Restore the Athleticism in Your Swing Like this Former NFL QB

Do you ever feel like your natural athleticism doesn't quite make the transfer over to your golf swing? Well, you're not alone, but this live lesson will show you how to get it back!

Well, we dive into this lesson. I wanted to do a quick intro to show you what we're really covering through this 30 minute live lesson. This is Aaron Murray. If some of you may know him, he played football for the university of Georgia and was played in the NFL and obviously is a superb athlete, but like so many great athletes. When you pick up a golf club, a lot of times that athleticism just seems to disappear for some reason. And so I talk about that in this lesson and I, and I start to get Aaron to understand how to use his body. Obviously, as a quarterback, this guy knows how to throw, right? So there's no question that this guy has superior athletic ability knows how to move his body in the right kinematic sequence. But when you put the golf club in the hand and both hands are on the club, all of a sudden, a lot of that stuff gets lost.

And so what I'm going to show you is how we got that back in this short lesson. So just a quick run through of what you're going to see before we dive in. So on the left is, is before swings, right? When we started, you'll see this at the beginning of the lesson. And what you'll notice is something that's super, super common for golfers, all amateur golfers at all levels tend to fire their arms and shoulders from the top and never really use their legs because they don't understand how to get the arms and the legs and lower body to work together nicely. And that's what you're going to learn in this lesson. So what I had him do, what you'll see here is his hands basically trace almost a straight line path from the top to the ball. And this is super, super common.

And if you're a type of golfer who swings over the top, your hands are probably even going outside of this line even more. But you can see here that the club and the hands never really shallow out, they come straight down and he is basically square with his hips. It impact. So he's really just relying on his arms and shoulders, musculature alone, which he's strong enough as you'll see, he produces tons of speed, but he's doing it in a very inefficient way. You'll also notice watches the watch, just the mat, move back and forth here. Do you see how the mat is moving away from the target? This is something that we is really cool to see because you can see it actually moving. But when we look at using swing catalyst, the 3d motion plate, we can't the plate. Doesn't obviously move it.

We can measure that torque that he's generating on the mat. Now, of course, this is a remote lesson. He's in Georgia, I'm in Colorado. And so we didn't, didn't have a chance to get him in person on the map, but you could see the actual representation of what that torque would look like in that last video, where I was talking about how you know, we use our feet and the ground for leverage and torque. You can see that actually happening here. And when you're very shouldery and very arms dominant from the top, your shoulders are gonna try to turn really fast and your hips are actually going to try and turn the opposite direction to get those muscles to fire more aggressively. So that's what you'll see have happening here. A few times in the lesson, as this is moving back and forth.

So again, club just, doesn't shallow out. It's just firing from the top. Now let's look at after swing on the right now, of course, these are drills. Some of these are exaggerations, but you'll see that the massive change and what you'll notice is it, as he starts to come down and begins to feel how to use his legs and load up to throw that right arm, which I have a video on the side, I published over a decade ago, called the throw the ball drill. And I showed how it leads to massive increases of speed. When you understand how to do this drill correctly. And you'll see now that his hands actually look like they're falling now, of course, they're gravity is being assisted in that he's loading up to throw. But the big thing is that his lower body has a chance to lead the downswing.

And that's what creates this look of the hands, instead of going out toward the ball, traveling what that initial phase and what looks like a more or less straight line path straight down, which you can see me talking about in the lesson here. So you can see now his hands, instead of going straight out to the ball, they're staying back, he's getting, it's buying his time for his legs to begin, to turn, to shift, to post, and then he's able to get into an excellent position at impacted delivery position. You see the club shallows out before it was going right through his shoulder and then straight to the ball. Now it's going down through the shoulder, through the bicep, through the forearm, and then coming from the inside for a great release. And now you can see his hips are much more open than they were here on the left. He's in a much better impact position. So now let's dive into lesson and let me show you how you can do this in your own swing and how we got Aaron to start swinging like an athlete. Again,

I've been enjoying, I became a member of the the swing pet plan about a month ago, maybe less three weeks ago, and been working on it and feeling, feeling better. Obviously there's a lot to work on. But it's been, it's been a really cool kind of fall along with the five steps. And but I figured it needs some live lessons to, to help out as well. So looking forward to it.

