More Shaft Lean/Hands forward - more hands are away from body?

[nevets88]

Or at least it feels like it? I've been working on hands ahead of ball, forward lean and that's what it feels like. Is this correct?

[Chrepper]

Your hands, at impact, are naturally ahead of the ball.  Your hands don't have to be too forward at address; I set up approximately an inch or two in front of my pants zipper.  That's right, pants zipper...I said it.

[Ernest Jones]

If I have forward press at address wouldn't it stand to reason that my chances of having forward press at impact are vastly improved? And if so - wouldn't my swing naturally bottom out ahead of the ball?

[bunkerputt]

Originally Posted by Ernest Jones

If I have forward press at address wouldn't it stand to reason that my chances of having forward press at impact are vastly improved? And if so - wouldn't my swing naturally bottom out ahead of the ball?

I used to think this, which is why I had a "forward press" where my hands were over my lead thigh when viewed face on.  It really wasn't a press at all, because it's just where my hands naturally hang at address.  What actually happens is the left arm gets loose, the right arm overworks, the club tends to be brought back too far to the inside with an open face, and it requires a huge shift-rotation to get the club working back up to the right downswing plane along with a timed closing of the face.  That's my old swing that also had a minor, but noticeable flip in it going down into impact.  Now, I'm working on pulling my left arm in at address, back more to my zipper with a little cup in the wrist.  On the takeaway, the club stays somewhat neutrally shut and in a neutral position.  The difference now is that I'm working the club back down onto the proper downswing plane very slightly from above instead of below, but pretty much on the same plane.  Compared to what I was doing, it feels extremely loopy to me, ala Jim Furyk.  But looking at it on video, it just looks like a good swing now.  The difference in the face-on videos are tremendous.  Now I'm getting so much lag that I almost can't release the club aggressively enough to send it left like I used to.  Generally, my misses are slight right now, instead of left and lefter.

[bunkerputt]

To continue the thought here, because I have the left elbow pointed slightly towards the target, the left arm pulled back into my pec with the hands more at the zipper, my left arm stays connected better and I actually get better connection than I did with the forward press.  If you are referring to the distance your hands are from your body, I found that by pulling my hands back to my zipper at address (not in, just back away from the target), my contact moved away from the toe and more toward the hosel.  I have yet, in 3 days of hitting balls this way, to hit one off the toe.  I always had at least one per range session every single day of my life up to now.  I've also not hit a single hosel rocket, which is pretty incredible because the grass mark is pretty dang close.  It let me get further from the ball which helps me not feel so jammed up on my downswing.  Here's Tiger at address nowadays.  Keep in mind, I think he is trying to hit a high shot to get some carry from the wind here, so his normal trajectory may have his hands in a different spot.  Notice his hands are much closer to his zipper than to his left thigh.