Showcasing real students with real change. Below you will find out exactly how my students went on to become more powerful and consistent ball strikers.

Dennis came to me as a complete beginner golfer who had kind of started playing golf on his own..  He came to me not wanting to learn bad habits.  The before video you see here is actually after a few lessons in where we got some general fundamentals in; grip stance, posture.  The after video is after several lessons and when Dennis was showing all time consistencies and power in his golf swing.  Read more to find out exactly how he achieved better swing proficiency.

I chose Dennis because he represent a large portion of the golfers who come to me.  The chances that you're also making a variation of this type of move is probably 75% according to the thousands of lessons I've taught.  I also chose Dennis because he actually put in the time to make these changes and trusted me. He is now a much more consistent and powerful ball-striker in very short period of time. Considering his lessons were only 30 min/week, I consider him to have made substantial progress in this video examples. 

Problem
Dennis' problem was basically what I call "Spinning" in the backswing.  Another good way to visual is to sit in a rotating chair and start spinning around in it.  Or also stand up and just turn your shoulders side to side.  If you are doing that in your backswing, then you are most likely doing in on your downswing.  See there's a big buzzword in golf right now and it's called, "Rotation." Many golfer are misinterpreting it and becoming worse and even injuring yourself. See, this is what Dennis was thinking subconsciously as evident in the first video. You can see how he keeps his forward bend all the way through the backswing and downswing; his hips and shoulder are turning too flat and he's more inclined to be on his toes.

Fix
If I had to explain everything little thing we did to fix Dennis' swing, I would need three pages. In order to get to the point, I will explain the things we worked on as succinct as possible. Therefore you can apply it to your own swing.

1st.  We created some side bend mobility with drill where I would have Dennis stand straight up and have his hips sway from side to side.  Then we had him do this in a normal golf posture to see how it kept his head more steadier. To him, it felt like he was really swaying, but because there was already some hip depth, at address, it didn't appear excessive as you can see.

2nd.  We worked on how the lead shoulder, arm, hip and knee had to tilt downward on its proper angles to promote and early swinging of the lead side down and laterally. In return this resulted in an early pressure more to the trail side (leg/hip). If you're unfamiliar with pressure shifts, please refer to my other posts.  

​3rd.  We worked on how this early pressure shift is used to re-route the trail hip back and around to the target side in the transition. 

4th.  We worked on posting up the lead leg and getting the arms to race of the chest to a fully extended left side on the follow through.  The key here is that everything prior to the follow trough was done correctly to inspire him to want to put on the brakes with his lead leg and get the swinging of the shoulders, and arms to accelerate through the ball into a nice balance finish.  When he did this all correctly you can see the result in the video of how much more powerful he seems to swing.  

This can be a very complicated subject to try to teach using words.  Hopefully reading this article along with watching my videos will help you.  Remember if you start hitting a few with a ton more power, you know where you got it from !

Cheers!

If you know what the Pump drill is then you've probably been around golf instruction for sometime. Those of you have had success using the pump drill will find that it's hard to replicate when starting from you regular address position. In this article we will examine how you can use the pump drill to inform your entire swing from the address position.

I remember first hearing about it when I was first starting to learn this game in the 90's. It has since been my go to drill when working on the transition  Call it what you want but the "Pump Drill" or the "Waist High" or any variation of it is when you set you hands at waist high and start the swing from there.  Some people just like to swing from there as Viktor Hovland does below or someone like Justin Rose who does it in slow reps on his pre-shot routine.  I also like to teach my students to pump it 3 times from waist high to the top to get a sense of the plane as well.  

If you have some experience with this drill you will notice that you can hit some of your best shots with it. Most people will assume that the secret behind this drill is because it helps get your shaft on plane.  But, in this article we are going to take a look another important reason this drill works; the transition!

