to the toe of center. And, boom, all of the sudden starting hitting high, far, and straight!
Such a small thing can make a big difference.
Had a productive 9 holes this afternoon, limiting internal focus to the setup, and then thinking about the target and ball flight! Several clubs suddenly started doing their job! I did miss the fairway a bit more, applying the tip to close the club face a bit…apparently it was a bit too much…it’s FUN getting down the fairway quickly with those 2nd and 3rd shots.