Sure. What set down a little about your game? What, what's your handicap right now?

I am an eight handicap. 

You know, just want

To be more consistent, you know, like the other day I, you know probably drives, I played yesterday and I would say probably about 67% of my drivers are good. And then a couple of them, you know, three or four, you're just like, what the hell happened there? You know, and same thing with the iron plates, just trying to get more consistent. I think the more I get a more consistent swing that should help out a lot. And then obviously I've got to continue to work on just around the greens and learn how to score a little bit better. But for me, I think a big issue is for every little part, you know, I don't feel like I load properly from the start. Just that might screw up my down swing a little bit and obviously not getting as good as contact as I want. I hit the ball pretty high, probably too high. Both with all my clubs. It just it's, it's just, it's like a moon rocket up there. So maybe not make it as clean as contact and as pure as contact as I need to.

Okay. Well, let's let's take a look kind of dive right in. So I see you hit balls there. I want to record you hit a couple balls and then if we can get face on and down the line, even if we hit a ball, if you can just make a practice swing one way, that'll be clinic. You want me to hit a ball or just practice swing? If you can hit a ball. That's great. Let's

Do that. Yeah. Yeah. I got it. I got a net in here, so

Awesome. My,

As soon as quarantine hit, I was like, I need a golf man in my down here so I can do something with my life. So.

Cool. All right. Great swing. Let's do one down, down the line and even if you don't, yeah,

I'm on a tr I to my phone's on a tripod. So it's easy to move. You just tell me where you want me to go.

Oh, perfect. Yeah, that's perfect, dude. You got some awesome speed. You're going to be fun to work with. You can be a little bit cleaner contact and we'll be good to go. Yeah, I don't take,

I don't take divots in front of the ball. That's yeah, that's probably, yeah,

That's it. It's a little bit static, but I'm going to this. You're going to be easy to get going on the right track. So long stories. Can you see your screen here? Yep. So right now, when you start the club back, your lower body is taken a nap. Okay. And this is really what the detrimental thing is in your swing because you're super fit and powerful and you can make a lot of club head speed, but you're doing it all with your upper body. Okay. And so you're creating a lot of torque because you're S you're turning your shoulders really hard. If your lower body isn't doing anything, it's very, very hard to be a very consistent golfer like that now, because the sequencing is always going to be a little bit off. And so you're always kind of just relying on your hand-eye coordination.

And so what I want to do is get your lower body working because everything else is fantastic. Yeah. So your legs are like totally quiet here. Yeah. And the arms start down, it's all arms firing there. So your hips are almost like dead squared impact. So, all right. So this is going to be fun to get your work. So your whole swing right now, the only thing that's initially, if your swing plane is fine, position at the top is fine. Your lag is fine. Your speed is fine. Your shoulders are fine. All that stuff is fine. What's not, is everything happening from your belly button down? Yeah, it's all that works. You'll always kind of be stuck. You will, you will be stuck at the handicap level that you're at the ball striking level that you're at. You will never be able to kind of do better than what you're doing right now, but you're, you physically have the ability to play at a very raw high level with the speed that you're able to produce.

And the athleticism that you have, you can play to a scratch or plus handicap, no problem from a ball striking perspective. Once you learn how to use your legs. So the easiest way to think about this to me, for somebody who like you, who moves really well uses their body, their upper body really well is throwing a ball because this is the thing that's missing. I'm sure you've probably played other sports. You look athletic. If you've ever thrown a ball in your life, this stuff is going to make a lot of sense. Really fast. Well, yeah, just, just, just background. I 

This is, this is why it's frustrating. Cause I feel like I should use my lower body better. I actually played quarterback for university of Georgia. And then I played the NFL for three years. So you would think, I would know how to use my lower body in the golf swing because I use it so much throwing a ball. But for some reason in my mind, I think, I think for so long when I first picked up a club, cause I've only been playing for two years is I was so scared. Initially I was swaying. I had a bad sway. So then I think I just taught myself. Okay, let's just not do that. So then I got stuck using too much upper body because I was so worried about the suede

