How important is club position at A2?

[golfaddict1]

How important is it to have the club in a 'good position' at parallel point 1 i.e. 1st point shaft is parallel to ground in backswing.

I know ideally the club would be a little outside the hands and the face matching the spine angle. I'm not a million miles away from this but as you can see my arms have come away from my body slightly, the club is a touch open and slightly behind my hands. But the top of my backswing is pretty decent. Club neutral, parallel to target line.

Thing is my coach has got me working on these exaggerated feelings of club outside hands, hinging up much more vertically and getting way more laid off at the top. Admittedly these are all 'feelings' and when I actually do them whilst hitting a ball I've actually only moved the club a tiny bit closer to the 'better' positions. 

But I honestly feel so awkward and horrible doing them. It just makes me hit it so much worse and come down very steep on the ball. I've always enjoyed the flatter more baseball like feeling in my golf swing. I feel like my arms are trapped against my chest in the backswing and I cant rotate properly. My coach says changes like this are always tough and will feel horrible for a while, but I've made positional changes in the past and yes they've felt odd at first, but I've usually been able to adapt to them pretty quickly and my swing has improved quickly as a result. But these changes he's trying to make to my backswing have been going on for a while now and every time I focus on implementing them, whether it be on the range or during a round, my ball striking deteriorates.

Im a 7.0 hcap and improving, but he says if I want to reach a more elite level I need to bite the bullet and make these changes to my swing.

Thoughts? 

[mvmac]

2 hours ago, golfaddict1 said:

How important is it to have the club in a 'good position' at parallel point 1 i.e. 1st point shaft is parallel to ground in backswing.

It's probably the least important position in the golf swing. There are great players that are well inside the hands and other that are way outside.

Having said that it can be an important position for some players because loading the club low and in can create a "domino" effect with the rest of the swing. The change typically isn't to fix the position but why it's occurring. 

2 hours ago, golfaddict1 said:

I know ideally the club would be a little outside the hands and the face matching the spine angle. I'm not a million miles away from this but as you can see my arms have come away from my body slightly, the club is a touch open and slightly behind my hands. But the top of my backswing is pretty decent. Club neutral, parallel to target line.

It looks fine to me, agree with the changes if you wanted to make it "perfect" but you reach a really nice position at the top.

One thing that stands out to me is that you look like you have some weight back into your heels. To fix that I'd look at getting the arch out of your lower back.

 

[golfaddict1]

thanks for the response. I agree I think the position at the top is far more important than how you get there. I've always felt the weight was in the balls of my feet at address so maybe i'm falling back at touch during BS. You're right about the arch. I have pretty weak core muscles and I need to engage them more at address.

[iacas]

FWIW I renamed the thread to say A2 instead of "PP1" (which would be "pressure point 1").