Improve Backswing Width with This Towel Drill

If your backswing tends to get narrow, lifted, or “army,” this towel drill can help you create better width and a more connected motion. Many golfers fold the trail arm too early and pick the club up with the hands and shoulders. That can make the swing harder to time and less reliable at impact. By using a towel to connect your trail arm to your body and trail hand, you train your torso to move the club back more effectively. The result is a backswing that feels more organized, a better-loaded body, and improved contact on shorter swings like punch shots, distance wedges, and controlled 9-to-3 motions.

How the Drill Works

The idea behind this drill is simple: you want to reduce excess arm lift and maintain a more stable swing radius during the backswing. When your arms collapse, the radius of your swing changes. While that can sometimes create speed, it often comes with a cost—more timing, less control, and inconsistent low point.

In a sound backswing, your upper body acts more like the center of the motion while your arms and club work as the radius. If that radius stays more intact, the club is easier to return to the ball consistently. When the trail arm folds too early, however, the club tends to get lifted rather than turned back. That usually means your chest and rib cage have not done enough work, and your core is not as loaded as it could be.

This towel drill gives you immediate feedback. You place a towel under your trail armpit and also trap part of it under your lead hand so the towel runs across the top of your trail thumb area. That creates a connected structure between your trail upper arm, trail hand, and the club. If you start snatching the club back with your arms or bending the trail arm too much, the towel will lose its tension and the connection will disappear.

Because of that feedback, the drill teaches you to move the club back with more chest rotation, rib cage movement, and body-driven motion. It is especially useful on shorter swings rather than full swings to the top. The best ranges for this drill are:

• 9-to-3 swings
• 10-to-2 swings
• Punch shots
• Distance wedges

Those swing lengths are ideal because they let you exaggerate width and connection without forcing an awkward full-swing position.

Step-by-Step

1. Choose a towel with enough length and thickness. A slightly longer towel usually works better because it gives you more material to secure and more feedback during the swing.

2. Place the towel under your trail armpit. For a right-handed golfer, that means under your right armpit. The towel should sit snugly enough that you can feel it connected to your upper arm and side.

3. Set your lead hand on the club normally. Take your usual lead-hand grip first so your setup still feels familiar.

4. Lay part of the towel over the top of your trail thumb area. As you place your trail hand on the club, the towel should create light tension between the trail armpit and the trail hand. You are not trying to squeeze it aggressively; you just want enough pressure to feel the connection.

5. Start with small 9-to-3 swings. Make a backswing to about hip-high and a follow-through to about hip-high. Your goal is to keep the towel’s connection intact the entire time.

6. Let your body move the club back. As you swing to 9 o’clock, feel your chest and rib cage turning the club away from the ball. Avoid simply lifting the club with your hands or folding the trail arm.

7. Swing through to a 3 o’clock finish. Keep the same connected feeling into the follow-through. If the towel stays in place, that is a good sign your motion is being driven more by your pivot than by disconnected arm action.

8. Progress to a 10-to-2 swing. Once 9-to-3 feels solid, lengthen the backswing slightly. This is where many golfers lose width, because they try to go farther back by bending their arms instead of turning more.

9. Maintain tension as the swing gets longer. From 9 o’clock to 10 o’clock, focus on keeping the towel taut. If the towel goes slack, your arms likely took over.

10. Hit short shots with this drill. Use it for punch shots or distance wedges to train a more consistent low point and cleaner contact. Keep the effort level moderate and prioritize structure over speed.

What You Should Feel

The most important sensation is that your body is carrying the arms, not the other way around. If you normally start the backswing by picking the club up, this drill should feel very different.

A wider trail arm

You should feel that your trail arm stays more extended for longer in the backswing. It does not need to be rigidly straight, but it should not collapse early. That helps preserve width and prevents the club from getting too narrow too soon.

Connection from the trail arm to the torso

With the towel under your trail armpit, you should sense that your trail upper arm stays more connected to your side. That does not mean pinned tightly against your body. It means the arm is working with your torso rather than separating and lifting independently.

Pressure through the trail hand

Because the towel also runs over the trail thumb area, you should feel light pressure there as the club moves back. That pressure helps you sense whether the trail hand is staying organized with the rest of the structure. If the pressure disappears, something likely disconnected.

More chest and rib cage movement

As the swing gets to 10 o’clock, the backswing should feel as though it comes more from your chest turning and your rib cage moving than from your arms lifting. Some golfers even feel a touch more extension through the torso as they maintain width.

More core involvement

This drill often makes golfers realize how little they were using their body before. If you do it correctly, your hips and core may feel much more active than usual, especially on the way back and through.

A more stable radius

At a bigger-picture level, the club should feel like it stays farther away from your body instead of getting sucked inward by bent arms. That more stable radius is one reason this drill can help your strike become more predictable.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Using the drill on a full swing to the top. This drill is best for shorter motions like 9-to-3 and 10-to-2. If you try to force it into a full backswing, it can become too restrictive.
• Squeezing the towel too hard. You want connection, not tension everywhere. If you clamp the towel aggressively, you may create too much stiffness in the arms and shoulders.
• Keeping the trail arm rigidly straight. The goal is not a locked-out trail arm. The goal is to prevent early collapse and preserve width.
• Lifting the club with your hands. If the club gets picked up instead of turned back, the towel will usually lose tension. Let the torso move the club.
• Turning too little and reaching with the arms. Some golfers try to maintain towel pressure by just stretching their arms away from the body without enough pivot. True width comes from better body motion, not just reaching.
• Ignoring the follow-through. The drill is not only about the backswing. Maintaining connection through the 3 o’clock or 2 o’clock finish helps reinforce a body-driven motion through impact.
• Trying to hit hard shots. This drill works best at controlled speed. If you swing too hard, you will often abandon the structure you are trying to learn.
• Letting the towel go slack from 9 to 10 o’clock. This is a common place for the trail arm to fold and the width to disappear. Pay close attention during that part of the backswing.

How This Fits Your Swing

This drill addresses a common pattern: the golfer who gets to the top by lifting the arms rather than turning the body. Even if the club appears to be in a “high” position, that does not necessarily mean the swing is loaded well. In many cases, the golfer has mostly loaded the arms and shoulders while leaving the torso underused.

That matters because golf is easier when your larger muscles organize the motion. When your body drives the backswing, the club tends to stay more in front of you, the radius stays more consistent, and the transition becomes easier to sequence. When the arms dominate the backswing, you often need extra timing on the way down to recover the club and find the bottom of the arc.

This is why the towel drill can be so helpful for golfers who are collapsed at the top or narrow early in the backswing. It gives you a practical way to train a better pattern without overthinking positions. Instead of trying to “place” the club manually, you learn to create the right structure through motion.

It also ties directly into better wedge play and control shots. On distance wedges and punch shots, too much arm lift can ruin contact and trajectory control. A connected 10-to-2 motion helps you manage low point, keep the strike more centered, and produce more predictable ball flight.

As you improve with the drill, the bigger lesson is not that you should keep a towel under your arm forever. The lesson is that your backswing width should come from a coordinated relationship between your arms and torso. Your trail arm should support the structure, not collapse it. Your chest should help move the club, not simply react after the arms have already lifted it.

Use the towel drill as a training exaggeration. Build the feel in shorter swings first, then carry that sensation into your normal motion. If you can learn to keep the club moving back with better width and connection, you will make your swing more repeatable—and that usually leads to better contact, better trajectory control, and fewer compensations later in the swing.