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Many golfers have a hard time balancing torso rotation and side-bend in the backswing. This can lead to a few common swing faults, most notably a loss of posture or a flat shoulder plane. For players that fall into this category, it can be helpful to focus on side-bending immediately at the start of the take-away. This will help create more of a 1-to-1 ratio of side-bend to rotation. It will also prevent the need for any additional compensations at the top. Too often, players will start their take-away with a very flat shoulder turn and then try to excessively side-bend as they work to the top of the swing. This can really throw off the timing and load of the upper body and cause a number of issues in the downswing.
Tags: Standing Up, Backswing, Drill, Beginner
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This drill is side bend first.
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So many golfers struggle with loss of posture or standing up and they're told to keep
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their head down or you've probably thought about just trying to keep your chest over the
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golf ball.
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What usually happens is when your head is raising in the backswing is because you don't
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have enough of side bend.
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So in this drill we're going to talk a little bit more about the timing and how to practice
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that during your takeaway.
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We know that when we get up to the top of the swing we roughly want the shoulders pointing
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down at the golf ball.
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We don't want them pointing at the horizon.
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And you can see the difference between me standing up and staying in my posture is actually
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side bend because this camera I'm now I've turned from where I was at start and now I'm
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facing this camera.
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So if I lower my left shoulder that's actually tilting to the side.
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Everything happens in the follow through where if I've stood up here it's not so much
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that I've extended my spine so that I don't have enough side tilt of my hips and my pelvis.
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But this drill is focusing on the takeaway and focusing on the backswing because what I
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tend to find is that many golfers who lose their posture they start with a very level
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shoulder turn and then try to correct it from there but by then everything's kind of
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got sucked inside the shoulders have already started on a very flat plane you've probably
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shifted off the ball it's hard to play catch up.
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What's better is to have a pretty even ratio of a little bit of side bend for every little
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bit of rotation almost a one to one relationship.
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So if you fall into that more flat shoulder takeaway what I want you to feel is you're
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going to feel like you're a straight side bend to start the backswing.
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Very few golfers actually do that when I ask them to straight side bend it looks more
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neutral more like that but they'll often feel like they're just bringing this shoulder
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down towards this foot and the hip is actually going out that way so they'll feel just
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kind of a little side bend and then that movement.
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If I get to about halfway I can double check and just make sure that the shoulders are
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pointing closer to the golf ball instead of to the horizon.
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So working through the drill you're going to do first just a little side bend extra
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side bend during the takeaway and just do a little nine to three action from a little
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pause position exaggerating that shoulder going down before it rotates so I'm feeling like
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I'm going like this and then rotating in reality I'm probably blending them together.
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The next one I'll try is a hip from the top so I'm going to do a little side bend
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get up to the top of the swing.
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Just kind of check that shoulder angle and then from here.
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Well, transition and just extend those arms and then lastly I'll do the side bend movement
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without any pause without any gimmicks just trying to feel it in my takeaway.
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So if you struggle with getting proper tilt or you look like you stand up in your
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backswing, you're early extend.
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You can focus on getting that side bend before the rotation that often helps create the
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kind of the proper spine angle when we're making the backswing and if you are struggling
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with the stand up in the follow-through you could focus on the right shoulder down too
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but in this particular one I'm usually just focusing on one side at a time.
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This is focusing on the takeaway and the backswing pivot.
