Pete Styles – PGA Teaching Pro
For some issues relating to this head staying too still that a golfer needs to understand because if they’re focused solely on keeping their head perfectly still in the golf swing, it will have some potential issues for them. So the first one is going to be a restricted backswing, if you’re setting up to the golf ball here and you’re focused on absolutely maintaining head position, no movement at all. Unless you have a great level of flexibility, you’re going to find that your backswing can be a little bit impeded and be quite short. So a golfer that’s focused on keeping his head perfectly still will often turn and get quite restricted here. The left shoulder has no flexibility to turn under the chin for the right handed golfer and they tend to find they’re a little bit short in the backswing.
Generally speaking, keeping the head still is also going to encourage the golfer to keep the knees and the legs and the hips still and then we find very, very limited rotation coming back here. With the golfer who struggles with that rotation a little bit, might be better if the head moves back and slightly upwards so very slightly to the right, very slightly upwards and then suddenly the golf swing can complete its backswing to generate a lot more power on the downswing these real marginal movements, we’re not asking the golfer to stand way up and move way off the ball and then die pocket it of course. But keeping your head perfectly fixed in your backswing if you struggle with rotational issues is going to cause a very, very short backswing. Likewise on the downswing, if their head isn’t allowed to move at all in the downswing, swinging down towards the golf ball can cause restrictions in how much the body can turn and therefore, a loss of club head speed. So you’ll actually swing slower by not letting the head move. Because by not letting the head move, generally speaking, the body doesn’t move very much, we focus on this, we don’t focus on this and we’re going to struggle to get good club head speed down in towards the ball. And the last issue that can relate to this is a poor strike on the ball. So we might hit the ball heavy, we might hit the ball on the top, all because the head isn’t moving. The head could be so focused on staying down. The golfer doesn’t drive forwards enough and can catch the ground before the ball. Sometimes that’s going to cause the golfer to lift up their arms and hands as they hit the ball and pull upwards here focused on keeping their heads still, but not focused on what the hands and arms are doing and we can hit the ball heavy, we can also hit the ball thin, all caused by that same issue. So it’s simply keeping your head perfectly still is not great advice. And those three main issues of moving off the ball in the wrong way, so we got a short backswing, not generating enough power for the downswing and getting a poor contact are all faults related to a head that stays perfectly rigid. 2016-10-12 Pete Styles – PGA Teaching Pro
For some issues relating to this head staying too still that a golfer needs to understand because if they’re focused solely on keeping their head perfectly still in the golf swing, it will have some potential issues for them. So the first one is going to be a restricted backswing, if you’re setting up to the golf ball here and you’re focused on absolutely maintaining head position, no movement at all. Unless you have a great level of flexibility, you’re going to find that your backswing can be a little bit impeded and be quite short. So a golfer that’s focused on keeping his head perfectly still will often turn and get quite restricted here. The left shoulder has no flexibility to turn under the chin for the right handed golfer and they tend to find they’re a little bit short in the backswing.
Generally speaking, keeping the head still is also going to encourage the golfer to keep the knees and the legs and the hips still and then we find very, very limited rotation coming back here. With the golfer who struggles with that rotation a little bit, might be better if the head moves back and slightly upwards so very slightly to the right, very slightly upwards and then suddenly the golf swing can complete its backswing to generate a lot more power on the downswing these real marginal movements, we’re not asking the golfer to stand way up and move way off the ball and then die pocket it of course. But keeping your head perfectly fixed in your backswing if you struggle with rotational issues is going to cause a very, very short backswing.
Likewise on the downswing, if their head isn’t allowed to move at all in the downswing, swinging down towards the golf ball can cause restrictions in how much the body can turn and therefore, a loss of club head speed. So you’ll actually swing slower by not letting the head move. Because by not letting the head move, generally speaking, the body doesn’t move very much, we focus on this, we don’t focus on this and we’re going to struggle to get good club head speed down in towards the ball.
And the last issue that can relate to this is a poor strike on the ball. So we might hit the ball heavy, we might hit the ball on the top, all because the head isn’t moving. The head could be so focused on staying down. The golfer doesn’t drive forwards enough and can catch the ground before the ball. Sometimes that’s going to cause the golfer to lift up their arms and hands as they hit the ball and pull upwards here focused on keeping their heads still, but not focused on what the hands and arms are doing and we can hit the ball heavy, we can also hit the ball thin, all caused by that same issue. So it’s simply keeping your head perfectly still is not great advice.
And those three main issues of moving off the ball in the wrong way, so we got a short backswing, not generating enough power for the downswing and getting a poor contact are all faults related to a head that stays perfectly rigid.
