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Heel and Toe contact can feel clunky or dead. Learning what causes painful misses allows you to learn from each swing and gradually move your swing to a more consistent pattern.
Heel contact is likely caused by:
- Thrust
- Too much side bend
- Late shaft rotation
- Early trail arm straightening
Toe contact is likely caused by:
- Reverse thrust of the thorax
- Forward lunge
- Bending the arms on the way through
- Flip during release
Playlists: Stop Lunging Forward, Fix Your Flip, Fix Your Chicken Wing (Bent Arm @ Impact), Fix Your Shank, Swing Plane Simplified - Working with steeps and shallows
Tags: Poor Contact, Early Extension, Chicken Wing, Impact, Release, Concept, Intermediate, Beginner
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This video is looking at factors of heel and toe contact.
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So factors of heel and toe contact is basically looking at what do we do in the swing
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that makes us either hit it more towards this part of a club or more towards this part
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of a club not so much in the middle.
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So heel shots with a driver will tend to have a little bit more slice of them with the
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irons they can feel a little clunky and they can lead to shanks or shots that go way
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off to the right.
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So, it's not quite as simple as just hey is your path more outside.
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So, you can also get toe shanks where it goes way off to the right but frequently toe
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shots will just feel weak they'll feel powerless.
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So there are a couple of different factors both from the arms and from the body that relate
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to heel and toe contact so it's not quite as simple as just hey is your path more
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outside you're probably going to hit it on the toe is the path more inside you're probably
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going to hit it more on the heel.
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So in this video we'll go over those factors.
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Looking at the body there's two main factors.
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One is looking at about the amount of thrust so the more that my body moves in towards
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the golf ball the more I'm going to tend to hit it on the heel especially if my upper
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body is moving in towards the golf ball.
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So if my upper body is kind of going in that way or during the downswing if my body
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is going in that way that's going to move my hands closer to the golf ball which are
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going to bring it more towards heel contact.
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So one is that thrust and then two is side bend so the more that I get a lot of side bend
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the more that it will tend to shallow out the club and it will tend to get the club
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to swing more in towards the heel.
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Now with the body or sorry with the arms the two things that will make it move more towards
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the heel are either earlier arm extension so the more I keep this kind of loaded and
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bent the more that I'll hit it on the toe the more that I really straighten that arm
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early before impact the more that that will tend to get the club out away from me.
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This can happen either coming from the inside and get it on the heel or from the outside
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and get it on the heel.
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In fact that's one of the big culprits for golfers who get outside and still shank the
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ball.
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The other one with the arms is looking at clubface rotation.
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So I like to talk about the clubface having a gradual and consistent closing during the
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whole downswing.
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If you tend to have more of a really late closing or not a whole lot of rotation you can
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be more heel biased and you can hit it on the heel if you have early clubface rotation
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you'll tend to hit it less on the heel or more towards the toe.
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So those are the four major influencers for the club moving more out towards the heel.
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If I demonstrate a few of those if I move forward you'll see that that was pretty much
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heel contact and that one I also comboed with the early arm extension because I was
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going to fall over.
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So the early arm extension if I tend to get my arm to straighten kind of like that you can
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see that's one of the ways that you can deliberately shank the ball which is one of the things
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that I mentioned especially if you come from the outside and you're shanking it and
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then too much side bend would look a whole lot of access tilt.
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There's another one you can see that contact right there more in the heel and then the
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last one will be a little tricky but the last one is late late late clubface rotation
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so we'll try to really hold that open late into the downswing and snap it close down
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at the bottom.
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So we've got no hit it on the top.
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Nope hit it more in the middle but that's the last one because I did get it to close
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some golfers will go late late late late and never get it close and it tends to hit
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more on the heel.
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Okay so those are the four heel contributors.
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Now let's look at the toe.
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So the toe tends to be more of the opposite the more that I reverse through us or pull
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my upper body specifically away from the golf ball.
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So if I tend to kind of stand up if I tend to move away from the golf ball during the
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downswing that'll pull the club in closer which will tend to get me to hit it more
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on the toe.
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Now the opposite of this side bend is golfers who tend to hit it on the toe tend to
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have more of this upper body lunge or upper body lean so they'll tend to get more kind
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of this way where the upper body gets well in front of the golf ball.
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That one is usually accompanied by the arm motion but even in cases where I've seen that
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they don't really bend their arms they just lunge more in front.
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It will tend to have more of a strong toe contact like I did there.
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So then the two arm motions they get it more on the toe would be bending the arms or
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chicken wing.
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Most golfers who tend to bend those arms on the way through that shortens the radius which
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pulls the heel in closer which tends to give more toe contact kind of like that.
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So even though I hit it pretty straight you can see on there I hit it towards the far
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side of those grooves.
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So then the last one for the arm motion would actually be letting the club pass which
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tends to get the path going more outside and starts the radius coming back in which tends
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to get it more on the toe.
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So it'll look more like a scoop.
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Now that doesn't have to happen can see I scoop there without chicken winging and hit
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that way on the toe.
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So it doesn't have to be a chicken wing when I've got a scoop it could just be a risk
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movement of letting the club pass.
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And so in order to control heel toe contact you want to make sure that your upper body
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stays in a good place.
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It doesn't drift too far forward, backward too much side bend too much forward kind of
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stays in more of a centered position and you rotate the club enough and you delay your
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arm straightening by having good sequencing.
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You do all those and you'll tend to hit it more in the middle of the club.
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If you're struggling with a heel contact or toe contact, review the causes for each of
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them.
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It's likely that you're falling into one of those four different categories for either
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toe or heel contact.
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So to hit it in the center I'm going to control my upper body pivot.
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I'm going to rotate the club and I'll make sure that my arms extend through the ball instead
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of before it.
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And that you'll see was hit pretty close to the center.
