So I am posting this for a friend because he is a donk and hasn't signed up on this site yet. He is a five handicap and is a magician around the greens. He is an athletic guy but I have often thought that he could take it to the next level if he hit his tee shots a little further.

Here a video of his driver swing.

http://www.vimeo.com/7366729

It is obvious that two things are occuring.
1. There is no wrist hinge/lag as he comes down into the ball.
2. His hips are sliding a lot.

He currently hits his driver 230-240 and 7iron 150.

He says that he now knows what the problem is, but his instructor isn't giving great advice/drills to help remedy the problem.

Can you offer any help/instruction/tips?

Is there anyone out there who can help?

It looks to me like he swings around behind him quite a bit. He is definitely releasing the club too soon. I don't think there is anything wrong with his hips, I think you need to move aggressively toward the target with your hips. He has his hips way open though before impact. And I mean way open.

I think he needs to get the club more in front of him vs around behind him, get his arms wider, and make a more aggressive move with his hands, arms and shoulders vs just his hips. That is my take.

he needs to keep is back knee flexed rather than straight(aka the Charles Howell III). then by swinging more in front of him rather than around he should create a more natural wrist hinge that would allow him to release the club later through impact. it would make him feel as if he is swinging very steep into the ball

Not a teacher so take what I say with a grain of salt...

agree that he should keep his right knee more stable on the back swing, but look at his left hand/elbow at address. It looks VERY stiff and turned inwards does it not(a little like Duval does)? There is no way to move your hand away from your body into a more relaxed, wider position at the top with that tension. Same goes for the wrist, needs to be more relaxed at the top for him to create the lag that he's missing. U can't make a whip snap with a stiff arm.

My advice would be to keep your elbow and wrist more relaxed during setup and maintain it through out the swing, keep right knee solid and more flexed in the back swing, and try and work on a bit of a lag motion at the top(think of sticking the butt of the club in the ground on the downswing). Otherwise, pretty good swing.

Teacher's opinion on this? Am I full of crap?

Edit: Nm not what the problem is, thats a tough one.

Edit 2: Not a teacher but...

Have him try letting go of his hands and making a "pulling motion" into the ball. Letting the swing control the hands. Check out how tiger "pulls" his hands down into the ball.

What i see from that angle, is that your friend just needs to work on a more solid base, from the hips down. Two things are happening. First his hips turning too much on the back swing, that is leading to his slight over swing (beyond parallel and across the line). Second his right leg is straight, at the top of the swing. Thats a power killer. Yes, he is releasing early, but i think that to compensate for the othe errors. What i would suggest to your friend, would be, go to the range and hit half and three quarter pitching wedges ... work on a very solid base, with minimum hip movement on the back swing. Really work his torso with his arms and start with easy swings until he can feel the tempo ... then increase the length of the swing, but use the same tempo. IMHO!!!! Ive been teaching golf for 25 plus years. Id like to see some DTL vids!

I disagree with most responses. His lower body movement is fine....it may or may not be ideal, but it's certainly acceptable. He could try float loading....it'll help his early release and he'll hit it farther. If he doesn't like playing with that technique, at least he'll learn what it's like to feel angle retention in the downswing. I think the pure ball striker would be a good training aid for him. Also, he doesn't appear to have a big flip. I think it's possible that he loses his lag because he doesn't get his right shoulder down far enough in the down swing, and so he has to lose the angle in order to reach the ball. A DTL view would help

I think he needs to post a DTL video as well to see if there is anything else that's off.

I looked at the video last night and came to another conclusion. Could it be that he isn't retaining his wrist hinge during the downswing because he never actually hinged his wrist in the first place? It seems to me that he keeps his arms and wrists very stable but never allows any actual movement of the wrist. That could be one reason he is swinging his arms around his body so much rather than keeping the club in front of him.

Also not a teacher here but it looks like he has a very descending blow into the ball and I'm guessing he generates a ton of spin with that angle. An easy fix would be to move the ball up in his stance, more off his front big toe, and think of trying to sweep the ball to create a better angle of attack and hopefully some better launch conditions. With his size and athleticism he should definitely be hitting the ball further. Also, you might just tell him to go and take a lesson from his local PGA pro.

You stole my thunder buddy .
It would be better to have a view along the target line but he seems very flat abd doesn't have quite enough flex in left knee..
Great shoulder turn though.

Is that a stack & tilt swing? That would explain the straight right leg.

I'd move the ball forward, but my opinion doesn't mean anything.

He is not attempting any sort of stack & tilt type of swing. He does try to swing on more of a single plane though.

He says that he does have a DTL view that he'll load up later. That mey help with any sort of critique.

A list of what I see:

1. On takeaway he is rolling his hands and arms and getting too flat (inside too quickly). I bet he hit a lot shots to the right.

2. He needs to keep his right knee flexed, but that is difficult to do with the over-rotation of his hips. A lot of this relates to No. 1 above.

3. He is an arm swinger and he lets the right arm fly away from the body on the way down because his is casting.

I would like to see him take the club away with the face in a squarer position. He is over-rotating hands, arms and hips on the takeaway. He needs to take it away without rolling his wrists. He needs to keep his right arm closer to his side coming down, which will promote lag.

He needs to work on these changes with no more than a 6 iron. If he can hit the 6 iron about 175 yds he is on his way.

His tempo seems real good to me because he keeps his balance throught the swing. But power comes from release and that is where what he is doing with his current swing will not allow.