Swing

The greatest force you can develop with a given amount of power is centrifugal in nature, that is, it is achieved by swinging. Even in the time of David and Goliath men realized the value of using a swinging action to develop maximum force.

The upward swing should be slow and even, the downward swing even and swift. But though the upward swing should be slow, it should be a swing and not a lift.

Swing with the hands, and let the body respond to that motion.
Develop feel for the clubhead, imagining it’s a weight on the end of a string.
Keep the wrists flexible to insure rhythmic motion.
Think of the swing — felt through the fingers and hands — as a pendulum.

I must remind you again, because it is fundamental to this book, that learning by a sense of feel is something quite different to learning by the intellect. Intellectual memory may be of use in learning golf, but it is never paramount. What is paramount is what I have called muscular memory, a memory for the right feeling of a movement which enables the muscles to repeat that movement time after time, without directions from brain or will.

Real power is generated from the ground up, through the legs and arms, and then transmitted to the clubhead by the hands. This is the way a fighter generates punch, and it is the way a golfer should generate distance. I suggest you erase the thought of the “wrist” from your mind and concentrate instead on using your hands.

Your pivot motion provides 3 vital ingredients in your athletic swing:

A coiling and stretching effect where your torso is wound up and loaded like a spring ready to unwind.
A transfer of your body weight from one side to the other.
Consistent tempo or speed.

Although your pivot motion should not include any pauses or breaks in motion, for the sake of clarity, I can describe it as 3 pieces:

Your backswing or pivot motion to the right.
The transition from backswing to downswing as the body changes direction.
Your downswing or pivot motion to the left.

What permits the 2 pendulums to work together is the combination of the weight in the clubhead, centrifugal force, the good old law of gravity — and the golfer. These pendulum supply about 80% of the distance in your golf shot — provided the swinging elements of your body drive the turning elements and not vice versa.

If your grip pressure is too tight, the weight at the end of the club is restricted from doing its job.

If you try consciously to turn your shoulders and shift your weight, you destroy the natural harmony of those 2 pendulums.

If you try to accelerate at impact and follow-through, well you know what happens there.

But if your posture is good, and your grip pressure — fingers secure, arms relaxed — is correct, you give those 2 pendulums a chance to work in harmony.

If we liken the backswing of a golf club to the extension of a coil spring, or the stretching of a rubber band, I think we shall not be very far off the mark. The greater the extension or stretching, the greater the force of the return. In the golf swing, every inch added to the backward windup, up to the limit at which the balance of the body can be easily maintained, represents additional stored energy available to increase the power of the downswing.

The golf swing is, in principle, a continuous chain of actions. Like the component parts of the engine of an automobile, the component parts of the swing fuse together and work together in a purposeful sequence. As each component performs its part of the operation, it sets up the proper operation of the other components with which it is connected.

You want to turn the shoulders as far around as they’ll go. (Your head, of course, remains stationary.) When you have turned your shoulders all the way, your back should face squarely toward your target. Most golfers think that they make a full shoulder turn going back and they would challenge you if you claimed they didn’t, but the truth is that few golfers really complete their shoulder turn. They stop turning when the shoulders are about halfway around; then, in order to get the clubhead all the way back, they break the left arm. This is really a false backswing. It isn’t any backswing at all. A golfer can’t have control of the club or start down into the ball with any power or speed unless his left arm is straight to begin with. When he bends is left arm, he actually performs only a half swing, and he forfeits half his potential power. More than this, he then is led into making many exhausting extra movements that accomplish nothing for him.

An excellent way to check that you are making a full shoulder turn is this: when you finish your backswing, your chin should be hitting against the top of your left shoulder.

The golf swing for me is a source of never-ending fascination. On the one hand, the swings of all the outstanding golfers are decidedly individual but, on the other, the champions all execute approximately the same moves at the critical stages of the swing. There is still a lot about the swing we don’t know and probably never will. In any event, scarcely a day goes by when I don’t find myself thinking about the golf swing.

Many amateurs straighten or even lock the right knee immediately as they start their backswing. That causes their hips and shoulders to turn at the same amount, so they aren’t building any coil for power. They end up throwing the club over the top to get back to the ball, which further reduces power and leads to slices or pulls.

Instead, maintain the flex of your right knee throughout the swing. This encourages the shoulders to turn more than the hips, storing power. On the downswing you’ll be more on plane and can release the club later for a more powerful hit.

Imagine the clubhead flying toward the hole.

While the left wrist and forearm should feel the power and control of the club, the initial effort at the beginning of the downward swing is caused by the necessity of getting the body, or the “right side” out of the way, so that the arms and club may have a free and uninterrupted passage on the way to the ball. The body action is a lateral motion of the hips, often referred to as the forward shift, and has laid the foundation for the now well-known axiom of golf — “hitting against the left side.”

After the ball has been hit, the great thing to bear in mind is to keep the clubhead traveling toward the hole. That is why I have stressed that great care and effort should be made to keep the left arm in front as long as possible.

