Doug, reader of this blog, asked for some clarification about its meaning and purpose.
He read about that in the Bobby Clampett’s book (The Impact Zone) and, as mentioned earlier, it is taking its roots in the Golfing Machine book from Homer Kelley.

Fellow golfer Doug asked this about the Aiming Point:

I do love the idea of "aimpoint" ahead of the ball
(Bobby Clampett focuses on this quite a bit in his Impact Zone book, "4
inches for optimal striking which I believe he was taught by Ben Doyle and
a TGM (The Golfing Machine) instructor).

For the "Driver" in some of your forums you mention that the "aimpoint" should be at the ball or before (upward strike) but Bobby
says different.

Any thoughts on this would be great.

-Doug

Very interesting topic, isn’t it?
So, let’s find out if Bobby Clampett is right.

To do that, let’s explain this Aiming Point thing!

The Aiming Point concept

For those having the Golfing Machine book, chapter 6-E-2 provides a very detailed explanation of the Aiming Point concept. The description is exhaustive but not very easy to understand so I’ll try to explain that in layman’s terms.

Basically, the Aiming Point is a point on the ground that you intend to direct your Lag Pressure to during the downstroke.
And if you read this blog, you know how important Lag Pressure is in the golf swing.
If you don’t, I strongly advise that you take time to read all the materials on this blog – and support us by buying our eBook about Lag

Indeed, the first thing to do in your journey to great golf is to establish that Lag Pressure feel in your swing. This will immediately translate into crisper and powerful shots.

You know that the Lag is felt during the downstroke as a steady pressure in the index finger of your right hand (aka Pressure Point #3 (PP#3)).

Done properly the hands and the clubhead combine as Clubhead Lag feel that can be directed, or aimed at a target.
Consequently, the Aiming Point is a target on the delivery line where you fire the pressure in your index finger (PP#3) to.

The Aiming Point is very rarely at the ball. Therefore you must not consider the ball as your target.
Instead, the Aiming Point replaces the ball and becomes your new target.

Think about an explosion shot of the bunker in the sand. In this scenario, the Aiming Point would be located before the ball (which is fine in the sand but of course a no-no in the fairway with a short iron!).

What’s the exact location of that Aiming Point?

From here, I can hear you say: “OK, that’s super easy, I just have to manage to constantly aim at the same spot every time, and that’s the end of the story: it will repeat the same shot every time whatever the club…”.

Not so fast my friend, because you would be very wrong!

This misleads a lot of people with the Aiming Point: its location varies with each club and depends a lot on clubshaft length (and hands speed too but the most obvious being clubshaft length…).

For exemple, a wedge requires that you aim past the ball whereas the driver requires an Aiming Point located before the ball!

But why?! Shouldn’t it be always 4 inches past the ball as Bobby Clampett says?!

Well, the simple reason is that, for the same hand speed, longer clubs take much time to release that shorter clubs. This is not me it is physics!

For the interested maniacs, it’s about the law of conservation of angular momentum that says that it takes less time for shorter clubs to reach their in-line condition from a given release point than do the longer clubs!

Therefore, you must give the Driver more time to release by aiming at point well before the ball. If you fail to do so or if you aim past the ball, you will look like this and come up with the face wide open (fore right!):

Even with perfect dynamics, lag and technique, if you aim past the ball with the Driver, the club won’t release on time and you’ll block the shot to the right because you won’t give enough time to the club face to square up.

This is an amazing revelation because you may wrongly try to correct an overall good swing technique while the only problem might reside on understanding that you must aim before the ball with the longer clubs!

The phenomenon is even worse with the driver where the ball is usually placed around low point (in front of your right shoulder) than with a wedge where the ball would lie mid-stance.
With such a setup, you now understand that aiming past the ball with the driver is waaaaaay wrong from what you should do.

So, you may be tempted to deliver your Lag pressure by aiming like this:

Instead of delivering your Lag pressure to this Aiming Point:

This could make a huge difference to the results without ever changing a thing in the core technique of your stroke!

Having fun with the Aiming Point

Now, take a minute to think about that: if you choke down on the driver to get it as short as a wedge, you are moving its Aiming Point forward and may end up aiming past the ball!

To quote the Golfing Machine book:

Choke Down to make all Clubshafts the same length means the same Aiming Point for all your clubs – shorter radius but precise timing”.

With this example, (provided of course that you do not choke down on your clubs ) you easily understand that you have to move your Aiming Point depending on the club or the shot at hand.

Where to aim at finally?

The goal of the Aiming Point is to replace the ball as a target for your Lag Pressure felt in PP#3.

To send your ball straight, the club face must contact the ball squarely every time with every club and this is where the trick is.

The Aiming Point’s purpose is to get the proper release of the club head for any given club, from the Driver to the Wedges.

Locating your Aiming Point(s) (the plural would be more adequate here) is a matter of trial and error because it varies from one player to another. It depends on hand speed, ball location and clubhead length.

You will have to tweak your Aiming Point(s) with every club and check the results to get it right.

As a reminder, here are the general rules:

• with the longer clubs you need to aim further before the ball (right for a right handed player)
• with the shorter clubs you need to aim further past the ball (left for a right handed player)
• a mid iron may require an Aiming Point close to (or at) the ball
• if you have fast hands, I mean if your hands are traveling very fast, you need to aim farther before/after the ball (driver/wedge)
• if you have slow hands, the Aiming Point must be closer (before/after) the ball (driver/wedge)
• with a set of clubs having the same length (which is very unlikely!), the aiming point is the same for all clubs (but may be located before, at or after the ball!)

