Understanding the Left Wrist Position at the Top of the Golf Swing
In this video, I discuss the left-wrist position at the top of the golf swing (the lead wrist for a right-handed golfer). Watch the video to learn how to match your left-wrist position to your grip type and ball flight.
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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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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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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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Ed
Jun 20, 2017 at 11:02 pm
So if I have a strong grip (& therefore bowed wrist at address) should I flex my wrist in my take away to get to the FLW at the top or change to a neutral grip?
Mat
Jun 19, 2017 at 5:05 am
Personally I think wrist position at that point is mostly placebo. It’s telling you where you finish your backswing, but if you return it before contact, it is a zero sum. It’s hard to even think of twisting your wrist at impact, much less have it give any major difference. What it DOES do is indicate is whether you’re in a position that will likely be over-the-top, or a sweeping duck. This is akin to guys that work on finish. It’s important in the context that good balance at the end is a good indicator of what happened before, but the ball don’t care after .004 after contact.
G
Jun 22, 2017 at 12:09 am
well stated and is that .004 seconds after contact when the ball is off the face?
Steve
Jun 19, 2017 at 2:35 am
You have to sit down and make a decision are you going to square the club face with the arms and hands or are you going to square the face with the body motion or for the really great hand eye coordinated few both.
coops
Jun 18, 2017 at 11:58 pm
Have a read of this thread form the forums – started by iTeach
http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/topic/746351-top-of-the-backswing-cupped-bowed-or-flat/
“Should a golfer have a cupped, bowed, or flat left wrist position at the top of swing? The answer is it doesn’t matter.
Now that’s not 100 percent true, but I will explain why you shouldn’t be paying attention to the left wrist at the top of the swing (for a right handed golfer). If you look at the best players in the world, you will see some large variations in left wrist positions at the top of the swing. This is because they all have different grips. So you ask, “If we aren’t supposed to pay attention to the left wrist at the top of the swing, what are we supposed to be working toward?”
When we get into wrist conditions at the top of the swing, we can keep it simple by looking at the right wrist. In order to have a forward leaning shaft at impact and take a divot after the ball the right wrist must be bent backwards….”
….
“Most people feel the bowed left wrist is very strange feeling and therefore the most comfortable grip for most to get right wrist bent would be a strong left with neutral right hand. This places right wrist bend and the cocking of the left wrist on the same plane, so bend right wrist cocks the left wrist. Feels simpler for most people ” <— this means a weaker right hand grip than left hand… as below
Adam Scott pic on post # 74 from that thread
[img]http://www.brianmanzella.com/brianmanzella/.Pictures/adamscott1.jpg[/img]
G
Jun 22, 2017 at 12:13 am
it it doesn’t matter what is holding up the club at the top, the left hand thumb or the right hand upper palm?
Mark
Jun 18, 2017 at 8:46 am
Strong grip = cupped wrist = slice???????This is something new because usually it is hookers grip!
Weak grip = flat wrist = hook????????????
There must be something more to it