There’s a simple way of knowing whether you are coiling properly during your backswing. Try to hold your top-of-the-swing position for 10 seconds. If you’ve really coiled the spring, you’ll find this, if not impossible, certainly a considerable muscular strain.

You will also find that the need to “unwind” is a reflex action. As your shoulders reach the limit of their turn, the opposing force in your resisting legs and hips will already be winning the battle. Almost before your shoulders have reached the limit of their turn in one direction, the lower half of your body will have started to pull in the opposite direction. This is what is meant by “starting the downswing with the legs and hips,” a recommendation made by nearly every golf author and modern teacher of the game.

This natural reflex action, the result of opposing forces acting upon each other irresistibly, is the start of the downswing.

In a good swing, the downswing begins before the backswing finishes. This change of direction, this victory of one force over an opposing force is a crossroads equal in magnitude to starting the club away from the ball. The clash of opposing forces must take place if the golfer is to get his maximum power into the shot. But it can only take place if he has wound up properly in the backswing. In the backswing, the top half of the body has been turning, the lower half resisting, as the arms swing up. In the downswing the lower half turns while the top half resists and the arms swing down.

As I’ve stressed, all of this — subject to a proper wind-up — is largely a reflex action. You can hardly prevent it from happening if you’ve coiled properly. But the real trick is not in the lower-body action. It lies in the action of the top half, the torso and the head.

Throughout the downswing, the head must remain back; pretty much where it was at address and during the backswing, behind the ball. And the upper torso, notably the shoulders, must resist the pull of the lower half of the body until the arms have swung down. This is the key to power, the natural cause of the “late hit,” which so many golfers have sought so long in vain.

In all of the great swing I have studied, there is no evidence of a “stop” and “start” that together reverse the direction of the club from backswing to downswing. Instead, I see a smooth, flowing transition. In fine golf swings, the last thing to change direction at the top is the clubhead. This, of course, makes perfect sense, because all the centrifugal and centripetal force we apply in the swing is designed to do nothing else but load the clubhead with energy and deliver it down the proper path.

In the transition, your arms and hands are passive. The first move is backward and down. The clubhead sinks lower as your hips start to unwind. Your hands and wrists respond immediately to the reversal of direction. Your right elbow automatically drops to the proper slot by your right side. There is a sense that the hands free-fall down to the delivery position.

There must be absolutely no lateral movement of the hips away from the hole, or as it is termed, swaying. This unsettles the center, or base, of one’s swing in a class of strokes wherein one should confidently strive for as much accuracy as in putting.

If you top shots, your swing is too steep.

Ask golfers what causes a topped shot and most will immediately say “head up.” Usually they are wrong. Even if you anchored their heads in cement, a great many poor players would still manage to top the ball quite effectively because the fault is not in their superstructure, it is built into their games by faulty swing patterns.

At address on every golf shot, the radius of the swing — the measurement from player to ball — is established by the unit of the left arm and the club, held in a more-or-less straight line. In the early part of the backswing this radius is maintained by the “one-piece” (no independent movements) combination of arm swing and shoulder turn. But at some point in the action, where we cock our wrists, the radius obviously decreases. If, then, in hitting the ball, the wrists do not uncock sufficiently to reestablish the radius of the swing at impact — reestablishing the left arm and club as a straight-line unit — the ball is likely to be topped, at at least hit “thin.” Among fairly competent players this is the commonest cause of topping.

Fluffing is hitting the ground behind the ball, or hitting shots “fat.” There are 2 common causes of this depressing disease.

Among both good and indifferent golfers alike, it can often be caused by nothing more complicated than bad posture at address, leading to loss of balance during the swing.

The most common cause of fluffing among reasonably accomplished golfers is poor coordination of body and hand action in the downswing. It is the opposite of a topper’s problem — a tendency to hit too early with the hands and wrists, before the hips have cleared a way for them to swing past the body and out toward the target.

As most slicers are prone to topping, so most hookers are liable to fluff occasional shots. What happens is that the fluffer lengthens his swing radius by letting the clubhead catch up with and pass his hands before they have arrived back at the ball.

Our tennis players must specifically watch this. In tennis you must swing up to get the ball into the air, because the tennis racket has no loft. In golf we must get the club down to the ground to get the ball into the air.

The angle at which the clubhead comes into the golf ball is the angle at which the ball will come off the clubhead.

How to slice: To cut the ball, I align my body left of target and aim the clubface at the target, then swing to the left along my stance line.

How to hook: I align my body to the right of the target, aim the clubface at the target, and swing out to the right.

How to hit low: It is a matter of ball position. I move the ball back in my stance. Moving the ball back reduces the effective loft of the club.

How to hit high: Move the ball forward in my stance.

Hit the ball, then the ground — that will assure you of getting down to the ball.

You have heard it from me many times by now, but I will say it again — to start your swing, let your weight shift to your left foot while bringing your right elbow back down to your body.

This is one move, not two.

Practice this move again and again. You don’t need a club to do it. Practice until you get the feeling and rhythm of it, and then keep on practicing. Be sure your eyes are trained on the spot where the ball would be. Your head will stay well back.