Super common and listen, I've taught everybody under the sun from different. I mean I've taught Neil Anderson who obviously replaced Walter Peyton at the bears. And why I've thought work with Michael Jordan, you name it. I've worked with all these different guys who are phenomenal athletes and horrible golfers. And the correlation is shockingly similar, but it's always the same stuff. As soon as you put both hands on the club and you don't get that natural step that you get in baseball or throwing motion, all of a sudden people don't know how to move. And it's like the difference between learning how to ski versus learning, how to snowboard for the first time. If somebody has never done any snow sport, you put them on skis first because they don't understand how to move their body without their feet being allowed to move. And the same thing is true of golf.

As soon as you put somebody who's super athletic, which obviously you are, and you put a golf club in their hands, they swing from here up and that's it. But the cool thing, you already know how to do everything I'm about to teach you. So you're going to figure this crap out really fast. So understanding the sequence is nothing more than this. The dynamicism that's missing in your swing is happening because your shoulders are so tight and loaded at the top. That there's nothing else for that to be able to stretch. And when you were throwing a football, you obviously know that your upper body, your arm was traveling backwards while your hips were moving. Yeah. The transition in the golf swing, and this is the thing that nobody gets, right? And then the point is you can't get it right? If your muscles aren't allowed to stretch, if there's nowhere else for them to go, they're already fully maxed out and you start down while everything kind of goes together.

So what I want you to do at first is we're going to do some right arm, only stuff just to get you there. The sequencing again, which is nothing more than my right arms going back while my hips are turning and beginning to shift, I'm going to exaggerate some of this stuff. So it's easy to see my hips are turning and then beginning to shift back to the left. And then as my right arm is still kind of traveling back as I begin to turn, that's what brings my right arm down as I turn my hips a little bit, but my arm is still not doing anything yet. Then once I begin to post up on this left leg, if you were to throw a ball straight at the ground, it would, I promise you for, especially for somebody like you, it would be impossible for you to not post up on this left leg and push this hip out of the way as your right arm, extended you, the natural throwing motion. But what you're doing right now is literally just I'm exaggerating a little bit, but it's that right? And this isn't working. So what I want you to do, we're going to get you to feel a sidearm, throw down at the ground. As soon as you have that your lower body is going to work. So grab one of those balls. I'm going to have you literally throw it.

And so just show me throwing a ball at, down at the ground

Is a camera you want closer. Is that good?

No, it's perfect right there. Okay. So don't think about balls at all. I want you to imagine a sidearm throw to a ball down at the ball at address. Do you want me to do the whole back swing? Yeah. All nine yards and throw it. Yep. Go ahead and throw that puppy. Okay. Pretty good. Do it again. I do it with some zip. Let me take a quick look at that one. All right. So, so now at least going back during the back swing, your legs are working before they were literally your right leg. Didn't move at all. Now look as you, as you begin to shift back to the left, your right hand is still actually going back, right? Whereas before you didn't shift at all and your right hand was firing down dramatically already. Now what we need is this, this post up move.

You're not quite, you're hanging back on the right a little bit. You don't want that left leg. You're still creating a lot of shoulder turn. And so you're throwing a little bit more over the top, like a, an overhand thrill. And this is a little bit more of a side sidearm skipping some rocks. Bingo. Exactly. Because if you throw straight down, you need to think about where your hips need to move. If he throws straight down, you won't necessarily post up. If you're coming from the side this way to get the shoulders steeper, the left hip naturally clears out of the way. Okay. So show me that, there you go. A little better. So your left hip cleared out better.

Good. One more. All right, cool. So now we're going to tweak this drill justice a little bit, because I do want you to actually start getting the feeling of throwing it at the ball on the ground. But what I want to do first is just wake up your lower body, right? Yes. So now you obviously have a natural sequence, your lower bodies and way out in front, the arms or chill it out. And now you see all your left leg is totally posted up. You're still hanging back on the right a little bit, but this is your hips or turn. And so now the legs are working, but how do we do this with an actual golf club in a, in a golf ball. So right now you're kind of throwing out there. Yep. And the feeling is actually throwing down here. Gotcha. Because obviously at some point, what we're really doing is throwing the club, head at the golf ball. Speed comes from. So as I'm doing this, I want to get used to the feeling of staying down an end so that your hips naturally go back and up and you're throwing the ball down here. That same keeping your posture. Gotcha. So let's do a couple more, then I'm gonna have you do it with a golf club, right? So more just throw it right down in front of me. Yep, exactly. There you go.

