Increase Clubhead Speed with Your Pinky

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Learn how this one simple golf swing grip tip can increase your clubhead speed 5 mph!


Have you ever wondered why the end of your grip is tapered in the way that it is? It seems kind of strange given that your pinky on your left hand, it's obviously the smallest finger on your hand, and that's the fattest part of the grip.

Why do you think they designed it that way? And it's also interesting because there's a.

There's some grips out there that are actually reverse tapered, so that this part of the grip is actually the smallest part of the grip.

And it actually gets fatter as you go down the grip where your right hand would be.

So who's right and who's wrong and why did they do this in the first place? Well, it's a great question, and incredibly enough, it's an incredibly important part of your golf swing when you understand it.

So if you don't understand why this is tapered the way that it is, and you don't feel like this tapered part is actually helping your golf swing.

You're gonna start to understand why you probably can't get into those tour quality impact positions, and why you can't pick up the club head.

Speed you think you should have, even though you're swinging at it as hard as you can.

So let's take a look at this.

First thing I want you to understand is one simple piece of math that we're gonna work with.

For every half inch and club link that you go up.

So let's say from your seven iron to your six iron, your six iron's probably about a half inch longer than your seven iron.

You're going to, on average, pick up about two miles an hour of club head speed just for the sake that the club is a half inch longer.

Simple enough right? So for every club in the bag that we go up for every half inch.

We can use that as some very simple, rough estimates as to how much club head speed you're gonna pick up.

That's why the whole concept of a single length set of irons just simply can't work.

By the time you get to your longer irons, you can't pick up enough club head speed to make up for the difference.

So that's why your clubs all have to be a little bit longer than the other.

That and the combination of the loft is what allows you to hit the ball further with a longer club.

So we need that extra half inch per club to help us hit the ball a long ways.

But if you're not using the club correctly, and I'm going to show you why in a second, you're going to not take advantage of that extra half inch.

And you're gonna be able to hit the ball as far as some skinny guy like myself who hits the ball a long ways without a lot of effort.

That's because I'm using the club the way it was designed to be used.

So let's take a look at this.

The one thing I want you to understand is that, and I've talked about this in other videos, is that the golf swing is predominantly left-hand dominant.

Okay, and so when you start to think of it that way, you're gonna start to understand how things fall into place the way that they do.

The problem is, most golfers are right-handed and they're right-hand dominant, and they try to swing the golf club right-handed.

And stuff starts falling apart really fast when you do that.

So here's what's going to happen.

And here, tell me if this is you.

You come into impact and you look like this.

Where you're scooping and flipping it, and your right hand is causing your left wrist to break down.

As this happens, what you're essentially doing is you're making the pivot point on your club further down the shaft.

Whereas the way that I'm swinging with using my left hand to control the club, I'm taking every inch of the shaft and utilizing it to generate speed.

Because my club is pivoting from up here instead of down here.

So now you can imagine if I'm trying to force the club to release.

With my right hand, I have effectively made my iron four inches shorter.

You're not gonna be able to make up four inches of speed no matter how hard you flip it with your right hand.

You have to use the taper and the grip and use the last three fingers in your left hand to allow the club to release with a lot of speed.

And the club should almost feel like it's trying to slip out of your hands and the taper is what's allowing you to hold on to it.

If it wasn't tapered and you swung the club correctly, the club would actually fall out of your hands.

It'd be very hard to hold on to.

So that's why your grips are tapered.

So now, in the next part of this video, I'm gonna show you two simple drills that are gonna help you learn how to understand.

And take advantage of this leverage piece of the swing to get a lot more speed with a lot less effort.

Alright, so now that we've got the concept of why this grip is tapered this way and why you need to use it the way that it was designed.

To get a lot of speed without a lot of effort, we give you the two drills that we need to work on.

So the first one is, I want you to take the grip, take the club and just grip it with your last three fingers.

Literally just hold the club with your last three fingers.

Take the thumb and forefinger off.

And what this is gonna do is it's gonna force you to stop pushing against the shaft with your left thumb, because again, that's gonna move that pivot point down the shaft.

