(golf ball whooshing) – Hello, Adam Bazalgette here, founder of Scratch Golf Academy. Today's subject, how to
release the golf club. I'll show you the two
main components of that. There's two different ways
you can define release. And I'll also show you some things I think you should work on, and the order you should work on them. You'll have some success. (cheerful music)
(golf ball whooshing) (golf club whooshing) (golf ball bouncing) (cheerful music) Very briefly, if you're
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keep bringing you free content. Thanks very much for doing it. So when we talk about the release, there's two real elements of it, at least in my opinion,
that you'd look at. This is a down-the-line view. This is Billy Horschel. One of them is club face. Can the club face snap closed.
So, typically, great players, the toe is about up at that point, certainly not always, but generally. And then it has to square
up, and then de-loft and close over there. Now you see it's relatively
toe-up over there. As a general reference, when
it's on that side of the body, visually, you'll see the club face line up about with the club shaft. So the closing of the face
is certainly one element of the release. The other one, there's Michelle Wie. Let me just move her up just a touch so we can see the ball there. And we should look at a
couple of players here. The other one is the
unhinging of the wrist. So, she's got lots of lag, there's a significant angle, obviously, there between the lead
arm and the club shaft. And just watch through impact. As she comes through,
that thing snaps square. So somewhere about in there,
about this far past the ball, is the point where, most players, you'll see the shaft fully in line, both wrists straight, if you like, the shaft fully in line
with the arms there.
Let's have a look at Mr. Woods there. We'll just bump him up
just a little bit as well. And let's have a look here. So, loads the club beautifully, and then snap go those wrists. He's maybe, at that point,
just slightly before Michelle. And I really believe, a couple of things, I think unless you can,
first off, load the club. We'll get into that in a moment. Unless you can decelerate
your arms and body and really crack the
energy out to the club, really transfer energy,
you won't get this look to the extent they will. You will see a lot of these players, shortly after coming past this lead thigh, you start to see the knuckles of that glove hand under there.
Not typical to see a higher
handicap with that look there. And I believe that if you
can get this view correct, the releasing of the wrists
as we see it from the face on, the down-the-line view, the club face bit, will largely take care of itself. I'll show you how these blend together later in this video, though. (golf ball whooshing) So how do we go about
getting this release? What's gonna give that to you? Well, the fact of the matter is, you can't just manufacture it
with your hands down there. It has to be part of the
overall physical force. Think of skipping a rock. Think of the bounce that
would be in your arm and the way you'd stop your arm and snap that club through.
Now we're gonna get into a nice
little drill, I'll show you. But let me just show you a feature here, that if you don't have this right, it's not gonna be possible. Now this video isn't about grip per-se, but let me just say a couple
of things that'll really help. Relax your hand. If that grip isn't fairly
far down in the fingers, under that pad, you won't have
the mobility in your wrists in order to make this happen. And not only that, when you
practice this grip a little bit, hey, you need some grip pressure. When that club's moving
quickly, you need some pressure, but you must have mobile wrists. Practice that. So get a short iron. I've got a 9 iron here. Go ahead and get that
grip we're talking about.
And practice that feeling of
some control over the club but some looseness. Here's the drill. Here's what I want you to do. Two features to it. The swing's going to be roughly this big. Actually, the follow-through, in terms of your arm
swing's a little shorter. First thing you've gotta
be able to do is, again, you've gotta be responsive
and soft enough. If you thrust that club down, you waste all the spring in the club, it's not gonna release
properly at the bottom. And the second one, and that's, I suppose, the focal point of this drill, is the finish, as we go through. And what I'm gonna try to do is, I'm going to stop my arms
as nearly past the edge of my lead leg there, as I can. And at that point, I
want to feel the energy having gone out into the golf club. So I want a very sudden, abrupt stop.
So here we go. A little swing, nice and soft. (golf ball whooshing) I just stop that thing right there and I can really feel the energy transfer. Again, if you don't load
it and decelerate your arms and stop, you're gonna not have
the type of punch you need. Well, you might say, we
certainly don't want to stop our arms that quickly in a real swing. As we showed you with
the pros earlier, though, there's gotta be a certain
amount of deceleration to crack the whip. Then there should be so
much energy in the golf club it takes you back around to the finish.
That's the idea. So let's try it again, here. (golf ball whooshing) Just right there. I'm hitting those balls, that's a 9 iron, probably 120 yards, reasonably far. Your own scale will be your own scale. Now there's a little pitfall
people often fall into. Let's look at that. Here's a critical point, and
this is not only gonna affect the way you release it, but will affect, overall,
point number two, the rolling of the face
through the release. When that club snaps through, don't let that wrist cup down here. The idea is, as it snaps,
the wrist folds under, turns under a little bit, if you like, and more bows this way. So you can still snap it
and bow the knuckles under, and if you do, you'll
square the club face up a lot more effectively. Also, you'll have a much more
stable hand and club shaft right at the moment of contact. Let me show you Tiger doing it, then we'll hit a few more shots.
So there's Tiger Woods,
quite a while ago here. I think this is Bay Hill. A long par three, it appears anyway, but watch as he comes down, obviously very dynamic, great lag. Here comes the snap of
the wrists right there. Here's where they pop. But watch closely, watch
the back of that left hand. It's starting to aim downwards. That's what you want. It's bowing more
underneath and there we go. That's the look. Now he may have a little cup in the wrist by the time he gets up here somewhere, but it's bowing downwards
as he snaps the club. That helps snap the face square, helps de-loft the club,
as well, through impact. Now if you wanna hit solid shots, I have brand new three-part,
in-depth video course on solid strike formula. Just go down to the description box and pick it up for yourself. So now I'm trying to blend
both the stop and the pop of the club with this feeling of turning those knuckles down a little bit.
You might hit few hooks, initially, not a bad thing for most people. Let's try it here. (golf ball whooshing) I could really feel the
knuckles aiming down there. That was a pretty solid shot. And, of course, you get started on this, then you start to feel
that snap at the bottom. Once you've got the feel for it, don't hit 40 or 50 in a
row or you'll feel like you've got two swings
that can't be combined. One's my drill swing and one's when I wanna make a full swing. So every third or fourth shot, or whatever discretionary
mixture you choose, go ahead and take the drill,
but make it a bigger swing.
(golf ball whooshing) And just go ahead an go on through there. A little too much hook on that one. And make some medium size swings,
so you experience the stop but not a complete stop. And then make it all
the way to a full swing back and forth and so on,
until you've got the feeling. You will have a good release Well, I hope that helps you with how to release the golf club. Would really appreciate a thumbs
up, if you liked the video. Helps us, again, build some
momentum at the channel. Appreciate your interest
in the golf instruction. Hope your game is getting better. (cheerful music).