Great. Now grab a golf club and I want you to replicate that feeling with the golf, but with your right hand only for right now, again, just like that. Now show me some speed with that lower body. There we go. All right. Now you're starting to look like an athlete. Again. Golf has an incredible ability to, to make you not look athletic. Trust me. So, yes. So now you're naturally shifting your weight into this right leg. I didn't tell you to do anything. I just said, make a natural throwing motion. And so this is the one you just did, right? Arm throw with the club and naturally go back and you immediately shift in your right hip, which you can see. If you can of look at some of the little black spots in the concrete and the law, you shift to the right. Naturally you load up your lower, body's leading everything down and you post up and you release the club and your hips are working. Whereas before, at this point in the swing, like your hips, literally still hadn't moved. So this is giving they're closed. Yeah, they, yeah, you're literally shut. And you can see, look, watch just the mat. And I know you're not swinging at full speed, but watch how the mat moves. Doesn't really move a whole lot. Now watch if I share the other one. So here's where you started wants during the down swing.

You see how the mat is turning back away from the target here. Yep. So what this is is torque. So when you swim really upper body dominant you're lower body is always going to move in the opposite directions. Your upper body is when your upper body dominant upper. Body's trying to turn this way. So your lower body literally tries to turn the opposite way to create torque. And that's how you're creating a lot of speed. So you're creating a ton of torque in your swing, but which is great to a degree, but you don't need that much torque. This is all upper body toric, right? So now as you use your lower body to get a throwing motion, it's a way less effort compared to creating a ton of torque from the ground. Like if you played on this, like a wet grass, you didn't have golf shoes on you like totally your feet would slip out.

You're creating so much torque there. So instead, now we need to get used to that. You're moving in a proper sequence, which you are now to get that throwing motion, throwing the club down at the ball and feeling how your legs naturally move. I didn't have to tell you that to shift and turn you did it because you know how to throw. So you get used to this feeling of this right arm extending while the left leg goes back. These two are like synonymous motions. All you need to do then is get the left hand to play nicely with that and getting to throw that, throw that club for the speed. The left-hand is then just there to provide control of the club face. Whereas right now you're using it to yank the club down and turn your shoulders really fast. You have all this torque of the mat twisting in the other direction you can do is we're going to do a few practice swings, right arm only. I want you to try to get some zip into it like you really well. And then I want to get the left hand in there.

Nice. Really good dude. Now get your left hand to just lightly touch the club for a moment and do the same drill, but I want you to feel the same sequence. Okay. That one was better. What'd you feel different that time?

I felt more of a load that time. I felt the time before I didn't really get loaded back up in the right, the right

Leg. So when you did it right on moly, your sequence is perfect. First two swings left arm only. You started to kind of use your shoulders again because you have both hands on the club. Last one. When you said you felt like you loaded more than the right side, that's the initial start of that kinematic sequence of the throwing motion. But when you put your leg, you kind of threw that away for a second, but you got it back on the last one. It was great.

Yeah. I just kinda feel that athleticism loading into that side and then

Hips fighter. Yeah, exactly. There you go. Nice. Can we, can we video one of these from down the line? Yeah. You want right-hand only, or both? Let's do both. Just like the double check. Is that good? Perfect. Let's do right our mole at first. Good. Love it. All right. Let's take a quick look at the down the line there. Last one. Okay. So now you can see your lips are turning way more in the backswing and now they're actually getting open a lot more open. You can actually just stepped up more. Yeah. You see how you're a little bit, you're a little bit steep coming down. So right out of that club, isn't shallowing out. I'm going to explain that in just a second, but your hands are just a little fast. And so that the club chef's coming through the shoulder at this point, it should be more through your bicep and dropping underneath into the form. And so it's just a little bit steep. And so that's deeply, this is not buying enough time for your hips to get as open as they should. Okay. Really, really close. This is a million times better. You look a lot more freed up through the release. It's a lot better.

