Right Arm and Pulling

As a right hander I have made a counscious effort to keep my right arm pinned to my side to control my arms on the backswing. The theory is if I don't let my right arm slide behind me or separate I can keep the arms in front of my torso and stay in sync. As a result, my misses are usually straight pulls. I will go to the range and while hitting the ball solidly with say a seven iron I will consistenly pull 20 or so yards to the left of the target.

Any thoughts?

Check your left hand grip, sounds basic but a proper left hand grip will make a world of a difference. I have the same problem with pulling and hooking shots sometimes.

check out his video

For a multitude of possible reasons your swing-path is out to in. Really work on hitting the ball to first base with a straight, flat wristed left arm. This requires you to get the club down inside and making a good turn back to allow the club to descend down inside from the top. The right arm should extend through and beyond the ball at the bottom. If it extends at the top, you spend your hit and the club is outside or over the top. As a pro on the OTT move, for me to rid myself of it, it took a view of the golfswing no one teaches, that is, turn back and swing down, not on plane but down. The proper plane will result form the turn forward. You must also religiously insure you take the club straight back from the ball to start the backswing so that the club crosses over to the rear at the top, this allows a natural drop to the inside. If you take the club away inside at all at the bottom, you will use your arms to raise the club and complete the backswing resulting in a natural over the top move forward and also little or no body coil to go forward with, hence the rear shoulder has to fire at the top to move the club OTT. Hello pull or slice.

Agree with previous post. Sounds like an over-the-top move. After a lot of work, I no longer come over the top. I still block shots, but at this point, I'd rather do that than pull

One thing that helped me is to start with 1/4 and 1/2 swings, esentially pitches, and really work on making sure the ball starts out to the right. Don't worry about the result of the swing, just make sure the ball starts a bit right. One nice thing about smaller shots is that the same over-the-top flaw will most likely emerge, but it will be easier for you to self-correct than in a full shot, in which there are many more variables.

Once you get the feeling for how to bring the club in from inside on a 30 yard pitch, you can start increase your swing length and see if you can get the club into the right position coming down from a full backswing.

Thanks for the replies. I've done some research, especially on Golf Link, and definintely think it is swing path. My path is too steep and over the top a bit causing pulls and fat shots. My shoulder turn is leading or out running my hip turn. Interestingly enough, before your comments and my research I did some things at the range Saturday that helped a bit but the pull was still there. I was actually bringing the club straight back or a little to the outside on the way back and looping back to the inside. I got this from something I saw Hank Haney doing with Charles Barkley on the Haney Project . Really helped me to come from the inside better. My shoulder turn is definitely out of wack. It is so hard for me to turn it perpidicular around the spine. It always rotates a little more in the horizontal plane relatively than straight around therefore causing me to throw the shoulder out.