Getting speed into the grip early without casting

Hi Max, Thanks for not putting me in a tough situation.

I saw the same thing with my 3D. I define the delivery position based on the max grip speed. What I saw clinically was that very few golfers moved the hands faster when they tried to. I found that by getting their lower body involved and getting some downswing arm load, they were more likely to create earlier handle speed. This was one of those parameters where for many it's more important to monitor hand speed rather than focus on it.

Some possible explanation. Typically, when the body leads a movement the movement often feels slow. So in this case, leading with the body feels slower but produces faster and earlier hand speeds. While trying to speed up the hands often increases the feeling of strength, but slows down and delays the actual speed.

So the key question becomes "how do I get faster hands?" Does trying to get faster hands actually get faster hands or do you need to break down the movements that create hand speed and focus on those. I tend to lean more toward the latter. What gets faster hand speed is using the body in transition instead of the arms.

When it comes to distance, with my students I usually apply the order of Solid, Straight, Far. Usually, I want solid contact and good curve control before I try to focus on speed. For many of my students, they learn to hit a comfortable distance without doing any speed work. For those who do need speed work, we do it by learning to use the legs and core to move the hands faster...whether it 'feels' faster or not.

Lastly, not everyone needs to feel each piece. If you don't need to feel the pinned arm. That's great. A helpful exercise is understanding why that's not important for your swing. If you can answer that question then you likely have a good understanding of your pattern tendencies. FWIW, feeling that lead arm pin isn't one of my personal keys either. But I have lots of students who have that as one of their main keys. The variability of what each golfer feels and needs to focus on is one of my favorite parts of this great game.

Hi Tyler,

Thanks for your reply, thorough as always.

It sounds like another "feel vs real" debate. I completely empathise with body movements feeling slow, even if they are faster. Maybe my brain just needs retuning to correlate "smoothness" with speed. I'd be interested to see a station where from the backswing a rope / pulley system with a force meter is connected to the grip, so you could explore various ways of maximising the force from backswing to transition. I'm sure you're right that it wouldn't be the movements that you would expect generating the highest numbers.

As for why the left arm feel is no good for me, I don't know. I've just tried doing it a number of different ways, and they all feel bad:
* Rear elbow gets trapped and I can't wipe
* Hunch my shoulders trying to hold it there
* Can't lift my hands high enough at the top of the backswing, or if I do I can't move them down nicely in the downswing

What's much more workable is "bouncing the arm off the shoulder in transition". Still a bit casty and interrupts the shallowing, but strikes are solid. I don't know if there is a right answer, but I suspect this is evidence that I'm more upper-body dominated (with a two plane swing?). I was sure there was a Justin Rose thing for this, but I can't find the exact drill. "Not getting the left arm trapped ... and keeping the triangle formed between the shaft and arms in front of the chest in his transition" from the article below resonates with my much more strongly with me. https://www.todaysgolfer.co.uk/features/instruction-features/2018/october/tips-from-europes-ryder-cup-team-/justin-rose-7-ways-to-hit-it-pure/

Max

I have an idea about how you would have to design it. I think you would need a spring gauge. A rope or pully would require too much linear force in one direction, instead of more of a curving force.

With the lead arm pinned to your chest idea, I guess the first question is, "why do you think you need it?" Do you get into a position where the lead arm is off your chest really early in the downswing? If not, then you might be trying to exaggerate something you are already doing well enough. Usually, exaggerating things you are doing enough of is a recipe for struggles.