The GOAT Delivery Position (GDP)
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During my study of the GOATs, it kept becoming clear that they deliver and release the club in much the same way, no matter how different their swings may have looked. In this video, I show you how to get into the GOAT Delivery Position (GDP) and how to release the club from there.
On the surface, you may think that Ben Hogan and Tiger Woods don't swing anything alike, but when you get them down into the delivery area, like you see here, they're in almost identical positions.
And you can see this amongst all the greats.
You can see this in Bobby Jones and Jack Nicklaus.
And when you look down the line, you can see this in all modern players as well.
You're going to see this in Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, look at Tiger Woods, Ben Hogan, Bobby Jones.
Look at the position of their arms, the right arm and the left arm.
Notice the internal rotation of the left arm, the right arm being tucked in with the elbow pointing out away from the elbow pit and the wrist.
That's what we're going to talk about, how to understand how to get into this position and why it is so important.
When you look at the swings of the greats, they tended to all do certain things very much the same.
And the delivery position is something that's consistent amongst them all.
And when we talk about the delivery position, what we're really talking about is roughly when the hands start to get back in front of the leg, the trail leg, and the club shaft is roughly parallel to the ground.
That's what I call the delivery position.
Because from there, things are happening much too fast for you to try and control, as Hogan liked to say.
It was a devilish thing to try and control the impact area as the club is releasing through.
But understanding how to get into this delivery position will help you not only get more control and stop flipping, but help you also stop coming over the top.
Because when you move into this goat delivery position, it's basically the opposite of how you would swing over the top.
So let's first look at how to get yourself into this position, what it's going to feel like.
And first, Understand that there's no physical special flexibility or strength or anything like that that's required.
And what I want you to do first is with your trail arm, so if you're a right-handed golfer, your right arm, Simply stand in a normal posture and then get your elbow pit facing straight away from you and turn your palm so that it's also facing straight away from you.
And then just simply bend your wrist and your elbow a little bit.
What I mean by that is just flex the elbow a little bit and bend the wrist back a little bit.
That's it.
That is the goat delivery position as far as the trail arm is concerned.
So once you understand that this is what you're trying to do to get down close to the ball, now you're halfway there to understanding what's really happening in the swings of the greatest.
Because what they're doing is getting into this position with the lead arm in a internally rotated position.
So what we mean by that is the arm, If you just take it and take your whole upper arm and twist it out so that your elbow is pointing straight down the target line and you combine that with the elbow pit pointing away from you.
So you can kind of think of these things as 90 degrees opposing each other.
This elbow pit is pointing straight away.
This elbow pit pointing this way or your elbow pointing straight down the target line.
Your arm has to be internally rotated for this to happen, and your shoulder actually has to be protracted a little bit.
So this would be normal posture where my shoulder is back in neutral posture.
But what you see in the position of the goats is that their arm, their lead arm is protracted and internally rotated while this one is basically close to neutral.
So from here, all I've got to do is release that golf club.
And once I've got this position understood, and I've got this position locked in, when I have the club in my hands, You're starting to be able to very easily square the club face and get yourself into a proper release position.
Now, this delivery position isn't that complicated.
The hard part is how do you get there?
That's the tricky part.
Because what most golfers want to do, and what feels really natural, is to start rotating the shoulders to get that club back to the ball.
From down the line, you can see this immediately starts creating the old over-the-top move.
And so now everything starts to go this way and we're in trouble.
The greats, of course, we saw, we know that none of the greats had a big over-the-top move.
They all came down this way.
Because what they were working on is getting into this delivery position with this trail arm, in a position where it can release that right arm, right hand with some speed.
And that is what you're going to have to feel in order to stop, to break that habit of wanting to swing over the top.
So how do we get there?
I want you to do this with your trail arm only at first.
Go to the top of your swing, not too worried about where you are roughly, just kind of get it in the ballpark to where you're, this part of your arm, Your forearm is kind of pointing straight down at the ground, and your arms roughly in front of your body.
Now from here, the trick is I want you to feel what it would take to get your right arm, your trail arm back into that delivery position.
Well, you wouldn't want to go this way at all, right?
As soon as you start trying to push with your right arm, extend this right arm or push with your right shoulder to move your hand fast, that gets your hand moving out toward the target line, toward the ball and get you steep and over the top.
Instead, what you want to feel is that your right, Your trail, Elbow and your shoulder work down into that position, where your elbow pit can now face away from the target or away from your body.
You'll see that as you start going to go this way, your elbow pit will start wanting to point this way.
And that's when you're really over the top.
So instead, go to the top and bring it into that delivery position where your arm is tucked into your side, your elbow pit's pointing away from you and your palm is facing away from you.
So from there, from the top to here is this motion.
And you can see that it makes sense for me to naturally shift my weight back to the lead side.
Because I've got to make room for this arm to get in close to my body.
If I go this way, then I obviously I don't have to shift and I can do all sorts of things.
But when you move correctly, when you move this arm from that position at the top to going down with the shoulder, down with the elbow, that gets you into this position where it's very easy to have this elbow pit point away from you.