We want that to be as far up the shaft as we can.

So right at the very end is where the majority of our grip pressure is gonna come from.

So what I want you to do? Last three fingers and start making little swings back and through, and as you're doing this, keep the thumb and forefinger off the shaft.

And start seeing how the club wants to and needs to turn over and rotate, kind of around the butt of the club.

And as you're doing this, one of the things I talk about in the clinics, in my lessons, all the time.

Good way of thinking about it is rolling the knuckles under.

So you're taking your knuckles on your left hand, and as you're flattening out that wrist, you're rolling the knuckles under to exaggerate it to where you could see your fingernails.

That's gonna be a hook if you're doing it right, but it's a good exaggeration, especially if you're used to flipping it with your right hand.

This is gonna get you into a flat left wrist position, rotating so I can see my fingernails and releasing it all the way around on the left hand side.

So that's the first drill and you need to practice this as much as humanly possible.

It looks incredibly simple, but what you're gonna find is that you have very little coordination, probably in your left hand, and especially when you take that thumb off of there.

And you may even have a little bit of a weak left hand because we don't use it all the time, so just keep working on this drill and just even hitting little half shots back and through.

This alone is gonna start giving you the feeling of how to get that club to work and release correctly.

Okay that's the first drill.

The second drill is obviously got to put the right hand back on at some point, right? So we need the right hand on there.

It does a lot of things for us.

But what I want you to do is put the right hand on there and we open.

Palm it at first.

And what I want you to start doing is letting your hand come off.

So now, as we're working through and we're releasing the club, my right hand is actually tracing along with the club, but I'm letting it come off.

So from face on, you can see that as my, my left hand is doing the work and my right hand is releasing off.

Now, what we want to start doing this, or transferring this into, is keeping that right hand on there longer and longer and longer.

And I call this the VJ drill.

So what we're gonna do, you're gonna come into impact now.

My fingers are on the club a little bit more and I'm gonna look like VJ or Phil Mickelson or Freddie Couples.

These guys all release the club really, really well with their lead hand and the trailing hand actually comes off, and that's why VJ looks like this.

Hogan didn't understand this.

That's why when they asked him about it, he said, Well, I guess he just doesn't need it there.

He had that part, right, but Hogan thought you really needed to push through with the right side and that's why he looked like this at impact.

You look at the modern player, who has a tremendous amount of club head speed these days.

They release the club very aggressively and let that trailing hand come off.

Because that's all it's going to do with the trailing hand is slow it down.

Because the tighter you hold on with the trailing hand, the more your body has to come through with the release.

The club can't move independently of your body to speed up and it needs to.

So when we let the right hand start coming off like VJ now, all of a sudden the club can speed up really fast.

And you'll see my body, it's actually moving quite slow, but I've got a lot of speed.

So that drill as you start getting into this VJ position where you're letting that hand come off.

The club combined with the first drill of starting to learn to use the left hand, The last three fingers and the left hand only will start to get you into a perfect impact position and get you a tremendous amount of club head speed with very little effort.

