Flipping at impact

[norrisedgar]

Hi guys, I need some help tracking down the reason for my flip.

I thought I had it nailed down a few times but nothing has reall worked so far. I thought I had this morning when I noticed my right elbow dropping below my left on the downswing but apparently this is a good move. I've seen video of Jason Duffner doing it for one and even the great Ben Hogan did it.

The one thing I have noticed is that my right elbow stops moving forward just after the club passes parallel to the ground. Thisin turn causes me to flip my hands at the ball just to make contact. The problem is I can't work out why my right elbow is stopping.

I would appreciate any suggestions as to the cause and tips to correct it.

I'll post a couple of videos underneath.

Cheers, Dan.

[norrisedgar]

I think both videos are with a 7 iron.

[norrisedgar]

Nobody any ideas? Actually I have noticed it's not just my elbow that stops moving but my shoulder rotation as well. The right stops altogether and the left climbs. I'm still not sure why this is happening

[Ernest Jones]

Perhaps your elbow is somehow connected to your shoulder...

[iacas]

Originally Posted by norrisedgar

Nobody any ideas?

Key #3 drills. And Key #2 drills.

http://purestrike5sk.com/videos.php

[solarbear]

Sounds pretty confusing. Imagine the spot where your two hands meet. Try and feel this spot in both the back and the downswing. Swing this spot into the ball. I love this sensation.

[JetFan1983]

What Erik said. Pressure has to go a bit more forward into that front foot on your downswing.

But to be more specific with your lack of a flat left wrist and no lag, your arms stay too loaded on your downswing, and you don't extend your trail arm soon enough to get the trail forearm more forward on the downswing.

Case in point:

Trail forearm is lagging. Left arm is lagging. The club head is being thrown.

Take Sergio Garcia for example (all pros do this though to varying degrees):

His left arm is less loaded against his chest. In fact, it's not loaded against his chest at all at this point. His right forearm has traveled down further. And he has less bend in the trail arm. As a result, he can sustain lag much later and also, the release will just naturally occur at the correct time. This is why your left shoulder has to raise and the right shoulder has to drop in order to reach the golf ball. You'll have a helluva time trying to hit it straight or solidly with consistency when the left shoulder raises and the arms stay loaded.

A lot of the time, we as golfers are told that the swing is "body driven," or that "the arms come along for the ride." That's borderline mediocre advice for someone who is all arms (like most high handicappers). But better players tend to forget that -- duh -- we gotta swing our goddamn arms and we can't be all body.

There's a rate at which the arms have to swing relative to one's body motion. If those two aren't in sync, you get into positions like you are getting into on your swing video.

Swing your left arm down across your chest better. Drive your right forearm more forward. Extend your right arm. You'll sustain lag much later in your downswing, presuming of course that you can also increase front foot pressure to shore up that weight shift you have. All this will stabilize that faulty shoulder rotation.

Cheers, mate. Hope that helps.

PS- Start a swing thread.

For further study on this, please refer to this video here, made by resident moderator and teaching professional Mvmac:

[norrisedgar]

Originally Posted by Ernest Jones

Perhaps your elbow is somehow connected to your shoulder...

Hmmm...it must be a possibility surely

[norrisedgar]

Originally Posted by solarbear

Sounds pretty confusing.

Imagine the spot where your two hands meet. Try and feel this spot in both the back and the downswing. Swing this spot into the ball. I love this sensation.

I think I understand what you are saying, I'll give it a whirl cheers.

Originally Posted by iacas

Key #3 drills. And Key #2 drills.

http://purestrike5sk.com/videos.php

Thanks iacas, I'll work my way through these

[norrisedgar]

Thanks JetFan, your post makes perfect sense to me. I've noticed the difference between my right forearm and the tour pros. Been trying to figure out a way to achieve this same position and not the overloaded one in the picture of my swing you posted.

One quick question, should my weight move to the outside of my left foot through impact? so almost like a roll towards the target?

[JetFan1983]

Originally Posted by norrisedgar

Thanks JetFan, your post makes perfect sense to me. I've noticed the difference between my right forearm and the tour pros. Been trying to figure out a way to achieve this same position and not the overloaded one in the picture of my swing you posted.

One quick question, should my weight move to the outside of my left foot through impact? so almost like a roll towards the target?

Well, hopefully Erik, Mike, or James chime in if I screwed up somewhere on this thread.

But, as for rolling your left foot onto its outstep.... that can be a slippery slope. It's just important to remember that if you implement this move, you still have the pressure firing into the ball of your lead foot before and during impact. Like, you obviously don't want to be well on that outstep of the front foot at impact. That'd be the wrong way to do that. It might be useful practicing that just to get the feel for it, but I think when you actually hit shots, it's a lot more important to apply the pressure correctly and for that foot rolling to occur well after the ball is gone. But yea, so many touring professionals make that move to get forward.... Fowler, Mickelson... Hogan did it some. Tiger does it some. Jack Nicklaus. I'm pretty sure Erik and Dave do it too.... I mean, the list goes on and on...  Steve Stricker rolls onto his outstep earlier than most I've seen...probably the earliest one could without screwing up impact.