So what about Bobby Clampett? Is he right or wrong?

In his book, Bobby demonstrates the Aiming Point using a wedge. As a result he says that the Aiming Point must be located past the ball, which is right in that case.

I think he deliberately took a shortcut by telling that this is the absolute position of the Aiming Point. And he certainly did that on purpose because he wants your hands to go past the ball every time.
Remember, his book focuses on teaching good Lag dynamics rather than being accurate with the Aiming Point.

Getting the hands past the ball on every shot is priority number 1, aiming the Lag at something comes in second position.

And as such, an Aiming Point located past the ball is a great drill to achieve priority number 1!

But once you have decent Lag in your game, priority number 2 starts to be a concern if you want to be accurate with every club in your bag.

And this is why accurate location of your Aiming Point(s) is so critical.

So, try it out by yourself: go out there, grab your favorite club, aim before/after the ball and check the differences.

We’ve put a lot of hard work and passion into this eBook and we are now proud to deliver 115 pages of great golf instruction.

We’ve taken special care to include a lot of clean and appealing visuals to support the content. This is very important because the visual impression plays a great role in passing the ideas.

For example, there is a tip involving a ball retriever (how about that! ) where you can actually see the action frame by frame from the inside to help understand how to get a visual feel for the Lag!

We decided to ship the eBook for €29. We think this is a great value for money and more important, we hope to generate enough revenues to be able to invest again in creating more and more quality content.

Amazing feedback

We’ve also been receiving rave reviews from the people who already get their hands on their copy:

John, I bought your ebook and read it and went to the range two day ago and played yesterday.  I could not believe the shots I was hitting.  My irons were so straight and long.  I hit a 7 iron 165 yards.  It was amazing.  So, I hit my driver after doing this.  I hit the driver for 310 yards.  By far the longest I have ever hit a driver.  If anything I had a slight wind in my face.  Amazing.

Andy

or

Thanks for all or your hard work here, I’ve been lurking around for a couple of years and have truly enjoyed your posts and feedback that you’ve received.  It’s helped my play more than I can say.


I was delighted to see your ebook available now and finally have a chance help support your efforts.  This simple lesson is some of the best instruction I’ve ever read and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend to anyone.


Thanks again for everything,

Kurt

Thanks guys for your support and feedback. It’s amazing to see how much positive feedback we’ve received so far!

Writing an eBook has been a lot of fun and I think this is a great way to deliver high quality content.  Moreover, the nice feedback received so far strongly convinced us to release more content of that kind.
We have great ideas for the next eBooks and we’ll try to release them as soon as we can!

For the time being, I hope you’ll contribute on supporting this site by buying the eBook or at least to spread the word !

Thank you again and enjoy the Lag.
John.

Due to my Achilles tendon injury and a mass of considerable professional work I have been taken away from the game and took huge delays in the plans I have for the site.

But the wait is over and we start again with a very popular topic:

There has always been a fight between Hitting and Swinging aficionados: On the paper, these are two mutually exclusive ways to propel a golf club so in theory you have to choose either to Hit or to Swing.

Both ways to hit the ball have strength and weaknesses and once you’ve tried and identified the differences between both techniques you could have a hard time choosing one path or the other as both are equally efficient.

Wouldn’t it be sweet if we could merge Fire and Ice?

Rejoice my friend, because now you can !!!

This "monster" is referred in the Golfing Machine terminology as the Four Barrel Hit. According to Homer Kelley (the author of the book) it is the ultimate way (although tough according to him – on what I tend to disagree) to hit the ball.

A few weeks ago a fellow reader asked me:

Just a fan and reader of you lag blog, had a couple questions:

I myself am stuck in that land between swinging and hitting. I’m not exactly sure what keeps me from committing to one or the other.  I really love the swings of Rory Mcilroy, Trevol Immelman, all of Slicefixer’s students, as well as you’re "swinging" video.  You’ve got sooooooooooo much extension and width that swing it’s just beautiful.

Somewhere on your site you mentioned that recently you’re playing with more of a hitting style.  With a swing as beautiful as yours I wondered why you would prefer the hitting method?  Of course in that video we can’t see what the ball flight looked like.  Maybe you prefer the accuracy and lower flight of the hit.  I too like the control I feel when I’m "hitting", but when I’m working on swinging, making a bigger, wider turn, rolling my forearm, letting centrifugal force do what it’s supposed to do, and I flush one, and that ball goes longer and higher than anything I’ve ever seen, it’s just such an amazing feeling, like a drug, and I just want MORE.

I guess I’m just wondering if it’s possible to have a little bit of both.  A nice wide, long, fluid swing, but with a deliberate squaring of the club, maintaining the lag with that right index pressure point.  Would there be any benefit to this?

Sorry I gota bit long winded with this one, I would love to get a response but also understand we’re all busy people.  Thanks again for such an informative little blogsite.

-Sean

Here’s what I wrote to Sean:

Introducing the Four Barrel Hit!

Now, regarding your question: I found myself switching between the two techniques during the past 4 years and achieved quite the same results in scoring with both.

Also a word about power and distance: I achieved more or less the same results in distance with hitting and swinging.
Without flattering myself, I can proudly say that I’m the longest hitter in my area (I drive the same distance as a friend of mine playing on the Allianz Tour (a Nationwide-like tour in Europe) and slightly longer with my irons (but accuracy not still at par )) and I cannot remember someone overdriving me!

