Instruction
Learn from the Legends: Introduction
There is a better way to swing the golf club. I’d prefer to write that there is a correct way to swing the club, but I know that really freaks people out. People love to talk about how everyone’s swing is different. “There are lots of ways to get it done,” they say. “Look at Jim Furyk’s swing – it’s not what you’d teach, but it works for him.”
To some extent, they’re right. Elite swings do have different looks. Some take it back inside (Ray Floyd). Some cross the line (Tom Watson). Some swings are long (Bubba Watson). Some are short (young Tiger). But these differences are superficial and largely irrelevant. When it comes to the engine – the core of the swing – the greatest players throughout the history of the game are all very similar.
Don’t believe me? Well, let me prove it to you. In this series of articles, I will do my best to show you – with pictures and videos and data – that the legends all move a specific way. Focusing on these elements (while ignoring others) and practicing a certain way is the surest path to improving your golf swing and lowering your scores.
So, let’s get into it. There are a number of important elements that all the legends have, but the biggest and most important of these elements is rotation. Every great player throughout the history of the game has had elite rotation. It’s the most important thing they do, and it’s easy to see. When you’re looking down the line at all the great players at impact, you’ll see hips and torso open.
This is what the legends look like at impact:
And here’s what some very good players with less good rotation look like at impact:
Now, there are plenty of nuances to how great players rotate. They do it while keeping spine flexion, for example, and they do it with very little (or no) lateral movement toward the target (lateral movement impedes rotation). I will discuss these things in detail. My hope is that at the end of this series you will have a much better understanding of what separates the legends from the very good… and from the rest of us.
You will understand their “engine,” and hopefully this understanding will help you begin to create your own legendary swing!
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Instruction
Clement: Laid-off or perfect fade? Across-the-line or perfect draw?
Some call the image on the left laid off, but if you are hitting a fade, this could be a perfect backswing for it! Same for across the line for a draw! Stop racking your brain with perceived mistakes and simply match backswing to shot shape!
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Instruction
The Wedge Guy: The easiest-to-learn golf basic
My golf learning began with this simple fact – if you don’t have a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, it is practically impossible for your body to execute a fundamentally sound golf swing. I’m still a big believer that the golf swing is much easier to execute if you begin with the proper hold on the club.
As you might imagine, I come into contact with hundreds of golfers of all skill levels. And it is very rare to see a good player with a bad hold on the golf club. There are some exceptions, for sure, but they are very few and very far between, and they typically have beat so many balls with their poor grip that they’ve found a way to work around it.
The reality of biophysics is that the body moves only in certain ways – and the particulars of the way you hold the golf club can totally prevent a sound swing motion that allows the club to release properly through the impact zone. The wonderful thing is that anyone can learn how to put a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, and you can practice it anywhere your hands are not otherwise engaged, like watching TV or just sitting and relaxing.
Whether you prefer an overlap, interlock or full-finger (not baseball!) grip on the club, the same fundamentals apply. Here are the major grip faults I see most often, in the order of the frequency:
Mis-aligned hands
By this I mean that the palms of the two hands are not parallel to each other. Too many golfers have a weak left hand and strong right, or vice versa. The easiest way to learn how to hold the club with your palms aligned properly is to grip a plain wooden ruler or yardstick. It forces the hands to align properly and shows you how that feels. If you grip and re-grip a yardstick several times, then grip a club, you’ll see that the learning curve is almost immediate.
The position of the grip in the upper/left hand
I also observe many golfers who have the butt of the grip too far into the heel pad of the upper hand (the left hand for right-handed players). It’s amazing how much easier it is to release the club through the ball if even 1/4-1/2″ of the butt is beyond the left heel pad. Try this yourself to see what I mean. Swing the club freely with just your left hand and notice the difference in its release from when you hold it at the end of the grip, versus gripping down even a half inch.
To help you really understand how this works, go to the range and hit shots with your five-iron gripped down a full inch to make the club the same length as your seven-iron. You will probably see an amazing shot shape difference, and likely not see as much distance loss as you would expect.
Too much lower (right) hand on the club
It seems like almost all golfers of 8-10 handicap or higher have the club too far into the palm of the lower hand, because that feels “good” if you are trying to control the path of the clubhead to the ball. But the golf swing is not an effort to hit at the ball – it is a swing of the club. The proper hold on the club has the grip underneath the pad at the base of the fingers. This will likely feel “weak” to you — like you cannot control the club like that. EXACTLY. You should not be trying to control the club with your lower/master hand.