The longer and wider you make your back-swing, the more time you give yourself to accumulate speed and power on the downswing. A big shoulder turn is responsible for part of that, but your arms play a big role, too. One of my key thoughts is “wide at the top.” I push my left arm away from my head as far as I can, and my right arm goes right along with it. My two arms and elbows form a triangle that helps keep the clubface square and the club on line.

There comes a moment in a swing when I’ll sense that everything has fallen together perfectly, and I just let it rip. It doesn’t happen on every swing, but it happens often enough to give me goose bumps just thinking about it. At that moment, every ounce of strength, speed and emotion is applied into just hitting the ball. There’s no science about it, no conscious thought at all. Just pure joy.

A 9-iron shot won’t hook or slice as much as a 5-iron shot. The more loft you have, the less sidespin you can impart on the ball.

The proper backswing is a combination of horizontal and vertical movement. Most amateurs err on the vertical side — they start the swing by lifting the arms straight up and coking the wrists immediately. Because the backswing is too vertical, the downswing is too vertical as well. The tendency is to chop down on the ball instead of swinging through it smoothly.

Don’t forget the horizontal part of the backswing. That means establishing a nice, wide swing arc as soon as you move the club back. I have the feeling of stretching my hands and arms away from my body early in the backswing, my wrists beginning to cock naturally after the clubhead reaches about knee height. That helps me accumulate power and also ensures that my downswing won’t be too steep.

The look of my follow-through serves as sort of a road map for what happened earlier in my swing. See how my arms are extended? That shows my swing was real wide, with good extension through the ball. See how far my shoulders have unwound? That shows my swing was predicated on a full shoulder turn instead of just my hands and arms. Finally, see how the toe of the club points straight down? That proves I didn’t rotate the club excessively with my hands through impact. For it to arrive at this position, I had to release the club naturally.

The most common backswing error: Shifting your hips laterally to the right just kills your backswing. If your right hip moves outside of your right foot, you have to slide back to the left just to hit the ball. It’s hard to time that move properly. What’s more, you’ve cut your power by about 50%, because a sliding motion on the downswing isn’t anywhere near as powerful as a rotary unwinding of the hips and shoulders. A good thought is to keep your weight on the inside portion of your right foot, keeping the angle of your right leg constant throughout the backswing.

One of Harmon’s favorite reminders on the follow-through is to “shake hands with the target.” My right arm is fully extended straight down the target line. That shows I’ve tried to generate as much clubhead speed as possible.

I can tell that I hit a draw on this shot just by looking at the photo, because my right forearm is rolling over the left. That’s a sign of natural hand rotation — or moving the clubface to a square or slightly closed position.

I know I’ve made a good swing when I feel balanced at the finish.

I never let my weight stray to the outside of my right foot.

My head is still down, a sign I’ve “stayed with the shot” instead of bailing out with my upper body.

For power with no loss of accuracy, I extend my right hand straight down the target line after impact.

If you slice the ball: The clubface is open at impact. Often the culprit is the wrists and / or the forearms. The forearms rotate too much on the takeaway and the left wrist is cupped at the top of the backswing. The result is an open clubface at the top, meaning it points more vertically than horizontally. Open at the top usually means open at the bottom, too, and a huge slice. Combine that with a swing path too much from the inside and the ball has to go right. You want more of a flat left wrist and a square clubface at the top of the backswing. You can attain that position by having quieter hands and restricting forearm rotation on the backswing.

If you hook the ball: The clubface is closed at impact. Most hookers suffer from a lack of body rotation on the through-swing. They start with the chin buried in the chest on the takeaway and never really rotate fully away from the ball on the backswing. Since they can’t unwind what they don’t wind up in the first place, they fail to rotate fully toward the target. What small amount of weight they have transferred to the right side remains there. To compensate on the downswing, they flip their wrists, toeing in the club and producing a snapper — the ball starts left then hooks. To fix the problem, stay connected. That is, make sure the triangle created by your hands, arms, and chest at address remains intact throughout the swing. If you maintain that connection, your weight will naturally shift into your right side on the backswing and transfer to your left side on the downswing.

A vital part of our presentation for a golf shot has to do with alleviating tension from our body. Excessive muscle tension is an obstacle to making a fluid, powerful golf swing. There needs to be just enough tension to maintain our posture and hold onto the club as we swing, but any more than necessary interferes with the flow of the swing.

You don’t play golf to relax, you relax to play golf.

All too often we try to get something extra out of our drives, and the results are usually the opposite of what we desire.

The golf swing is a series of muscle movements, all in sequence. Any interference with that sequence, such as extra muscle tension, interrupts the flow of the swing. The average golfer’s idea of “trying to hit it farther” actually causes an excess tightening of muscles, which shortens the arc of the swing and reduces the whipping action of the arms, resulting in a loss of distance.

Most average players try to hit every shot as far as they possibly can. Ego is the culprit here: We think that how far we can hit a particular club is the measure of how good we are. But that’s not the point of the game of golf. Accuracy and consistency are much more important for lower golf scores.

