Tyler Ferrell is the only person in the world named to Golf Digest's list of Best Young Teachers in
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Train Your Release
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An impact bag can be a great tool for players to better understand how they are moving in space. For this drill, I will place the impact bag outside of the lead foot and ask players to:
- Brush the ground.
- Strike the low side of the impact bag.
- Keep the hands and clubhead in line (or vertical).
These (3) checkpoints will require players to properly tie together the pivot and sequencing of the arms. Players who struggle with accomplishing this may have more of a "flip" or "chicken-wing" style release. If you fall into this category, re-visiting drills such as the "grip throws" or "merry-go-round" can be a good place to start.
Playlists: Train Your Release, Fix Your Flip, Fix Your Chicken Wing (Bent Arm @ Impact)
Tags: Poor Contact, Not Straight Enough, Release, Drill, Intermediate
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This drill is impact bag outside of lead foot.
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So not a huge fan of using the impact bag in the traditional way of kind of putting it
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there and just kind of smacking it for the sake of feeling some shaft lean.
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But I do like to use it to stop the club to help your brain figure out what you might
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be doing in space.
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So my impact bag is seen better days.
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We're going to use an object.
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You can use a pillow.
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I'm going to use the impact bag to help uncover what might be going on down to impact.
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So I'm going to do this off-grass, but you can do this on carpet.
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You can do this off-mats.
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You can do this striking ball or not striking ball.
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I'm going to kind of identify where ball position would be.
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So somewhere right around here.
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And then I'm going to try to brush the ground roughly where that ball position would be.
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And then I'm going to try and strike the impact bag that is just outside my left foot.
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And my goal is to have my hands and the club head in line.
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So basically vertical.
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This is to help with golfers you have a tendency of getting low to high.
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You would say I would hit it very high up on the impact bag.
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And my hands would be well behind where the club is at that point after impact.
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The other option would be golfers you have a little bit more of a scoop.
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And chicken wing, I would hit it high on the impact bag.
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I might not even hit the ground and my hands would definitely be behind.
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So in order to accomplish the two goals of or actually the three goals, brushing the
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ground, striking it low on the impact bag with my hands even with the club head, I have
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to do a decent job of getting my hands in front, maintaining that leg, keeping my chest
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in a good merry-go-round position or getting my body into a good impact position.
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It kind of ties together a few things relating to both the pivot and the sequence of the
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arms.
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For me, in order to do this correctly, it feels like I'm throwing my arms out in that direction
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such as the grip throws or the single arm throws or any of those drills.
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But for you, by doing this, you may develop your own unique feel.
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All that's important is that you take that feel and then we're going to try to apply it
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with a golf ball.
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So first, I'm going to do the trickier version, which is just kind of a tap drill.
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I'm going to try and strike the ground and just tap the impact bag like I was doing right
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there.
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The goal on this is not to make the impact bag topple over and make it go flying.
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If anything, I'm almost kind of decelerating in the impact because of the limited amount
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of grip pressures.
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So basically, I don't want to feel like I'm really squeezing my arms and tensing my
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shoulders.
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I'm going to feel more like they're getting pulled away by the weight of the club.
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And in order to do that, I'm not using my body for the bracing and the power transfer
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the way that I would normally.
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So the club is actually going to be moving fairly slow when it strikes the impact bag.
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So now, again, I'm going to try and brush the ground and strike the impact bag low
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towards the bottom of the impact bag with my hands relatively even with the club head
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when I make contact.
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Once I have a feeling of that, I'm a big fan of baby steps.
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And now I'm just going to move the impact bag so that I won't make contact with it.
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And then I'm going to try and basically duplicate that same feel.
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Once I have a few of these little baby step drills, then I can move up into a little
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bit bigger.
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Then I might be able to move into more of a continuous 9 to 3.
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And then once I feel like I've accomplished the goal with my 9 to 3, I'm going to move
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up to my 10 to 2 and into full swings.
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And now when I start to do it with a little bit more speed and body, I'm going to start
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to hit the ground hard enough that I've probably taken a divot where in the slow motion
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swings it's unlikely even if I'm having a leading edge strike unless the ground is really
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soft.
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I'm probably not going to take a divot.
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So this is great for golfers who have more of a scoop early release and you struggle
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with more of the clubbed going low to eye high or bottoming out behind the golf ball.
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So if you have trouble taking divots or you're more of a picker of a golf ball, this
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is a great way to get a sense of the handle getting ahead of the club head down through
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impact.
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One of the key skills for striking the ball in the center of the club from having good sequencing,
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good body position and good chef lean.
