Hit your drives 60 yards farther by changing your setup
Hello, GolfWRXers. This is Piers Ward and Andy Proudman of Meandmygolf.com, and in this video we’re going to show you how you could be robbing yourself of distance through a poor setup to the golf ball.
In the video above, we use Trackman to show you how a simple change in your setup can help you drive the golf ball 60 yards farther by improving your strike and attack angle. The next time you’re at the range, make sure to check your setup to see if you are optimizing the distance you can hit it.
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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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golfraven
May 7, 2016 at 3:40 pm
Ok, here is my advise for all sub 200y hitters (talking driver not 8 iron). If you want to hit it long, study GG (swingtips) – yes, it on Youtube too.
golfraven
May 7, 2016 at 3:32 pm
What is this now, Youtube? First Crossfield and now those clowns. Just can’t be bothered listening to such nonesense. Those fellas put too much emphasis on just one club in the bag – and this is not the one which scores most.
Mark
May 4, 2016 at 8:45 am
60 yards? You are having a larf…….
Mat
May 3, 2016 at 5:13 pm
Didn’t even watch. Just commenting that the headline is clickbait, and thus not going to watch.
jj
May 3, 2016 at 12:06 pm
why don’t they show the smash factor? the first drive was hit really poorly and ladder was hit well.
TCJ
May 3, 2016 at 11:20 am
It it doesn’t involve pachinko balls, then it’s crap! It’s the only true way to find more Ooomph, more power!
ron
May 3, 2016 at 10:24 am
Good to see all my YouTube boys on here! if you all can get some EA Tischler (my most recent discovery) on here that’ll be sweet.
Stefan
May 3, 2016 at 3:04 am
First video i really didn’t like from these guys, they are playing with their credibility.
It seems they are doing this up in an effort to earn more clicks.
Someone
May 2, 2016 at 10:11 pm
This really is a misleading article. This should be retitled to state “if you constantly hit drives under 200yds and have poor trajectory, it could be due to your setup/load balance. This setup correction could help you gain up to 60yds.” Information isn’t bad, just title is misleading…especially for someone who has that upward swing and is already driving it the average 230, but would like to be on the higher end closer to 290. This video isn’t really gonna help.
gmoney
May 2, 2016 at 9:50 pm
Hit your drives 60 yards further! looks like an ad one would see under the article
B Clizzle
May 2, 2016 at 6:55 pm
These guys remind me of Mac and Tosh (goofy gophers) from looney tunes
Me Nunya
May 2, 2016 at 1:15 pm
Those matching ensembles tho…
cody
May 3, 2016 at 6:44 pm
so strange….