Tour players swing at only 80% of their maximum power on most shots. It’s called playing within yourself, and the purpose is to make a consistent, smooth swing that produces consistent distances for each club.

Average golfers almost always leave their approach shots far short of the hole. Again, ego is at fault: We choose the club that would reach the hole only if we hit it absolutely perfectly. This creates a subconscious tendency to try to “kill the ball,” which causes all kinds of problems. Instead, when faced with an approach to a green, choose the club that will take you near the back of the green with a perfect shot. More often than not, you’ll end up about in the middle, not too far from the hole.

If the best players in the world, who practice for hours almost every day of their lives for 10-20 years or more, only manage to hit the ball straight within 5-9%, then direction must be very difficult to control. And you know what? It is. The clubface travels along a fairly flat swing plane, rotating 180 degrees through the region of impact, on all full-swing power shots. To get the face of the club at the perfect angle at the moment of impact is one of the greatest challenges in all of sport.

But why were they so good at distance? Again, it’s obvious: Distance is not as much a function of a golfer’s swing as of his club selection.

The modern power swing starts with a one-piece takeaway: The clubhead, shaft, hands, arms, elbows, shoulders, chest, and hips all start turning (rotating) away from the ball together. They move at the same angular rate, and continue to move until the body and hips become restricted and can no longer turn. When the hips stop moving, the upper body — the arms, shoulders, and chest, plus the shaft and the clubhead — continue to move, coiling against the lower body. This coil creates tension and stores energy to be released later, on the down-and-through swing.

During most of the backswing, the hands and arms remain in front of the chest, and another event occurs: the cocking of the wrists. As the backswing continues, the upper body meets so much resistance from the lower body that it can coil no further. In the final backswing motion, the arms, elbows, and hands then actually stretch or turn against the chest as the clubhead reaches the absolute top.

The swing down and through should be initiated by the re-turning of the lower body. This lower-body turn leads everything else toward and through the impact zone: The lower body pulls the upper, the upper body pulls the arms, the arms pull the hands, the hands pull the shaft, and the shaft pulls the clubhead. This chain of events means you create centrifugal force and maximum energy for release, as each component of the swing adds its own energy through impact.

My research has shown that golfers get the idea of “short backswing, long follow-through,” yet they still find it incredibly difficult to do on the course.

There is something about most golfers’ mental outlooks that causes them to be insecure at the top of a short backswing. My experience leads me to think that the golfer gets to the end of a short backswing and thinks, “I can’t get it there from this position; I’m going to leave it short.” He wants to hit those shot with his muscles; it’s instinct, and it is very difficult to overcome.

The angle between your spine and the ground determines what level, or swing-plane angle, you must swing on. Thus, your swing plane and body angles can change with the length of each club and with the slope of the ground beneath your feet on each successive shot.

The more you bend over, increasing the angle between your spine and hips, the more difficult it is to rotate your hips.

While the concept of swing plane is complex in the power game, in the short game it is very simple. After you have determined your posture and committed to a dead-hands, synchronized finesse swing, the finesse-swing plane is the very steep angle that includes the ball and both of your shoulders. And you definitely want to keep your clubhead in the plane throughout your finesse swing.

Nothing, and certainly no human muscles, will ever be more repeatable than centrifugal force through impact.

Good alignment and posture, and in-plane swing, and a good turn through impact are all you need.

Your perfect finesse swing begins from a perfectly postured setup, aligned parallel left of your target, the ball centered between your ankles. Your weak finesse grip has the back of your left hand facing the target, the forefinger lines pointing at your nose. Beginning with a one-piece takeaway, everything moves away together and stops together at a short backswing position. There is no upper-body coil, no excess storing of energy, and your fully cocked wrists have the clubhead in the perfect swing plane, which extends high above and slightly behind your shoulders.

On the downswing, everything moves together, perfectly “synchronized” and accelerating with dead hands through and past impact. The clubhead is stable, achieving its maximum velocity 2 or 3 feet after contact with the ball. The through-swing continues to a full, high finish, your right hand almost touching your left ear. At the finish, nearly all your weight is on your left (front) foot, with the right toe touching the ground for balance. You made a smooth body turn, with no hint of a forward slide and no lateral motion of your left knee toward the target. Your left leg was almost straight as you held your finish, standing on your left side, feeling the swing and watching the shot’s result.

The rhythm of your finesse swing must be constant — shot to shot, hole to hole, day do day, year to year.

Many high-handicap players swing with little or no weight transfer. Therefore they have to take the club back too far in the effort to produce the same clubhead speed they could produce with a proper weight transfer and shorter swing. If you have a problem over-swinging, first check your weight transfer. Then trying swinging the club back shorter and accelerating it more firmly through the ball.

Push with the left hand on the backswing. Pull with the right hand on the downswing.

A hook is a shot that curves sharply from right to left (for right-handed players) in the air. It is generally an unintended shot shape caused by excessive hand rotation and can result in the ball traveling offline and potentially into trouble.

I said to Jon: “Listen, a lot of people are going to try to change your swing. But don’t listen to them. I’ll teach you how to use it, and how to build it,” and that’s what we did.

