Why You Need This: Today, you'll discover "I Wish I Had Known THIS About the Backswing"

A great backswing does two things: It loads up your power, and sets the club in the right position for an effortless downswing.

But if you get too steep, it leads to all sorts of struggles, like slices and weak contact.

The secret? A shallow downswing…

Ready to perfect your backswing and hit straighter shots?

 

 

 

 

 

Golf Pros Featured:

Instructors Featured: Clay Ballard    

Video Duration: 10:28

Video Transcription:

Clay: So what is the perfect backswing? How do I get this club in the backswing perfectly on plane? Perfectly set at the top? Well, there's about 700 checkpoints that you could be looking at if you're browsing around Googling. How do I make a good backswing? Well, what is the backswing first? That's the number one thing.

If I get to the top of the swing, the whole point of the back swing is two things. Number one, I wanna get loaded up enough so I can get some club head speed. And number two, I want the club to be in a position. to where when I start my downswing, I don't have to reroute it. So if you're struggling in your downswing, feeling like as you come down, the club face is constantly wanting to be open.

And I have to slow down and try to manipulate it the last second to square it up. If you're feeling like you really have to do a lot with your hands, this is going to be one of the best videos for you. Now, first, let's take a look at one of my swings in slow motion here. And from the down the line view, if I go to the top of the backswing, here's a key point.

And when I look at analyzing pro data versus high handicappers, a lot of times high handicappers get this wrong and pros are very consistent on this, but I want the butt end of the club directly over the center of my ankle. So what I mean, if I draw a line at the very end of my backswing from the butt of my club straight down, you notice how it's barely behind my right ankle.

That's pretty much what you're going to see with most people. pros. It's going to be right around the middle of that ankle. Now, if you, I'm not talking about the middle of the foot here. If you look at this picture, you'll see that bone that sticks out on the outside of your ankles called your lateral malleolus.

That's the one that if you bang something into it, like a golf club, it hurts like crazy, but that's the part I want to be centered over. So if my button in my club is over that, Then I am in a perfect position to start the downswing. If I'm too deep, then that can really cause some problems. And when I look at recreational players and I analyze slow motion footage over large numbers of recreational players, what I've seen is a lot of those players get the club too deep.

Now, the reason for this is we've all been told swing from the inside, get it more from the inside. And as a response to that, we tend to drag our hands in the club further back to the inside early in the takeaway. And then we try to reach back here and try to get as deep as we can in the backswing as we complete the backswing.

So that looks something like this. And now I get this club kind of well behind my ankles there in an effort to get an inside out path. Now that actually causes some problems. And if you do it that way, you're going to struggle to not slice it. You're going to struggle to square up the face. And here's what I mean by that.

If we go from that position at the top of the backswing, that butt in the club. And I played this video until my left arm is parallel to the ground in the downswing, and I mark the butt end of the club again. That's going to give me my hand path as I start the downswing. So on mine, you're going to see an angle, if I'm remembering correctly, somewhere in the 60 something degrees.

Now, if I was straight up and down, or if my butt end of my club was here at the top of the backswing, and I moved my hands straight down to the ground, That would be measured like a 90 degree angle. If my club was at the top of the backswing and I moved it straight this way, that would be measuring it as a zero degree angle.

So when I'm saying the mid sixties, that's the direction that you're going to want the hands come down. Now pro average tour average is right around that mid sixties. It's about 66, 67 degrees is the direction of the hand path. And when they do that, as you stop with your left arm, um, parallel on the downswing, and I look at my club shaft in relationship to that hand path line that I just drew, pros on average are going to be shallowing that out about 15 or 16 degrees.

So what that means is, when I'm looking at this video, if I look at the angle of my club shaft, it's going to be about 15 degrees shallower than the direction my hand path is moving. Now this sounds pretty complicated at this point, but this is really critical to squaring up the face. You see, if I go to the top of the swing, my hands are over the center of my ankles or the butt in the club's over the center of my ankles.

And I swing down on that high sixties angle and my club shaft is shallowed out. The face squares itself up. And here's what I mean by that. Imagine that I just took this club and had it parallel with the ground like this from the down the line view. If I had the club outside of that shaft angle and I pull it forward toward the target, you're going to see that that club wants to kick in.

Yeah. Another way to visualize this or to show this is here would be the direction that I'm swinging if I put this club on the ground. If I put the club on this side of that angle and I pull it straight forward, what's the club want to do? It wants to kick this direction. It wants to kick inside. If I put the club on this side of the angle again and I still pull dead straight, it wants to go the opposite direction.