It's definitely a commonality though among great players... a commonality that maybe 1 in 2 PGA Tour players use (just pulled that stat out of my ass, don't quote me).

I think ultimately though, it's really, really important to learn these new moves with training wheels on, basically. Learning to bring the arms down better can be challenging. Half and quarter swings done at a slower tempo are probably one's best bet at improving them.

I guess if I was to summarize: more pressure forward in the lead foot, release the arms (left arm more down, right arm more extension). Ankle rolling can be a nice supplement to adding pressure forward when done with some discretion.

I hope I didn't give you too much to think about here.

[norrisedgar]

No that's great thanks JetFan. Interestingly if I do a 3/4 swing I can get my left wrist flat at impact. Maybe that is because my arms don't have to move so far and fast. Speeding my arms up might be the key. It's like you said you hear so often not to swing with your arms but let your body do it you become sort of brainwashed

[JetFan1983]

Originally Posted by norrisedgar

No that's great thanks JetFan. Interestingly if I do a 3/4 swing I can get my left wrist flat at impact. Maybe that is because my arms don't have to move so far and fast. Speeding my arms up might be the key. It's like you said you hear so often not to swing with your arms but let your body do it you become sort of brainwashed

Yea for sure.

One other thing to notice is the relative height of the hands between you and Sergio in those two photos I provided in my first post here. His hands reach a lower point than yours, obviously as a result of those things I mentioned. I think some golfers use "get the hands low" as a swing thought for lowering/releasing the arms. You'll notice that when the left arm stays the most loaded and the left shoulder raises the most that the arms don't really get that low relative to where your thighs are. That could be a simple way to boil this down.

[mvmac]

Originally Posted by iacas

Key #3 drills. And Key #2 drills.

http://purestrike5sk.com/videos.php

Yep and turn/flare the left foot out 10 degrees more, will help the left knee flex more and longer.  Also grip looks very weak.  Left hand grip should be in the fingers, not the palm and turned about 35 degrees.  First pad of the right hand index finger sits on the side of the grip.

[JetFan1983]

Originally Posted by mvmac

Quote:

Originally Posted by iacas

Key #3 drills. And Key #2 drills.

http://purestrike5sk.com/videos.php

Yep and turn/flare the left foot out 10 degrees more, will help the left knee flex more and longer.  Also grip looks very weak.  Left hand grip should be in the fingers, not the palm and turned about 35 degrees.  First pad of the right hand index finger sits on the side of the grip.

Oops. Totally missed the setup changes. Agreed.

[norrisedgar]

Originally Posted by mvmac

Yep and turn/flare the left foot out 10 degrees more, will help the left knee flex more and longer.  Also grip looks very weak.  Left hand grip should be in the fingers, not the palm and turned about 35 degrees.  First pad of the right hand index finger sits on the side of the grip.

Cheers mvmac, hadn't noticed my grip slip. It's something that tends to happen so I have to keep my eye on it.

[norrisedgar]

Hi guys just wanted to post an update.

I've been working on getting my hands more forward at impact with very little success unfortunately. But today I may have figured out why.

It appears that I am thrusting my right hip at the ball which is causing me to not have enough room to bring my arms through. I've got a few pictures of my swing compared to Hunter Mahan's and I've noticed just how much closer my right hip gets to the ball.

In the first set of pics my backside moves towards the ball where Hunter's if anything moves away from the ball.

In the second set you can see how much further my right hip is over my toes when compared to Hunter's.

Am I barking up the wrong tree here guys or is this definitely my problem?

Cheers Dan.

[Spyder]

Originally Posted by norrisedgar

Hi guys just wanted to post an update.

I've been working on getting my hands more forward at impact with very little success unfortunately. But today I may have figured out why.

It appears that I am thrusting my right hip at the ball which is causing me to not have enough room to bring my arms through. I've got a few pictures of my swing compared to Hunter Mahan's and I've noticed just how much closer my right hip gets to the ball.

In the first set of pics my backside moves towards the ball where Hunter's if anything moves away from the ball.

In the second set you can see how much further my right hip is over my toes when compared to Hunter's.

Am I barking up the wrong tree here guys or is this definitely my problem?

Cheers Dan.

It almost looks to me as if you are standing too far away from the ball as well. If you're moving in towards the ball at impact, you're stretching too far to the ball in my opinion. However, I am sure one of the gentlemen with 5SK will be more than happy to steer you in the right direction.