Interestingly enough, this length and power is directly related to the Lag I now have in all my shots – not Hitting or Swinging. Lag pressure is independent of the technique.

After 4 years of studying Hitting, Swinging and Lag, I came to the conclusion that both are very efficient IF Lag is present. This makes the Lag the most important thing to master.

Now, a proper technique eases the use of Lag. This is why learning Hitting and Swinging is so important.

But due to their essence, Hitting and Swinging shouldn’t be combined!

“…you CANNOT pull (Swing) and push (Hit) something at the SAME TIME…”.

True, and I have a nice analogy for you to get a feel for that: Imagine that you intend to spin a bicycle wheel.

You can either:

• Drag the rim with your left hand (Swing)
• Drive (push) a spoke with your right hand (Hit)

Try to do both AT THE SAME TIME – you’ll find yourself chasing one move with the other – it doesn’t work well.

But there is one way!

You surely noticed the capitalized words in “…you CANNOT pull (Swing) and push (Hit) something at the SAME TIME…”.

• Ok, so what about saying: “…you CAN pull (Swing) and push (Hit) something BUT NOT at the SAME TIME…”
• Or, even: “…you CAN pull (Swing) FIRST and push (Hit) something SECOND provided you do not do both at the SAME TIME…”
• Or better: “…you CAN pull (Swing) and push (Hit) something IN SEQUENCE!”

Great, but how to do that practically?

First, a little reminder of the particularities of Hitting & Swinging:

Swinging:

• Centrifugal force
• A lot of “rotary” body power

Hitting:

• Right arm muscular thrust only
• Little to no “rotary” body power

A “4 Barrel” stroke is sequence of both techniques – and it is vital that they stay sequenced.

To get a feel for it, let’s go back to our bicycle wheel:

1. Swing the wheel by dragging the rim
2. The wheel is turning – centrifugal force has been generated
3. If the wheel is not turning too fast, you could be able to catch a spoke and push it to give the wheel extra spin!

Now applied in the golf swing :

From the top of the backswing

1. Swing component: with your left arm across your chest, perform your body rotation towards the target in order to blast this left arm away from the chest.
2. Swing component: WAIT for the feel of centrifugal force coming in as your body stops his rotation and your left arm and club are swung into orbit.
   Note: At this point, in the most extreme cases, your body could very well be facing the target!
3. Hitting component: As soon as you fell that centrifugal force coming in, fire the powerful right arm thrust of the Hitter.

It works beautifully if the sequence is done properly and if you stay within your limits.

The good

• Maximum power. For me it gives me one more club at last with irons and could sometimes send the ball 350 meters with a driver!
• No accuracy loss if done properly
• Makes your friends laugh as you send balls out of bounds in the neighbor’s swimming pool the other end of the range!

The bad

• Timing is the issue. Be careful with your sequence, do not engage your right arm too soon.

Have fun playing with the beast!

But do you have an idea of how much ahead?

A few years ago, my divot location was starting just under the ball and I thought that was not too bad. I was shocked when I discovered how much ahead of the ball it should be if you really hit DOWN on the ball and compress it properly. It’s common for Tour Players to create divots starting 3 inches after the ball!!!

Lets have a closer look at this phenomenon and tell me if you’re as shocked as I once was!

Check the video first!

Stroke sequence (Hitting!) – Details

Ball first, turf second: keep moving your hands forward!

The divot located in front of the ball with irons is a natural byproduct of clubhead Lag. As a consequence, you can look at your divots to check how well you are compressing the ball with a descending blow.

If your divots start before the ball, you certainly stop/decelerate your hands at the ball.

The only way to create a divot after the ball is to drag your hands as far as you can towards the target on the downstroke. If you are used to stop your hands at the ball it will feel like your hands are going past your left leg at impact (and of course this is not the reality but just the correct FEEL!).

This sounded promising and I was happy to give it a try!
Disclaimer: I’m not affiliated to Jeff’s business in any way – he just kindly provided a free sample!

Read the manual!

The PBS comes out of the box with a one page manual explaining how to properly use it.

Jeff employs some specific TGM (The Golfing Machine) terms in his manual such as "Extensor Action" and "Aiming Point" that might scare those unfamiliar with those concepts… but nothing to worry about as your servitor has put this site up to guide you through this jungle!

I may add also that you’ll figure pretty quickly how the device should be used:

It is designed to be placed on the aft side of the grip where your index trigger finger touches the grip.

Notice also that it cannot be tightly fixed – for a good reason: you have to keep it in place by keeping a constant pressure in your index finger!

Video review

Have a look at that video and I’ll catch you after the break (by the way, sorry for the windy mic and the French accent, it was an impromptu video!):

Troublesome in “non Lagging” motions

The PBS matches your #3 Pressure Point location and helps focusing on the pressure exerted (or not!) on that spot.

If you’re not familiar with the Lag Pressure Feel, you might find that the PBS is pretty tough to use properly as it will tend to slip away from the grip.

This is normal, it was designed on purpose: It happens only if you lose pressure on it somewhere during the downswing OR if you apply pressure somewhere else than on the aft of the grip.

I’ve tested it on mid-handicappers and to my surprise, they were having a lot of trouble using it. They failed miserably in using the PBS and had a lot of trouble keeping it in place. They were also pretty annoyed by this foreign thing on their grip that was disturbing their feels!!! (lol)

In fact it was a very good clue that something was not working right in their swing’s dynamics.

Be humble and stick with it!

You have to stay humble and accept that the PBS is working as it should if used properly – the PBS is here to tell you the truth and will help you in knowing what is dynamically sound or not in your motion.

