General Golf Discussion A little myth about grip pressure...
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Posted: February 17, 2010 • Views: 1,111 • Replies: 10 • Go to Last Reply |
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Sam Snead is well known for his thought on grip pressure: "Hold the club as if you were holding a bird in your hands." That seems like a good thought, but it can actually be misleading to many, including myself for many years. Think about this for a minute. Every great golfer through the years has hit many, MANY thousands of golf balls. This cannot help but to significantly strengthen a player's hands. Ever shook a pro golfer's hand? They have quite strong hands, almost without exception. As an example. my buddy Rick Karbowski, a Champions Tour player, has an extremely strong hand and firm handshake. What does this mean? What may be "light" pressure to a seasoned golfer is actually quite firm by our standards. The grip should be FIRM. Don't squeeze the club, now...but grip it very firm. Now, the key here is to apply this pressure in the right way. Ben Hogan, in 5 Lessons, mentioned that the right (for right-handers) thumb and forefinger should not apply any pressure. This is KEY. A tight right thumb and forefinger activates the wrong set of muscles in the right arm, rendering it immobile. The pressure, he said, comes from the middle and ring fingers of the right hand. On the left hand, the pressure is evenly spread throughout the fingers. Listen here to one of the great ballstrikers, Steve Elkington, talk about the grip and how firm the grip should actually be. After all, as he says, the hands ultimately control the angle of the clubface at impact. With a lighter grip, you're just not going to have control over the clubface. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.. Now it IS true that you can hit it farther if you grip it a little lighter (remember, Tour pros are strong, so their firm hold on the club is actually light for them). But your shot dispersion will likely increase. By gripping the club more firmly (remember, not tight, just firm), you should see your accuracy increase. Don't worry about losing yards at the outset. Distance will come back when your hands become stronger and your grip gets effectively "lighter" (even though you are applying the same amount of pressure). To end, Jackie Burke once said: "What Snead didn't tell us was that bird he was trying to keep a hold on was a [expletive] hawk!!!" |
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# 1 on 2/17/2010 10:06:04 PM |
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Great post. I believe that to be very true. Most things we read or hear from others is to be very light with the grip. Being firm with the grip without over tightening your hands is a great key. Good advice Goynes.
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# 2 on 2/17/2010 10:10:11 PM |
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Good post. Grip pressure is definitly something that can get VERY tricky with many players.
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# 3 on 2/17/2010 10:16:00 PM |
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Not too tricky if you apply it correctly. That's the key. As long as you have the correct pressure points as described in Hogan's book, just go ahead and grip the thing. As Steve said, you wouldn't be able to pull the club out of his hands. Now how cool is it to see Steve freakin' Elkington playing with hickories?!?!? Here is he and Mike Maves, another great ballstriker, having some fun with the hickories: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.. I've always respected Steve...now even more so. I doubt hardly any of the young guns out on tour could move the ball at all with a hickory club. Steve just nails it. Mike too! |
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# 4 on 2/18/2010 12:17:03 AM |
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great post! very informative.
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# 5 on 2/18/2010 9:05:43 AM |
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How do you build something that you have studied into your swing? I guess this is why we continue to recheck the basics from grip to setup. I've worked on this last year and after reading your article here, I know that I've gone back to holding a baby sparrow and my right hand thumb and forefingers have been WAY to tight. My contact has been erratic just in the last few weeks (relatively of course - I'm just erratic period). I can't wait to to out and revisit this on the range. I'm willing to bet that it straightens right out. Thanks!! |
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# 6 on 2/18/2010 11:43:18 AM |
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I'll have to respectfully disagree with you here. I've been messing with pressure grip all winter. I've found what many gurus tell us: Grip pressure equals tension that can create many different problems golfers don't want. A looser grip keeps the body and wrists loose and gets the face of one's club to square at impact without having to force the issue. It also helps transfer the power to the clubhead last and gets that whip-cracking motion into the swing that equals distance. I keep it loose enough to keep the club from flinging out of my hands and have had great results with distance and accuracy. No sparrows were hurt in the making of this message. |
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# 7 on 2/18/2010 6:40:34 PM |
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I'll have to respectfully disagree with you here. I've been messing with pressure grip all winter. I've found what many gurus tell us: Grip pressure equals tension that can create many different problems golfers don't want. A looser grip keeps the body and wrists loose and gets the face of one's club to square at impact without having to force the issue. It also helps transfer the power to the clubhead last and gets that whip-cracking motion into the swing that equals distance. Again, my whole point is that the unwanted tension comes from applying the pressure in the wrong way. Most golfers grip the club with a lot of pressure from the right thumb and forefinger. This tightens the outside muscles of the right arm, which are the wrong set to play golf with. By using the middle and ring fingers as the primary pressure points, you can still hold the club firmly--and this activates the INSIDE muscles in the right arm, which as Hogan describes in 5 lessons, are the ones that you want to use to hit golf shots. And really, it's okay to have tension. "Live tension" as Hogan calls it. If you're too loose, your muscles will not react the same way from swing to swing. But if you apply firm pressure in the grip correctly, you will create that live tension in your muscles, which will cause them to move in the same way on each swing. Remember, I'm saying the grip is FIRM. Not TIGHT. You don't want a deathgrip on the club, because that DOES render the body immobile. But as long as you apply the pressure with the right parts of the hands, you can grip the club quite firm and create that live tension Hogan talks about. |
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# 8 on 5/22/2010 10:35:21 PM |
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great read, Goynes42
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# 9 on 5/23/2010 12:50:34 AM |
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I can tell by looking at how a guy grips the club what kind of player he is before he even makes a swing, especially if he is giving it the white knuckle treatment at setup. I can see a shank, slice, top, fat or a duck hook in that guy's very near future. Or if you are trying to hit a chip or a short pitch to the green I can see that one flying clear over the green or flubbing it or stubbing the club and leaving it 20 feet short. My rule for grip pressure is to hold the club just tight enough that it doesn't flop around when you waggle it and it won't fly out of your hands on the back swing. About the same pressure you put on a steering wheel turning when you are driving a car is about right. Maybe even a little less than that.
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# 10 on 5/23/2010 4:12:58 AM |
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Nicklaus says to hold the club with a pressure that would allow someone to pull it from your hands if they tugged lightly.If you want to draw the ball, use the lightest grip pressure possible (but be careful of duck hooks). For fades, hang on a little tighter. I have two hand grippers. One in my car and one on the stand next to my recliner. I have a 50 minute commute each way to work. I use the gripper on the commute, and then later at night when I'm watching TV. Been doing this for 15+ years. I have hands and forearms like a gorilla. Get a gripper and do this exercise for a month. You'll be amazed at the results. And you don't need to go to the gym.
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