Many beginners and intermediate players tend to pull their arms toward their body during their backswing. This decreases the width, or radius, of the swing, which makes it extremely difficult to get consistent results. Usually, it also causes a significant loss of power.

Time and again, I see players set up to the ball with their arms as straight and stiff as boards. What those players don’t realize is that the more relaxed the arms are, the easier it is to cock the wrists during the takeaway. Your wrists are your igniters, and your swing largely is built around proper wrist action. Do not render your wrists powerless in your swing by stiffening your arms.

If your club is coming in too steeply (at too sharp an angle) and hitting too much ground, there is a good chance you are lowering your right shoulder or lowering the club with your body. Remember, those are symptoms of trying to swing too hard, of mistaking force for speed, or of not allowing your arms, hands, and club to start your downswing.

At professional golf tournaments, players often make the game seem simple, and their swings look effortless. The reality is that the game is far from easy, and their swings are anything but effortless. Great ball strikers look like they are able to create tremendous clubhead speeds and still finish their golf swing with impeccable balance because they have put many hours of work into the technical aspects of the golf swing and the movement capacity of their bodies.

Maintaining a large radius with a straight lead arms as the downswing begins requires tremendous control of the spine and a great deal of flexibility in the pelvis, abdominal, and shoulder regions. A limitation in any of these areas will result in a shortened radius (bent elbow) between the shoulder and hand. This results in poor sequencing and decreased power generation. A loss of radius also requires other compensations throughout the body to get the club face square at impact.

During the swing, one of the 2 arms is always straight. There’s a very good reason for this. In order for the club to travel its maximum arc, one arm must be extended at all times. If a player breaks his left elbow on the backswing or break his right elbow on the follow-through, he shortens his arc appreciably. And if he swings with a shorter act, he gives himself a shorter distance in which he can accelerate the speed with which his club is traveling.

With practice, these movements will all blend harmoniously together and fuse into one smooth overall movement. A bad swing is tiring drudgery. A good swing is a physical pleasure.

Turning the hips too soon is an error countless golfers make, and it’s a serious error. It destroys your chance of obtaining the power a correctly integrated swing gives you. As you begin your backswing, you must restrain your hips from moving until the turning of the shoulders start to pull the hips around.

The effect of this exercise is to exaggerate a fundamental fact and feeling you want to have about the full golf swing: the action of the arms is motivated by the movements of the body, and the hands consciously do nothing but maintaining firm grip on the club.

I made an adjustment on the takeaway that kept the club face looking at the ball a bit longer. I kept the face looking down the line a bit more rather than rotating, and I hit a very solid shot for basically the first time that day.

As you practice different-length finishes, you’ll see that even though the ball stays on the clubface only a very short time, your follow-through has a real effect on ball flight. The higher your hands finish, the higher the trajectory; the lower the follow-through, the lower the shot flies.

To stop hooking:

Weaken left hand.
Place right hand on top of club.
During transition, left hip moves back quicker.

To stop slicing:

Move left hand over to see 2 or 3 knuckles.
Use light grip pressure.
Keep left arm close to chest at impact.
Rotate left arm through impact.

Playing in the wind:

Left shoulder low, right shoulder high.
Play ball back into stance.
Take more club.
Swing easier.

Less is often more when it comes to the golf swing; smooth rhythm is preferable to brute force.

You should feel that the club is almost free-wheeling as it approaches the “hitting zone.” It has little to do with brute force.

An overly aggressive approach tends to rob the swing of coordination and timing, which leads to poor distance and a loss of accuracy.

The fixed point in your golf swing should be between your collarbones and about 3 inches below them.

Greg shifted the plane of his swing a little to the outside on the backswing, and then shifted to the inside on the downswing to achieve his particular curve of the ball, a draw.

Bruce shifted the plane of his swing a little to the inside on the backswing, and then shifted to the outside on the downswing to get his particular curve of the ball, a fade.

If a player’s favored shot is one that bends a great deal in the air, the swing plane is tilted either to the right or to the left to compensate for the ball’s flight. But if you’re trying to hit straight shots, one consistent plane is the way for you.

The root cause of most faults is your head position. Your cranium’s position relative to the ball as you strike it dictates where the bottom of your swing is. The bottom of your swing is always a spot on the ground relative to where your head is positioned.

In general, slicers use too much body action and not enough hand action in their swings. Golfers who hook have the opposite tendency — too much hand action, not enough body.

The push is a shot that starts right and just keeps going. This shot happens when the body does not rotate through to the left on the downswing, and the arms hopelessly swing to the right, “pushing” the ball in that direction.

Pulls are caused when your shoulders “open” too fast in the downswing. For the proper sequence, your shoulders should remain as close to parallel to the target line as possible at impact.

In most cases, a short swing comes from too little shoulder turn. Turn your left shoulder over your right foot at the top of your backswing. If you can’t, lift your left heel off the ground until you can.

How can you back up the ball like the pros on the tour?

