[Jeff]

Mike O

Consider the following two statements-:

1) Not letting my right shoulder go down and out as much as I felt in the past. I do a lot of start down waggles and feel my right shoulder go down just slightly. From there my arms swing past my body.

2) Try to keep the rotation of my body more passive.

I would have also thought that those two actions would predispose to pulling, rather than correct a pulling problem.

This represents my attempt at logical reasoning - correct me if I am wrong.

If one doesn't maintain right shoulder thrust downplane during the downswing, then one will run of out of right arm, and the momentum of the moving club will likely produce slight flipping through impact, which will close the clubface and predispose to pulling. By contrast, if one maintains right shoulder thrust donwplane, then one can more easily maintain a bent right elbow and bent right wrist as one nears impact. Then, the straightening right elbow (complete release of power accumulator #1) during the exact moment of first ball impact will keep the clubface slightly open as one aims towards the inside quadrant of the ball. That should prevent a pull, and produce a straight ball flight if the clubface is square at the exact moment of ball-clubface separation. The same logic applies to having a too-passive torso rotation in the late downswing. If the torso slows, the arms will whip past the slow-moving torso and produce flipping. By contrast, if one maintains an active torso rotation through impact, then it is more easy to drive all the power accumulators to a full release post-impact.

Here are two comparative photo sequences to illustrate my point.



In this Hogan photo-series, Hogan is turning his torso very well through the late downswing and followthrough and driving his arms to the both-arms-straight end-followthrough position by inducing a full release of all his power accumulators via the biomechanical mechanism of an excellent downswing pivot action.



In this photo-series of an elderly golfer who has a slow, and incomplete, torso rotation through the impact zone, his arms simply flip through the impact zone and he also has chicken-winging due to i) insufficiently forceful release of his power accumulators to a both-arms-straight position and ii) due to a lack of sufficient extensor action through impact.

Jeff.