Weight Shift Debate Continues

Our Swing Tip last week got an interesting cross-section of comments. First I need to clarify that a golf swing where you fall back with all of your weight on your trailing leg will result in mishits or topped balls. If you ever try to crush the ball and swing at a high speed using only your arms, you WILL fall backwards. Our tip last week was intended to help golfers who finish their swing falling back on their back foot to break out of that problem.

Larry Rinker’s Corrective Comments
I first must apologize to Larry Rinker as I misunderstood his comments. He was offering a DRILL to help golfers transfer their weight from the trailing leg to the leading leg during the swing. He clarified by telling me: “Setting up with 60-75% of your weight in your lead side, the way you would be positioned at impact, is a good DRILL to learn how to swing your arms, hands, and wrists correctly.” He was NOT recommending this as a proper setup position.

Tiger is a good example of 75% weight forward well before impact during his swing.  If you setup with only 60% of your weight forward, it will help you stay forward through impact and in balance at your finish.

[I just found that HOLDING a 60% forward pressure from setup to impact is a great way to force your weight transfer to 100% on your leading foot at the end of your swing. Tommy Armour also setup with more pressure on the leading foot and the setup pressure on your leading foot should increases as you move to higher irons. If you find that you are able to transfer your weight during the swing, you may want to ignore this tip.]

Larry then went on to say: “The upper core player (not recreational player) will pivot around their lead leg on the back swing with the least amount of lateral motion. So in your case, if you are an upper core player, you are benefiting from not moving off of the ball on the back swing, which is what an upper core player does. This helps your contact at impact.”

NOTE: Each of the golfers who I see loading their weight on the front leg during the setup have strong upper cores. They avoid a reverse pivot in the downswing. To lock your head in one position throughout the backswing, try the Jack Nicklaus trick: Just turn your head back slightly so that you can focus on the ball with your left eye. It forces you to rotate my shoulders around your neck in a locked position the way most pros do (without swaying back or lifting up in your backswing)

Andy Schwebe’s Update
Andy is a low handicap golfer and has been setting up with his weight forward for years. He commented on last week’s swing tip with one further clarification: “Besides keeping 60% of your weight on your front foot, the other cheat that helps is to only put the rest of your weight on the inside edge of your back foot. Never let your weight go to the outside edge of that back foot.

If your body is not allowing you to swing like Ben Hogan, why not try this pressure shift to get your body and ball moving in the right direction. Once you get the feel for swinging through the ball with your weight shifted forward it will start happening naturally and you will be swinging like Ben Hogan in no time. Remember to practice with GOLFSTR+ for every swing in your game. Buy one today at www.golfstr.com

 

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2 Comments

  • Tom Davies says:

    Thanks for the advice! When I started implementing this into my game, I really saw improvement straight away. The issue is, though, that now that I’ve started driving my hips more, I’ve started hooking it every now and then! What can I do?

    • Will Curry says:

      I just use golf pro recommendations but I can suggest the following: To change your hook into a draw, don’t put so much pressure on your leading leg during your setup as you are probably swinging around your leading leg as if it is a post. Your leading leg should be bent throughout your swing until after impact. Eventually you need to learn to swing by transferring your weight to your leading leg during your swing. You can feel this transfer of weight (from the trailing to leading leg) by taking time for the transition at the top of your swing. Thanks for the update on your progress.