The more steeply you hit down on the ball and the faster you swing, the more spin you generate. People who play golf for a living hit short irons with a very steep angle of descent into the ball, which creates a lot of spin (along with the extra swing speed a pro generates). We also tend to play 3-piece golf balls with relatively soft covers — balls that spin more than the 2-piece ball most people play.

We also play on grass that’s manicured and very short so that we can get a clean hit with the club off these fairways. All this helps a bunch when you’re trying to spin the ball. The bottom line is that we’re trying to control the distance a ball goes. I don’t care if the ball backs up to get to that distance or rolls forward to get there.

2 simple ways to practice the fade:

Swing at balls below your feet on a sidehill.
Swing half speed at balls you’re trying to curve around an object.

The fade:

Mistakes:

Coming across the ball, right-to-left, too much; this is due to lifting the club instead of coiling back and approaching the ball to the inside.
Releasing clubface at impact, creating a “double-cross” (aiming left and hitting it so it also flies to the left).

Setup:

Assume a stance that is aligned along the start line of the ball’s flight.
Aim clubface toward ultimate target.
Position ball slightly forward in stance.
If your natural ball flight is a draw, weaken the grip slightly.

Pre-swing thoughts:

Visualize the ball curving from left to right and landing at the final target.
Trust the pre-swing adjustment — no further manipulations needed.

Swing:

In backswing coil behind ball, making a solid weight transfer to back leg.
Swing along line parallel to target line.
Maintain open clubface through impact.

Making a full shoulder turn is one of the most misunderstood concepts among weekend golfers. Two common mistakes come to mind immediately. Many golfers move their hips and shoulders as a unit. They shouldn’t. When hips and shoulders turn together, there’s no foundation for the transfer of weight. The player who turns in this fashion typically ends up with a reverse weight shift, despite the fact that he executed a full shoulder turn. This ironic turn of events results from the hips turning with the shoulders, creating a kink in the forward knee. When you cut a notch in the trunk of a tree, the weight of the tree falls into the notch. Same goes in the golf swing.

A proper shoulder turn coils the weight into the inside of the back leg and behind the ball. The lower body is the foundation for the shoulder turn to coil the weight. In a proper turn, the shoulders start the turn, while initially the hips resist.

The other mistake occurs when golfers don’t rotate their shoulders level to their spine angle versus level to the ground. Many golfers try to turn their shoulders too level because they’ve been told or are aware that they dip in the backing.

Good players maintain their spine angle throughout the backswing by turning their shoulders level to their spine. To do this, maintain an athletic position, bending forward from the hips and flexing the legs at the knees. At the top, however, the left shoulder should be lower than the right because the spine angle is tilted toward the ground.

The hardest part for a player learning is to swing inside-to-out. Most amateurs swing out-to-in, or over the top.

A few things you can do to promote an in-to-out swing: Setup with great posture, keeping your spine angle straight as you tilt forward from the hips. Keep your chin up, which leaves room for the shoulders to turn level to the spine angle without dipping. During the swing, keep your head behind the ball and let the hands release through the impact area. Because of the strong grip, the hands during the through swing and at impact will rotate the clubface slightly closed, thus impacting a draw spin.

Hit balls above your feet because it helps you learn the arc of the draw. Stand taller when the balls are above your feet and turn your shoulders on a less tilted plane — this will keep the club on a shallower plane. When moving down from the top, feel that you are swinging to the right. The release of the clubface will get the ball moving back to the right.

The draw:

Mistakes:

Swinging too far to the inside in the backswing, forcing the downswing to come from over-the-top (outside-to-inside the target line).
Failing to start the ball to the right of the target.

Setup:

Align the body in the direction you want to start the shot; pull the right foot back.
Aim the clubface at the final target.
Position the ball slightly back of center (1-2inches behind sternum).
Adjust to slightly stronger grip if you play a natural fade.

Pre-swing thoughts:

Setup and swing will reduce loft of the club.
The amount you adjust your grip, stance, and clubface will determine the amount of right-to-left ball movement and height of shot.
Start the ball along the line of your stance; trust your release of the clubhead to bring the ball back to the left.

Swing:

Swing a long the line of your body alignment.
Approach ball with slight in-to-out path.
Release hands through hitting area and during impact.
Maintain tempo and make solid contact at impact.

As the boxer moves forward to strike his opponent, he will plant his weight firmly on his left leg, creating a pillar against which he can slam the right side of his body as he unleashes his punch. When viewed in slow motion, this movement from the right side of the body to the left is a fluent, wave-like motion. First the weight transfers, moving the entire left side of the body over the supporting left leg, then the right side uses this support to deliver a blow using the whole of the torso.

When examining the role of the right leg during the backswing, a good analogy is that of a battery waiting to be charged. At address you should feel lively and ready to go, while during the backswing, you should feel that the right leg increases its pressure into the ground. The more pressure you can “load” onto your right leg at this time, the more power your will have to offer the ball when you hit it.

As you make your backswing, try to maintain the same amount of flex in your right knee that you introduced at address.

