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Golf Impact Position Down the Line
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As I discussed in the video on Impact Alignments Face On, impact is everything in RST. All the work we do at setup, the takeaway, the backswing, etc. is all to lead to tour caliber impact position to produce powerful, penetrating golf shots. In fact, you can do a lot of things technically wrong in the swing and arrive at a perfect impact position everytime and still play great golf. The key is that all things we work on in the setup, backswing, etc. make achieving this ideal impact position more repeatable with less effort.
- The club should be square to the path at impact
- Tilt in the swing plane affects the path, causing in-to-out or out-to-in shots
- Hip spinners need to drill keeping both hips and shoulders square at impact
- Glutes should be engaged at impact, right arm straightening
- Use an impact bag to drill and a mirror to check impact alignments
impact is everything in the golf swing and from down the line you can see a lot of things that tell the truth about what you've done on going back when you're at impact so if we do everything right going back it doesn't necessarily guarantee that we're in a perfect impact position but it makes things a lot easier to get there but getting there and understanding what there is is the key and that's what we're going to talk about here is what are the alignments that you're looking for at impact what positions what are you looking for when you look at your swing in the mirror or on video to put yourself in an ideal position impact so looking from down the line we're going to talk about what those positions are so a couple things here one most of this information is going to be geared towards hip spinners because it's the most common problem for members on the website the students that i teach it's typically a better players problem so if you're not a hip spinner then i'm going to address some things specific to you but most of this and i'll point out which isn't directed towards hip spinners it's going to be directed towards guys who really tend to fire push off the right side too much okay so let's look at where we're trying to be in an ideal world at impact the goal and really what we're trying to do is make sure that that club is coming down i grab another club here at some point for a brief period of time it is coming down on square to the path or close to square to the path of where we're trying to get the ball to start online so if i'm swinging way from the inside my club's approaching the ball way from the inside my path is working this way way into out the ball is going to want to tend to start on that line unless i do something with a club face to flip it to save it to bring it back around obviously we don't want to do that most golfers higher handicappers coming over the top and so their path is going this way and so the ball is going to want to start left of the target line we want to make golf really simple it's hard enough as it is the more that you get the ball starting online the easier everything is to get the ball starting online you need a path that's pretty close to zero degrees in relationship to your target line this might be 20 degrees into out this might be 20 degrees out to end now we want to get as close to zero as we can what dictates that a large part is what the plane is doing so if my plane is if you imagine the back of my hand here if my plane is square to my path or my plane is in this direction i will come down with a zero degree angle uh path as i tilt my plane this way so now the back of my hand is pointing this way my swing plane is tilted i'm going to swing into out so when we're doing that we've got all kinds of problems and we we have to really do a lot of work to try and time everything to get the ball to come back towards our target no need to do that when we can just work on getting everything right and get the right plane and path so the most common destroyer of getting that path tilted or the plane tilted so it's no longer here it's angled back this way for most better players is for hip spinning they get to the top of the swing and then it's first first move down as they fire their hips as fast as they can their arms can't catch up right heels way off the ground hips are way open and now my my plane is tilted and now my path is going to be approaching the ball from in to out and it's going to lead to a ball that wants to start right at the target line and hopefully comes back a lot of times it doesn't and it's going to lead to a higher ball flight because your angle of attack is going to be shallower so this is no bueno we don't want to be spinning our hips and then hope to flip the face back the exact right amounts trying to draw the ball back to the target line so what you're going to feel when we look at impact for most of our better players and most players on the website as they sit down and coming down the downswing and they're pulling those arms down they feel that their hips are very square or even shut in relationship to the target line so if i match up my shafts here just putting this across my thigh this would be square this is open and this is closed you will feel if you're a hip spinner that you are basically keeping this shut remember the belt buckle drill in the hip spinners video you're keeping your hips shut as you come down to give your arms time to get back in front of your body so now i can bring the club down on plane and now as it's on plane my path is square now i just have to worry about the club face angle so now if you're not a hip spinner and you see yourself usually being square at impact you need to work on getting your hips to rotate through and getting your hips open at impact but most of the golfers again on the website and the students that we teach don't struggle with that it's the opposite so what we're feeling coming down getting into impact this is what you're going to drill at impact is that your hips are basically square they'll tend to still be 20 30 40 even 45 degrees open but you want to drill that they stay square so that you can get your arms back in front of your body this is critical so now if my arms are back in front of my body my right foot is just rolling slightly in my shoulders should also now be square in relationship to my target line if they're very open my hips are going to be open i'm going to be struggling coming from too much from the inside so here's what we're looking for at impact the right arm should also now at this point be almost completely straight it's straightening through impact and the release is when it gets fully straightened shoulders are square hips are going to be square glutes are contracted just like in the impact alignments face on video and that should be impact so from down the line there's not a whole lot to check here other than making sure that you're going to drill that your hips are square glutes are engaged shoulders are square right arms basically straightening now the opposite of that is going to look like my hips are open my right elbow is tucked in close to my side and it's very bent and now i've got to do something to try and save it your right elbow should be away from your body because you remember to throw the ball drill getting your right arm to release to get some speed in there and now we're in a good impact position so check yourself in the mirror with those impact alignments and see whether or not you're getting yourself open you need to diagnose whether or not you're a hip spinner and start working on these impact alignments you can use an impact bag to do it and it will help you get much better compression on the ball and get you starting the ball on the target line
Kevin
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