Must be Premium Member to Comment

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George
I am a "play-at-golf" golfer...at age 72, I play only Executive type (9 hole courses) in The Villages, FL, and have truly appreciated your instructional videos. My swing (takeaway, downswing, tilt angle, weight shift, lag, etc.) has improved tremendously, but I struggle desperately with consistency issues. Speed is not my nemesis, as I am not a long ball hitter and really don't care about 300 yard drives. My accuracy and consistency concerns are my biggest problems. I have investigated the single length iron philosophy and find it as technically accurate as the RST philosophy. My question is: Why are you guys SOOOO opposed to the "One Iron" single length clubs philosophies??
October 12, 2020
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello George. I am happy to hear that our videos have helped you. We've talked about this on a lot of different forums. Basically, the clubs have to be matched perfectly to you and why give up on free speed. For every half inch is 2 MPH club head speed for free just because of the wider radius. Why work harder to produce the same result. Side note: what is your consistency issue?
October 12, 2020
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THOMAS
Looking forward to working on this drill. I've read so many times that you're supposed to grip with last three fingers of lead hand and middle two of trail hand...and now Chuck explains why this logically accounts for optimizing speed by moving that hinge to take advantage of the full length of the club. I'm getting drunk on all of this knowledge.
August 29, 2020
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Thomas. Awesome. From personal experience it was a game changer for me.
August 30, 2020
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THOMAS
Craig...I'm giddy with two more golf days to go this Labor Day weekend. I was holding off mentioning anything else before I got out away from my indoor mat and mirror and used this on the course today. Mind-blowing change in distance increase of 20+ yards with the long clubs and overall accuracy through the bag. My only misses were if I got excited and moved my head forward through the downswing and hooking it. This is an amazing lesson!!! !!! A 76 and with no birdies on the card...so that's a good and a bad thing but there's more out there. The greens were inconsistent between them speed-wise today ...so we were all scratching our heads.
September 5, 2020
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Great Thomas. Thanks for sharing. I hope the rest of the weekend followed suit. Getting the scores down and adding distance is always fun!
September 7, 2020
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Owen
First person I know that has helped me feel what a proper release feels like. I have always either flicked by forcing a release or hinged by pushing the right hand through. I just did about 10 reps and it feels great!!!
January 8, 2020
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Owen. Love it! Thanks. Release that puppy.
January 8, 2020
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COREY
Just started this learning program a few days ago. No questions yet. Just wanted to say this particular video is brilliant.
April 10, 2019
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Corey. Much appreciative of the positive feedback. Welcome to the club!
April 10, 2019
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Steven
How much does finding the right shaft (flex & Low, Mid, or High flex point) impact the amount of speed that can be achieved? I'm 66 yrs of age and still using stiff shafts in all clubs. My driver club head speed is between 100 & 105 mph.
February 3, 2019
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Steven. Making sure you have the proper shaft flex is very important when trying to optimize club head speed.
February 4, 2019
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Steven
I fully understand that. My question was HOW to determine what shaft dynamics and flex are right for me?
February 4, 2019
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Steven. You would need to see a proper club fitter and/or find a trackman device to get some numbers. Once, you have some data you would be able to figure out the best for your swing.
February 4, 2019
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Steven
This is a great video and has helped me to understand the grip better as well. I am curious when this video was made because at 1:30 Chuck does comment on single length iron shafts not being feasible. Naturally that is a controversial issue with the success of DeChambeau on tour and how this will affect that technology in the future?
January 3, 2019
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Steven. Glad you enjoyed the presentation. This video was made about 4 years ago. We still aren't a fan of single length irons. We've talked about this on numerous forum boards. But, the main point is more width gives you more speed. Why would we give up something that is totally free with incremental changes in the shaft.
January 4, 2019
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Paul
I understand taking out thumb and forefinger to create speed as I practice these two drills and then go to hit balls how much do I use the thumb and forefinger in my regular swing
November 15, 2018
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Paul. Not much. It will primarily be there for support and not active usage.
November 16, 2018
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Marc
Interesting I had seen this video before but now that I am improving on my 9 to 3 swing I am getting totally new sensations. Am I correct to assume that the club is automatically releasing as the posting is pulling the left arm into impact and the hands remain very soft. I think I used to try to pull the left hand into position whereas I am just amazed how soft the action is. Thanks, Marc
June 5, 2018
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Mark. Yes, the club will release automatically with proper posting and soft wrists/forearms. You can continue to pull too much affecting the rotation.
June 5, 2018
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Joe
