- Well hey, Adam Bazalgette here,
Founder of Scratch Golf Academy.
Today's subject is a good one,
Two Simple Drills To Immediately Fix Your Takeaway.
Now you'll probably recognize
Eric Cogorno right next to me here,
of Cogorno Golf, very popular on YouTube.
And Eric is gonna be showing us a few things,
a couple of drills that I really like.
So, we're pleased to be together here in South Florida.
Nice to have you down - Yeah, thanks for having me.
- You gotta good drill for us, stay tuned.
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Okay, let's get Eric back in here
and look at our take away drills.
Well Eric, let's have a look,
what show is this drill.
- We just got our alignment rod, right?
- Yeah, just alignment rod, very simple drill.
I think Adam, the point of this
and the take away that we see
a lot of golfers have issues with,
really stems from a disconnect between
what their body is doing - Sure.
- And their arms and hands.
And when their body and arms and hands
aren't sorta synced up, we'll say,
there can be a variety of the things that come up.
I know you and I both see especially a lot
the hands out club roll, right?
- Right, absolutely.
- We might also see the hands away, club away disconnected
and we've got a really simple drill
with an alignment rod here,
one of two drills that we have.
How to fix both of those issues, but
- Great.
- Maybe before we dive in and show that,
let's take a look at how some good golfers--
- You'll get a good mental picture,
it'll help you.
So Tiger Woods here,
let's have a look.
You will certainly notice on the right hand picture
how the trunk and the arms all move away together.
If you picture this as maybe a triangle
and just keep your eye on that,
very much involved in the first part of that takeaway.
And if, let's say your hand's just passed that back leg,
if I draw a line up the club shaft,
it would be pretty close to that hip at that point.
And you'll notice from the other angle,
as he moves away in this nice together look,
that left arm, that lead arm, stays very much
connected and up close to the body.
You do not see the gap there,
and that club shooting behind him.
- Okay, so we gotta look at how good golfers
do their takeaways,
some checkpoints that we wanna use.
And so Adam, how I love using this drill,
we've got a simple alignment rod
drive away markers simple to get.
I'm gonna go ahead and put this
on the left side of my shaft,
so basically,
just kind of on the left side of the grip there,
and I'm gonna take a grip with it.
Maybe slightly uncomfortable
if a viewer hasn't done this before.
Now, what I'm trying to do here is when I take
- Well you probably have just a little more
forward press here than normal,
maybe just. - Yeah, exactly
- So that's okay, right.
Let's say, it's probably gonna feel a little
different for some people in the beginning.
But when I do this, I'm gonna have my hands
more or less inside, left thigh.
And then when I set that up,
you can see the shaft on the side.
So from face on, this alignment rod
should be touching your hip.
Now, as Adam mentioned,
if you normally don't have your hands,
where it's gonna feel pretty darn forward
compared to normal.
Now here's the point right of the drill.
When I go back
and watch the stick on my left hip.
If I do that disconnected takeaway,
see what happens there right away?
- Yeah, immediately a gap.
- Right off the bat.
Batter the club and thing,
stick your pointed weight to right field.
Now, if I did a, how we would like a takeaway,
that would probably look a little bit more like here.
- Right.
So you've actually maintained connection
all the way to maybe shaft parallel.
- Yeah, so a really easy feel
when I'm going back here of hey,
start with the stick on the left hip,
make my takeaway, and keep this.
It's gonna ride down my leg a little,
right, as it's in hand,
but I'm gonna keep connection.
And as I'm doing that,
really the only way we can do this
is we do keep that connection, right?
- Right.
- So this is a really simple one Adam,
that I've used that I really like,
start on my left hip,
ride back down,
have the club head more or less
in a straight line back.
- Right
I love to see the club face a little tilted there.
- I'm with you.
I hate when that toe is flipped over in that way.
It is such a difficult way to play, yeah.
- Yeah.
and as I do this, if I grip it right
and I do my takeaway,
the only way for me to get that thing up there
would be to have a pretty,
you know, a lot of twist going on.
- Yeah - Like I could still do it,
but wanna have that takeaway.
And what I would do in the beginning
is I'd pop that stick down,
and I'd try and retain that feel.
- I wouldn't recommend you try to come down
and hit the ball
(laughs)
cause you could spear yourself if you do that, so
- Then you remove the stick. - This is a takeaway, yes.
(laughs)
- And so I might have a couple of field.
Now again, like you mentioned,
hand a little more forward is the feel there,
and I feel like I'm gonna get that stick just working back.
same sort of feel,
- Yeah.
- And hit one or two.
- I really like how that fosters a connection
in that left arm and the torso as you start back.
(golf club thudding)
(wind howling)
Now, once you're about hip high there,
I noticed you start to get some hinge, which I like.
- Yes - That's the way
that should look, so the key,
I think, that when you do that,
is the hinge,
if I turn to this camera here,
is really primarily just upward hinge.
It's not backward hinge.
So once Eric's gotten over here,
it's primarily upward hinge.
Just don't tinch it behind you, right?
- Right, and the one thing I'd add
the drill Adam is,
if I put this on here
and let's say you wanna add a little hinge
- Or someone in particular wants to
- But actually help you determine
where the club's what plane you're on, right?
- Yeah exactly and when I go down,
a simple version of this drill would be,
starting out on my hip,
when I do my take away,
why don't I just ride
that down my leg a little further
and then now I have little more hinge to it.
So keep it on the hip,
let it ride down a little as I go back.
And I might just make one no ball practice swing.
(golf club thudding)
and now we're good.
Lens it and puts it together there very nicely.
Just a take away,
it doesn't make you a great golfer
but if you get out of the gate in the first few feet,
in a good position with good sequences,
it's a lot easier, a little tiny anecdote.
I wouldn't say I knew Moe Norman,
but I've been around him a little bit
and talked to him.
Many of you may have probably familiar with him.
So I asked him a question
he may have been asked a lot of times before.
If you remember,
he started with a club about a foot behind the ball
- That's right
- Where he sets up like that.
The Canadian, Moe Norman.
If you don't remember he is a legendary ball striker
the late Moe Norman.
And I asked him and said,
"Hey Moe, why do you like to start with the club
so far behind the ball?"
And his answer was kinda profound and simple,
he said,
"It's the hardest bit of the swing.
So I just take it out."
(laughs)
So in a certain sense,
if we can get this first part of the swing right,
you're helping yourself for sure.
Well if that was helpful for you,
now we have a second drill with the alignment rod
that I really like as well but to see that
you're gonna have to Corgono Golf
we'll show you a link right there
where you can over there same title,
and then you'll really like the drill.
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