If you go across and high with your trail shoulder, you'll find the opposite.
And that's where you start coming over the top.
So now with a club, do the same thing, turn to the top and now bring your arm down into that delivery position.
My palm is out.
My elbow pit is out.
My arm is close to my body and I'm working this trail shoulder, not across or out toward the ball, but what it's going to feel like down.
And you can see, as I move down, watch what happens to my hip.
You see how my hip gets moved out of the way without me having to think about it.
I don't have to think about pushing really hard or whatever to shift off that trail foot.
Getting my feeling of getting into this delivery position helps me make that weight shift really natural.
So from there, if I put my lead arm back on there, now my back of my hand, or if I had a glove on, the logo of my glove would be pointing away just like the palm of my trail hand is.
Those two should be working in opposites.
So now my elbow, my lead elbow is down the target line.
This one is pointing, pit is pointing away from me.
And right here, from here, if I go back to the top and down, now you understand how simple it is to get into a proper delivery position.
If you do anything different from that, you're going to find that you're going to go over the top, or if you start trying to shallow out the club in an unnatural way, it's going to throw everything off.
Make it simple and first get yourself in this position, your palm out, elbow pit out.
That's it.
Now go to the top and bring it right back down to that position.
Get your shoulder to go down to get that hand closer to the ground.
And if you've struggled with flipping, This is one of the keys to breaking that bad habit is a lot of times when people flip with their hands.
And if you don't know what a flip is, just your wrist breaking down at impact too early, adding loft to the club.
When that happens is because you're running out of extension with this arm and wrist, eventually the club hat, your wrists have to break down.
And if you run out of something to continue to drive that club forward, then you're always going to start flipping because there's nothing left to hit with.
There's nothing left to keep that club moving forward, but you'll see when my shoulder goes down, as long as like, you know, again, I'm not trying to really exaggerate this.
It's a feeling of getting my arm down so that my elbow kind of gets down into my pocket.
And then my palm is facing away from me.
As I do this, this makes it so that this arm can stay bent and this wrist is staying bent, but I'm closer to the ground than I was when I started.
That's why you see good golfers, especially golfers like Tiger and other great players, their head goes down because they're maintaining this angle.
So now as they continue to drive down, I'm not running out of right arm or right wrist to keep the shaft delofted.
If I was up here and my head didn't go down and my body didn't go down, and I started going to release the club, well, eventually I run out of stuff to hit, I run out of stuff to release.
And so the club's going to start releasing and flipping.
But if I go down and get this elbow down and my head down, now it's very easy for me.
I still actually have angle in my wrist to keep that club delofted.
And that's a great way to start feeling.
How to hit balls from here is get into this delivery position.
And then work down to where you can get your hands still staying arched back or your lead wrist flat.
And this one's still arched back.
This would obviously be a very low shot, But this will get you the feeling of how to get your arms into this delivery position and releasing the club without flipping.
You'll see if you stand really tall and you start extending this arm early and the wrist early, you eventually run out of things to hit with here.
Of course, you're going to flip and scoop.
But as soon as I work on getting into this delivery position, palm out, elbow pit out, shoulder down.
Now I'm in a position where I can maintain those angles and have a lot left to release with.
All the greats do this.
Let's take a closer look at both the greats and some modern ball strikers to see this in action.
So you help to visualize it a little bit better and understand exactly what you're trying to do in your downswing.
All right, we'll start with Nellie Korda.
I know many of you are big fans of her swing, me included.
I love her golf swing.
It's amazing.
Take a look, first of all, as she gets into GDP.
Note the external rotation of the left arm and the right elbow pit facing straight at the camera.
So the left elbow is pointing down the target line.
The right elbow is pointing straight at the camera.
Now you can match that with the logo on the glove pointing straight at the camera.
The right palm facing straight at the camera.
This is the delivery position that you'll see all great players get into.
When we look at her from down the line, you're going to see the same thing.
The right elbow in close to the body, the left arm in an internally rotated position where the left shoulder you can see is protracted.
Notice how it's out away from the body.
The right shoulder is in close to neutral position.
And this is what allows her to get into that delivery area to be able to deliver the club, driving it through with that right hand.
You can see an obvious release and strike with the right hand there through the ball.
And that gets her to that full follow -through.
One other thing to note, you'll see this in some golfers.
Tony Finau is an example.
Korda is another example.
Notice how the lead arm is bent.
This is being driven or pushed by the trail arm and hand, really the trail hand and the shoulder body working together.
But that's why that left arm is bent.
It's internally rotated and it's in a bent position because the force, The driving force is coming from the trail hand, that allows it to stay in that more soft position as she comes down into impact.
And again, you see the GDP position right there as the hands get back in front of the thigh, the club roughly parallel to the ground, logo of the glove pointing toward the camera, right palm facing the camera, left elbow down the target line, right elbow pit pointing at the camera, and then continuing to drive that into the release.
As we look at her sister, Jessica, you're going to see the same great technique.
