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"Grip Strength"

Grip strength is a term for identifying the orientation of the hands on the club. The grip is usually categorized in one of three ways

  1. Neutral - theoretical ideal which is either seeing 2.5 knuckles on the lead hand when you look down, or having the V's between the thumb and index finger pointing near the trail shoulder
  2. Strong - a grip turned more to away from the target than neutral where you see more than 2.5 knuckles on the lead hand when you look down, or having the V's between the thumb and index finger pointing right of the trail shoulder
  3. Weak - a grip turned more toward the target than neutral where you see less than 2.5 knuckles on the lead hand when you look down, or having the V's between the thumb and index finger pointing toward the chin

Tags: Set Up, Drill, Intermediate

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In this video, we're going to look at grip strength.

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Now in a number of these videos, I talk about the concept of grip strength.

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So I thought it would be helpful for us to get on the same page.

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So let's define it.

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Grip strength is really just a term that golf instructors have used to define how you're

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holding on to the club.

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Now with typical video analysis, they're usually using a reference frame.

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So if I'm looking from a face on point of view, what they'll usually look at is where

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these V's pointed like so.

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But for me, that's a little bit vague.

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So with 3D motion analysis, I've noticed certain correlations with what you see on video

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and what you see on 3D.

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And so here's how we hear so I and us here at a golf smart academy look at grip strength.

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So we're going to look at flexion extension of the wrist as the primary determinant of grip strength.

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Now grip strength is commonly referred to as either being neutral, which would be pointing

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somewhere right around this right shoulder, strong pointing over here to the right of the

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right shoulder.

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So that would be strong.

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That would be kind of neutral.

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And then pointing more up at my chin would be weak.

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So let's look at the flexion extension component to this.

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A neutral grip on 3D is roughly going to be about 25 degrees of extension like so.

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So if I take this 25 degrees and put it on the grip just like so as you've been practicing

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in kind of the grip section, you'll see that this points roughly over to my shoulder

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if it's kind of in the middle of my body.

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Obviously if I took this and stood with it here, it would be very hard for me to say

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where that V is pointing because of kind of the unorthodox position.

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If we're looking at the trail wrist, then neutral is going to be pretty much straight

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or I'd say plus or minus 5 degrees.

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So whether it's just there, just there, that's pretty neutral.

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So if I take my grip, which I consider fairly neutral from looking at 3D and video, so if

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I take my grip, kind of look something like that.

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So I've got about 25 degrees of cup in this lead wrist and I've got this trail wrist pretty

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much straight.

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Now one of the other factors that a lot of instructors talk about is looking at how much

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these forums are kind of rotated on the grip because we're essentially taking the cylinder

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of the grip and we're positioning our hands on it.

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So one way to think of a strong grip is my hands are turned more underneath or my hands

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are turned more to the right for a right hand and golfer and a weak grip would be my hands

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are turned more to the left and a neutral grip would be just slightly to the right.

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I'm going to give you a little bit more, let me first, the reason I don't like that is

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because if you look at 3D of just the forums, what tends to happen is just because a person

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sets up with this grip a little bit stronger doesn't really impact too much how the arms

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are going to work in the downswing.

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Basically that whole concept is built around this premise.

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If you look from a face on camera view, a lot of golfers will come back with this looking

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like it's pointing in the general direction of the target.

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Now the problem is since I'm able to isolate this section, I can tell you that where you

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set up most golfers are going to be slightly more pronated when they make contact with

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the golf wall.

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Tour golfers are going to be typically around 20 degrees more pronated like so.

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So the problem is the assumption is if I start with it more like this than when it comes

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back, that's going to close the club face.

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But what usually happens is if I start with it more straighter like this, then I'm

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going to have more side bend, more rotation, more shoulder external rotation.

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So I have all these other compensating or contributing movements and it's not just that

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my forums all come back to the same location.

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So we're going to scratch that and we're just going to say grip strength is going to be

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about 20 or extension of the trail or lead wrist and flexion of the trail wrist.

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The trail is going to be about 25 and 0.

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If it's I've seen strong grips up around 45, 48 and I've seen weak grips around 0.

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Over here I've seen kind of weak grips in the minus 20 and strong grips in the positive

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10 positive 15.

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But in general we're going to be about 25 and neutral.

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Now let's put those hand positions as they relate to the grip.

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So most grips and I'll give a little close up here.

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So most grips are going to have something that indicates kind of the middle of the club

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face and if I angle this down you'll see that roughly coincides with the leading edge or

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the club face position.

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So it's pretty easy to see where dead center would be on the club.

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If I was to extend the wrist, so I'm going to go through the grip process.

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So I'm going to extend the wrist slightly and now when I put my hand on the grip, that's

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going to put it slightly to the right of center.

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You can see there's the center line.

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It's just going to put it slightly to the right of center.

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Then I make sure it's in the fingers like so.

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When I slide this hand back, that wrist is pretty much a neutral and I've established kind

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of my good neutral grip.

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So when we go forward and you look at the rest of these videos, you're going to hear me say

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grip strength.

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Know that I'm not talking about how tightly you're squeezing the club.

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I'm talking about how your hands are positioned on the club and that's going to have

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a direct impact on how you're going to control the club face and what you're going to do

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with the rest of the body.

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So pay attention to your grip strength.

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It's definitely one of the things that I like to adjust any time we're trying to adjust

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the club face to the path.

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So it's a useful tool to get sensitive to and know how it works.

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