Tweet
For awhile I was on a long driving binge. I studied many of the longest hitters swings in slow motion, to look for their secrets. I have also read articles and books on distance here are some basic and advanced techniques.
Basic
These are techiques that are used by most/all of the long hitters on the PGA Tour. By using these you can improve your distance.
Maintain Your Spine Angle: The simplest thing you can do, is to stay in your posture and maintain your spine angle throughout your swing. What I mean by this is to not "come out of it" so that when you reach impact, you are not standing straight up, but rather over the ball a little. This needs to be done in any swing for maximum consistancy and power. Do this in all of these techniques.
Length of Arc: How far you take the club back. try and take it back farther WITHOUT comming out of your spine angle and posture. the key here is to do it with your Shoulder Turn and not by bending your left elbow. just turn farther.
Width of Arc: How far away your hands are from your body. try and get as much extension away from your body in your backswing.
Hip Turn: the less you turn your hips the more torque you can create, and that means more power.
X-Factor: this is an equation that deals with hip turn to shoulder turn. the more your shoulders turn in comparison to shoulders the higher your x factor will be.(natalie gulbis has the highest, even higher than tiger).
It requires a great deal of flexibility to maximize the xfactor. so if you arent that flexible, dont try this, its more important to make a full shoulder turn than to restrict your hip turn.
Clear Your Hips: On your downswing, turn your hips through fast enough so that your belt buckle points at the target when you make contact with the ball. You probably wont be able to get your hips that far ahead, but thats the image you want.
Turn Through It: Just simply turn through the ball with your body hips and shoulders in sync. This goes along with "clear your hips".
Advanced:
I advise only players with a high skill level to try these. And only if you dont mind messing up your swing. They are extremlely hard to time and perform properly. If all you care about is distance, then these are for you.
*note: some of these contradict what I said above.
The Knee:
This is a technique that I have discovered from watching Bubba Watson.
What he does, is during his backswing, he lifts his front heel off the ground, and bends his front knee inward towards his back knee. All while limiting his hip turn and staying in his spine angle. The first move in his downswing is to fire his front leg straight. What this does for him, is makes his hips fire extremely fast.
The Elvis:
I call this "The Elvis" because it looks like Elvis when he his flailing his hips and knees around. This is similar to "The Knee" but has a slight difference. This technique is employed by Sean "The Beast" Fister. He delays the knee action untill late in his swing, then he basically kicks his front knee back which flares his hips open, but this can create more speed because he is strong enough to fire them through. The farther your hips have to turn the more speed potential is there if you can physically do it. To see it in action, watch the commercial for the "Power Hitter" where Sean is hitting golf balls through plywood, and look at his lower body action.
ok im sick of typing stuff out, i have a few more, and a few secret ones that only tour pros know about, but i might keep them to myself. i might update this later on. if you have any questions, feel free to send me a message.
Basic
These are techiques that are used by most/all of the long hitters on the PGA Tour. By using these you can improve your distance.
Maintain Your Spine Angle: The simplest thing you can do, is to stay in your posture and maintain your spine angle throughout your swing. What I mean by this is to not "come out of it" so that when you reach impact, you are not standing straight up, but rather over the ball a little. This needs to be done in any swing for maximum consistancy and power. Do this in all of these techniques.
Length of Arc: How far you take the club back. try and take it back farther WITHOUT comming out of your spine angle and posture. the key here is to do it with your Shoulder Turn and not by bending your left elbow. just turn farther.
Width of Arc: How far away your hands are from your body. try and get as much extension away from your body in your backswing.
Hip Turn: the less you turn your hips the more torque you can create, and that means more power.
X-Factor: this is an equation that deals with hip turn to shoulder turn. the more your shoulders turn in comparison to shoulders the higher your x factor will be.(natalie gulbis has the highest, even higher than tiger).
It requires a great deal of flexibility to maximize the xfactor. so if you arent that flexible, dont try this, its more important to make a full shoulder turn than to restrict your hip turn.
Clear Your Hips: On your downswing, turn your hips through fast enough so that your belt buckle points at the target when you make contact with the ball. You probably wont be able to get your hips that far ahead, but thats the image you want.
Turn Through It: Just simply turn through the ball with your body hips and shoulders in sync. This goes along with "clear your hips".
Advanced:
I advise only players with a high skill level to try these. And only if you dont mind messing up your swing. They are extremlely hard to time and perform properly. If all you care about is distance, then these are for you.
*note: some of these contradict what I said above.
The Knee:
This is a technique that I have discovered from watching Bubba Watson.
What he does, is during his backswing, he lifts his front heel off the ground, and bends his front knee inward towards his back knee. All while limiting his hip turn and staying in his spine angle. The first move in his downswing is to fire his front leg straight. What this does for him, is makes his hips fire extremely fast.
The Elvis:
I call this "The Elvis" because it looks like Elvis when he his flailing his hips and knees around. This is similar to "The Knee" but has a slight difference. This technique is employed by Sean "The Beast" Fister. He delays the knee action untill late in his swing, then he basically kicks his front knee back which flares his hips open, but this can create more speed because he is strong enough to fire them through. The farther your hips have to turn the more speed potential is there if you can physically do it. To see it in action, watch the commercial for the "Power Hitter" where Sean is hitting golf balls through plywood, and look at his lower body action.
ok im sick of typing stuff out, i have a few more, and a few secret ones that only tour pros know about, but i might keep them to myself. i might update this later on. if you have any questions, feel free to send me a message.
Comment