Why You Need This: In this video, you'll learn why you DON'T want to hit down and through the ball.

You've likely heard the popular advice to hit down and through.

The problem is that following that advice is likely causing you to chop down into the ball.

In the downswing, there's a lot of force being released...

And these Newtons of force make the club want to slam into the ground.

This is not what you want.

So in this video, you'll get the explanation of why you don't want to hit down and through...

And how to transition that massive energy force to help bring the club back up and through the ball.

Watch this video now to start hitting the ball farther for crisp, pure contact with a nice follow through!

Golf Pros Featured:

Instructors Featured: Clay Ballard    

Video Duration: 6:34

Video Transcription:

What the heck was that about? That’s the force that’s happening in your downswing. As you start your downswing, there is a lot of force going this way down toward the ground. Your club wants to slam into the ground.

In today’s video we’re going to talk about why you don’t want to hit down and through, why you actually want to be turning that energy back up to get the club to accelerate, to start hitting it farther, and to hit that ball dead, crisp, and clean. Let’s go ahead and get started.

All right, so as we start the downswing, there’s a lot of momentum as I said, moving that club into the ground.

That’s one of the reasons that people struggle so much casting, they struggle hitting behind the ball, chunking the ball, there’s nothing worse that hitting six inches behind the ball and having it dribble forward.

That momentum, we have to do something to change that so that the club whips through the ball. One of the biggest misconceptions out there is that as I’m coming down, you can see all this is a big, heavy head when it’s moving very quickly.

There’s all this force moving down into the ground, and now all of a sudden I’m thinking I’ve been told to move my hands down and through the shot. If I want to hit down and through, compress the ball, have forward shaft lean, I need to hit down and through.

That gets us really, really steep. The club already has tons of momentum moving down, we’re going to add to that coming through contact, and it’s just going to be really tough. We’re going to be chopping down into the ball and really, really struggle.

What really happens, is our momentum is moving back up toward our body. Let me explain what I mean by this.

As we start down, as your club is about parallel with the ground, your hands will be in front of your right leg just at maybe slightly outside of that. Your club itself will be pretty low, so if you look at my hands, they’re going to be just above my knees, somewhere in this general vicinity.

I’ve created some good amount of lag here. My club is actually too close to the ground. If I kept my handle her and let the club drop down, you’ll see it would be way behind the ball as I’m hitting.

So if I set up here, there’s my good lag, my hands are low enough to where if I release the club from there, it’s way behind that. That’s that downward portion of the swing.

Now as I get to there, my hands are actually going to be working back up as I release the club. So you can kind of imagine if I had tons of lag and I exaggerated this, I’m very close to the ground now, watch the butt end of the club.

It works up as the club releases. That’s what gives us what’s called a flat spot. So as your club’s working down, the hands are turning up as the club is releasing, it gets close to the ground and then it works what we call impact glide all the way through the striking zone.

Your club is swinging down, as the hands turn up it comes in very level. You have this big six or eight-inch gap there where you can hit the ball and it’s going to turn out pretty well.

If I just keep the hands moving down, now I don’t have that six or eight-inch gap, I’m chopping down into the ball. I have to meet the ball and the ground at the exact same time.

My hands are turning up, club’s coming down, then just like a plane landing on the runway it smooths out and glides nice and smooth with the turf. You can hit anywhere in this one, and you’re going to hit a decent shot.

So the first part of that, that’s all good in theory, how are we actually going to do this in our swing?

The first part of that is, let’s go ahead and pause as your hands are in front of your right leg. My legs are going to be bent, my hips are opening up, and now my hands are pretty close to the ground.

From here, my left leg is going to drive down into the ground, that’s going to move my hip up. My shoulders are going to naturally rotate up. If you look at my shoulders rotating as they turn around in a circle, they’re going to rotate up, and my hands are going to rotate up.

So my hip, my shoulders, my hands, all that is rotating up to get that club to shallow out and to release kind of parallel with the ground. So pause here, hands parallel with the ground, or club parallel with the ground.

Hands in front of your right thigh, then from there, pushing down into the ground. Hip, shoulders, and hands are moving up, and we’re going to make a nice shallow divot as we’re doing that. That’s the first part of it.

Now the second part is, we’re actually losing the bend in our body. We’re actually standing up through the shot, and a lot of people don’t realize this. It’s a little bit confusing at first, but it’s super simple once you learn the idea.

So again, if I’m going this direction, let’s pretend that I’m hitting the ball directly that way. As I start my downswing and I’m very low in the downswing, look how there’s an angle between my torso and my upper legs, I’ve got this angle.

Well, as I come through the shot, I’m actually losing that angle. So even though I’m staying in my posture, I’m losing that angle. I can imagine I’m swinging this direction, this is the best angle to look at this from.

As I come down, there’s that angle between my upper legs and my torso. As I hit the ball and I come into the release, now look how that angle’s gone. See how my body’s flat.

Now I’m not coming out of my posture, even though my body’s flat, I’m staying down in my posture, but my torso has lost that angle. Let me show you from a couple different angles here.

There we are coming down, in my posture but my torso has lost that. It’s that straightening up that happens through impact, even though you’re still turned sideways. That straightening up that allows that club t move up through there.

If we don’t do that, we’re slamming down into the turf, we’re really going to struggle.

Now let’s put that move into the last move we learn. So again, we’re going to go down in the downswing, pause in front of the right leg, big angle between our hips and our torso.

As we release the club on out in front, now I’ve lost that angle, but make sure you stay in your posture. Your shoulders are still tilted. So as I come through here, my hip is still back, my shoulders are still tilted so that I’m staying in my posture from the side.

That’s going to make it nice and consistent. So I’m going to do 100 repetitions the exact same way. Hands down, and then I’m straightening up into my release all the way on through. You’ve done 200 practice swings, do another 100 in full motion.

So full practice swing’s going to look like this. Hands are working low to high, club is gliding through impact, nice shallow divot.

You should feel like you’re taking a razor blade and slicing the top layer of grass off of the ground, just like you see the PGA Tour players doing. That’s going to help you to be dead solid. Let’s go ahead and try one out.

There we go, hit that one really solid, dead straight, nice thin, shallow divot. Good luck to you guys. Work on these drills, it’s going to make you a more pure ball striker, and you’re really going to enjoy it. I’ll see you guys soon.