Gripping too tightly
Nearly all golfers hold the club too tightly, which tenses up the forearms and prevents a proper release of the club through impact. In order for the club to move back and through properly, you must feel that the club is controlled by the last three fingers of the upper hand, and the middle two fingers of the lower hand. If you engage your thumbs and forefingers in “holding” the club, the result will almost always be a grip that is too tight. Try this for yourself. Hold the club in your upper hand only, and squeeze firmly with just the last three fingers, with the forefinger and thumb off the club entirely. You have good control, but your forearms are not tense. Then begin to squeeze down with your thumb and forefinger and observe the tensing of the entire forearm. This is the way we are made, so the key to preventing tenseness in the arms is to hold the club very lightly with the “pinchers” — the thumbs and forefingers.
So, those are what I believe are the four fundamentals of a good grip. Anyone can learn them in their home or office very quickly. There is no easier way to improve your ball striking consistency and add distance than giving more attention to the way you hold the golf club.
More from the Wedge Guy
- The Wedge Guy: Golf mastery begins with your wedge game
- The Wedge Guy: Why golf is 20 times harder than brain surgery
- The Wedge Guy: Musings on the golf ball rollback
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Instruction
Clement: Stop ripping off your swing with this drill!
Not the dreaded headcover under the armpit drill! As if your body is defective and can’t function by itself! Have you seen how incredible the human machine is with all the incredible feats of agility all kinds of athletes are accomplishing? You think your body is so defective (the good Lord is laughing his head off at you) that it needs a headcover tucked under the armpit so you can swing like T-Rex?
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Andrew Cooper
Jun 26, 2018 at 6:47 am
Lucas, in picking out Hogan, Snead, DJ, Woods – you’re looking at phenomenal athletes. They get to where they are at and through impact because they can, physically. The average golfer – middle aged, sedentary lifestyle, non-athletic, stiff lower back, tight hamstrings – has no chance of emulating this impact position. It is relevant to maybe 0.1% of the golfing public.
RBImGuy
Jun 26, 2018 at 2:14 am
Tiger compared to Hogan, what a joke.
You do understand they did things, differently?
and besides Tiger never had the secret down
Rev G
Jun 19, 2018 at 9:54 am
I think this is a good start Lucas. And I agree with Fred above that the hips are the key. Under rotation of the Hips ( on the backswing and the through swing) is the most prevalent mistake that all golfers make. The Hips not only supply the power of the through swing, but they allow the clubface to square up at impact and in large part control where the ball goes.
gif
Jun 19, 2018 at 12:03 am
Herbert Warren Wind, a journalist, wrote 5 Lessons. Hogan was auneducated and couldn’t write a cogent sentence. HWW took Hogan’s blurts and wrote a book out of it. Hogan was near illiterate.
david
Jun 18, 2018 at 8:06 pm
You’ve done it again…another author trying to figure out the mechanics of the swing with good intentions, but whose unintended end point will be to confuse golfers so much so that any who actually try and copy or imitate these positions will get worse, get frustrated, and implode. I think I heard somewhere the secret is in the dirt, with feel leading the way.
Fred
Jun 18, 2018 at 2:39 pm
The club is not controlled by the shoulders. Its not controlled by the hips. Its not controlled by the knees. There is no body part or parts that determine where the club is at impact. The club determines ball flight. Learn from their club movement not their body.
stevet
Jun 17, 2018 at 12:29 pm
Before sweeping conclusions can be made you must differentiate between body types. Different bodies, different swing mechanics. It’s all in “The L.A.W.s of the Golf Swing” by Adams et al. Read it!
Geohogan
Jun 17, 2018 at 6:27 am
Totally agree that the Legends:
1 Hips open
2 Torso open
3 Both butt cheeks visible
4 Left leg extended and visible
Draw a vertical line at the back of the ball, its undeniable that the Legends moved laterally at impact compared o address. Please get these articles right.
gif
Jun 19, 2018 at 12:00 am
The Legends are FOSh cause they didn’t have launch monitors or 3D vids… they only guessed based on their own subjective feelings…. and they guessed wrong most of the time.
dilly dilly
Jun 17, 2018 at 12:15 am
Focusing too much on positions, just worry about where the ball is going.
Geohogan
Jun 17, 2018 at 6:58 am
The ball is going more consistently where we intend
when golf swing uses body rotation to square the clubface
rather than hands(forearm muscles).
Lucas has listed body positions that prove that body rotation at impact was used to square the clubface. Cannot achieve these body positions at impact if hands (forearm rotation) was used to square the clubface. They are mutually exclusive.
Man
Jun 17, 2018 at 10:16 am
Nope. Wrong.
Depends on the intended ball flight.
These static photos prove nothing.