Wrist Angle

[jambalaya]

Show me the perfect wrist angle at address. Should the wrists, hands and arms be straight in line with the club shaft? I just try to let my arms hang straight down naturally from my shoulders at address. This seems to promote a slight cocking up of the wrist at address. I would have to uncock and lift the arms a little to line everything up. Should I?

[ZaPPPa]

Best advice I can give you is to go to the bookstore and pick up a copy of Ben Hogan's Five Lessons (or at Amazon ).

Your arms should not be in line with the shaft. They should be almost perpendicular to the ground. In your setup, if you have your arms down, your fingers should point at the balls of your feet. With longer clubs I tend to decrease my angle a little bit.

What you're doing is good, but I cannot stress enough that you should read up on setup position (from reputable sources of course). Leadbetter, Hogan and I'm sure others have other sources. Having a good setup will prevent and cure many problems. If my swing is off, the first thing I look for is whether I got lazy with my setup and I'd say 80% of the time this is the case.

[jambalaya]

Duh, I just looked at the swings about six pro players. All of them except one had the arms, wrists and hand pretty much lined up. There was not cocking of the wrist in any direction. But of course as you said, the club shaft is still at an angle to the arms.

[Open-Faced Club Sandwedge]

There's more than one school of thought on that subject (address position). Some teaching pros (the one I took my only lesson thus far from, for example) are of the school of thought that the swing becomes simpler and easier (more repeatable) if the position at address mimics the position at impact, so that the plane of the club doesn't have to be manipulated mid-swing.

At impact, the momentum of the club mean the shaft is much more in line (looking down the line) with the trailing arm than the traditional address position. So my teacher taught me to hold my hands much higher than the traditional address position, so that my hands were on a line from the ball to the center of my back (traditional has the hands on a line from the ball to the belt buckle). Also, at impact the hands should be slightly ahead of the ball on a good swing (all good golfers do this), so my teacher taught me to set up with my hands a little ahead of the ball.

So to summarize, the way I was taught to set up has the club shaft pointing to the left side of my ribcage, whereas traditional golf (Ben Hogan) has the shaft pointing to the belt buckle. It's the direction the shaft is pointing that defines the wrist angle, since the wrists have to angle the hands to line up with the shaft.

-Andrew

[ZaPPPa]

Duh, I just looked at the swings about six pro players. All of them except one had the arms, wrists and hand pretty much lined up. There was not cocking of the wrist in any direction. But of course as you said, the club shaft is still at an angle to the arms.

Yes, I guess the natural build of the human wrist make it look like they're in line. However, if you look at Tigers picture below his wrist are not in the natural, neutral position (which has almost a 70 degree angle with your forearm). You could call it de-cocked even.

I thought you wanted to have your arms be in line with the shaft, which would put your way to far away from the ball and would force you to bend over too much.. Sorry for the confusion.

[Open-Faced Club Sandwedge]

Yes, I guess the natural build of the human wrist make it look like they're in line. However, if you look at Tigers picture below his wrist are not in the natural, neutral position (which has almost a 70 degree angle with your forearm). You could call it de-cocked even.

As I pointed out before, some instructors are advocating the position in this picture, which is further away from the ball and has the the arms (at least the right arm) in line with the shaft:

I learned this setup (that's not me in the picture, but it's what I was taught to do) from a PGA pro. He argues that it's simpler to swing the club starting from this position, because the orientation of the arms and hands doesn't have to changes as much during the swing. I'm not an experienced golfer yet, but his argument seemed logically valid and convincing to me. -Andrew

[jambalaya]

Well I went to the range today and took the wrist angle thought with me. I started a new thread in the Golf Talk forum called "Best Range Session Everrrr!" The wrist thing wasn't the only thing I did but that little change did wonders. Fat shots suddenly gone, apparently weight shift is not so much of a problem. Oh, I did think about swing path, hitting the inside part of the ball towards right field, and pulling the club down with my left arm/shoulder rather than throwing the right hand and shoulder at the ball. But having that wrist-arm alignment felt noticeably different.