I just joined your site. I love it! Only problem is some videos ask me to join again. At the end of the pinky video there is a second part to it. Am I nit supposed to have access to that?
May 21, 2018
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Joe. Glad you are enjoying the site. If you are a premium member you should have full access. Can you give me an example of a video that asks you to join again?
May 22, 2018
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Sašo
I have exactly the same problem. It asks me to join again at the end of this video. Regards, Saso
May 27, 2018
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Chuck
Hey guys I found the issue and am fixing it now. If you see any other videos like this, please let us know.
May 27, 2018
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Kenny
Amazing!! Where were you when I started playing golf in 1992? Lots more clubhead speed. Thanks!
May 21, 2018
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Ken. Thanks for the post! Sorry Chuck couldn't help back in 92'
May 21, 2018
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Dan
There are some new grips on the market that don't taper at all. What is you opinion about these. Seems you can still grip the club in the last three fingers of the left hand with these, but I'm not sure what the purpose of a non-tapered grip is.
March 16, 2018
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Dan. Some of the non-tapered grips are geared to try and keep the right hand less in the equation. You can still control with the last three lead on those specific grips. But, I find it tends to make my lead hand even more tense because of how it wraps around the club.
March 16, 2018
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Devin
This one video alone was worth the membership fee. Thank you.
October 3, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Thanks Devin. Glad you enjoyed.
October 3, 2017
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Kenneth
Not sure why you are repeating the Vijay release drill from the "Adding the Lead Arm" section. On retrospect, you had it in the last section because it is more a lead arm release drill ...and in this section because it relates to the speed gain potential from pivoting 4 inches up the shaft ...of the pinky. Also, repeating helps slow guys like myself pick it up from repetition. ALOT of great stuff in here. LOVE this program!!
September 12, 2017
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Chuck
Yep, sometimes I try to say the same thing a few different ways until I find a way that it "clicks" for each golfer.
September 18, 2017
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Sanjay
Brilliant! I haven't heard anybody else ever talk about this. Very helpful when done right. Still not ingrained yet.
June 5, 2017
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T David
This video seems to end around 15 seconds. Can someone take a peek at this.
May 29, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Dave. It is playing correctly on my end. Let me know if you are still seeing the error.
May 29, 2017
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T David
Huh, very odd. It plays for 30 seconds and stops... It looks like 30 seconds is the full length (bar at the bottom moves to the bottom).
May 30, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Dave. Are you using Chrome? Try logging out. Clearing your cache and history. Log back in. See if that does the trick. If not, report back.
May 30, 2017
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T David
Thanks, Craig. Got it now. I appreciate the help.
May 30, 2017
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T David
Hi Craig - This was the video that I was watching (in reference to the video analysis you just did). That is why I was taking my thumb out of the picture, though I was completely unaware of the tension and angle I was not doing at the top. Thanks for the great insights... I'll try to focus on this. My next video will probably be the same step 4 drill... I really want to get these elements down. Thanks~!
May 31, 2017
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Bruce
I'm right handed and while trying the 1st part of the drill using only the 3 fingers, the club grip moves back and forth through the swing. I can't seem to control the club. Is it possible I need a bigger grip? My hands are average but not fat.
May 20, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Bruce. Sounds like the grip is too much in the palm and not in the fingers. If you tend to get a wear spot in the glove. That would typically be the tell tale sign. Take a look at the Golf Grip Tips Video.
May 20, 2017
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Paul
hello : I am right handed, but play golf lefty. I feel that my lead hand is to powerful n overtakes to much in the swing. Is that possible ? Thanks
April 27, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Paul. In your case, playing lefty, but being right hand dominant you could use too much. The tendency would be to over pull and have the club shallow too much with excessive lag. Is this what you are experiencing?
April 27, 2017
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Harry
Is the right arms only job to pull the left arm back in the backswing?
April 19, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Harry. The folding of the trail arm will bring the hands across centerline and support the plane. As well as, position the scapula in the proper position and help you maintain width. Take a look at the 3 Functions of the Right Arm Video.
April 20, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Harry. The folding of the trail arm will bring the hands across centerline and support the plane. As well as, position the scapula in the proper position and help you maintain width.
April 20, 2017
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Paul
Yes, this makes a difference alright ,thanks for the tip.
April 18, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Paul. Glad you liked.
April 19, 2017
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Rick
Great video. Thank You
April 18, 2017
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Hello Rick. Thanks for the positive post.
April 19, 2017

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