Peter Thomson (Video) - by Peter Finch
Peter Thomson (Video) - by Peter Finch

One of the very best golfers to come out of Australia is big hitting Peter Thomson. Now Peter Thomson is an Open legend winning five times in three of those years with consecutive victories. So a real love affair with the Open and that must means that his swing must certainly favor a links style of course. And when you look at his swing, there are certain things in there that would suggest he is very well built to play in windy conditions. One of the things that really stands out straightaway is the width of his stance. Big tall guy, big powerfully built man, but at the actual address position, his right foot is a long way away from his left, well outside the shoulders giving him a very, very stable base. Now one of the problems with having a very, very wide stance is it’s very hard to transfer the weight from the back foot to the front foot during the downswing, but this is one thing that Peter Thomson does very, very, very well.

Gets up to the top of the backswing, drives his way through very, very hard, to impact and then stretches out that right leg and really plants that toe down into the ground. It’s very, very interesting action and its a very, very hard one to repeat, but if you can get it right, the actual amount of stability available is greatly increased. And certainly when the wind is up and the conditions are as calm as they are here today, then it will certainly, certainly help you stay a lot more stable. So it’s getting that big wide stance, outside shoulder width, ball position here [Inaudible] [0:01:45] with the driver, and it’s making sure that the weight really drives forward onto the front foot during the downswing. The foot extends and really points down into the ground. If you can get all those factors working together, a lot of width and a lot of stability, and hopefully a lot of distance should be available to you.
2015-04-22

One of the very best golfers to come out of Australia is big hitting Peter Thomson. Now Peter Thomson is an Open legend winning five times in three of those years with consecutive victories. So a real love affair with the Open and that must means that his swing must certainly favor a links style of course. And when you look at his swing, there are certain things in there that would suggest he is very well built to play in windy conditions. One of the things that really stands out straightaway is the width of his stance. Big tall guy, big powerfully built man, but at the actual address position, his right foot is a long way away from his left, well outside the shoulders giving him a very, very stable base. Now one of the problems with having a very, very wide stance is it’s very hard to transfer the weight from the back foot to the front foot during the downswing, but this is one thing that Peter Thomson does very, very, very well.

Gets up to the top of the backswing, drives his way through very, very hard, to impact and then stretches out that right leg and really plants that toe down into the ground. It’s very, very interesting action and its a very, very hard one to repeat, but if you can get it right, the actual amount of stability available is greatly increased. And certainly when the wind is up and the conditions are as calm as they are here today, then it will certainly, certainly help you stay a lot more stable. So it’s getting that big wide stance, outside shoulder width, ball position here [Inaudible] [0:01:45] with the driver, and it’s making sure that the weight really drives forward onto the front foot during the downswing. The foot extends and really points down into the ground. If you can get all those factors working together, a lot of width and a lot of stability, and hopefully a lot of distance should be available to you.