Subscribe now to watch the full video.
Use a pool noodle, or an alignment stick as a visual for a good side bend in the follow-through. To have a really clean side bend, you'll want to have an even blend throughout your spine. The spine can be broken up into thirds. The lower third comes from good use of the core/obliques (turtle shell/crunch). The middle third comes from good scapular movement (wipe/lead arm high trail arm low/Moe Norman). The upper third comes from neck motion (head on a pillow).
Working on these three zones can help your consistency of contact as well as direction.
Tags: Not Enough Distance, Early Extension, Drill, Intermediate, Beginner
WEBVTT - This file was automatically generated by VIMEO
0
00:00:05.600 --> 00:00:09.000
This drill is the side Bend visual. So side Bend
1
00:00:08.200 --> 00:00:11.600
is a really important shallowing component.
2
00:00:11.600 --> 00:00:14.900
It's kind of a master move because it
3
00:00:14.900 --> 00:00:17.600
helps it helps with the slice
4
00:00:17.600 --> 00:00:20.500
early in the downswing and then it helps with the hook later
5
00:00:20.500 --> 00:00:23.700
in the downswing. So it's really a
6
00:00:23.700 --> 00:00:26.100
kind of a regulator and helps a lot
7
00:00:26.100 --> 00:00:30.100
with consistency and it's a there are
8
00:00:30.100 --> 00:00:33.400
a couple different ways that I approach it. So in this video, I'll break down the three
9
00:00:33.400 --> 00:00:36.300
most common kind of control centers for
10
00:00:36.300 --> 00:00:39.300
getting good side bend down through
11
00:00:39.300 --> 00:00:42.500
impact and into the follow through so we're gonna use a little visual here.
12
00:00:44.300 --> 00:00:47.300
If I get into the Merry-Go-Round drill where the
13
00:00:47.300 --> 00:00:50.600
club is across my shoulders and I turn where this is basically pointing down
14
00:00:50.600 --> 00:00:53.300
towards the golf ball. You'll see that my shoulders kind of
15
00:00:53.300 --> 00:00:56.400
match roughly this pool noodle here. So I
16
00:00:56.400 --> 00:00:59.500
basically have a line going from my shoulders down
17
00:00:59.500 --> 00:01:02.300
to the golf ball oftentimes in lessons. I will
18
00:01:02.300 --> 00:01:05.300
draw this so I will go up to the top of the swing and then it
19
00:01:05.300 --> 00:01:08.300
will draw a line from the golf ball or sorry
20
00:01:08.300 --> 00:01:11.300
from the shoulder the trail shoulder the right shoulder in my case down
21
00:01:11.300 --> 00:01:14.400
to the golf ball. And what you'll see is with a
22
00:01:14.400 --> 00:01:17.300
lot of the consistent ball Strikers their shoulders will stay under
23
00:01:17.300 --> 00:01:20.500
it all the way or or going along
24
00:01:20.500 --> 00:01:23.800
it all the way until follow through position where what
25
00:01:23.800 --> 00:01:26.800
I see a lot of amateurs do is either they spin on
26
00:01:26.800 --> 00:01:29.600
top of it early so they go over that
27
00:01:29.600 --> 00:01:32.800
plane early or they're under
28
00:01:32.800 --> 00:01:35.000
it and then during the release in kind of
29
00:01:35.300 --> 00:01:38.800
a stand-up move and a shoulder coming up move it tends
30
00:01:38.800 --> 00:01:39.400
to go out there. So
31
00:01:40.300 --> 00:01:43.300
What I'll do is I'll put this pool noodle kind of at
32
00:01:43.300 --> 00:01:46.200
that shoulder plain angle just to help create a
33
00:01:46.200 --> 00:01:49.000
visual now. I've got it pointing at the golf ball. So I'm not gonna be
34
00:01:49.100 --> 00:01:52.200
able to hit because the tripod would get in the way. So first I'm going to do this as
35
00:01:52.200 --> 00:01:55.400
just a body awareness drill and basically what I'm
36
00:01:55.400 --> 00:01:58.300
going to do is get in my golf posture and then I'm gonna turn and
37
00:01:58.300 --> 00:02:02.200
I'm gonna try to match the pool noodle
38
00:02:01.200 --> 00:02:03.400
here with my shoulder angle.
39
00:02:04.100 --> 00:02:07.100
Just kind of like that and then I'm gonna back up and move a little
40
00:02:07.100 --> 00:02:10.700
bit forward and I'm gonna try to match it with both my arms
41
00:02:10.700 --> 00:02:13.700
and my my shoulders
42
00:02:13.700 --> 00:02:16.600
now I mentioned there are three common places
43
00:02:16.600 --> 00:02:19.300
where golfers tend to struggle with getting this
44
00:02:19.300 --> 00:02:24.000
side bend down at the bottom of the Swing one. We
45
00:02:22.300 --> 00:02:25.400
can kind of break your spirit your
46
00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:28.300
spine up in thirds. So first you've got from your rib
47
00:02:28.300 --> 00:02:31.500
cage down. So this would be more kind of ab Zone then
48
00:02:31.500 --> 00:02:34.600
you've got from kind of your mid thoracic. So
49
00:02:34.600 --> 00:02:38.200
from about armpit down to just above
50
00:02:37.200 --> 00:02:40.000
halfway between belly button in the bottom of
51
00:02:40.100 --> 00:02:40.400
your ribs.
