There has been significant discussion and debate surrounding Tiger Woods' more rounded backswing technique. Some confusion has arisen from the belief that Tiger has become a "one plane" swinger — which is partially true, but NOT by Jim Hardy's strict definition of the term.
What makes Tiger's swing "one plane" is that his swing plane is dictated entirely by the shaft angle at address. He swings the club on — or parallel to — that plane throughout his entire golf swing. Shortly after the takeaway is complete, Tiger shifts to a plane parallel to the address shaft plane and continues upward on that parallel track all the way to the top, as clearly visible in the photo below.
In the photo above, you can see that Tiger has shifted to a plane parallel to the shaft plane angle he established at address, as indicated by the red line — a beautifully consistent path from start to finish.
To achieve this, he swings his arms on a slightly more rounded path than he did while working with Butch Harmon, and the clubface rotates open throughout the backswing to maintain this flatter plane alignment.
As an interesting side note: during the telecast of the 2006 Tour Championship that Adam Scott won, one of the announcers mentioned that Butch Harmon had told Adam to start "fanning the clubface open" during the takeaway because it was lagging behind his hands too much. If you watched Adam that year, you could see him moving toward a more laid-off position similar to Tiger's at the top — and adding the forearm rotation during the takeaway was accelerating that transformation.
Whether other professionals admit it openly or not, when Tiger makes a swing change, the entire tour takes notice. At the 2006 Masters, I personally watched at least four players working on rotating the clubface open on the way back and getting more laid off at the top — one of whom was Padraig Harrington. Interestingly, while Harrington drilled this motion religiously in his practice swings, his actual swing did the exact opposite. Swing changes can be remarkably difficult to implement under pressure.
Back to Tiger's mechanics. From the face-on view, you can observe that Tiger has barely moved his hips during the backswing — a testament to his superior flexibility and core stability.
He maintains excellent width during the takeaway, as he always has. However, one notable difference in this version of his swing is how early his right arm disappears beneath his left. This is a direct byproduct of the clockwise forearm rotation he maintains throughout the backswing.
As he reaches the top of his swing, we get to see one of the key reasons Tiger's technique looks both distinctly different and remarkably efficient at the same time.
At the top of his swing, Tiger is undeniably in a flatter position with his left arm relative to his shoulders compared to his 2000-era technique. What makes this position truly unique is that the left arm, shaft, and clubface are all perfectly parallel to the shaft plane established at address — creating what appears to be a "laid off" look at the top of the backswing.
It is NOT actually a laid-off position. If Tiger continued his shoulder turn, the club would end up pointing directly down the target line. The laid-off appearance is simply an optical illusion created by the combination of his overall club movements and the shorter, more compact backswing.
Tiger's swing from the face-on angle appears very compact and completely under control. His hips have rotated only minimally, and his left arm has stopped at approximately the 10:30 position on an imaginary clock face — a model of efficiency and restraint.
Because of the more rounded nature of his current swing, many observers have mistakenly classified Tiger as a true "one planer." At the top of his backswing, while his position is significantly flatter than before, his left arm sits slightly above his shoulder plane — though the margin is minimal.
Tiger certainly has a spine angle steep enough to qualify as a one planer, and his shoulder turn plane at the top is excellent for that classification. However, it's important to understand that Hank Haney's methodology is concerned exclusively with the movements of the club throughout the swing — not with the relationship between the shoulders and the left arm. So the similarities to a one plane model are, in many ways, a fortunate coincidence of efficient mechanics rather than deliberate design. If you want to understand how your own backswing plane compares to Tiger's, a free AI swing analysis can show you exactly where your club tracks throughout the swing.
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Watch part 2 now to see how you're moving your body in the opposite direction of the pros!