Many golfers focus primarily on their right leg during the backswing and pretty much dismiss the notion that the left leg plays a role of any importance in the backswing. However, it is the stretching away from the left side into the right side that allows the body to wind and coil on the backswing. If the left knee collapses and buckles in toward the right leg on the backswing, you are robbing your swing of vital resistance and power.

In an ideal world, the shoulders wind to about 90 degrees as the hips turn about 45 degrees on completion of the backswing. However, it is important to realize that, over the years, many top players have produced great golf with significantly more or less turn than this.

From midway into the downing to impact the swing is a blur, pretty much uncontrollable and totally at the mercy of the quality of the preceding address position and backswing.

It is important to remember that the only straight line in golf is that from the target to the ball and beyond. The clubhead meets that line at address and at impact for a fraction of a second and then moves back inside it in a circular fashion. Never force the clubhead to swing along the ball-to-target line in order to gain more accuracy and control.

In the early stages of the backswing and the follow-through, the arms knit close against the body. However, this does not mean that they are jammed into the side of the upper body. Instead, they are pliable and fold like hinges during these key stages of the swing. These images show why it is possible, indeed recommended, to play chip and pitch shots with the arms totally linked to the body pivot. The smaller swing can sustain a total “blend” of arm swing and body turn.

Because the torso is a large, physical mass, making changes to its motion can be relatively quick and painless. The arms and the golf club, however, present a different predicament. Positioning the club correctly during the swing requires good synchronization with the body motion as well as the ability to develop great awareness of where the club is at any given point without directly looking at it.

Typical slicers allow the right side of their body to become involved far too early in the downswing, leading to that all too familiar out-to-in swing path through the ball. Similarly, golfers who drive their hips excessively at the start of the downswing and inevitably push or hook the ball will benefit from planting the left leg rather than allowing it to slide forwards. Once this has been achieved the player can then rotate into the left leg rather than slide into it.

The control of this power comes from fully committing the right side of the body into the shot. When you want the clubhead to move through impact with speed, your right knee and foot must accompany it. Always remember that since the clubhead will be moving far faster than the body at this stage of the swing, you must fire your body through equally as hard.

I also must stress at this juncture that the hands should never be “rolled” through impact in an effort to square the clubface to the target. This all too common belief originates from hordes of slicers trying in vain to become drawers of the ball. The fact is that a great grip (square clubface) coupled with sound body motion (consistency in motion) and good synchronization (good positioning of the club and timing) will almost completely eliminate any chance of slicing the ball.

Always try to hold your finish momentarily after the ball has been struck whatever the outcome of the shot. Apart from ensuring that discipline and balance have been present throughout the whole motion it also gives the body a chance to receive some vital feedback from the swing itself. Stillness is the key to receiving feedback from the body. This is vital to the learning process, though more subconsciously than consciously. With stillness, the body will reliably send information about the swing back to your brain.

Truly sense the stretching sensation required to “torque up” the body in the backswing.

A tilted backswing and a “Reverse C” finish are by-products of midsection rocks and sways. This poor motion also aggravates any lower back problems that may be present. Keep it level!

The “chicken wing” in a golf swing, where your elbows flare out and your lead arm (left arm for right-handed golfers) loses connection with your body, can be caused by several factors:

Lack of Lower Body Power Transfer:
- Ideally, power for your swing should come from your legs and core, rotating your torso and transferring that energy to your arms.
- If your lower body isn’t engaged properly, your arms might try to “muscle” the swing, leading to the chicken wing as they overcompensate for lack of power transfer.
Over-the-Top Swing Path:
- This occurs when your downswing with the club goes outside-in instead of coming down on an inside-out path.
- To compensate for this swing path and hit the ball straighter, golfers might subconsciously “chicken wing” their arms to shallow out the club at impact, leading to a less powerful swing.
Weak Core and Stability:
- A strong core helps maintain posture and allows for efficient power transfer throughout your swing.
- If your core is weak, you might struggle to maintain proper swing mechanics, leading to the chicken wing as your body compensates for instability.
Incorrect Grip:
- A weak or overly strong grip can hinder your ability to maintain proper arm positioning throughout the swing.
- A weak grip can contribute to the chicken wing effect as your hands lose control of the club during the swing.
Technical Flaws in Swing Mechanics:
- Issues like poor posture, improper weight distribution, or an early release of the club can all contribute to the chicken wing by forcing your body into awkward positions.

A steep swing is often associated with an outside-in swing path and with that path’s corresponding feature of a tendency for left-to-right sidespin.

Additionally, the steep angle of attack is known to generate more spin and to lead to a higher than usual ball flight.

It is especially useful for balls buried in tall grass. Indeed, a club that descends rapidly towards the ball has less opportunities to get slowed down by the blades of grass in front of the ball.

It is also quite useful bunker shots that need to fly high rapidly, where the clubhead will strike the sand with a powerful blow which will send the ball high.

Then the golfer must try to find the flaw by going through a checklist roughly the length of the one used for Apollo 13: recheck the grip, the alignment, the angle of the takeaway, head placement, head movement, the arc of the swing, the depth of the swing, the placement of hands at impact, the fullness of the follow-through, and so on. There’s no guarantee that you will ever find the problem.