The good thing is that if you start feeling comfortable when striking the ball with it, you’ll know that your Lag Pressure is on the right track and so will your game.

More info available on Jeff’s site.

Photo gallery

Click on the images to display the slideshow, and then use the PREVIOUS / NEXT controls to navigate through the images.

But what you are about to see is incredible enough to justify this dramatic entry…

I’m very excited to share this with you because I’ve never seen such an amazing improvement on a Golf Swing in such a short time.

Here’s the story: My wife, Carine, is a casual player who started golf a few years ago and plays around 30. But due to her pregnancy she hasn’t touched a golf club for two years and she only played 4 practice rounds since (!):

• May 5, 2008: One bucket of practice balls
• Aug 24, 2008: One bucket of practice balls
• Sept 1, 2008: Two hours working on Lag & proper swing dynamics
• Feb 13, 2009: One bucket of practice balls with a great smile !

Carine did the first two practice sessions with her old Swing. But at the end of the second session in August, she wasn’t totally pleased by her game and she decided it was time to do something…

As I got great improvements on my own game by introducing Lag in it, I proposed her to give it a try.

And this is what we got (click on the thumbs for the details):

Old Swing – Iron play – Date: May 5, 2008

This is Carine’s old swing.
This swing sequence may look good at first sight but still images tell the truth: The Left Wrist bends at impact due to clubhead throw away. Leverage is lost leading to power loss and poor accuracy.

Old Swing – Driver – Date: Aug 24, 2008

Carine hasn’t touched a club since her last session three months ago. However the same flaws can be seen here again.

They are also magnified by using the Driver in an attempt to hit it hard…

After that session, we watched the videos and she asked me what could be done to improve her golf swing.

I was happy to oblige and gently proposed she’d be my Guinea Pig for some experiments during her next practice session

New Swing – Iron Play – Date: Sept 1, 2008

One week later (without touching a club in between) we managed to get together for that "lab" session.

First, we did a few exercises to make her understand Lag pressure – Dynamics of the stroke.
Second, I explained the correct Geometry of the stroke and how to comply with it.

She gently, diligently and blindly (this must be love!) did all the strange things I asked her to do during the first 45 minutes.

We then moved to an area where we can hit balls a bit longer. After 10 balls, I took the first Swing video: She was performing perfect "Acquired Motion" strokes!

The second Video was shot a few minutes later: She loved the new feels and was looking to compress the ball with increased authority!

New Swing – Driver

As a reward we headed to the range to hit some Drives. I was wondering if she could reproduce the feel with the big stick…

Well, see for yourself!

Absolutely no clubhead throw away here and a nice looking golf swing on still images!

New Swing – Hungry for Lag – Date: Feb 2, 2009

And the final test: She hasn’t seen a golf ball since the last session more than 7 months ago!!! I told you she was a casual player!

I took the video 5 minutes after we arrived – she did it immediately right as if she had played the day before!

That was funny because she loved the Lag Pressure Feel so much that she was compressing the ball like crazy!

She was so concerned by driving it down that she never thought of her finish and always stopped at the end of her follow through – the both arms straight station.

Woah!

Pretty amazing don’t you think?

Isn’t it a great proof that switching to the correct dynamics can lead to huge improvements on the Golf game?

And most important: by accepting to change your conception of the golf stroke those improvements can come pretty fast!

What kind of black magic is in use here?

As I think you are dying to know what magic was used, let me explain exactly what we did to achieve those tremendous changes almost instantly.
I’m sure this will benefit to a lot of you who don’t know where to start to go from Hackville to Lagville!

My goal was to get rid of her clubhead throw away.
I knew I had to make her feel Lag pressure because the more the Lag Pressure, the harder to throw it away – pretty simple.

But before hitting any ball, we talked 15 minutes about the geometry of the stroke.

From there she understood the need of hitting down (& out) on the golf ball instead of scooping at it.

She then realized that a Flat Left Wrist at impact was mandatory to achieve this and that the clubhead must never travel faster than the hands (the clubhead must stay below the hands until both arms straight).

I told her that one way to ensure a Flat Left Wrist at impact is to think of maintaining the right wrist bent at all times.

With that in mind, she was now ready to get introduced to Mr. Lag Pressure and ingrain that feel in her mind.

We just did a variant of the "Drag the Wet Mop" drill:
With an 8 iron, walk down the fairway while strongly dragging the leading edge of the Golf club. Your goal is to bend the shaft and maintain that stress as you walk. This puts quite a strong pressure into your index trigger finger of the right hand that can’t go unnoticed!

Do it for 3 minutes and keep that feeling in your mind and in your finger.

Now, you are ready to hit some "Basic Motion" shots: This is only a miniature swing where the emphasis is put into the impact zone – two feet back and two feet through.
The goal is to feel exactly the same strong pressure in the index as in the previous exercise while maintaining a Flat Left Wrist (or a Bent Right Wrist) and driving the ball down into the ground.

We did that 15 minutes and moved to "Acquired Motion": Still a miniature full swing (and not a pitch shot), hands no further back than shoulder high and stop to both arms straight with the clubhead below the hands.

The risk when you move to longer shots is to go faster because you subconsciously think of the distance the ball must travel.
To keep her away from that I asked her to think "Slow and Heavy".