[JackieTreehorn]

However, if you look at Tigers picture below his wrist are not in the natural, neutral position (which has almost a 70 degree angle with your forearm). You could call it de-cocked even.

I wonder about this myself. I do not fully "de-cock" my wrists at setup but sometimes tinker with that. I think it also depends on how far your arms are from your body at set up. I see suggestions all over the place. I would think that if you like your arms further from your body you would favor the "de-cocked" wrist setup and vice-versa.

I am more of a "arms-close / neutral wrist" golfer at address.

[ZaPPPa]

I learned this setup (that's not me in the picture, but it's what I was taught to do) from a PGA pro. He argues that it's simpler to swing the club starting from this position, because the orientation of the arms and hands doesn't have to changes as much during the swing. I'm not an experienced golfer yet, but his argument seemed logically valid and convincing to me.

Interesting. Though, my address and impact position are not identical. My hips are square at address, but open at impact. This would pull my left arm back and I would either have to move my whole body forward to compensate, or somehow lean into the ball to not hit it off the toe or miss it completely.

[JackLee]

My address position is what I consider conventional. With my irons, my arms and hands hang straight down, with about a hand width between the butt of the club and my body. I also set my hands a little ahead of the clubface. With my metalwoods, I reach out a little, with maybe a hand and a half clearance.

At impact, my hands are higher, but my left shoulder has turned some. These two differences seem to cancel each other out very well.

[Open-Faced Club Sandwedge]

Interesting. Though, my address and impact position are not identical. My hips are square at address, but open at impact. This would pull my left arm back and I would either have to move my whole body forward to compensate, or somehow lean into the ball to not hit it off the toe or miss it completely.

Thanks for the response.

True, your hips are open at impact. But your shoulders should not be. If your shoulders were open at impact, that would indeed be pulling your left arm back, and it would produce a consistent slice. But during the backswing, the shoulders rotate much further than the hips. Then the downswing starts with the lower body, meaning the hips stay much more open than the shoulders all the way through impact. If you look at good players at the moment of impact, their hips are open but their shoulders are square (meaning they haven't pulled their left arm, which is why they're good players). If you don't believe me, look at Tiger's shoulders relative to his toes in these impact photos. His knees and hips are open, but his shoulders are totally square. Also, his shoulders, arms, and head are in the same position I set up in: -Andrew

[ZaPPPa]

If you don't believe me, look at Tiger's shoulders relative to his toes in these impact photos. His knees and hips are open, but his shoulders are totally square. Also, his shoulders, arms, and head are in the same position I set up in:

True.. I think it is just the awkwardness of the setup that is throwing me off. Bending over like that at setup would, for me, lead to a killer backpain. If it works, great, but not for me.

[Open-Faced Club Sandwedge]

True.. I think it is just the awkwardness of the setup that is throwing me off. Bending over like that at setup would, for me, lead to a killer backpain. If it works, great, but not for me.

It is a little awkward at first, and I haven't really gotten past the "at first" stage yet, so I still spend a lot of time paused at address going through my mental check-list of whether I've gotten myself into the right position, and making little adjustments. But it doesn't cause me any back pain, FWIW.

-Andrew

[grantc79]

Left wrist should be flat throughout the entire swing.

Right wrist should be cocked throughout the entire swing.

Reverse this if you are a lefty.


Now if you can tell me why at address you would line up differently than you want to return, then perhaps we would have something.

I can't for the life of me think of why you would want to do such a thing though.

[kafka01]

As I pointed out before, some instructors are advocating the position in this picture, which is further away from the ball and has the the arms (at least the right arm) in line with the shaft:

This position looks a bit forced to me with very extended arms forcing quite a bit muscles to tension up, which you want to avoid.

[grantc79]

The entire idea is to hit down on the ball and I don't see how that is possible from that picture.

Every club in your bag except for your putter is made to strike downwards on the ball. Irons are actually supposed to hit the ball into the ground and trap it (in a way) if you hit them correctly.

This is why every pro's hands will be in front of the ball when they strike the ball.

I don't see how anything but sweeping the ball is possible from that distance away from the ball.