Should I lock my right arm in my golf set up position? Well, the correct position to hit your golf shots from as you set up, is you should want to see that your left arm is nice and straight and that your right arm is nice and relaxed, okay? The left arm if you’re right hand golfer is going to drive your back swing as you turn your shoulders and you want to fully extend your left arm to get as much distance between your hand and your shoulders as possible. In order to do that your right elbow needs to be nicely relaxed and very passive and it will go into this folded position.

If you start your golf swing with your right arm locked out, it’s going to be very difficult to swing the club back because the right elbow won’t want to bend during the back swing and its really going to make you tilt rather than rotate and you will find it very difficult to get into a good position at the top of the swing which generates power and accuracy. So as you set up the arms do you want to be fairly straight, but it is the left arm that you want to make sure it’s straight.

The right arm needs to be slightly more relaxed than the left, just to allow the right arm to be guided by the left, also if we look this way, if you lock your right arm it will tend to make you push tour right shoulder forward of your left, and that now if we are looking at swing in the club directly along the target line which is represented by the yellow pole here, if we lock the right arm, the shoulders are now aiming left of that target line and it’s going to give you issues of power and accuracy, because as you start to swing the club back, you will take the club head away on the outside of the target line. You will pick the club up rather than turning and you will shoot across the target line rather than swinging straight down it for straight shots.

So the right arm position at set up wants to be at relaxed, it’s the left arm that you want to see fully extended and straight, just let the right arm relax next to it.