When practicing the golf swing or any part thereof, forcing additional distance by trying to hit too hard speeds up the swing, changes timing and rhythm, and pulls the ball left. Rather than leaning on a wedge and pressing for extra distance, obtain more control and accuracy by opening your stance a little to shorten the backswing, choking down on the club, and using the same grooved swing to hit a smooth 9i instead.

Each golf club has its own swing plane, somewhere between flat and upright, as determined by the length of the shaft — which is one of the reasons it is more difficult to swing the driver correctly than to swing a short iron correctly; the length of the driver makes it harder to swing upright. Timing is also different with a longer-shafted club, simply because it takes more time to complete a bigger swing arc.

Although the right arm folds as the backswing starts, the right elbow has a strong tendency to fly or float upward rather than point down toward the ground. Keeping the elbow down, however, weld the body and arms together as a cohesive unit to prevent their working independently — and it is absolutely essential to a sound, repeating swing.

The position of the right elbow is a good place to look for trouble when shots are simply erratic for no apparent reason. When the elbow flies upward, there is little or no clubhead control because the hands and arms swing free from the body to produce a loose, erratic swing. You must then rely on accidental coordination rather than on firm control to get good results.

The right knee stays inside the right instep. There is no leeway in this position. Once your knee goes beyond your right instep, your weight is rolling across your right foot and pulling your body laterally.

Over-swinging is a much more common and a more serious problem than a shorter, restricted swing, because your hands swing too far beyond a point where good lower body action moving back to the left can pull the hands downward. When your hands swing too far beyond the top of the swing, it is difficult to shift your weight left because the clubhead is thrown outward and upward from the top of the swing and momentum from the clubhead action prevents the weight from shifting left by keeping it on the right.

Over-swinging is seldom the result of just one thing, making it difficult to correct at times. If not too excessive, however, over-swinging can be corrected by one of several methods: lengthening the left thumb to a long thumb position, firming the left arm and grip at address, starting a more deliberate movement away from the ball, checking the wrist break for a square left wrist, and correcting positions and movements that promote a shoulder turn while preventing excessive turning of the hips along with the shoulders.

If over-swinging remains a problem, practicing three-quarter backswing while working on the follow-through will help you develop a shorter backswing to position your hands correctly.

Young, flexible golfers or those with somewhat fluid swings, frequently swing below parallel; senior golfers with less muscular flexibility very seldom swing so far; and very strong golfers with short, compact swings are often very short of parallel and still get excellent results.

Pulling results from the same thing that cause slicing except that the clubface returns square to the directional line at impact; consequently, when you set up to slice, too strong a grip may result in pulling.

Following through completely is, ideally, the automatic result of a well-executed swing. So much emphasis is placed on just hitting the ball, however, that once the ball is on its way, very few golfers make a concentrated effort to really finish the shot. Consequently most golfers are quitting on the shot before the swing is finished. If you are unable to follow through the shot completely, you are losing power through impact.

Using a forward press action to trigger the swing.
Taking the club away very slowly and gradually, in one piece, to build up speed until impact, when power is released fully.
Striving for a full finish to promote acceleration through the ball.

Nicklaus realized early on his golf career that it is almost impossible to start the swing from a static setup position without jerking the club away and disrupting the tempo, timing, and rhythm of his swing. He figured out that for the address or starting position to flow smoothly into the backswing, he had to move the club slightly toward the target.

The trouble is, the average amateur tries to make this happen early in the downswing by rotating the right forearm over the left and using the right wrist and hand to flick the club into impact. Forget the release, since it happens after the hit, not before. More than that, it is a result or a response to other technically correct moves. It is not a move you should think about employing.

To give you an idea of tempo and a feeling of the swing’s motion, we’d like you to consider an unusual, but highly effective, analogy. If you were to drive a stake into the ground, you would swing the hammer head smoothly and unhurriedly up on your hands and arms and almost drop it onto the stake. The deeper you wished to plant the stake the slower you would swing your arms. Essentially the speed would be going the right way, not up into your upswing, but down onto your target.

Similarly, if you were to hammer a nail into a piece of wood, the deeper you wished to drive the nail, the smoother your swing would be. If you wanted to drive the nail only a short way into the wood, you would use short, sharp, fast strokes.

Contrast this with the golfer who, in desperation for extra length, snatches the club away from the ball and throws it forward on the way down. The speed of the swing is in the wrong places, in the takeaway and at the start of the downswing. The club is actually decelerating as it approaches the ball and the speed is going the wrong way.

Gary told me the secret to great ball striking was “a total release of the club, but with no fear of a hook.”

Hogan said the takeaway is a recoil from the forward press. The first move in the backswing is actually a slight move toward the target, then the club rebounds away.

Hogan was adamant that golfers of every level limit the use of the hands. He wanted no conscious manipulation with the hands. The hands and wrists do not roll.

Don’t be afraid to swinging too hard. I can hit the ball straighter if I hit it hard and full.