You're going to see that right shoulder starting to work down, the right elbow starting to work down to put the elbow in the pocket, the left arm maintaining that internal rotation.
And now as she gets into GDP, the left elbow is pointing down the target line, globe, logo of the glove and palm facing at the camera, right elbow pit facing out.
And this allows her, notice how much she's maintaining the flexion in that wrist.
Actually, that would be deviation would be the proper term, but you can see how the right wrist is still bent back.
And that's what is allowing her to continue to drive the club forward without flipping.
Is by getting that right shoulder and right elbow down lower to the ground that allows her to maintain those angles.
If her right shoulder was higher, That right wrist would have to be releasing a lot earlier because that would be the only way to get the club back to the ball.
Now let's take a look at Tiger coming down into impact.
Watch first of all, notice how his right shoulder is visible behind his head here.
Watch how quickly it disappears.
You see that?
This is working that right arm and elbow down into GDP.
And that's what gets his right shoulder so much closer to the ground, which allows him to maintain angle a lot longer to avoid a flip.
Now he's driving that wrist forward, that right wrist forward with that right shoulder low.
And that's maintaining the angle until after impact.
But you can again see that this delivery position is consistent amongst all great ball strikers.
The same thing, the left arm internally rotated, right elbow pit out, palm and back of the hand facing toward the camera.
Here's an awesome view of Jack Nicklaus from up above.
Now Jack was famous for having that flying right elbow.
So now would it be harder with that elbow position to be able to get that arm back into GDP?
Nope.
Watch.
Note how that right arm tucks right back into the body, gets him into the perfect delivery position at impact.
Well Sergio Garcia has always had a pretty unique swing, but you can see the exact same motion.
And this is a great angle.
Watch his right shoulder and arm.
Note how that's basically the only thing moving to initiate the downswing.
You see that?
He's getting that right elbow to start to work back down into the pocket and getting ready to get into GDP.
And of course he does, just like every other great ball striker.
Note how his right elbow is actually still back behind his pocket.
He's got it down and now he's going to begin to rotate everything together and start to move that right arm forward to maintain that angle.
And now he's in the perfect delivery position.
The left shoulder is still protracted, left arm internally rotated, gets into the release, And then a tremendous amount of rotation of the right hand, releasing over the left aggressively through the strike.
I mentioned Tony Finau earlier.
Let's take a look at his swing.
First of all, you're going to watch his right elbow drop big time.
He's getting ready to get into GDP, a powerful position to throw that club head from.
So his first thing he's doing is moving that right shoulder, right arm to get down.
And now as he gets into GDP, you're going to see the exact same thing.
Notice how internally rotated that left arm is elbow pointing down the target line, right elbow pit straight at the camera, back of the glove facing straight at the camera.
He's in the exact same position.
And because he's going to continue to drive with that right arm, He's going to be able to maintain that bend in that left arm and keep that club.
Face nice and square for a very long time.
Through the strike and then release in a tremendous amount of hand rotation after the strike.
Last and most certainly not least, one of my favorite swings of all time, Bobby Jones.
From up the line, it gives you a much better view of just the difference of where the lead arm is in the trail arm.
Notice how much lower the trail arm is than the lead arm.
This is a view, if you've studied anybody else like Mo Norman, Mo Norman believed that this was, he described this as his magic move.
And basically it was an oversimplification of it, Is that it's dropping that right elbow below the left so that the club can approach the ball from the inside.
And it also is that right shoulder drops lower.
It allows you to maintain a squarer path with that club longer.
So long story short, I'll get into more into that in a video another time.
But this view helps you understand how much lower that right arm works down into the ball, into the delivery area.
Right here, he's in GDP, right?
Basically there where he's clubs roughly parallel to the ground.
That right elbow is in his pocket, the left shoulder is protracted, and then he's going to be able to release the club with that trail hand from there.
And then you can see the left wrist breaks down so quickly.
In order for that to happen, you have to have very, very little tension in that left wrist.
So a lot of times, golfers who flip start trying to hold on to that club really tight with the left hand.
And this causes you to start to bow the wrist early in the backswing.
And then as I talk about it in the lead wrist extension video regarding the hack motion, you'll find out that you'll run out of wrist.
And then you'll actually start trying, you'll be forced to flip before impact by trying to bow your wrist too much too soon, unless you have a lot of body rotation, which I talk about in that video as well.
But long story short, this is obvious that they are throwing that club head at the ball from this GDP, obviously from the top and into GDP and releasing it very aggressively.
And that left wrist is relatively soft.
And that's why you saw in the swings of like Tony Finau and Nelly Korda that that left arm actually tends to stay really bent.
And it can't do that through tension per se.
The right arm has to be driving it, and the left arm has to be relatively not working super aggressively, super hard in order for you to maintain that position.
So work on visualizing this in your swing, Getting that right arm and shoulder and elbow down so that you can release the club from the inside and stop swinging over the top and start having a powerful position to be able to drive that club head forward, drive that hands forward, drive the handle forward so that you can get rid of your flip.
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Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
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