New drivers are built for speed, but be careful not to waste it.
There are a lot of different swing styles on the pro tours, particularly backswings, but what you won’t find are big differences in how the pros finish their swings. This club-behind-the-neck look that I’m showing below isn’t the result of simply trying to strike a pose. It comes from momentum because elite players know where to put the speed in their swings.
If you want to get the most out of that new driver – the one that is so lightweight and hot that it just needs a little help from you to deliver serious performance – then consider how you finish. Think about a lever: it moves its fastest when it straightens, right? As you swing down to the ball, you have a lever between your arms and the clubshaft, and that lever has to straighten for you to give the ball a powerful smash.
Ideally, you’ll straighten the lever “through the ball” and let the clubhead and your arms extend towards the target after impact. It should feel like the club is moving its fastest in the through-swing (though it will be slowing down after the collision with the ball). It’s a feel-versus-real thing, but if you focus on straightening that lever and then extending after impact, the momentum will carry you into a full, statuesque finish.
Many pros are so unwound and fully released at the finish that the shaft is actually pointing towards the target. Try to do that, and you’ll have lots of speed at the ball.
– Jason Guss, one of Golf Digest’s Best Teachers in Illinois, is director of instruction at Naperville Country Club
