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5 Minutes to a Perfect Backswing Pitfalls
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In this premium video, I am going to cover some of the common mistakes that RST students make while trying to build a perfect backswing. If you have been working through our extremely popular "5 Minute" series and you have found yourself struggling with your backswing, this video will show you how to correct your faults and get back on track.
- Maintain elevation as you go into golf posture
- Make sure there is no major amounts of tension in the shoulders.
- Shoulders should be in a neutral position
- Allow the wrists to rotate when adding flexion
- Only add enough flexion so that the lead arm stays straight
Hi, I'm Rotary Swing Tour Instructor Craig Morrow, And today, I'm going to talk to you about a few of the common pitfalls I see when people are working on their drills.
To the five minutes to the perfect backswing.
If we're going to get into the correct position at the top of our backswing, we have to make sure that we're doing the drills correctly.
And it's something that I see on a day in and day out basis.
That our members or students are putting in the time and they're putting in the effort, but they're getting into an improper position because they miss one or two things in the drills, and they've spent tons of times ingraining the improper position.
And we want to make sure that you do the drill correctly so that you get into the correct position at the top.
And so what I want to do today is I want to show you a few of the common pitfalls that I see on a daily basis.
Into making sure that you're ingraining a nice position at the top, versus missing one or two key elements that's keeping you from getting into the correct position at the top.
So the first thing is, is that when people add their right elbow flexion, they lose their shoulder elevation.
So let me show you a little bit about what that looks like.
They elevate to the base of their pec, but when they add their right elbow flexion, they lose their shoulder elevation.
Now you can see that my right elbow is more in line with the middle of my torso, and that my left arm's coming more across my chest.
This isn't a very powerful position.
If I bend over and rotate, now my arms are deep, now my hands are low, I'm not going to want to create any lag, and I'm typically going to drive hard with my right shoulder to try to get any speed.
Or to get that club head working back out in front of me.
And for those of you that have watched any videos on the site, we know that right shoulder on the downswing is our enemy.
We don't want to use him too much.
So let's make sure that when we add our elevation and fold our right arm, that we don't lose that elevation.
We want this left forearm blocking out our right eye.
We don't want it below our head, we definitely don't want it up here, but we want this left forearm blocking out our right eye.
Just as what Clay talked about in the checkpoints video.
If we don't lose our elevation, this left forearm should be blocking out our right eye.
The next thing that I see is that people get the arm motion correct.
They get the elevation, they get the flexion, they get the left forearm rotation as the right arm starts to fold.
All the good things in front of them.
But then they lack the rotation going back.
They move their arms independently of their body, versus allowing their body to transport their arms and club to a completed position.
They get everything correct with the arm motion and then they go like this.
And they think that they've rotated to the top.
Well, you haven't rotated, all you've done is just moved your arms.
You can see that I've lost the connection between my upper right bicep and upper pec.
And now my arms and hands have gone very far across centerline.
So if I were to bend over, You can see that my arms are now behind me versus being in front of my sternum or being in front of my chest.
The left arm is going to cross centerline a little bit as we continue to the top and as the right arm folds.
We don't want to manually get it to cross centerline too much.
This isn't very supported and it's not very powerful.
So what we've got to do is?
We've got to make sure that we maintain this connection between our upper right bicep and upper PEC, and that we rotate back using the right shoulder blade, using the right oblique.
Not going like this, keeping that connection and we're rotating back.
The last thing that I see is that people get either too little wrist set or too much wrist set.
Now a wrist set throughout the golf swing is going to be very gradual.
It's going to feel something like flipping a coin over your right shoulder.
If I was in this position and just flipping a coin over my right shoulder nice and gradually, I'd add a little bit of set and a little bit of hinge.
That's all the amount of wrist set that we need in the golf swing.
It's a nice simple motion.
There's no max set, there's no too little set.
So let me show you what the two differences look like.
If you add elevation and add a little bit of flexion, if you get into this position, then your wrists are too tight and your grip is too tight.
You haven't allowed for any wrist set.
The club's pointing up towards the sky.
We want to make sure that we have a little bit of wrist set.
So don't hold the wrist too tight, don't hold the grip too tight.
If you have too much wrist set, now the club's going to be pointing down towards the ground.
That means that my grip is too light and my wrists are too supple.
I'm not controlling the club anymore.
I don't know about you guys, but I still want to be the boss of my club.
I don't want him telling me what to do.
And if you get into that position, he's going to dictate what you do.
So we've got to make sure that we keep a nice grip, pressure and that we're kind of actively controlling it, but not controlling it.
We allow for a little bit of wrist set and we maintain control of the golf club.
We don't give up on it, allow too much wrist set.
We don't hold off on it, not allow any wrist set.
Use this as your checkpoint.
If you get into this position where you have this box, then you have about the proper amount of wrist set.
If you form an L, then you know you're not allowing your wrist to set and that you're holding it too tightly.
If you form this kind of right triangle looking thing where the club's pointed down towards the ground, Then you know you're not controlling the golf club enough and that you're allowing for too much wrist set.
So make sure that as you go through the drill, that you just form this little box.
It's not going to be perfect, But just form this little box and that'll mean that you're allowing for the wrist set to happen and it's in a good location.
So check those pitfalls.
Make sure that when you're folding the right arm that you don't lose your shoulder elevation, that when you get the arm motion correct, that you use rotation to transport the arms, That you just don't move the arms independently of your body, and that you have the proper amount of wrist set at the top.
It's going to be very gradual, just a little bit of hinge, a little bit of set.
We're not going to give up control, get too much.
We're not going to not allow the club to do anything.
By controlling it too much and getting this wrist too tight and not allowing it to set.
So take a look at those.
Let's make sure we do the drill correctly and let's get into the correct position at the top of the backswing.
Mehul
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
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