Cause And Cure Of Too Much Leg Drive Golf Swing Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles
Cause And Cure Of Too Much Leg Drive Golf Swing Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles

As you maybe aware, golf as a sport is constantly evolving whether it’s new golf courses, new technology or new swing theories. And one of the biggest change we’ve seen in swing theory is relating to the leg action. If we go back maybe 40-50 years and we look at the likes of Nicholas playing golf undoubtedly probably the best player that’s ever lived unless Tiger goes on to break his record of maybe championships. His leg action was a bit of an awkward thing to see in a golfer and particularly from a modern coaching perspective. As a modern coach, I would never really like to see someone with the same leg action. Nicholas through the ball was very, very aggressive with the lateral drive and particularly lateral with the knees. The knees moved a long way past the golf pole resulting in the head staying back and a massive reverse see type of action.

We often see this sort of action from club golfers; we don’t really like it because it tends to be quite inconsistent causing problems with the ability to be nice and consistent with the vertical height but also direction of shots, because it doesn’t really give the golfer anything to rotate around. A very different to the modern coaching perspective, would be looking at hitting up against a firm left side for the right handed golfer who would often talk about turning into this left side, actually bracing the left leg, almost having that as the end point from the lateral perspective and then turning around that left side, giving the hands and arms an area where they can rotate around rather than Nicholas set through his legs at it and then – and really have a stopping point. If you feel that your leg action is too lateral, you often become off balance or you are not consistent with your golf shots. Consider that from the top of the swing, the hips need to do two things but very quickly. They need to shift, then they need to rotate. If they shift too far, and don’t rotate, then they end up just sort of sliding past. And if you like the endpoint, should be your shoelaces on your front foot. If your knee can go against the shoelace line and then straighten up, you’ll be balanced, more stable. If your knee goes past the shoelace line, slides underneath it here this is going to cause you too much lateral action and a little inconsistency as well. Another area that I would like you to see work on is just making sure you got a broad stable base to start with. If your feet are too close together during the start of a swing of the setup, you’ll generally find too much lateral action. So nice stable stance, right foot or rear foot square, front foot might be turned about five degrees. Hogan always liked to see that, talked about the ability to turn into that left side bat because of it. So the left side will play out five degrees from the top, a little hip action across, big hip action turning back, snap the left leg back if you can do and then turn through to that left side. And if you can be less lateral, less inconsistent with your legs, it should provide more consistency to the golf club head, to the ball and ultimately to your shots. 2014-03-27

As you maybe aware, golf as a sport is constantly evolving whether it’s new golf courses, new technology or new swing theories. And one of the biggest change we’ve seen in swing theory is relating to the leg action. If we go back maybe 40-50 years and we look at the likes of Nicholas playing golf undoubtedly probably the best player that’s ever lived unless Tiger goes on to break his record of maybe championships. His leg action was a bit of an awkward thing to see in a golfer and particularly from a modern coaching perspective. As a modern coach, I would never really like to see someone with the same leg action. Nicholas through the ball was very, very aggressive with the lateral drive and particularly lateral with the knees. The knees moved a long way past the golf pole resulting in the head staying back and a massive reverse see type of action.

We often see this sort of action from club golfers; we don’t really like it because it tends to be quite inconsistent causing problems with the ability to be nice and consistent with the vertical height but also direction of shots, because it doesn’t really give the golfer anything to rotate around. A very different to the modern coaching perspective, would be looking at hitting up against a firm left side for the right handed golfer who would often talk about turning into this left side, actually bracing the left leg, almost having that as the end point from the lateral perspective and then turning around that left side, giving the hands and arms an area where they can rotate around rather than Nicholas set through his legs at it and then – and really have a stopping point.

If you feel that your leg action is too lateral, you often become off balance or you are not consistent with your golf shots. Consider that from the top of the swing, the hips need to do two things but very quickly. They need to shift, then they need to rotate. If they shift too far, and don’t rotate, then they end up just sort of sliding past. And if you like the endpoint, should be your shoelaces on your front foot. If your knee can go against the shoelace line and then straighten up, you’ll be balanced, more stable. If your knee goes past the shoelace line, slides underneath it here this is going to cause you too much lateral action and a little inconsistency as well.

Another area that I would like you to see work on is just making sure you got a broad stable base to start with. If your feet are too close together during the start of a swing of the setup, you’ll generally find too much lateral action. So nice stable stance, right foot or rear foot square, front foot might be turned about five degrees. Hogan always liked to see that, talked about the ability to turn into that left side bat because of it. So the left side will play out five degrees from the top, a little hip action across, big hip action turning back, snap the left leg back if you can do and then turn through to that left side. And if you can be less lateral, less inconsistent with your legs, it should provide more consistency to the golf club head, to the ball and ultimately to your shots.