That’s all folks: Nothing more than Lag Pressure Feel (good dynamics) applied to a correct conception of the Golf Stroke (good geometry)…

The player’s feel

She told me what she felt different from her old way of swinging the golf club:

1. Compressing the ball by visualizing a line going down and out into the ground and through the ball and that she needed to aim down that line.
   Before that, she was seeing a line going towards the target and laying on the ground.
2. She immediately loved the feel and was "greedy" for more compression!
3. She felt maintaining the Left Wrist Flat by maintaining the Right Wrist Bend.
4. She tried to reproduce the pressure in the index trigger finger of the right hand witnessed during the Drag the Wet Mop drill.
5. Thinking "Slow and Heavy" as a mantra to keep away from over accelerating the clubhead and sensing a heavy Lag Pressure.

I’ll try to perform that little experiment again to see if I can manage to get the same amazing improvements on someone else.
I’ll keep you informed if I manage to find another gentle Guinea Pig!

In the meantime, feel free to try this curriculum by yourself and share the results with others on the comments area.

The hitting action is a bit the dark side of the moon when it comes to golf instruction. It seems that a vast majority of golf instructors (with the exception of The Golfing Machine Instructors of course) are simply unaware of its existence and mainly teach golf the "Swinging way".

This is very unfortunate because it is a very efficient way to strike the golf ball and in my opinion a very interesting alternative for strong or less flexible players.

Muscular Thrust

Unlike the Swinger who manipulates centrifugal force, the pure Hitter ONLY uses his right arm to activate the Primary Lever Assembly (that is the Left Arm plus the club as a whole).
For those interested, the muscle involved here is the right triceps as it is responsible for straightening the arm. So if you are a boxer you should give the Hitting stroke a try !

The main action involved here is a muscular thrust of the right arm against the Primary Lever Assembly.
The clubhead is not thrown into orbit by the pivot; Instead, the hitter pushes radially (against the radius!) against the shaft with his right arm only.

Think of it like pushing against one spoke of a bicycle wheel to put the wheel into motion – Swinging would make you drag the rim of the wheel.

The proper action is to straighten the right arm without flattening the right wrist in a piston like action. 

Address: Impact Fix

It all starts at address – the Hitter usually sets up with his hands in a position that is called "Impact Fix":

This position, while not mandatory, allows for an easier pickup of the Primary Lever Assembly as a whole by the right arm (the right forearm takeaway). Also it establishes the proper impact alignments right away.

From this position all you have to do is to freeze your wrists into their position and move the whole thing back and forth with your right arm pretty much in a piston like motion.

A good way to feel this motion is, without a club, to hold your left wrist with your right hand and move your left arm back and forth. Simple enough? Well this is the principle of the Hitting motion.

Half Roll of the club face

Due to the way the club is moved, the clubface doesn’t open as much as the Swinging motion during the backswing and doesn’t close as much in the downstroke. Consequently, Hitting naturally produces what is called a "Half Roll" of the clubface: When you look at the clubface at both arms straight, you should see the clubface looking 45 degrees left (for righties) instead of 90 degrees left in the Swinging motion (full roll, clubface closed).

Funnily enough, this produces a no-roll feel which is very important to note as you might intuitively search to feel a roll.

This Half Roll also has a natural fade tendency. As a consequence, the Hitter tends to adopt stronger grips to counterbalance that effect and produce straight shots.

You should also take into account that the more forward the ball in your stance (Driver for example), the more the need for a closed face and a stronger grip because the more the layback of the clubface at this point.

Experience with your grip to find the correct amount of shut face to induce.

Face constantly looking at the ball

Another interesting fact is the way the clubface swivels during the swing.

Unlike the Swinger whose clubface almost immediately swivels against the plane of the swing, the Hitter doesn’t rotate the clubface but rather keep it "looking at the ball" during the backswing: The clubface stays at right angles against the face of the plane. This is the natural byproduct of the angled hinge and you must not intent to rotate it clockwise/open on the backswing or you will have to consciously rotate it back counterclockwise on the downswing for proper contact.

Establishing the Lag: Drive Loading

You will discover that the piston like action of the right arm produces a shorter backswing than the Swinger due to the position of the right elbow set to push against the shaft instead of pulling.

From there, usually the hands cannot go higher than shoulder high – which is called the Top.

But, from such a shorter backstroke, the tendency is to rush on the downstroke.

Make sure you give yourself enough time to transition from Top to Start Down and accomplish the necessary Drive Loading.

Uh? Drive Loading you said?

Let me explain: For the Hitter, an efficient way to establish the Lag is to resist the backstroke motion then perform a right arm thrust against this clubhead Lag striving to accelerate a pre stressed clubshaft from a slow startdown through impact and to both arms straight.

Here, the Pivot (Right Shoulder) must also provide the initial acceleration of the Power Package (Shoulders, Arms, Hands and Club).

But beware! From there, you only have your bent right arm to provide the Thrust. So, if the right arm begins to straighten too soon, you will have triggered the release, and you will run out of right arm before impact and product a nasty Clubhead Throwaway. 

Slow Start Down

As previously mentioned, for the Hitter a slow Start Down is mandatory to allow for the right arm to properly get into position.
In the transition from the Top to Start Down think very Slow and very Heavy and that should do the trick.

A word about Pivot Action

Unlike the Swinging motion, the Pivot (the body) doesn’t perform the blast of the left arm off the chest. Instead its purpose is to put the right shoulder into position (closer to the ball – down plane) as a platform to push against.

Think of a sprinter pushing against his starting-blocks.
Think also of the action of a boxer: before delivering its punch the boxer will get his right shoulder into position closer to his opponent to strike him with maximum force. In the Hitting stroke, you have to move your right shoulder down plane to get closer to the ball and deliver the right arm thrust.