What is it in the transition that make this drill work so well?  You'll find that it really helps you drop the club down on a shallower plane and more often than not your club will find the middle of the clubface. When you are doing this drill correctly, what you're going to notice is that when your club is set at waist high, your pressure has been set to your trail side. This is also a natural occurrence because the weight of your club is also on the trail side making your trail side that much more pressurized.  Then, as you are turning your shoulders and getting your arms up in the air to strike the ball, pay attention to the transition from backswing to downswing. It is during this period where you're inspired to shift pressure to your lead side from the waist-high position and there's a short period of weightlessness before your ground pressure ramps up to our lead side.  It is also in this period where there's a lot more space created between your hips and your arms allowing for the club to shallow in the transition. 

Now why is it that the drill works but when you set up to the ball normally you can't do it as well?  Simply put, you're not getting in to the same waist high position when you start at address. From what I've seen in my experience, most of my students are not pitching the club up the plane properly and loading into their trail side early enough in the takeaway.  Instead, the most common mistakes I see are: rolling your wrists back, too much one piece takeaway, spinning out with hips and a late weight shift to the trail side. 

The takeaway and transition is huge deal in getting the sequencing right. In fact this is probably the most overlooked part of the golf swing, but most important.  Get this right to make a GIANT leap toward improvement!

I want you to think back when you first tried learning golf. I don't think there has been any golfer who hasn't entertained the idea that their lead arm needs to be straight in the golf swing.  If you think about what your first observation of the golf swing was, it was that you noticed the pro golfer having a straight lead arm.  

There is a lot of discussion in popular instruction that says you shouldn't straighten the lead arm... that your arms have to be relaxed when swinging the golf club, but what actually happens in the golf swing?  To examine this let's look at other sports.  Pick any sport that involves kicking or throwing and you can apply this analogy.  let's take for example a tennis player.  How are their arms in the beginning of making a serve or volley? It's nice relaxed and ready to go, What about a kicker getting ready to kick?  His legs are nice relaxed and ready to go.  What about hockey player?  Even say a hockey player, I mean you name it, their body is always in a relaxed and predisposed to be making the actual motion, 

Now, let's examine what happens during the natural motion of the athlete throwing, kicking, or whatever motion they are making. The arm begins to extend to strike the tennis ball and extends even further after impact, the kicker begins to extend his leg as he approaches the kick and the leg extends further through the kick. The hockey player begins his extension of arms and then the extension increases through the impact area.   

So what does this all mean for the golfer and what does it have to do with the lead arm?  Well, the exact same thing.  When you go for a  golf swing, you are in a relaxed state at set up, although your arms are connected more to you sides they are not fully tense and straightened.  However as you approach you backswing, your arms begin to start extending toward the top of the swing and even more as you approach the follow through.  This will give you that "look" that the lead arm is straightening.  

So for all of those who are saying you don't need to keep your arm straight in the golf swing, they are wrong.  And to those who say you need to completely keep your arms loose throughout the whole swing, you are also wrong. It's actually a combination of both.  Watch the videos of Koepka and DJ.  notice how their arms hand and address without and tension and then notice how their arm gradually start tensing up throughout the swing..  Try this!!!  You will be amazed!

This post is part of a series of discussions where I tackle a lot of common swing issues.  However, instead of providing common fixes that you've probably seen elsewhere, I will be providing a more accurate way to think about how to obtain the correct feels of the swing.  This series is catered to help more of an intermediate to advanced player who has somewhat of a functioning swing.  These articles will assume you know some swing vocabulary.  Please also check out my earlier posts in the swing fixes category.

Today we will be discussing an uncommon swing fix to help you get a sense of hitting the golf ball more in the center of the face or even toward the heel if you are a player who keeps hitting it on the toe.

How it's different:  The most common fix that you find online to cure toe shots will deal with early extension or something having to do with the follow through.  This tip shows you something you need to look in your actual backswing that may be hindering your center strikes instead of purely looking at the downswing.

