WEBVTT

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This drill is the side bend visual, so side bend is a really important shall

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owing component.

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It's kind of a master move because it helps with the slice early in the down

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swing and

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then it helps with the hook later in the downswing.

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So it's really a kind of a regulator and helps a lot with consistency.

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There are a couple different ways that I approach it.

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So in this video I'll break down the three most common kind of control centers

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for getting

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good side bend down through impact and into the follow through.

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So we're going to use a little visual here.

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If I get into the merry-go-round drill where the club is across my shoulders

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and I turn

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where this is basically pointing down towards the golf ball, you'll see that my

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shoulders

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kind of match roughly this pool noodle here.

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So I basically have a line going from my shoulders down to the golf ball.

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Oftentimes in lessons, I will draw this.

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So I will go up to the top of the swing and then I'll draw a line from the golf

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ball,

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or sorry, from the shoulder, the trail shoulder, the right shoulder in my case,

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down to the

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golf ball.

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And what you'll see is with a lot of the consistent ball strikers, their

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shoulders will stay under

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it all the way or going along it all the way until follow through position,

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where what

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I see a lot of amateurs do is either they spin on top of it early, so they go

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over that

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plane early, or they're under it and then during the release in kind of a stand

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up move

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and a shoulder coming up move, it tends to go out there.

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So what I'll do is I'll put this pool noodle kind of at that shoulder plane

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angle just

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to help create a visual.

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Now I've got it pointing at the golf ball, so I'm not going to be able to hit

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because

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the tripod would get in the way.

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So first I'm going to do this as just a body awareness drill, and basically

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what I'm going

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to do is get in my golf posture, and then I'm going to turn and I'm going to

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try to

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match the pool noodle here with my shoulder angle, just kind of like that.

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And then I'm going to back up and move a little bit forward, and I'm going to

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try to

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match it with both my arms and my shoulders.

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Now I mentioned there are three common places where golfers tend to struggle

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with getting

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this side bend down at the bottom of the swing.

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One, we can kind of break your spine up in thirds.

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So first you've got from your rib cage down, so this would be more kind of ab

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zone, then

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you've got from kind of your mid thoracic, so from about armpit down to just

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above halfway

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between belly button and the bottom of your ribs.

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So we've got that zone, that's more about kind of the shoulder blade and its

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crunch.

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And then you've got upper, so kind of above the shoulder blade, and that's more

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about

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the neck.

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So to really optimize the shoulder or sorry the side bend move, you're going to

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do a little

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bit of a crunch, a little bit of a shoulder retraction, and then a little bit

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of the head

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on the pillow or neck tilt, kind of like this.

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As we come through, I see common places where you'll break down would be either

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be, you

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can see if the head starts to try to look level, that would be the head on the

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pillow

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idea.

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But the shoulder is come way out, as opposed to shoulder being down or lead

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shoulder blocking.

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So we have a bunch of videos talking about that.

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And then feeling a little bit of a side crunch here versus kind of going up

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towards my toes

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and this feeling a little bit more straight, kind of like that.

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Oftentimes, golfers who lack this side crunch move, which is a big shallower,

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create a lot

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of slide or axis tilt in an attempt to kind of shallow in a different way.

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So this can be helpful for low point, for shaft lean, for not hooking the ball,

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as well

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as not slicing the ball.

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It's a, so as I said, it's kind of one of these master moves, it's a really big

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skill

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differentiator, and it's one of the things that contributes to having some of

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the most

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consistent bottom of the swing characteristics.

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So now that we've got an idea of this feel, we're going to move the tripod just

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slightly,

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and we're going to do a few kind of just nine to threes, where we're going to

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feel

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like we match that angle as best we can.

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I think I can do a little bit better than that.

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And when I do that, currently I feel like I'm way down.

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In fact, oftentimes the way I'll have golfers started is get to this position

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and then

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just do a little kind of brushing drill, just to feel, wow, that feels like my

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shoulders

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are much more vertical, or it feels like my arm is really tucked.

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It feels like my head is looking at it sideways.

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I don't know what the feel will be, but if you're just doing a few of these

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kind of exaggerated

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side bend brushing movements, I guarantee you you will get a feel.

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So then we can do one where we kind of like preset some of that side bend

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movement, and

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then just came up out of it, so caught that just a touch thin.

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So let's see if we can keep that shoulder going down a little bit longer.

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That was pretty good there, and you'll see that really helps kind of shallow

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out the bottom

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of the swing.

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A lot of golfers who tend to hook the ball and get kind of diggy that shoulder

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comes over

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the top at the bottom.

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There's going to be a big contributing factor there.

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So once we've got this feel of doing this little brush movement, then we'll do

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it more

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dynamically, and we'll move to a nine to three, kind of something like that,

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and we're going

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to go to that finished position.

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We're just going to do our best to try to match it, and we're going to explore

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as hard

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as we can do this, as big as we can do it, but using this pool noodle to kind

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of help

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with the visual of the angle of where that side bend will be, that'll help you

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develop

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some feels for the side bend through the ball.

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So now that we've got some feels of these smaller swings, we're going to try it

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with

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a little bit, kind of bigger movement, and one of the things that you'll want

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to pay

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attention to is if you're looking at video, from the face on view, a lot of

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golfers know

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that you don't want to get into this side bend movement too quickly.

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If it shows up on video that you're getting into this side bend movement right

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away, oftentimes

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what it means is you're not getting into enough of this left side bend during

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the backswing.

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Oftentimes you'll start coming up out of it and really get into that side bend

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movement

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quickly.

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So before the arm reaches parallel, you're already actually in that side bend

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movement

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as opposed to trying, I should say, you're already side bent.

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If you're left side bent, kind of like this at the top, then when you start

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going into

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that right side bent, we're at about even, or shoulders level, halfway down,

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and then

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it overtakes and goes into actual right side bend later, but you're starting

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that side bend

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move pretty much from the top and it's continuing all the way down.

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So quick little demonstration, we're going to go up to the top side bend move

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as long

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down through as we can, hoping to get a really clean bottom of the swing.

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If you're struggling with side bend, you can look at either the abs, the

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shoulders, shoulder

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blades, or the neck as good sources for increasing that side bend.

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I'd recommend looking from the down the line view, if you're losing the side

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bend up here,

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it's more of the neck, if you're losing it kind of more in this zone, that's

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more of

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the shoulders, some of the neck, and then if you're losing it more kind of in

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the middle

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of the back, that's going to be more of the crunch move.

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So one of those three will be your gateway to figuring out your side bend.