Well, that's it. That's one of the first ones are there?

Yeah,

Cause I didn't hit a ball that last one.

Oh yeah. I must have stopped recording on that one. So it was the, it was the first down the line with both hands on. Okay. So now what I was talking about with the shaft, getting steep, if you start firing your arms down soon, the hips just simply don't have physically enough time to get out of the way, right? Like, Nope. There's just not enough time in space. So what we've got to do is the hips have got to have a little bit more of a headstart. And what I want you to feel is not that your arms are firing hard from the top. Cause that would be the same thing. As you loading up to throw a football and then doing this before your hips have time to move, right? So there's just no power at all. Arm speed. You have a lot of arm speed, but you're going to be kept.

I mean, you're not going to ever going to swing at the speed that you're capable of using your body because you're just relying on your arm musculature. Right? So we have to be a little bit more patient from this part of the downswing to, to buy time for these hips, to get more out of the way. And a way of thinking about doing that is understanding how the shaft needs to shallow on the down swing to get it to come down. So if you were to throw a ball, I can assure you, your wrist would go back. Like this would hinge back dynamically and then rotate a little bit to get you into this sidearm throat position versus just throwing straight over the top. Yep. So what that looks like with the club to an exaggeration is I would go back and then my hand would shallow out. My right wrist would hinge back and my right wrist would rotate a little bit and you can see what that does to the shaft.

It causes the club to look like it's shallowing out. And then it's coming from the inside. And then I have all of this extra release in my wrist, but it also is buying me the time is I'm not trying to fire the club, head back to the ball. I'm letting the club shallow out so that I can release it from the inside. So go to the top and I want you to feel how your right wrist would naturally throw ball. You want one hand or two hand, one hand right now. Okay. Just go into the top and stop for a second. Now feel how your right wrist would hinge back. If you were throwing a baseball at the ground. Yeah. Hinge back and it would rotate. Exactly. So you're there while you're doing this, your hips would be going right? Yes. That's what I want you to feel.

There you go. And keep the hips posted. Yep, exactly. There. That's what brings the club down from the inside. There you go. Exactly. Perfect. Now take a look at the difference in the swing plane on that one, compared to what you were doing before I go to the last one. All right. So we know normally that the would be going right through your right shoulder. Yes. Way, way more Snell. Obviously you wouldn't be able to get it this shallow with your left hand actually on the club. Yeah, but we want to exaggerate it when it's right. And only be now you can see right through your right forearm and your hips are already open. Now the club's coming down on plane. Your hips have a chance. Now we can see more of the left butt cheek. And now the club's releasing from the inside instead of coming a little bit steep. So this keeping that arm back, letting the hips lead and keeping that wrist hinge back allows the club to shallow out. And you, if you compare that to where you were just commiserating

Weight steep before through the shoulder

Is way steeper. Yeah. So now you can see the sequence of it before. And this is after doing some right arm work. So this is way better than where you actually started because now at least your legs are working, but you can see the hands just immediately start going out toward the ball. And so now you're coming in a little bit over the top a little bit after closed hips are really shut. Yeah, exactly. Because they just don't have enough time. Yep. So this sequence that you're feeling is really cool in my opinion is exactly how you would throw a ball, your wrist, the natural wrist action. Is this right? Yes.

Yeah, exactly. And as I'm doing that, I'm just letting my hips lead the way so that I can throw that ball naturally get the zip from the wrist. Okay. So let your right arm, as you're doing this, let your right arm get brought down into your side by your hip movement. Don't try to bring you out. Don't try to bring the right arm down. Let the hips bring the arm down first. Gotcha. In that initial phase, there you go. That should pull the right elbow in closer to your body. If your hips are out in front, right there. Yeah, exactly. Now when you're doing this, right-hand only, it's going to be pretty extreme because your right arm. Yes. Out here, but that's okay to feel that once you put your left arm on there, it won't be so extreme. Yeah. There you go. You want me to try a left or just keep doing it? Right? Try left. Go ahead and try to get all the way down into impact is one move. Gets your hips out of the way. Okay. There you go. That's what I wanted to see. Good. Again. There we go. Let's take a quick look at that one. How does that feel? I'm feeling more that arm, that

Right arm thinking, you know, come into that slot, like a side-on throw and then the hips do feel a little bit more open. Yes. I hope they're open. They feel open.

