Hi, Robin here with the lesson I have today.
I want to share this lesson with you primarily to talk about the grip and how that influences
the swing.
But the main purpose I'm sharing this with you is for junior golfers who are trying to
get their basics right, and trying to give them the best start to their golfing career.
So you might be a junior, or you might be a parent.
This is really aimed at you.
I often hear many players and coaches saying that for a junior, it's okay to have a strong
grip.
It's okay to have your hands placed more to the right on the club than normal.
Not only just saying it's okay to have a strong grip, but maybe sometimes even changing the
grip to be strong.
They believe it gives more distance.
But in my opinion, that's really not giving a junior player the best start they can get.
Let me explain why.
So a strong grip will encourage the clubface to get close during the swing.
If you swing the club freely, the clubface would return to impact in a closed position,
and you'd hit a hookshot.
So you'll see this junior's had a strong grip for quite some time, she's practiced quite
hard, and she's learned how not to hook the golf ball.
In fact, most of her shots would be a missed shot to the right.
She does that by compensating through the impact zone.
You'll see here just before impact to impact, there's almost no rotation to the club or
rotation to her left arm.
It's very much a blocking movement to the left wrist.
The left arm stays very high relative to the right arm.
There's almost a gap between the arms here.
It's basically she's holding the clubface off to stop the ball going to the right.
It creates many problems.
The club shaft now gets too vertical.
The toe of the club is hitting the ground before the ball.
It creates a weak strike.
Like I said, her missed shots are actually to the right.
You'll see she's really fighting the hook.
She's holding the left arm off.
You'll see her left arm's not releasing.
We start to get this chicken wing look.
It doesn't create more distance because she can't release the club freely.
So I explained a few of these things to her in this lesson.
I explained the importance of her getting a neutral grip at her age if she wants to
give herself the best start.
Not only will it help her golf swing, it'll also help her short game.
It'll develop a good short game, hitting high bunker shots, spinning bunker shots, lob shots,
high soft-landing approach shots.
These things are all very difficult with a strong grip.
So we made an adjustment from a grip from this one to this.
It's actually slightly overdone here.
Giving her a more neutral grip.
Giving her a routine to get this grip each time.
I just want to show you that I videoed the first two balls she hit.
Again, old one on the left, new one on the right.
So this is the first golf ball.
That's before, and afterwards with her neutral grip.
And while it's not going to completely change, I think straightaway you'll see the club is
now more flat on the ground at impact rather than toe in the ground.
The shaft has already started to lower.
This is first ball, 57 degrees rather than 60.
The left arm isn't quite so high relative to right arm.
It's a small change, but in one ball, her golf swing, her tendencies through impact
started to change just by getting a neutral grip.
We'll see her from front view.
She had this chicken wing to her left arm, where you could see her left arm was bent
at impact and just after impact.
Again, this is the second ball she hit.
I'll run video of the second shot.
We'll take it to just after impact.
We can all see the left arm is now straightening up a little bit.
There is pretty much the same position.
Left arm has less bend to it, less chicken wing.
Again, only the second ball.
These are not dramatic changes, but good for two shots.
So there's no reason...quite a different look there at just before impact to the left arm.
There's no reason why, with just a little bit of practice with this grip, we don't see
more improvement over the next few weeks.
So hopefully just that lesson, seeing the improvements with just gripping the club neutral,
will encourage, if you're a junior player or you're a parent, to start the game by getting
a good grip.
I think there is no positive from gripping the club strong starting the game.
There's only negatives.
There's no negative from gripping the club correctly starting the game, and that's the
message I want to get across today.
And hopefully, from that, it'll encourage you to start the game in that fashion.
So thanks for watching.
And as always, don't be afraid to leave a comment below or ask some questions.
I always do my best to reply if possible.
So thanks very much.