15 years of EE, let's get rid of it

[7ender]

I have a pretty severe EE, standing tall and stalling/flipping through impact that has lead to inconsistency unless my timing for the day is spot on.

 

Iv'e played this way for 15 years and have tried to get better angles through impact, but it's been difficul to correct to say the least.  I'm currently a little laid off, too.

 

Looking for suggestions on feels to work on, or any other notables in my swing that could be leading to having to catch the hands up.

Thanks GolfWRX.

 

I apologize for the video quality....the slow mo did it.

 

Edited July 19, 2023 by 7ender

[ac6]

Can you get a face-on shot as well? I'm noticing the way your right foot behaves during your backswing and transition but a face-on would confirm. At the top of the backswing, the outer edge of your foot appears to be digging in, which tells me you're shifting and staying too far right during the backswing. As you transition down, you appear to be pushing off the right foot, which means that you're actively pressuring the right foot when you should be unweighting it and you are firing your right hip to swing forward around your left, when the proper feel should be that you are firing the left hip backward. Both are common issues, there are lots of drills to address it that could work. Monte has posted a couple of good feels/tips within the last week that might help you: (1) https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cuu91mhN-L-/ (2) https://www.instagram.com/reel/CtcoiOwMUz1/

 

 

 

Edited July 20, 2023 by ac6

[slytown]

I had a similar issue for a long time. Didn't swing over the top, but relied on EE to square the face.

 

You do a good job of shallowing the club with that early extension, but if you are looking for more consistency, I agree you need to work on keeping that right foot down and getting the left hip to work away from the ball, not towards it. The fix for you I think is to not try to shallow or turn your hips. The fix is to keep the feet planted and work on getting the arms and hands in front of you. Work on releasing the arms and hands with your back to the target and your right foot planted in the downswing. Your turn should come later. If you don't push your right hip towards the ball in transition, that release should be on plane enough to turn through and get that left hip back.

 

Remember, don't try to force the hip back to start the downswing. You want your lower body to react to what the arms and club are doing in transition.

 

I like the feet together drill. It forces you to use your arms more and stay in balance, which is what you lack.

 

P.S. Dan is the man.

 

 

[Valtiel]

As mentioned above this is definitely a case of incorrect/reverse lower body action in transition:



You're doing a lot of things well elsewhere, but this is spoiling everything. Monte explains this pattern here which we see a slightly less severe bit still similar version with you. This requires deliberate conscious effort to get off your right side in transition and use your left side to create rotation, because right now you do this:



Not only does your hip turn start too early, which is getting you disconnected and stuck with the arms, but the wrong parts are firing (right side). Lets break this down with Tiger:



First with the backswing pelvic movement, notice a few things here. First look at Tiger's right shin/calf and how it starts pitched forward and straightens in the backswing, pulling away from the red line. This is one of those moves you'll see that is part of the "pushing your right hip back" portion of what is considered "correct" rotation. On your side we don't see this. Your right knee basically stays on that red line and your left hip swings out. The problem here is that this has the effect of pushing your center of gravity towards the ball (note how the balance of your feet shifts towards your toes). With your momentum going in that direction you'll naturally continue towards the ball in the downswing once all the centrifugal force created by swinging a club in front of you adds to it. With Tiger (and all pros) a level of balance is achieved by countering the natural tendency for the left hip to swing out with a conscious pushing back of the right hip (note how Tiger isn't up on his toes like you are).



Now in transition focusing on the legs we can again see big differences. Tiger's left leg starts disappearing behind his right because he is driving it back away from the ball. The right leg comes forward slightly, but just like with the hip rotation above its the natural tendency for that to happen being countered by conscious movement of the other leg/knee/hip driving back. We see the opposite on your side with your left leg disappearing almost solely because your right leg is coming towards. Note how this brings your whole lower body towards the ball and puts your hands and your right leg on a collision course.



Only MUCH later do we see you start to use that left leg, but since your momentum has already thrown you towards the ball, this doesn't do much. You're forced to stand up now to make impact. This move we see on your side (right leg turning towards the target, left leg working back) needs to be what you feel in transition, NOT this late in the downswing.

If you've been swinging like this for 15 years more or less then it will be difficult to fix. It's a wholesale change in how you use your lower body that is not particularly intuitive, you will not get this right simply by understanding this idea and taking it to the range tomorrow, it will take time. The "feet together" drill that @slytown posted above is a good one, as is the Pelvic Punch Drill and a general understanding of how hip rotation is supposed to work.

The pelvic punch drill in particular I like when used a certain way because it takes advantage of something that is normally what gets us into trouble, which is approaching the golf swing intuitively. What you're doing (left hip forward -> right hip forward) is far more intuitive and natural feeling from a movement standpoint and it's why EE is such a pervasive problem. It's a Chinese Finger Trap if you can imagine what it would be like to know nothing about them or how they work. Initially using the pelvic punch drill as demonstrated above and then moving towards trying to create as much power from this position as possible (power punch drill?) forces you down two very distinct roads. You'll either continue using your right side for power and the ball and your contact will be all over the place, or you'll start intuitively snapping your LEFT side back/open to create power which you'll immediately find is more efficient, powerful, and consistent. Doing this drill with a long iron or even a 5w and hitting 175y-200y "punches" is a great way to get the feel for how to use your left side properly, and with that feel you can start to slowly increase the length of your swing while keeping the same overall sequence/action.