The most common tip you will find online on how to fix a toe shot will describe something you will have to do on your downswing. A toe shot is most often the result of the shaft coming through too steep.  There can be a lot of reasons why that happens but the most common issue talked about by coaches is the dreaded "Goat Hump" or "Early Extension." While working on these things can definitely help, here is another way to look at how you can create more depth in the impact area leading to more strikes on the sweetspot.

Remember that early extension is resultant of a player who tries to create speed at the ball too early in the downswing.  In an attempt to create maximum club speed, they jump up at impact.  Remember in the correct kinematic sequence of the golf swing, your pressure is transferred to you lead leg a lot earlier in the downswing before any sort of jumping happens.  In the process of starting the downswing the front and side bend angles of you body need to start getting deeper.  In order to do that you must feel like you want to do that at the top of the swing.

Try This:
In order for you to want to get deeper in the downswing we are going to start with the backswing.  Take your regular setup and grip.  then let go of your trail hand entirely and let it hang right there under your shoulder.  As you keep you lead arm relatively straight on the club, let your trail hand swing back into grip and hinge the club back on plane (what you feel is toward your trail ear).  If you are doing this correctly you will feel a lot less shoulder movement and more motion in the wrists and hands.  It should feel like a sort of exaggerated waggle, however there must be minimal shoulder movement.  Now here is the key: when you attempt to swing your club father back, do not try to bend you trail elbow as much, try to swing feeling like you almost have your arms more straight.  This will force you to use more shoulders and put more tension on you arms and shoulders.  Your grip end of the club should feel a lot farther from you and closer to the ground as you do this.  Start off by taking some pitch type shots an progress more into a fuller shot?  

Are you surprised that you're not hitting the club more center? Well you shouldn't be because that's what happens when you swing the club a lot more correctly!

-Cheers!

The first thing to check if you shank the golf ball is your stance.  Is your weight too much on the toes or the heels during the address?  If so make sure your are more level and balanced over the arches of your feet.  Think like you are on a skateboard and not feeling like you are on only one edge of the board.  If you'r not setting up correctly, it will negatively effect the way you apply torque to the golf club and everything else written below can go out the window.  

The next thing you want to check is if your backswing is getting wide enough on the backswing and that the clubface isn't fanning open on the backswing.  To exaggerate this feel make sure that the clubface is pointing more down in the halfway back position.  The clubface should be approximately the angle of your spine.

What I'm about to tell you is going to sound crazy, but I promise you, if you do it right you will hit it more solid.  Start with your normal stance and grip.  I want you to slide your hands across your waist to the lead side by pulling your lead arm behind your back.  Make sure you are not turning you body.  You should be only sliding your hands across you body so that you are feeling your lead rhomboid muscle completely flexed. (see pic on right) If you are doing it right, you should feel as if you're holding a sword to your side with your hands low.  Now once you got that down I want you to simultaneously bump out your lead hip and get into a semi-follow through position with you weight on your lead side and you hands and arms across your chest. Remember the key to this is to have your arm-swing past your chest, not together.  Do a few reps of this.  Now see if you can arrive at that point after you take your normal backswing.  Feeling wise it's going feel like your hands and arms are sliding across your body while your weight only shifts forward in the follow through.

Now take some shots!  See what happens.  It's almost like magic.  Remember, there is a lot more to this but you should hit some really great shots for awhile until your bad habits kick in again! Cheers!

goes against what is popular all over the web and social media  But, I stick to my guns and I know eventually the truth of what really happens in the golf swing will be validated by the masses and well, is already validated by science. 

Today I'd like to share with you a video I came upon showing a field hockey player striking a ball.  There are striking similarities between the motion with a field hockey stick and a golf club. If you apply these concepts to your golf swing, you will swing it better and it will feel better.
​
when watching the video I want you to pay special attention to the start of the golf hockey strike and around 13 seconds in on the transition.  Do you notice a striking resemblance? The inspiration to want to load into the lead leg, the shallowing of the club, the flexion of the lead wrist.  This is all the same characteristics in the golf swing.  ​If You're really trying to break down the parts of the golf swing into it micro-particles, make sure that you pay attention to how it fits as a whole.  My recommendation is that you understand the whole first and then chisel away the details.  - Cheers!