52
00:02:41.200 --> 00:02:44.600
So we've got that zone that's more about kind of the shoulder blade
53
00:02:44.600 --> 00:02:47.500
and it's crunch and then you've got upper so
54
00:02:47.500 --> 00:02:50.400
kind of above the shoulder blades and that's more about the neck.
55
00:02:50.400 --> 00:02:53.300
So to really optimize this
56
00:02:53.300 --> 00:02:56.100
shoulder or sorry the side Bend move you're going to
57
00:02:56.100 --> 00:02:59.600
do a little bit of a crunch a little bit of a shoulder retraction and
58
00:02:59.600 --> 00:03:03.200
then a little bit of the head on the pillow or neck tilt.
59
00:03:03.600 --> 00:03:04.300
Kind of like this.
60
00:03:05.400 --> 00:03:06.300
as we come through
61
00:03:07.400 --> 00:03:10.200
I see common places where you'll break down would be
62
00:03:10.200 --> 00:03:13.600
either be you can see if the head starts to try to look level that would
63
00:03:13.600 --> 00:03:16.200
be the head on the pillow idea. If the shoulder is
64
00:03:16.200 --> 00:03:19.500
come way out as opposed to shoulder being down or lead
65
00:03:19.500 --> 00:03:22.300
shoulder blocking. So we have a bunch of videos talking about
66
00:03:22.300 --> 00:03:25.400
that and then feeling a little bit of a side
67
00:03:25.400 --> 00:03:28.200
crunch here versus kind of going up towards my
68
00:03:28.200 --> 00:03:31.500
toes in this feeling a little bit more straight kind of
69
00:03:31.500 --> 00:03:31.700
like that.
70
00:03:32.700 --> 00:03:35.800
Oftentimes golfers who lack this
71
00:03:35.800 --> 00:03:39.100
side crunch move, which is a big shallower create a
72
00:03:39.100 --> 00:03:42.700
lot of slide or axis tilt in an
73
00:03:42.700 --> 00:03:45.000
attempt to kind of shallow in a different
74
00:03:45.300 --> 00:03:48.400
way. So this can be helpful for low point
75
00:03:48.400 --> 00:03:51.400
for shaft lean for not hooking the ball as well
76
00:03:51.400 --> 00:03:52.500
as not slicing the ball.
77
00:03:53.100 --> 00:03:56.000
It's a so as I said, it's kind of
78
00:03:56.200 --> 00:03:59.600
one of these Master moves. It's a really big skill differentiator. And
79
00:03:59.600 --> 00:04:02.200
it's one of the things that contributes to having some of
80
00:04:02.200 --> 00:04:05.900
the most consistent bottom of the Swing characteristics. So
81
00:04:05.900 --> 00:04:07.800
now that we've got an idea of this feel
82
00:04:08.600 --> 00:04:11.000
We're gonna move the tripod just slightly and we're
83
00:04:11.300 --> 00:04:14.100
going to do a few kind of just nine to
84
00:04:14.100 --> 00:04:14.400
threes.
85
00:04:15.300 --> 00:04:18.600
Where we're gonna feel like we match that angle
86
00:04:18.600 --> 00:04:20.900
as best we can I think I can do a little bit.
87
00:04:22.300 --> 00:04:25.300
Better than that and when I do that currently, I feel
88
00:04:25.300 --> 00:04:28.600
like I'm way down. In fact oftentimes the way I'll have golfer start
89
00:04:28.600 --> 00:04:31.200
it is get to this position and then just do a
90
00:04:31.200 --> 00:04:35.300
little kind of brushing drill just to feel wow
91
00:04:34.300 --> 00:04:37.400
that feels like my shoulders are
92
00:04:37.400 --> 00:04:41.200
much more vertical or it feels like my arm is really tucked. It
93
00:04:40.200 --> 00:04:43.100
feels like my head is looking at it
94
00:04:43.100 --> 00:04:46.300
sideways. I don't know what the feel will be. But if you're just
95
00:04:46.300 --> 00:04:49.400
doing a few of these kind of exaggerated side then
96
00:04:49.400 --> 00:04:52.300
brushing movements, I guarantee you you
97
00:04:52.300 --> 00:04:55.300
will get a feel so then we can do one where
98
00:04:55.300 --> 00:04:58.000
we kind of like preset some of that side bent movement.
99
00:04:59.300 --> 00:05:03.100
And then just up came up out of it. So caught that just
100
00:05:02.100 --> 00:05:04.000
a touch thin.
101
00:05:05.200 --> 00:05:06.600
So, let's see if we can keep that.