Just a thought/suggestion, the most important thing is that you get your head around what you're doing wrong and learn to feel it when it happens. Your symptoms to watch out for are:

1) Weight towards the toes at the top of the swing
2) Standing up on your right toe in the downswing + right side coming out and left side staying still
3) The almost vertical exit of the club after impact

Every instance of these things occurring will be due to the reverse pelvic action discussed and you'll need to stay focused (slowly at first!) on identifying and correcting that.

[7ender]

AC6, slytown, Valtiel,

Thank you for taking time out of your days to provide the feedback.  It's very much appreciated.

Iv'e spent the past few hours going through your replies, and trying to get a better feel for a proper hip movement.

I'm quite glad I posted, some things were pointed out that seemed like subtletees and I hadn't noticed but now I understand their impact down the line.

 

I know this is going to take time, so this is plenty to work on for now.  Thanks again for the reviews!

[Mike_C]

Very good commentary in this thread. I had basically the same movement for a long time.  Monte's stuff really helped me, also his "zipper away" drill videos helped with the feel.

 

One of the absolute worst "tips" I got as a young golfer was to "rotate around your right leg", this is a death move and leads to EE. I see it all the time, left hip goes out towards the ball while the right hip locks in, then on the downswing you do the reverse, so bad......

 

Hips need to rotate around the spine, not around the right then then the left.

 

I also like this Padraig Harrington video on the proper way to move the hips....

 

 

 

He also talks about  Jack Grout/Jack Nicklaus move of "rolling the ankles", not driving hard off the right foot.  

[Valtiel]

6 hours ago, 7ender said:

AC6, slytown, Valtiel,

Thank you for taking time out of your days to provide the feedback.  It's very much appreciated.

Iv'e spent the past few hours going through your replies, and trying to get a better feel for a proper hip movement.

I'm quite glad I posted, some things were pointed out that seemed like subtletees and I hadn't noticed but now I understand their impact down the line.

 

5 hours ago, Mike_C said:

One of the absolute worst "tips" I got as a young golfer was to "rotate around your right leg", this is a death move and leads to EE. I see it all the time, left hip goes out towards the ball while the right hip locks in, then on the downswing you do the reverse, so bad......

This is why it's such a difficult thing that almost everyone struggles with in one way or another. The RIGHT way to do it is hard on it's own, its an unintuitive learned set of movements, but then you couple that with bad advice like the "rotate around the right leg" concept and it's no wonder the average golfer is a mess, lol. I've heard that concept mentioned here almost verbatim by former baseball players turned golfers, it really messes them up for the reasons mentioned. 

When it comes to the "right" way to do all of this there are a few concepts that can help @7ender that I think might explain why my thoughts re: pelvic punch drill stuff. I've used the "running up to and kicking a soccer ball" analogy before as a visualization for the goal of the backswing/downswing:



The idea being that you don't get to this position by accident, there are a ton of things happening as you approach the ball to achieve this position. Even if you haven't played soccer at any meaningful level you've probably still felt this if you've ever run towards something to kick it; that unconscious shuffling/metering of stride length as you approach to make sure you're landing correctly on your off leg right before the the kick. The backswing/downswing is A LOT like this in ways that are unfortunately a lot less intuitive. Most of us (myself included on off days) make a backswing without any real intent to setup what the front side is supposed do, which is directly analogous to what a small child running up to kick a soccer ball does. No metering of steps, just an excited run at the ball and a flailing leg at some point to hopefully make (weak) contact. You average driving range will see majority of people basically doing the golf swing version of this, and there simply is no time to "figure out" what your lead side is supposed to do in the downswing consistently. 

Bringing that back to the pelvic punch drill, the value in it is that it gives the opportunity to more intuitively mess with setting up/doing things with your lead leg without having to worry about sorting out all the moving pieces of a "full" golf swing, because even with the knowledge of what you're supposed to do, actually doing it is often just as difficult due to the inevitability that other things in your swing are busted. While that latter part doesn't apply to you as much @7ender, being more laid off *does* place a premium on getting this stuff right because laid off = open without your body working to square your path and the club, which firing your right side out does NOT do, hence that huge chase with your hands through impact. I really like Denny McCarthy's action as a visual here:



This lower body action almost looks like it was built around pelvic punch drills. It's very compact, but that move he does as he reaches the top of the swing is tailor made for what comes next. It also contains the "zipper away" concept that @Mike_C mentioned in action.



Which is an aggressive stomping down/clearing of the left side to bring him down into a great impact position with tons of space and perfect balance. Watching it in motion does it proper justice.

Edited July 22, 2023 by Valtiel