Well, looking at the difference in the transition alone, see what you'll see in almost every great ball striker that's ever played the game during the transition, their hands look like they literally almost go vertically, straight down and every amateur on the planet, their hands look like they go straight out for the ball, right? That's just a golden rule of golf. And you can see that your club is just shallowing out in your hands are dropping, but your legs are doing a lot. Yes. But your arms are just chilling out there, waiting for the hips to deliver some power and get them turned. And now you can see it hit your way more open and the club, all right. I said, it should go down through the bicep and then down through the form. And now we have some literature, hips, holy smokes. That looks

Pretty good compared to what it started with

Rather than you can play on tour. Looking like that.

That's a lot, a lot, a lot more room to get some power in the club head through.

Absolutely. And it's just the sequencing of this. That's allowing for that room to be created instead of like before your arms were way extended out away from you, but it's because you were throwing them out there. And so now if you pretty much look like Cameron champion impact here, this is what, how he's getting there. And now as we see the release, the release is perfect. You're posted up your hips are perfectly open, perfect, straight off on the money. So the sequencing of this, so all we want you to focus on learn like a bunch of technical mechanical mumbo jumbo. You're an athlete. Let's swing like an athlete and use your body to sequencing that you already know how to do, because trust me, I can take somebody who's not, not the avenue. You want to take me a year to get them just to do what you just did. So it can advantage of that and get this feeling of how this, how your hips would naturally work to get into a sidearm throw. It's not throwing from the top. It's that throwing motion to get your hips out of the way and bring this arm down into delivery. Exactly. Like you just did, then you're golden. That's all you need to do.

Sweet. Awesome. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And those videos look a lot better too. So it's encouraging that's for sure.

It's dramatic the golf swing. I know it can be like the most frustrating thing on the freaking planet. I can assure you. It's almost always just sequencing. If you don't sequence things correctly, then you're just chasing your tail, trying to find one band-aid after the other. Once you will know how to move your body correctly in a throwing motion, not really rocket science. And

So would you recommend right now continue just to work on that just the one hand, get that feeling over and over again, and then slowly start adding the left-hand end there. And same thing just to afterwards, once we kind of had that feeling of getting the arm to drop in their hips open and then come in through

Exactly. I think for you being a natural thrower that doing this right arm only at first will be really, really natural. It'll it'll build up that, that muscle memory a lot quicker of getting your hips to lead, because it's very easy to do that with your right arm, only for the left arm on there. It becomes a little bit more tricky to feel that it's very easy for your shoulders to get tight. And now that you have both arms on the club, you can create all that torque that you're doing before and try to turn your shoulders for speed. And that happens. You can't really do that with your ride. Our home, it feels really funky. So, you know, do five or 10 swings right on our hallway and then try a couple left-hand as long as it still looks the same. And you still have that, shallowing motion of feeling how your arms getting into that side arm fro, you know, you can keep the left arm on there, but you'll find a couple of times when you go to hit balls that if you see your hands start tracing back out to the ball, instead of looking like they'd drop straight down, then you know your arm.

So

A good visual for me will be, you know, that over the top, through the shoulder compared to letting it come down, go through the bicep forearm, and then 

Exactly. Yep, exactly. And you'll get a recording of this. If you go back and look at the end where we just showed your down the line view, and it was spot on to her Gallagher, perfect. This will be a good reminder of exactly where you should be and how open your hips should be at impact. And they will get that open if you follow that throwing sequence.

Awesome. All right. I will look for that video, watch that and keep working on it and then maybe get another lesson with you here in the next week or two and see if we can progress it some more. All right, man. Sounds good. I appreciate it, man.

You bet. Talk to you later. See ya.