The 16 Motors of the Golf Swing: Part 2 - Hitting Power

We all want more power and more distance in our golf swing. And very fortunately, there are several options for creating power. If one does not feel good or suit your body type, there are still many more that can be used. This report is about hitting. Hitting, as contrasted to swinging, is when the player accelerates the clubhead by PUSHING ON THE SIDE OF THE GOLF CLUB. Technically, this is called a "radial acceleration" of the club meaning the right elbow and right wrist are pressing against the side of the club (radius) to achieve club head speed. This is hitting like with a hockey stick or tennis racket. In hitting, the right elbow, right wrist, and right shoulder all play very critical roles. The right elbow - How is power created? How is it used? When the right elbow is bent, energy is stored. This is the potential energy to open the elbow and move the forearm forward. This is the same action as a piston cylinder on an old steam locomotive or the piston action in a car engine. It is the action of a hockey player standing still on the ice and shooting the puck. It is a hard forward push on the club coming from the right elbow. (As an aside, this is also probably why we take a stand to the ball with our left shoulder to the target. This stand allows us to use our dominant right arm and right elbow with the best angle to hit the ball, like in tennis with the forehand swing.) The right wrist - The right wrist keeps pushing on the club during the milliseconds while the clubface is compressing and deforming the golf ball. The right wrist helps to resist the slowing down of the clubhead during impact. To keep it short, by resisting the clubhead tendency to slow down throught the hitting zone, a player can gain up to 30% more clubhead speed WITH THE SAME INITIAL CONDITIONS. So this is not trivial. Also, to be clear, this is NOT flipping the right wrist at impact. It is a passive but strong resistance to the slowing down of the club. (Resistance to deceleration of the clubhead through impact will be discussed in more detail in the report - Swinging from your feet.) Aha!!!! The right shoulder - We know that better players rotate the right shoulder very nicely down the plane and down the target line. Yes, that has been said and observed thousands of times. But WHY? The right shoulder performs two functions - one is putting body mass behind the piston movement of the right elbow. So connecting the body weight into the right elbow with put enormous more momentum into the contact with the ball and transfer more energy to the ball. It is like being hit by a bicycle or a 10-ton truck both moving at the same speed. Which is going to do more damage and transfer more energy? Obviously, the 10-ton truck. So get your body weight better connected and behind the right elbow for more power. OK - that is easy to understand. But the second function of the right shoulder is more subtile. Imagine a dog leash. The dog is free to move for a certain distance. But when is gets to the end of the leash, it is suddenly stopped. The rigth shoulder is similar. IF the right shoulder moves down the swing plane and down the target line, the right elbow can stay bent with all of its power for a very late hit. That is the dog leash is still loose enough to allow the right elbow to explode into the ball. However, if the right shoulder turns on a plane flatter than the swing plane, the right elbow will start opening up - that is loosing power - before it is even near the ball. The right elbow is "leaking power" because the unconscious minds says "You must hit the ball!" and the only way to hit the ball with a shoulder rotating more flat that the swing plane is by opening up the right elbow. The right elbow cannot explode into the ball because it is already opened up and can move only a short distance before it is at the "end of it's leash." Don't believe what I am writing here. Try it yourself. Do it now - even without a club in your hand. Am I right or not? And now you know why rotating the right shoulder down the swing plane allows a golfer to keep the power stored in the right elbow until the last possible second before impact.