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Understanding Shoulder Blade Glide
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If you have questions about exactly what the shoulder blade glide is or what it should feel like, this video is the answer.
- Shoulder blade glide is a movement toward center - down and in toward the spine
- Pulling from the right keeps you centered and permits full shoulder turn
- The same movement is used when throwing a ball
- When it's all the way back, the shoulder blade is connected to the core, ready to be transported forward on the downswing
One of the key components for the rotary swing is to rotate staying centered around your spine.
And one of the ways that we've talked about doing that, the primary way, is using that right shoulder blade glide for right-handed golfers moving down and in towards the spine.
And a lot of people have misunderstood it.
So I'm going to explain exactly what's happening and why we do things that way.
It's very, very simple.
One, if you look at the muscles that you have in your body to rotate around your spine.
So imagine my left arm is my spine here.
Your shoulder blades sit on either side of your spine.
If you glide that shoulder blade, it has full mobility.
It can move all over.
It can move up away from the spine.
It can move in.
It can move down.
And what we're doing is we're obviously wanting to stay centered around the spine as we rotate.
So we have a fixed axis, a fixed point in three-dimensional space.
So that our golf swing, we can take out all the moving parts and stay centered so we can make clean contact every time.
Well, that shoulder blade glide moving in towards your spine does a couple things.
One, it allows you to create some initial movement or the origin of movement to rotate around your spine and pull you in towards your spine.
So what that looks like, if I really exaggerate and just pull my right shoulder back, you can see that my head as I turn is hardly, it's not moving at all.
And I'm only focusing on the muscles in my back, which basically what's actually attached to your shoulder blade here is your lower trap muscle.
And so that trap can actually pull that shoulder blade in towards your spine.
So right now I'm just moving my shoulder blade.
What that's doing is creating movement or rotational movement around your spine and getting the motion kicked off.
It's not the only movement in the takeaway because your obliques are also working.
And so these sets of muscles are actually what are designed to really rotate your torso.
But we need something to make sure that we stay really centered.
A lot of times golfers really move during the takeaway from that left side and they push everything across their body.
And so they get to the top of the swing and this is what they look like.
And they haven't made a full shoulder turn solely because they're just moving from the left side.
If you move from the right side, it's very easy to make full shoulder turn.
Okay.
So that shoulder blade glide is the initial movement for that.
So that's the first piece.
It helps trigger everything, get everything to make sure that you're going to make a full turn and you're going to stay centered doing so.
The second thing is that that movement actually is a spine stabilizer.
So when you move your shoulder blade in, It helps mix your spine in a position that's safe for it and allows it to be protected during a lot of the violent motions that happen during the golf swing.
The golf swing is a hard motion on your body and especially when you're repeating it thousands and thousands of times.
You need to protect your joints and your muscles and things as much as you can.
The second, the last thing, the third thing is if I grab a golf ball here, what you'll notice is that if I were to take this ball and throw it, my shoulder blade would mimic the exact same movement that I'm advocating in the golf swing.
So I'm going to turn my back to the camera here and you're going to see that as I was stepping into a throw ball as far as I could, my shoulder blade, without me even thinking about it instinctually, would move back down and in.
So my shoulder blade is here.
As I go to throw a ball, my shoulder blade moves back down and in, connects me to my core, my big muscles as that shoulder blades down and in.
And as I go to fire my hips and throw the ball, that shoulder blade is locked down and in the exact same spot that we want for the golf swing.
Because we're going to be able to use these big muscles when that shoulder blade is down and in and connected to the box to apply power to the golf club.
This is what's so important about this movement.
Apart from creating rotation, stabilizing the spine, and all these things, it's a natural athletic motion that you know how to do instinctually already.
You just don't know how to do it with a golf club yet.
So if you go outside and you just try and throw a few balls, you'll notice that your shoulder blade goes all the way down and in towards your spine, and you can start to feel this movement.
It's the same thing you want to feel in the golf swing.
Okay?
So as you're going rotating back, you want to feel that shoulder blade really lock down and in because this is a fundamental piece for power in the golf swing.
So those are the three primary functions of it, but you don't need to overdo it.
It's not that you're trying to go in there and just really wrench that shoulder blade down and in.
That's not the correct movement.
That's making it too robotic.
It's a very athletic movement.
When you go to throw a ball, you don't think, okay, I'm going to really pull my shoulder blade down and in and now, okay, I'm going to lunge and try and throw.
Of course not.
You don't want to do that in the golf swing either.
It's the same fluid gliding motion as throwing, and that's what you want to try and envision when you're moving that shoulder blade.
And it doesn't hit to the point where it stops moving until you're all the way at the end and your hips are starting to go back the other way.
That's where you get that differential between your upper body and lower body.
That's when your shoulder blade kind of hits the wall and can't go back any further.
And now it's being literally, as it can't move back any further, it's being transported or your shoulder, all of this delivery package is being transported forward by your hip and torso turn, and then it releases.
So that's really what you're doing with the shoulder blade glide is that you're just slowly gliding it back as your torso, your obliques are firing and pulling everything back, your shoulder blade's moving back.
And then when you get to the top of the swing and the hips are going, that shoulder blade's in a great position to allow you to bring the club back down with some power.
So take some time to really feel that.
Go out on the range and instead of hitting balls in the range, try throwing a couple and feel what your shoulder blade's actually doing.
And you'll find it's the exact same motion.
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