Stop Getting Steep with Your Shoulders: Shoulder Blade Backstroke

The shoulder blade backstroke is a transition drill that helps you stop getting steep with your upper body as you start down. If your shoulders tend to work the club out and down too aggressively, the club can get too vertical too early. That often leads to poor low-point control, weak contact, reduced shaft lean, and the familiar pull or pull-slice pattern. Even if you sometimes still approach the ball from the inside because of slide or early extension, steep shoulder action can still hurt your strike. This drill teaches you a better transition pattern: the shoulder blades work in a way that helps the club shallow while your body stays organized and able to rotate through the ball.

How the Drill Works

The basic idea is simple: many steep players start the downswing by letting the right shoulder blade rise while the left shoulder blade drops. That pattern tends to throw the club outward and steepen the shaft. The shoulder blade backstroke teaches the opposite feel.

Instead of lifting the trail shoulder complex in transition, you want to feel more like the right shoulder blade works down while the left shoulder blade works up. Tyler often describes it as a small backward bicycle motion of the shoulder blades. It is not a big arm throw, and it is not a dramatic tilt of the whole torso. The motion is subtle, but it can completely change how the club delivers.

You can first learn it as a standalone movement without a club. Hold your arms out in front of you or out to the sides and rehearse the shoulder blades moving in that backward-cycling pattern. Your arms may soften slightly, but the goal is not to actively bend and pump the arms. The movement should feel as though it is coming from the shoulder blades rather than from the hands or forearms.

Once you understand the feel, you blend it into the swing at the start of transition—right as the backswing is finishing and the downswing is beginning. That timing matters. If you wait too long, the club may already be steep. If you do it too early or too aggressively with the wrong body parts, you can create a different problem and get too shallow.

That is the important balance in this drill. You want the shoulder blades to help the club fall into a better delivery position, but you do not want to fake the move by excessively dropping your hips or tipping your middle spine away from the target. If you overdo that part, the club can get stuck too far behind you. The better blend is this:

Shoulder blades perform the backstroke motion
Left side feels as though it crunches slightly down
Body rotation continues so you can cover the ball

That combination gives you a shallower delivery without losing your ability to turn. The result is a longer, flatter strike window through impact rather than a sharp, chopping motion into the ball.

Step-by-Step

Start without a club. Stand in your golf posture or even upright at home. Extend your arms out in front of you or slightly to the sides. This makes it easier to feel the shoulder blades moving without worrying about the rest of the swing.
Rehearse the backward bicycle feel. Move your shoulder blades as if one side is cycling back while the other cycles forward. For the downswing feel you want, the right shoulder blade works down and the left shoulder blade works up. Keep the motion small. Your arms can stay relatively long and quiet.
Avoid turning it into a whole-body sway. The drill should not feel like you are wildly dropping your trail side or shoving your hips. If the movement comes from your lower body or mid-spine instead of the shoulder blades, you can over-shallow the club and lose structure.
Add a backswing. Make a slow backswing to the top. Pause for a moment if needed. From there, begin the shoulder blade backstroke as your transition starts.
Pair it with a slight left-side crunch. As the shoulder blades make that backward-cycling move, feel a little left side down. This helps you keep covering the ball instead of backing away from it.
Rotate through the motion. Do not just drop the club behind you. Let your body keep turning. The drill works best when the shallowing from the shoulder blades is blended with a body pivot that keeps moving.
Check the delivery position. In a good rehearsal, the club should feel more inside and less thrown out in front of you. Your trail arm will usually feel more tucked, and the shaft will look less vertical.
Hit slow shots. Start with half-swings or short punch shots. Rehearse to the top, begin the shoulder blade backstroke in transition, then rotate through. Focus on contact and start line before adding speed.
Gradually increase speed. Once you can create the feel at slow pace, blend it into fuller swings. The motion should remain subtle. You are not trying to exaggerate forever—just enough to replace your steep pattern.

What You Should Feel

When you do this drill correctly, the sensations can be very different from what you are used to—especially if you normally pull hard from the top with your shoulders and arms.

Key sensations

The trail shoulder blade moves down instead of immediately lifting and driving outward
The lead shoulder blade works up rather than collapsing down and across
The club feels like it falls behind you slightly instead of getting thrown over the plane
Your trail arm feels more connected or tucked rather than flying away from your side
Your left side feels like it lowers a bit so you can stay over the ball
Your body keeps rotating instead of stalling while the arms reroute

Delivery checkpoints

A good rehearsal usually places you in a much better halfway-down position. You should notice:

The club is more inside your hands rather than outside them
The shaft looks shallower instead of sharply vertical
Your chest is not excessively backing away from the ball
Your trail shoulder does not look jammed high and out toward the ball

For some players, this drill feels similar to a float-load or a looping transition rather than a violent pull from the top. If you are used to “winning” the downswing by yanking the handle, this may initially feel softer, later, or more rounded. That is often exactly why it works.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Using the arms instead of the shoulder blades. If you simply bend and yank your arms, you miss the purpose of the drill. The movement should originate in the shoulder blade area.
Dropping the whole torso too much. Overdoing side bend or tilting your spine excessively can make the club too shallow and stuck.
Sliding the hips. Some golfers replace steep shoulders with a big lateral move. That may shift path, but it does not solve the underlying transition issue.
Stopping rotation. The drill is not just a shallowing move. You still need to turn through the shot so the club can keep moving with the body.
Starting the move too late. If you wait until the club is already steep in the downswing, it is much harder to recover. The feel should begin as the backswing is finishing.
Exaggerating forever. Big rehearsal moves are helpful in practice, but your real swing will usually need a smaller version. Let the drill train the pattern, then blend it naturally.
Confusing path with quality of strike. You may still hit some shots from the inside even with steep shoulders, especially if you early extend or slide. That does not mean the shoulder action is good. The real test is whether you improve contact, low-point control, and shaft delivery.

How This Fits Your Swing

This drill is especially valuable if your downswing is dominated by a forward lunge, a hard shoulder pull, or a steep upper-body pattern. Those golfers often feel as if they must drive the trail shoulder out toward the ball to create speed. In reality, that move usually shortens the strike window and makes the club harder to control.

The shoulder blade backstroke gives you a better sequence in transition. It helps the club shallow enough that you can then use your lower body rotation as a natural steepening force through impact. That may sound counterintuitive, but it is an important concept: if the club is too steep early, you have no room to rotate well. If the club is organized better in transition, you can turn aggressively and still deliver the club with a long, flat low point.

That is why this drill often helps golfers who struggle with:

Pulls and pull-slices
Weak, glancing contact
Inconsistent low point
Loss of shaft lean
A trail shoulder that works too high too early

It also pairs well with other shallowing and pivot drills. If you have worked on scapular alignment, loop feels, or transition rehearsals that soften the initial pull from the top, this is a natural companion. The shoulder blade backstroke is not a standalone magic move—it is a way to train the upper body so it cooperates with the rest of your pivot.

In the bigger picture, you are trying to create a transition where the club can fall into position while your body remains balanced, centered, and ready to rotate. That blend is what produces a more reliable strike. So if your shoulders tend to steepen the club, rehearse this drill slowly and precisely. Done well, it can turn a rushed, chopping transition into one that is much more efficient and much easier to repeat.