What Is A Chicken Wing In The Golf Swing (Video) - by Pete Styles
What Is A Chicken Wing In The Golf Swing (Video) - by Pete Styles

I think if there's one element of an amateur club golfer’s golf swing that differs the most from the professional golfer swings, particularly when we see them on high-speed video cameras, it's going to be this position through the ball that we often term a chicken wing. Now the problem with this is a lot of golfers don't know they do it until they actually watch themselves on high-speed video. Because when they're making a swing, they never see what goes on around here. They can’t focus on it. They are either looking at the ball, looking at the ball.

They just don't see this thing because it happens too quickly. But this idea of a chicken wing is what happens from impact through to around about shoulder level of the golf club coming through here. And it's this chicken wing that we see or sometimes even chicken wings both elbows being in the wrong position. Whereas for a better player, you often see elbows close together and a better extension. And like I said, a lot of golfers do this without noticing because they can't see that part of the swing. We put a high-speed video camera in front of them there, and suddenly this part of the golf swing becomes very apparent. Now it's responsible for a massive loss of distance, loss of control, loss of consistency of strike. You won't hit the ball as far as you want. You might hit the ball too high. All these things that could be plaguing your game could be happening through this part of your golf swing without you even noticing or realizing. Now for some golfers, they might have acknowledged this is the problem this is happening, but then they struggle to get rid of it. And I teach a lot of golfers who know this is going to happen in their swing, but are really struggling to get rid of it. And one of the reasons for that might actually be a physical limitation which is quite frustrating for a lot of golfers. They are trying the right things. They can possibly do it in slow motion, do it in practice swings. When we try it at full speed, it becomes a bigger problem. So let me have a look at that physical limitation with you. And you can identify whether you're physically capable of making this position, or actually do we need to work on the physicality of particularly your lead shoulder to improve that position. I’m going to do this just facing the opposite direction so you can see my lead arm. So we’re going to take our normal setup, get ourselves in good posture. Point the arm towards the camera here. Then bring the arms out in front of us. And then raise the elbows – sorry raise the forearms this way by keeping the elbows in. What we want to try and see that we can do is get the forearm nice and vertical as much as we can, at least to match the posture and the spine angle, and ideally a bit high behind that. For a lot of golfers, we get them here and they get to there and then it starts to become quite tight. And then what we see a lot of golfers doing is actually lifting out of their posture to tilt this forearm back to the vertical. We’re going to see whether we can tilt that forearm back to the vertical or as close to it as possible without losing that posture. Through the golf swing we can then let the left arm come up, and rotate up correctly this way, rather than getting stuck in this position which for a lot of golfers is the cause of that chicken wing. So if you are aware that you've got this chicken wing, check that physical limitation. If you're not aware whether you are chicken wing, but you're hitting some short shots, some high right shots, getting under the golf ball a bit too much and not consistent with your strike, check to see if you've got a chicken wing. Front on high-speed video camera from here, have a look at what your arms look like through the ball. If your elbows are close together, you are okay. If your elbows are parting like this in this classic chicken wing position, let's have a look at some more videos, and see whether we can improve that position for you. 2016-07-08

I think if there's one element of an amateur club golfer’s golf swing that differs the most from the professional golfer swings, particularly when we see them on high-speed video cameras, it's going to be this position through the ball that we often term a chicken wing. Now the problem with this is a lot of golfers don't know they do it until they actually watch themselves on high-speed video. Because when they're making a swing, they never see what goes on around here. They can’t focus on it. They are either looking at the ball, looking at the ball.

They just don't see this thing because it happens too quickly. But this idea of a chicken wing is what happens from impact through to around about shoulder level of the golf club coming through here. And it's this chicken wing that we see or sometimes even chicken wings both elbows being in the wrong position. Whereas for a better player, you often see elbows close together and a better extension. And like I said, a lot of golfers do this without noticing because they can't see that part of the swing. We put a high-speed video camera in front of them there, and suddenly this part of the golf swing becomes very apparent.

Now it's responsible for a massive loss of distance, loss of control, loss of consistency of strike. You won't hit the ball as far as you want. You might hit the ball too high. All these things that could be plaguing your game could be happening through this part of your golf swing without you even noticing or realizing. Now for some golfers, they might have acknowledged this is the problem this is happening, but then they struggle to get rid of it. And I teach a lot of golfers who know this is going to happen in their swing, but are really struggling to get rid of it.

And one of the reasons for that might actually be a physical limitation which is quite frustrating for a lot of golfers. They are trying the right things. They can possibly do it in slow motion, do it in practice swings. When we try it at full speed, it becomes a bigger problem. So let me have a look at that physical limitation with you. And you can identify whether you're physically capable of making this position, or actually do we need to work on the physicality of particularly your lead shoulder to improve that position. I’m going to do this just facing the opposite direction so you can see my lead arm.

So we’re going to take our normal setup, get ourselves in good posture. Point the arm towards the camera here. Then bring the arms out in front of us. And then raise the elbows – sorry raise the forearms this way by keeping the elbows in. What we want to try and see that we can do is get the forearm nice and vertical as much as we can, at least to match the posture and the spine angle, and ideally a bit high behind that. For a lot of golfers, we get them here and they get to there and then it starts to become quite tight. And then what we see a lot of golfers doing is actually lifting out of their posture to tilt this forearm back to the vertical.

We’re going to see whether we can tilt that forearm back to the vertical or as close to it as possible without losing that posture. Through the golf swing we can then let the left arm come up, and rotate up correctly this way, rather than getting stuck in this position which for a lot of golfers is the cause of that chicken wing. So if you are aware that you've got this chicken wing, check that physical limitation. If you're not aware whether you are chicken wing, but you're hitting some short shots, some high right shots, getting under the golf ball a bit too much and not consistent with your strike, check to see if you've got a chicken wing.

Front on high-speed video camera from here, have a look at what your arms look like through the ball. If your elbows are close together, you are okay. If your elbows are parting like this in this classic chicken wing position, let's have a look at some more videos, and see whether we can improve that position for you.