I want to start of with an illustration with another sport that requires precision and power at impact:  Billiards!  Imagine that you're playing a game of billiards, say 8 Ball.  To start the game you have to break a rack of balls racked toward the other end of the table.  Now, image you're about getting ready to strike the cue ball with all right in the center with a great amount of force.  What is your body position like?  You're not standing tall and loose, you're getting down, lowering your center of gravity.  Imagine what your legs feel like?  They're grabbing the ground, flexed and ready to support the strike that will be done by your arms and shoulders. Then you let everything go and strike. Now, if you imagine that with your legs being wobbly or moving around to much, you will probably not have a good chance of hitting the cue ball in the middle.  

Now, apply that same concept to your golf swing.  Make sure that those legs are really strong and sturdy in the backswing.  Especially that trail leg.  Feel as though your getting ready to plant that trail foot, knee and thigh as you would in a billiard shot on the backswing.  If you've never shot pool you can also try to feel as though you're getting ready to throw a ball into the ground.  Make sure you maintain that stability in your legs as you swing back.  It's almost going to feel as if you're wearing very tight pants and trying to rip it on you backswing because you're loading your legs so much.  Try this and you'll immediately stop hitting it chunky!  

​Cheers!

Why has the towel drill been such a popular drill for a long time? You still see people doing it from time to time.  Well, there's a lot of merit to the towel drill.  The mechanism behind it is the fact that it keeps your arms connected to your body. People who tend to over swing or get the arms too far away early in the swing are prime candidates for this drill. However, it has been proven that the arms actually come off your chest more at the top of the swing and that the connection of the arms to the body is more dynamic than just plastering your arms to your body. Those of you know that this drill is probably the most uncomfortable drill at first.  Let's take a look further as to what really happens in the golf swing.

during the first stage of the backswing from address to about hands waist high is the only area where the arms should stay more connected to the body.  after this point, as the club works toward the top of the swing is where your arm starts working more upward.  Some of the PGA players who get their hands really high is a great example e.g., Justing Thomas, Dustin Johnson.  Although it's in the beginning of the swing where there's some pinning of the lead arm toward the bottom of your chest, it then starts working up your chest as it creates leverage up against your body and spine, those hand and arms need to get really high after that.  Remember, the steepening of the hands is what creates a shallower path in the downswing not the other way around.  Keeping your arms stuck to your body all throughout the swing will create a too flat of an arm swing and actually get you steeper!

Try this! take something other than a towel, like a glove or piece of paper, put it under your lead armpit.  Keep it tucked as you take it back to about halfway in the backswing.  Then, as you swing your arms up in the air, try to get your arms up high and don't worry about letting the glove fall out, in fact try to let it fly out.  Try this while hitting balls and see what happens.  You'll be surprised.  Also, don't forget that you should not compromise your spine angle by lifting your head!

I appreciate you reading my blogs.  If you find my articles helpful. Feel free to call to get more information on lessons.  You should also look at my smartphone lesson options as they really help too!

To begin I recommend you build you swing from pitch shot with a short iron and gradually build up your swing.  The secret here is in the follow through. As you are taking your pitch type swings, you need to make sure that your left elbow is folding against your lead hip on the follow through. If you're doing it right your hip will be also working toward your lead side on the follow through.  If your hip is spinning out around you  in a counter clockwise fashion, you are doing it wrong.  If you find that your left elbow is locking up through impact and the follow through you're doing it wrong. In fact there's going to be more of a slight sway into your lead side as your elbow folds into your lead hip. 

​Another good way to feel this motion is to imagine holding a dumb bell with lead arm and doing bicep curls with the dumb bell angled over your lead leg. As you lift the dumb bell, work you lead leg into extension like you're picking it up with the extension of your lead leg.  Try to apply that feeling with the follow through of your golf swing, it will work wonders.