For me, extensor action is difficult to take from words on a page to implementation. If I try to foucs on it by applying pressure througout the motion it adds too much tension to my hands, wrists, and motion.
I try to keep width and structure in my swing but I have to do it without tension. In other words, if my right hand were to come off the the club at the top, my right arm wouldn't immediately straighten out because I'm not apply that kind of pressure.
Similarly, I find it difficult to treat my left arm as a rope. If I try to apply that literally, it feels like I'm swinging with one arm.
I have to moderate how I apply these for best results.
Hey Trig.
If I may take a humble stab at Extensor action:
I had a similar experience with extensor action but now cant think of swinging without it. When I first employed it I felt sort of stiff and bound up.
What I now believe happened to me is this: I had, for years been very left side dominant in my swing. I used to create width with a rigid left arm, I used my left arm to push the club away etc. My left side was stiff and my right soft. This stiffness in my left side I had gotten very used to. It was my usual way. When I added extensor action both sides felt awkwardly stiff, locked up.
I was averse to relaxing my left side because it was necessary for all of my old left sided motions or actions. But TGM I would say is very right sided.
In fact I would say that learning to relax my left arm and employ extensor action was for me, an open door into the real world of TGM. All of sudden things I knew only theoretically were possible in my swing. The non cocking, level right wrist and the cocking of the left wrist via right elbow bending for instance. None of which the old me could accomplish.
Similarly my new swing couldnt be accomplished without a rope for a left arm or extensor action. Now my swing is very right sided. It feels sort of like a right arm flying wedge that stretches a relaxed left arm. The right side is under the left. The right hip goes back. The right arm takes the club away. The right elbow bends, cocking the left wrist. I bump and drive the right shoulder down plane. Etc etc. A lot of right sided stuff. I feel a clear distinction between the role of the left wrist to define the hinge action and relaxed left arm.
Anyways. I'd keep working on it. Hopefully it will be as rewarding for you as it was for me.
OB - good comments. I probably haven't given it enough of a chance. It's a tough one for me.
I agree I have rarely been able to get the correct feeling of extensor action, nor have i been able to really get teh frozen right wrist, love theidea of softening up the left side, most traditonal golf learning i.e taking swings with jsut the lead arm and hitting shots have lead to a very firm left side making EA feel stiff
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If the right wrist flattens at or around impact, you will suffer from trajectile disfunction.
"Now my swing is very right sided. It feels sort of like a right arm flying wedge that stretches a relaxed left arm. The right side is under the left. The right hip goes back. The right arm takes the club away. The right elbow bends, cocking the left wrist. I bump and drive the right shoulder down plane."
Great visualizations of sensations. Very helpful! I too have been [or been trying to be] left-side-dominant for years, decades even. And as you report, as soon as I went to a flat left wrist, right elbow bend, and extension of both arms in the downswing, I felt awkward as heck (particularly going back; less so in the latter stages of the downswing) and could barely imagine--as stiff and "contrived" as all this felt--that I'd be able to hit the ball solidly, much less really forcefully and online. But that's exactly what has happened. With my old, left-focused swing, I felt like I was swinging 100+ mph and the ball flew like 80 mph, not to mention wildly inconsistent. Now I feel like I'm swinging 80 mph and the ball flies like I'm swinging 100+ mph, with heretofore undreamed-of accuracy and consistency. Oh, yeah, I still mishit and misjudge, but that's golf.
Truly appreciate the explanations, theories, observations provided here, as when we're self-medicating on the course or on the range, we need visualizations and vicarious observations to help make meaning of what we think and feel (and think we feel, for that matter). Kudos! -- JC
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