Making Progress - Swing Tips 6

Two days after my last visit to the range, I hit at another range near me, and I made palpable progress toward retarding the release. Again, in this video, you'll see the same symptoms as in the previous video: I'm starting too fast from the top of the swing. I don't know if the improvement I feel is actually visible, but each day over the past couple of weeks, since I started that left arm alone drill, I can see exciting and satisfying evidence that my swing is approaching the limits of my ability.

Conscious of that habit, I focussed on relaxed fingers and releasing later. With my left arm alone drill in mind, I started to see that I was still losing power potential by rushing through the swing, instead of building up momentum. Slowly, very slowly and tentatively, I started to feel that my hands should feel that they are out ahead of the ball when I release the swing. The improvement was immediate and dramatic.

Practicing with 3- and 4-hybrids, I started to hit farther and straighter. I could tell that the reason I have been hooking the ball is because I've been releasing too early. Now, when I got the feel of releasing later, of waiting, I suddenly had more power and more control. With this later release, I was hitting both clubs somewhere between 180 and 200 yards, probably a gain of at least ten or twenty yards in distance. And the hook disappeared. I began to feel the sense of power that friends of mine had when they talked about "crushing" the ball. Impact felt so good!

I hit a dozen or so balls with the driver, too, just to see what would happen. With the delayed release, I felt I was hitting with more power than before, with drives carrying somewhere around 230 or 240 slightly uphill. And they were straight!

In the last two weeks or so, my progress has been steady. It seems that every day a new swing subtlety reveals itself to me. Now the swing depends on the shoulders turning, the club handle in relaxed fingers, a gradual increase in momentum through the downswing, culminating, when the left shoulder is rising, in an incredibly fast release. From this vantage point, I can see myself maximizing the distances I can get out of various clubs. To test this thought, I hit one of the last balls with a 5-iron. Typically, I hit this about 160 to 170. I actually think that I hit the 7-iron better and farther. But with this new sense of the delayed release, I hit a perfect shot about 175 or 180 on the fly. That's got to be close to my maximum with that club. If I can hit it 180 or a little bit more, I'll feel I'm getting just about everything out of my swing. It was a gratifying end to the session, and I can't wait to go back and push that release point to the limit.