It wants to kick out like this. Now in addition to that, When this club shaft is shallower than my hand path, as I pull down, not only does the club want to kick back on plane from the inside, it also wants to close the club face. The reason is the mo, the mass of the club is outside of the shaft. So when it gets shallower and I pull down, not only does it want to kick the club square, it also wants to square up the face.

under what I call passive torque. So it means that you don't have to do anything with your hands to get this club wanting to square up. It passively squares up. If I get the club steeper than this angle, then the club wants to go this way and the momentum of the club wants to open up and I get passive torque making the club want to open.

Well, I don't want the club to open. I want the club to square up. So if I have my hands on this side or I have my club on this side of my hand path, Now all of a sudden all the momentum that's built up in my club wants the face to drop in behind me. That's chunks, fin shots. It wants the face to open up blocks to the right or I sense that and I say, Oh no, I don't want to do this.

And I slow down my swing, uh, lash at it with my hands at the last second. And now all of a sudden I'm really struggling to square up the face. Now you may say, okay, I get it. Pros are shallowing it out. I want to do that, but Does it really show up in the data? Well, when I measure higher, higher, higher handicapped players, what I see a lot of times is they get that hand too deep.

Like I was talking about, as they start down the hand path goes too flat with the ground. So instead of averaging high sixties, they're averaging somewhere in the fifties or flatter, more level with the ground. So that line I drew on the hand path, if we take a look at this player, you'll see that his hands are moving more out because he got the club too deep.

The hands are moving more out. And now that club is above that hand path line. Now from there, kind of dead in the water because from that point to impact is less than a quarter second. And the club is now wanting to have the face open. The club's now wanting to fall in behind those chunk shots and thin shots.

And the really, the only thing that I can do there to save it is to slow down and throw it with my hands. So if you're feeling like you're manipulating the club with your hands and the downswing, It's really this backswing position that you have to nail. So from here, what I want you to feel like to get this down, video your swing.

When you go to the top, just like I am in this video you're seeing with me of the driver, if I drew a line down from the butt end of the club, I'd want to see that right over my ankle. If I'm too deep, I'm going to struggle getting these torques to be right. So if I'm too deep, I want to feel like the hands are going more vertical, almost like a Ferris wheel.

If I'm too far out this way, we're not going to get into the details of that, but that can be bad too. I'm going to have to rewrite my hands to get me in this good position. Then I want to feel like I'm more like a merry go round. So, it doesn't matter what you're doing right now. Simply go to the top of your backswing, draw a line right down from the butt end of the club, and if it's too far behind you, the butt end of the club is, feel like the club's more like a Ferris wheel to get it over the ankles.

If it's too far in front of you, feel like it's more like a merry go round to get it over the ankles. So, long story short Whatever you have to feel, Ferris wheel or merry go round, make sure it's over the ankles. This is why it's not a cookie cutter one size fits all. I got to get that butt end of the club in a fairly good position starting the downswing.

Now from there, I want you to feel like as you make the downswing and your left arm is parallel or your hands are about chest or shoulder high, roughly chest high would be the most accurate. I want you to feel like this club head is a little flatter. And the face, instead of being open, is a little more square.

And if I do that, I'm in the perfect position to be passive with my hands through impact, and hit really nice, straight shots. That's exactly what you're seeing in the pro. So, for example, if you look at my club head face, when my left arm is parallel to the ground on the downswing here from this down the line view, it's not going to be really open like this.

It's going to be more square if you're looking at the leading edge of that driver club face. So from that position, I'm really ready to go ahead and swing through and effortlessly square the face. So that's one reason why if you see better players, they may be able to do something that seems impossible.

So like if I just take a swing with one arm and I go ahead and hit this golf ball just with one arm,

I'll be able to hit it fairly solid, fairly straight. I didn't feel like I had to manipulate it all with the hands. Well, that's because my club was shallowed out to the direction of my path. And I was able to just keep on swinging through and the clubface squared itself up. So now the next step is how do I get this club shallowed out in an easy way?

You see, you may be saying, okay, I get that I'm supposed to shallow it out. I see what you're saying here, Clay, but I just can't make it happen to my swing. When I videotape my swing, even when I get those butt in the club over the ankles, still feels tough to get this club to shallow out lower than that.

Well, that's where the 20 minute shallowing fix comes in. If you're a member of top speed golf. It's included in your membership and it is the easiest way to shallow the club in a single practice session. So head on over to the instruction tab, going down to the 20 minute shallowing fix. And I promise you in one single practice session, you're going to be shallowing the club every single time and hitting some of the most solid shots of your life.

Just work through exactly what I do in that course. And I guarantee you're going to shallow it out. Let's go and get started.