Want a More Balanced Golf Swing…Try Holding Your Finish

If I had to pinpoint the one swing fault that plagues amateurs golf swings the most it would most definitely be poor balance.

Not unlike the body control that’s required in order to compete in other sports at a relatively high level, being a good golfer demands having good balance. You’re all but doomed if you aren’t on-balance both during the swing and at the finish of your golf swing.

Jack Nicklaus swung the club with exceptional balance by lifting his lead left heel off of the ground during his backswing much like the younger Justin Thomas often does today when he needs some extra distance with the driver. In a fashion similar to Nicklaus and others, Matthew Wolff also likes to pick up his lead left heel while players like Tiger Woods elect to keep their lead heel/foot more in the ground over the course of the swing’s duration.

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How you elect to keep your balance won’t necessarily mimic how another person chooses to maintain their balance during the course of the swing. Like the other unique traits inherent to your own golf swing, maintaining your balance during your own swing is an exercise that’s performed in an optimal fashion when your body’s balance fits your body’s genetic makeup.

In order to hold your finish in a manner that’s similar to the great finish of Rory McIlroy, you’ll have to be on-balance during your entire golf swing before its completion; also known as the finish. In order to consistently smash the ball down the middle of the fairway with his driver at a distance of 320 plus yards, Rory must be on balance.

On those rare occasions when he’s not on-balance, Rory’s ball can go in any direction. Sure, there are times when you’ll be able to absolutely obliterate a dead-straight ball after swinging nearly out of your shoes like world long drive champion, Kyle Berkshire, so often does. Unfortunately, many of these world famous ball-beaters or world long drive competitors tend to hit ugly snap hooks off the tee almost as often as they’ll hit their ball relatively on-line.

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While each of them produce incredible club-head speed which, in turn, results in equally impressive gains in power/distance that also exists as superior to that of bombers like Tony Finau, world long drive hitters don’t employ the sort of repeatable motion that’s required to play golf at the highest level. Going after the ball as hard as those hitters do/does comes at a cost. A cost that often reads on the scorecard in the form of double bogeys and worse.

The prominent “recoil” in Berkshire’s finish results from a hard swing that isn’t typically executed in a manner that’s “within himself” or by the percentages. During Tiger’s prime, he often finished his driver swing with a pronounced recoil on the occasions when he felt he needed extra power with the big stick on reachable par 4’s.

Unlike the inconsistency that results from off-balance finishes on the part of both the average player and even the average touring pro, Tiger was able to get away with his patented recoil or off-balance finish. Due to his superior hand-eye coordination, Tiger can get away with a more lenient interpretation of many of golf’s basic fundamentals.

By way of natural selection, the large majority of us are not afforded with the same luxuries that regularly accompany the greatest players in the world. During this quest to achieve better balance, you should always start by working your way up thru the bag from smaller to bigger swings.

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Instead of starting with a driver, always start your range sessions with a wedge and progress up from there. If you find yourself routinely swinging to an off-balance finish, you’re either exerting too much energy during the swing or you’re not swinging the club effectively or efficiently enough.

Obviously, there are millions of amateurs who don’t swing the club “efficiently or effectively” enough! BUT, almost every single golfer possesses enough innate athletic ability and hand eye coordination in order to create plenty of club-head speed while swinging on-balance.

As I’ve touched on previously, lots of golfers swing the club in a fashion that demonstrates an improper understanding of the task at hand. For instance, lots of amateurs incorrectly associate long and straight drives with an off-balance finish at the completion of their swing.

Upon being directed to focus on nothing but arriving to a balanced finish during a lesson at the driving range, their first swings remain out of balance. Again, making any one change of a seemingly simple nature isn’t so simple when you’ve carried out an equally different and specific act for an extended period of time.

If you’ve been swinging in an off-balance manner for several years, it may take a long period of time to fix this habit. How long it takes to rid yourself of any one habit will vary from person to person or player to player and is never a simple one to one or a perfectly proportionate relationship. But, active engagement in taking one’s focus away from the ball and onto the proposed motion itself will produce more favorable results in a more timely fashion for those who choose to alter ones habits with such patience.

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