Tony Lema (Video) - by Peter Finch
Tony Lema (Video) - by Peter Finch

Tony Lema was an American golfer whose life was unfortunately cut short at the age of 32 in a plane crush. Before that event he did win the Open Championship as well as many other victories on the US Tour. He’s also known as Champagne Tony Lema because of his exotic lifestyle on and off the golf course. But there are things that you can learn from his technique that will definitely help you increase the power in your backswing and in your through swing. Now what Tony Lema did very, very well and he really, really stretched it almost to the extreme sometimes, is taking the club back very, very wide but lifting up the left heel to a very, very large extent. As he lifted up the left heel during his backswing, he was able to stretch up his hands and stretch up his arms, very, very high, before returning the left heel to the ground, and then flowing through and following through and swinging through as often as hard as he could to get the ball out there. But it was a great way to increase turn, it was a great way to increase power and by planting it back down at the start of the downswing, it allowed him to sync up the body movements and hit more successful shots than not. The real key to this is to plan to take it down first in the downswing before continuing the rest of the turn. So if you want to practice this, get the left of your lifting gradually through the backswing, but really push it up there, before planting it back down and swinging it through. It will help increase turn, it will increase power, it will help increase width, but it does take a little bit of time to get used to so it will take a little bit of practice. But if you are looking for those aspects of your game to improve, give it a go, and see what happens. 2015-04-29

Tony Lema was an American golfer whose life was unfortunately cut short at the age of 32 in a plane crush. Before that event he did win the Open Championship as well as many other victories on the US Tour. He’s also known as Champagne Tony Lema because of his exotic lifestyle on and off the golf course. But there are things that you can learn from his technique that will definitely help you increase the power in your backswing and in your through swing. Now what Tony Lema did very, very well and he really, really stretched it almost to the extreme sometimes, is taking the club back very, very wide but lifting up the left heel to a very, very large extent. As he lifted up the left heel during his backswing, he was able to stretch up his hands and stretch up his arms, very, very high, before returning the left heel to the ground, and then flowing through and following through and swinging through as often as hard as he could to get the ball out there. But it was a great way to increase turn, it was a great way to increase power and by planting it back down at the start of the downswing, it allowed him to sync up the body movements and hit more successful shots than not. The real key to this is to plan to take it down first in the downswing before continuing the rest of the turn. So if you want to practice this, get the left of your lifting gradually through the backswing, but really push it up there, before planting it back down and swinging it through. It will help increase turn, it will increase power, it will help increase width, but it does take a little bit of time to get used to so it will take a little bit of practice. But if you are looking for those aspects of your game to improve, give it a go, and see what happens.