Video Golf Tip | Power Sources for the Golf Swing
Remember that when you swing you want to use all three of your power sources when you hit the ball. If you negate one, you stop using your hands or you do not use your arms very well you are going to tend to overuse the others. Let’s review the three sources of power and see how we can use them the best. You are going to use your hands if you hold the club in your fingers. Do that grip routing, feel comfortable with the grip in your fingers, feel like you can waggle, feel like your arms and hands are nice and freed up. As I mentioned, a poor grip adds tension not just to your hands but also to the arms, you do not use your wrists and so forth. It is really important that you put your club in the fingers if you want to use your hands and wrists. The next thing I want to make sure you do is that your arms are moving fast coming through the shot, we are not hitting to the ball, we are hitting through it. My arms need to feel like they are back at the top and then whack, right through the ball. I want to feel like I am throwing hard to the left, I do not want to practice a little baby swing where I am gentle. Sometimes as women we try to over-control things and we are not risk-takers so what happens is that we try to control the ball and steer it towards the target, and you have to have a nice free arm swing and let her go. Something you can do to practice that and to start listening to the speed is to hold a wood upside down and listen to the shaft, you can make so much noise because it is so lightweight. You can see the acceleration that I am creating with this swing with the club backwards. I am not swinging and just easing into the ball, I am trying to hit it. Finally you want to use your body when you are hitting, and again your body is in the hit, especially in an athletic or one-plane swing, because of the position it is in. If I am bent over and I am staying in my posture I am using my body because of the position I am in, it is like punching. Now if I am coming through the ball and I am standing up my body is not so much in the hit. I might be moving and shifting and doing all kinds of things, but even though I might think this is giving me all kinds of power it is not really that powerful. So what I want to do with my body to make sure it is in the hit is use my core, turn it through and stay bent over. I am going to do a lot of practice, perhaps with this club behind my back in my elbows, feeling what it is like to stay in my posture as I am moving. I am very much aware that my shoulders, especially in an athletic swing, have to turn up and down, in order for my arm swing that is going across to work. Use all three of your power sources. Use your hands, use your arms, use your body because of the position it is in. do not give anything away. We want distance, we want power, we can get it.
Sandy LaBauve
Kierland Golf Club
15636 N. Clubgate Drive
Scottsdale, AZ 85254
Tel: 480-922-9283
Sandy LaBauve is one of the world's best beginner, junior and women's instructors. She is listed as one of Golf Magazine's Top 100 Teachers and is Founder and Creative Consultant for the LPGA Junior Girls Golf Club.