One more word about the Pressure Points involved in the Hitting Procedure

Again, to find the location of the pressure points involved in the Hitting action we’ll do a little drill: grab a club, put the clubhead against something heavy and try to push this thing not by dragging with your body but rather by pushing with your right arm.

You’ll easily identify 3 pressure points:

• Pressure point #1: The palm of your right hand against the aft section of the grip and you left thumb.
• Pressure point #2: The last 3 fingers of your left hand.
• Pressure point #3: The index-trigger-finger of the right hand resisting against the club wanting to stay behind.

Establish those specific pressures during you downstroke while performing the Hitting stroke to become an expert Hitter! 

In the eye of the Hitter!

The Hitter thinks of delivering a cross line blow down and out from the top of his swing. As a result he mentally constructs a "Delivery Line" going down and out to "first base".

I thought it could be interesting and fun to show what the Hitter sees in his mind. This gives a very good sense of the Hitter’s intents during the stroke.

Click on the images to display the slideshow, and then use the PREVIOUS / NEXT controls to navigate through the images.

Summing things up

1. Set up at Impact Fix and "freeze" your wrists alignments.
2. Pick up the whole thing back in a "piston + fanning" like motion (a piston-only motion would make you look like starting a lawnmower which is not the motion we want).
3. Perform what feels like a shorter backstroke as what you are used to.
4. From the top, initiate a slow startdown by pushing against the shaft with your right arm only (pressure point #1 feel). The slow start down will give yourself enough time to get closer to the ball to deliver your blow.
5. Drive it strongly down and out. Destroy the ground!

Swing sequence

As a reminder, here are the sequences of the Hitting Procedure. Click on the images to display the slideshow, and then use the PREVIOUS/NEXT controls to navigate through the images.

Hitting stroke video

Hitting stroke sequence

In this article I’ll try to cover the leading principles of the Swing and explain what you should feel to reproduce the correct motion.

Whirl something tied to a rope and you generate centrifugal force. That is simple and the very same principle is the essence of the Swinging Procedure.



However, in a Golf Swing you do not swing a rope, but rather a flail where the hinge pin is the left wrist.

Throw it incorrectly and the flail will go out of control and hurt you!

We must generate and master centrifugal force and make it an ally.

How to generate Centrifugal Force?

Centrifugal force allows striking the ball with a sensation of effortless power which is quite interesting!

The key here is the Throwing motion. More precisely it is a Throw-Out Action induced by the rotary motion of the swinging stroke.
The goal here is to (intend to) Throw the club out of the radius of the stroke (the Throw out Action).
Doing it is fairly easy as the only thing you have to do from the top of the swing is straighten the right arm. It won’t look like that on video but it is the correct feel.

How does it feel?

Try this tip: Go to the Top of your backswing. From there, try to hammer your clubhead right into the ground to the right of your right foot. Do not turn your body to the ball, just straighten your right arm as you would with a hammer in your hand, on a vertical plane.

You can hammer the ground very hard this way and it is pretty natural!
This is the Throw-Out Action!

Next step: All we have to do is to let this motion happen on the inclined plane of the swing passing through the ball instead of a vertical plane passing through our feet.

This is the tricky part because it means that in order to perform the same action as when hammering the ground on a vertical plane, this motion on an inclined plane puts your club face facing up and out to the right!
This is most disturbing for a vast majority of golfers because their brain senses this wide open clubface going down plane and tells their hands to urgently turn the clubface to the ball!

This is steering the clubface and it disrupts centrifugal force.

Have a look at this picture: I put in evidence the desired orientation of the clubface during the Throw-Out Action of the clubhead.

So the trick is to initially throw the club with the clubface face up under the plane of the swing.

What it means is that even very close to impact the club face remains pointing to right field almost at right angle!!! Then, at the very last moment, centrifugal force and inertia will automatically square up the club face for impact.

It’s really scary when you try it for the first time. But it is a test of faith!
The more you throw it DOWN and OUT freely “open” without trying to line up the club face yourself, the easier for centrifugal force to line up you club face at the very last moment!

What breaks the Swing?

You probably have an idea right now: You can mess things up very easily with the SLIGHTEST attempt to manipulate/control the club FACE.

Doing that will disrupt centrifugal force and you’ll break the motion.

Summing things up

1. Throw the club (Throw-Out Action) to generate centrifugal force by straightening the right arm.
2. Hold on to the club and resist the temptation of interfering. There is a sensation of no muscular effort and a freewheeling of the club head.
3. Keep the faith until low point! Centrifugal force will align everything at the last moment!

A last word about the Pressure Points involved in the Swinging Procedure

(This is an extract of a reply to Craig Vogel’s question about this particular subject)
To discover the location of the pressure points involved in the swinging action, do the “Drag the Wet Mop” drill and focus on pulling the mop (do not drag it by pushing it with your right arm or you’ll switch to Hitting with a different arrangement of pressures).

You can also replace the mop drill by putting your clubhead behind something very heavy and trying to move it forward by dragging the club.
You’ll easily identify 3 pressure points:

• Pressure point #4: The point where your left arm touches the chest.
• Pressure point #2: The last 3 fingers of your left hand dragging the club.
• Pressure point #3: The index-trigger-finger of the right hand resisting against the club wanting to stay behind.

Swing sequences

As a reminder, here are the sequences of the Swinging Procedure. Click on the images to display the slideshow, and then use the PREVIOUS/NEXT controls to navigate through the images.

