Check out my swing

I've been trying to improve lately by doing a lot of camera and mirror work. I took a break from golf to work on grad school and have gotten back into it lately. When I picked up the clubs I was pull-hooking everything. I think I was swinging a little OTT with a slight upper body dive.

Take a look at my swing and see if you can see where I can improve. This is a 52* wedge since it's the only thing that I can swing inside my garage (I'm 6'3"). Things I'm interested in knowing:

Posture: How is it?

Takeaway and Backswing: Too far outside? Too far inside? etc.

Transition: What is my transition like? Does it seem upper-body initiated? Did I drop the club into the slot correctly?

Downswing: Delivering it from the inside? Flat enough? Too steep?

Impact and Follow-through: Anything you see here?

Much appreciated.

I hope someone here can help you. I would need a face on view as well as down the line, and should be hitting balls with both. Also, slow motion is an absolute necessity for me to do any analysis, and I think that would be better for others too.

You may want to read my thread titled "Why you tube????". Swing Academy is much, much better for golf swing analysis.

Hmmm... we all swing pretty well when there is no ball, but your swing has some fine features (in my opinion.)

You are just barely off plane on the way up -- just a tiny bit, with the butt of the club pointing outside the ball (many good ball strikers are the same.) Good solid position and lower body at the top -- you keep flex and don't over rotate the hips. Can't see your club face clearly but it looks right on your left arm line. Downswing is really nice with the shaft bisecting your right shoulder and the club on plane. Impact, and right after, looks like a little bit of "turning off the gas" -- I don't see a full right side, body release to indicate you have not coasted a bit. Without the face on view, there is no way to tell for sure. Personally I like to see the left hip pocket a little further around at impact, but you are not too far off, especially on a controlled wedge swing. Don't take these comments as gospel because I make no claims of expertise -- you asked for thoughts and after looking closely (starting and stopping your video many times) this is what I see. As JackLee said, two views are really needed, and a driver and mid iorn might be better than a wedge (bet it is cold where you are right now.)

About the coasting comment... you mentioned pull hooking. When the lower body drive turns off early, a pull hook can follow because the club can re-route left and flip closed so easily. If the hips keep turning, it is harder (but not impossible) to come over the top.

If you swing this way at a real ball, I'll bet you hit it pretty well.

Regards,

Thanks guys. I realize this video format isn't ideal so thanks for the patience in trying to deal with it. When it gets sunny outside, I'll get some video of me at the range.

RC, I definitely know what your talking about when you mention *Turning off the gas*. I've always thought that my hip turn slows down /slash/ stops in the late downswing. Part of this is due to a chronically bothersome lower back, but part of it is just habit. When I swing harder the club generally snaps against the back of my neck because my body can't turn away any more to the left to give it room to swing through (Like Adam Scott or some of the girls on the LPGA). I've been doing hip flexibility exercises and stretches for about a year, but I work at a desk-job and I'm 32 years old, so there's only so much progress I can make in the lower body flexibility area.

About a week ago I checked out my swing personally and noticed I was taking the club back WAY too flat with my hands way too far to the inside. What I'm doing in this video feels incredibly steep to me, but obviously it's getting closer even if it is still on the flat side.

No problem... I sort of enjoy looking at swings (but unfortunately, I look only for things that I think are the optimal keys to the swing, and others may spot completely different things.) I like your swing, but there is more power hiding and waiting to be found.

On the hip turn power question, when you can get out and hit shots on the range, try hitting short 8 irons using no hip turn at all on the backswing, and simply turning the hips for 100 percent of the power on the down swing. You will not be able to take the club much past arms at 9:00, but you only want to hit the ball 80 yards. It is best to tee the 8 iron up a half inch to start this drill, because you will be thin initially. I do this drill actually trying to counter-rotate the hips very slightly (even if just millimeter) as the club starts back. What is so amazing is one can hit the ball nearly as far as a full out swing with no more than this little drill -- and it will certainly cause you to learn the driving hip release. There is almost no way to do the drill without the lower body dominating the swing.

I've talked about this drill here before, but for non-believers, just try it. You may be completely surprised at what you learn, and it will clearly show over rotating the hips on the backswing is a power loser and rotating them without sliding on the downswing is a power generator. I think the main difference in pros and amatuers is that pros know how to clear the left hip to generate more power and amatuers over rotate the hips on the back swing and turn their swings into upper body and over the top weak swings. If the body turns away like a door opening (hips and shoulders turning together) it is very difficult to time the downswing to generate power. Typically the lower body cannot keep up in this case and all one has is a weak upper body overtaking the swing before impact.

Sorry to go on like this -- the latter part of this does not apply to you. You have a good base and only need to fire it up a bit.