102
00:05:07.400 --> 00:05:10.900
Shoulder going down a little bit longer that was pretty good there and you'll
103
00:05:10.900 --> 00:05:13.500
see that really helps kind of shallow out
104
00:05:13.500 --> 00:05:16.100
the bottom of the swing a lot of golfers who tend
105
00:05:16.100 --> 00:05:20.000
to hook the ball and get kind of Diggy that shoulder comes over the
106
00:05:19.300 --> 00:05:22.900
top at the bottom. This can be a big contributing factor
107
00:05:22.900 --> 00:05:23.100
there.
108
00:05:24.300 --> 00:05:27.800
So once we've got this feel of doing this
109
00:05:27.800 --> 00:05:30.700
little brush movement, then we'll do it more dynamically,
110
00:05:30.700 --> 00:05:33.600
and we'll move to a nine to
111
00:05:33.600 --> 00:05:35.300
three kind of.
112
00:05:36.100 --> 00:05:39.300
Something like that and we're gonna go to that finished position. We're just
113
00:05:39.300 --> 00:05:42.900
gonna do our best to try to match it. We're gonna
114
00:05:42.900 --> 00:05:46.000
explore, you know, as hard
115
00:05:45.100 --> 00:05:48.000
as we can do this as big as we can
116
00:05:48.100 --> 00:05:51.600
do it, but using this pool noodle to kind of help with
117
00:05:51.600 --> 00:05:54.300
the visual of the angle of where that side Bend
118
00:05:54.300 --> 00:05:57.300
will be that'll help you develop some feels for the
119
00:05:57.300 --> 00:05:58.300
side Bend through the ball.
120
00:05:59.100 --> 00:06:02.800
So now that we've got some some feels of these smaller swings.
121
00:06:02.800 --> 00:06:04.400
We're going to try it with a little bit.
122
00:06:05.700 --> 00:06:08.200
Kind of bigger movement and one of
123
00:06:08.200 --> 00:06:12.000
the things that you'll want to pay attention to is if you're looking at video from
124
00:06:11.100 --> 00:06:14.200
the face on view a lot of golfers know that
125
00:06:14.200 --> 00:06:17.200
you don't want to get into this side Bend movement too quickly.
126
00:06:17.200 --> 00:06:20.200
If it shows up on video that you're getting
127
00:06:20.200 --> 00:06:23.500
into the side Bend movement right away oftentimes what
128
00:06:23.500 --> 00:06:26.600
it means is you're not getting into enough of this left side
129
00:06:26.600 --> 00:06:28.600
Bend during the backswing.
130
00:06:29.300 --> 00:06:32.700
Oftentimes you'll start coming up out of it and really
131
00:06:32.700 --> 00:06:35.600
get into that side Bend movement quickly. So before
132
00:06:35.600 --> 00:06:38.400
the arm reaches
133
00:06:38.400 --> 00:06:41.800
parallel, you're already actually in that side bent movement as opposed
134
00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:45.400
to try. I should
135
00:06:45.400 --> 00:06:48.000
say you're already side bent. If your left
136
00:06:48.200 --> 00:06:51.400
side bent kind of like this at the top then when you start going into
137
00:06:51.400 --> 00:06:55.400
that right side bent we're at about even or
138
00:06:54.400 --> 00:06:57.500
shoulders level halfway down and
139
00:06:57.500 --> 00:07:00.400
then it overtakes and goes into actual right side then
140
00:07:00.400 --> 00:07:03.200
later, but you're starting that side Bend move pretty much
141
00:07:03.200 --> 00:07:06.500
from the top and it's continuing all the way down. So quick
142
00:07:06.500 --> 00:07:08.200
little demonstration.
143
00:07:10.100 --> 00:07:12.200
We're gonna go up to the top.
144
00:07:14.400 --> 00:07:15.300
side Bend move
145
00:07:16.100 --> 00:07:20.100
as long down through as we can open to get a really clean bottom
146
00:07:19.100 --> 00:07:22.200
of the Swing if you're struggling with side Bend,
147
00:07:22.200 --> 00:07:26.100
you can look at either the ABS the shoulders shoulder
148
00:07:25.100 --> 00:07:28.300
blades or the neck
149
00:07:28.300 --> 00:07:31.800
as good sources for increasing
150
00:07:31.800 --> 00:07:34.200
that side Bend. I'd recommend looking from the down the
151
00:07:34.200 --> 00:07:37.300
line view if you're losing the side Bend up
152
00:07:37.300 --> 00:07:40.000
here. It's more of the neck if you're losing it kind of more in this
153
00:07:40.300 --> 00:07:43.300
Zone. That's more of the shoulders some of
154
00:07:43.300 --> 00:07:46.500
the neck and then if you're losing it more kind of in the
155
00:07:46.500 --> 00:07:49.700
middle of the back that's gonna be more of the the crunch
156
00:07:49.700 --> 00:07:53.100
move. So one of those three will be your gateway
157
00:07:52.100 --> 00:07:54.600
to figuring out your side Bend.