Swinging stroke video

Swinging stroke sequence

To properly understand that, let’s go back to school: Physics tells us that an object can only be moved either by pushing it or pulling it.

In Golf, and more specifically in The Golfing Machine, it is called Swinging (pulling) and Hitting (pushing).

Before going any further, take a closer look at those two swing sequences:

Swinging stroke video

Hitting stroke video

For easier reviewing, here are the sequences of each stroke. Click on the images below to display the slideshow, and then use the PREVIOUS/NEXT controls to navigate through the images.

Swinging stroke sequence

Hitting stroke sequence

Same player but two distinctive look and, believe me, two very different feels.

Those are the natural byproducts of the actions involved (dragging or driving). At no time I intended to adopt specific positions and it is very important that you do not attempt to copy those positions. Your body will automatically put you into the same positions if you properly employ the right set of physics and actions!

Swinging action

The swinger relies on centrifugal force to move his golf club.

The main action involved here is to throw the clubhead into orbit, down and out, hold on to it, and let centrifugal force do its job without attempting to disrupt its action.
It’s easier said than done because any attempt to "add to the shot (hit stronger)" or manipulate the clubface will disrupt centrifugal force and will result in steering disaster.

Swinging is the most common way of moving the golf club because it does not rely on muscular power but rather on the player’s skill to use centrifugal force.
As a result 99% of the children start to play golf as swingers because they have not enough muscular force and a majority of them stay this way growing old.

This is also a reason why many club pros who started the golf as youngsters (and as swingers) only teach golf this way to their students.
While this is OK if their students are children, it can make things tougher with adults starting to play golf because those adults’ natural instincts is to use muscular force as they’ve learned to do in their everyday’s life and less skilled to use centrifugal force!

Known players who are swingers include Geoff Ogilvy, Vijay Singh, Fred Couples, Jack Nicklaus…

Hitting action

The hitter on the other hand does not rely on centrifugal force but on muscular force instead.

The main action involved here is a muscular thrust of the right arm against the primary lever assembly (that is the left arm plus the club as a whole).
The clubhead is not thrown into orbit. Instead, the hitter pushes radially (against the radius!) against the shaft with his right arm only.

Hitting is less commonly used by golfers (at last consciously!) because golfing instruction out there is mainly about Swinging. However, this is a very efficient way to play Golf. It has often been reported that hitting is particularly accurate.

This said, it is worth noticing that Lee Trevino, who is a hitter, is credited to be the most accurate player of his time.

Known players who are hitter include JB Holmes, Kenny Perry, KJ Choi, Lee Trevino…

This is the end of the first part of this series of articles on Hitting vs Swinging.
In the two next articles of this series, we will explain how to successfully perform a Swing or a Hit and the distinctive ingredients of both.

Knowing to do both is fun and very instructive. It will help you discover which action naturally suits you the best to play better Golf.

By the way, forgive the fancy pants in the hitting sequence !

If so, I urge you to read this!!!
Pressure points could improve your game forever and simplify a lot of things in your swing by focusing your mind on feel rather than technique.  As a bonus, once you learn to rely on your pressure points, the game of Golf becomes more of a sensation than a mechanical cheklist!

But for the moment, think about this for a second: In order to move something like a shopping cart you need to push against it with your hands (actually, you could also pull it, but for simplicity stakes, let’s stick to pushing…).
While you push the cart, you feel a pressure in the point(s) of contact of your hand(s) against the handle of the cart: These are pressure points.

In the Golf swing there are 4 distinct pressure points (more on that in another article) but again, for simplicity stakes, we will focus on the easiest and more convenient to feel: the meaty part of your index (the "trigger finger") of your trailing hand where it touches the club.

Here is the trick: Are you able to perform a Golf stroke while feeling pressure in this index from start down to both arms straight (the end of the follow-through and before the finish)???

Even better: if you can feel this pressure not decreasing (unrelentless pressure), I bet my shirt you must be a 1 digit handicap as you must have Lag in your swing with all the good things that come with it!

Poor players have almost no pressure feel at all because they are "running after the club", exactly as you would run after your cart after having pushed it violently: the pressure against the handle was very strong the moment you pushed hard but disappeared as the cart when away from you (you can’t push something faster you can run!).

A player who casts the club (club head throwaway) does exactly that: he feels a lot of pressure in the start of the downswing (by accelerating the club very hard and convulsively). Such a sudden accelartion thows the club away with no chance to catch it up before impact.
Needless to say, that player feels no pressure at all in the index finger when the club head arrives at the ball.

The correct way to do it is to push your cart evenly with no over-acceleration.

The correct feel is a pressure in the trigger finger that is even and present from start-down to follow-through. Light or heavy pressure doesn’t matter. The important thing is that it must be there and steady.

A Tour Player’s feels exactly that. But imagine he is able to put and keep (most important!) a LOT of pressure in the trigger finger: harder to sustain during the swing but highly rewarding in terms of ball compression/distance/control.

Sounds easy to practice? Next time you go to the range, spend a bucket of ball focusing on that pressure. Start with half swings as it is easy to feel with shorter backswings.

Oh, by the way: This is how Lag feels; it’s a pressure in your hands!!! – The more unrelentless pressure you feel, the more Lag you have!

And if you are a Golf nut like us, look for the feel the next time you push your cart in the shopping mall!

Using the same principle as the drawing on the downward impact, we can geometrically represent the golf swing from a top view (above the player’s head) like this: 

Although many players understand why it is geometrically correct to hit down on the ball, very few realize that the very same principle applies to the outward component of the stroke.

The outmost point of the club-head orbit is exactly in front of the leading shoulder as it is the center of the swing circle. As the ball is positioned before this point (with the exception of the driver where the ball may be positioned an inch before this point), you will strike the ball first then take a divot down but also OUT until you reach the outmost point of the radius of the swing.

This is what is called a “three dimensional impact”, forward, downward and outward, and is mandatory to strike a golf ball with maximum compression.

Of course, including Lag in your golf swing is an easy way to achieve this proper impact: To create Lag, you apply pressure on your golf shaft. But that pressure has to be directed in a very precise direction. Previously, we talked about a tip named “drag the wet mop”; this tip helps to feel Lag as a pressure against the shaft in the trigger finger of you trailing hand. But if you think about it, dragging a wet mop directs the pressure mainly forward as we can’t drive the mop under the ground.
But you know understand that you need to direct that pressure not only forward but also downward and outward.

Try it and you’ll know what compression on a golf ball means!

Take a look at the picture below:

In order to strike the ball with maximum power, you must use the full leverage provided by the leading arm and the club. Poor players break their left wrist prior to impact resulting in an important loss of power mainly because the lever used is half the length as it should be.

This said, the Golf swing is nothing more than a circular motion of the club and leading arm assembly (also called the Power Package) operating on an inclined plane. The center of the club-head orbit is the leading shoulder. Thus, we conclude that the low point of ANY swing is exactly below the leading shoulder joint!

When you strike a golf ball with the driver, you hit the ball almost in the low point of your swing. But you still must hit down on the ball in a attempt to take an “air divot” behind the ball!

Using a mid iron, you place the ball somewhere between your feet and behind the low point if your swing. Therefore you will hit the ball first then take a divot until you reach low point.

This is why you take pretty deep and large divots with your short irons and less deeper ones with long irons or fairway woods.

Did you noticed that the angle of approach of your club-head hitting the ball then going to low point is pretty steep? Yet, you must aim this way on the golf ball, from wedges to driver!

Hitting down on the ball is vital to produce good swing dynamics and to use the full leverage of the leading arm plus club which in turn translates into power. This leverage is obtained by maintaining a mandatory flat left wrist and a bent right wrist (for right-handed players). You will also notice a very different sound and a solid feel because of the compression of the ball.

If you don’t know that you’ve hit down on the ball, assume that you don’t!

Stay tuned: on the next post we’ll talk about the “out” component of a geometrically perfect golf swing which I’m sure not much of you are aware of!

It may sound funny but the best way to discover and understand the Lag is to throw away any technical thought. Instead you must focus on feel and feel only. You’ll discover that feelings come from the hands. This is why it’s extremely important that you pay a lot of attention in what is happening in your hands (in the Golfing Machine’s terminology it is called "Mind in the hands"). During the swing, you must focus on their position and seek a feeling of pressure and heaviness.

Now, what kind of feel do you have to look for?

This is where the wet mop analogy comes in handy!

1. Grab a mop (a towel will do the trick) and wrap it around the clubhead. Now, soak the mop in a bucket of water then put it on the floor (this tip may actually help you clean the house!).
2. Take your normal stance and put the mop in front of your trailing foot. At this point, your hands should also be in front of your trailing leg.
3. Now, gently, try to drag everything in one piece by moving your hands past your leading leg and straight toward the target (we call this "Tracing the Line"). Do not try to manipulate the clubhead! We do not want the Mop to go past the leading leg: only the hands – so allow the Wet Mop to trail behind when you try to move your hands towards the target.

Congratulations, you are lagging!

Do it again and monitor those important things:

• The grip is pressing hard against the forefinger of your trailing hand – this is the exact feel of pressure we want in a normal golf swing.
• The mop feels very heavy as it lags behind your hands – this is the exact feel of heaviness we want in a normal golf swing.

Did you notice:

• that your body reacts naturally to ease the drag? The hips clear, the torso turns automatically when you try to create lag and not the opposite: deliberately putting those elements in motion won’t create any lag!
• that you automatically pushed against your leading foot to resist the drag?
• you might even notice that your shaft was bent and put in tension.

Now, your next task on the range will be to seek and incorporate those feelings of pressure and heaviness in your swing.

I recommend that you begin with very small swings (almost a chip – we call this "Basic Motion") using a seven iron and sending balls no more than 30 feet away. Basic Motion is important because they are less moving parts than in a full swing it’s easier to concentrate on pressure and heaviness in your hands.

In the golf swing, lag is that ability that allows the golfer’s hands to stay ahead of the clubhead before striking the golf ball.
In other words, the hands are ALWAYS leading while the clubhead is trailing behind.

Lag creation and sustainment is the most important fundamental in the golf swing.
Without lag, the fundamentals of the golf swing like grip, stance, etc., don’t really matter and you can forget playing golf at your best level.

No matter how different or unorthodox, all effective swings have one position in common: At impact, the skilled golfer’s leading wrist is effectively flat or bowed facing the target, the trailing wrist is bent backwards, the shaft is stressed and presses hard on the right forefinger.

How does the highly skilled golfer reach this position so consistently?

The answer is Lag: His golf swing produces and sustains lag in the downswing.

All the swing positions of professionnal tour players we see analyzed in the golf magazines and that many teachers told us to reproduce (this is known as "position golf") are the result of, not the cause of, this Lag fundamental.

When you have Lag in your swing, it generates most and coordinates all of these actions and positions to produce a consistent solid ball striking downswing.