October, 2018 | Wayne DeFrancesco

Online Lesson: Austin Kendziorski: Controlling Forearm Rotation in the Downswing

I’ve been working with Austin since the middle of 2015. Austin has a tremendous amount of power but has historically struggled with getting the clubhead trapped behind his hands at P6. He had a breakthrough in 2017 when he won his first college event at Erin Hills (where the U.S. Open was held) but began to struggle in the spring of 2018. We spent 3 days together in January of 2018, so I guess I must take some blame for that, but as I look back on his swings they look pretty good to me. Austin got frustrated by the summer of 2018 and decided to go full Dustin Johnson with the bowed wrist and closed face, but his results did not improve much even though it was amazing how close he came to copying DJ’s move. I compare Austin here with Kevin Tway, recent Tour winner who is built similarly to Austin, and who sports a short, wide swing that unleashes great power with the driver (Tway had the most drives over 320 yards on the PGA Tour in 2018). Though I don’t show it here Austin’s swing in the fall of 2017 was much shorter and wider, and as strong as he is (he has gained 35 pounds of muscle since I first met him, which may be another factor in his struggles) I like the Tway/Finau model where the extra speed generated by a longer swing is simply not necessary. If you are as strong as these guys are why not take advantage and learn a controlled swing that provides accuracy with the irons and plenty of length with the driver. I would also like to see Austin stay taller in the backswing and continue to work on trying to control the overly active adduction, supination and external rotation of his right arm in transition while trying to supinate the left arm earlier in the forward swing. I refer him to Tway’s rehearsal, in which he brings his arms down from P4 to P6 with little or no lower body movement and no effort to pitch the right elbow inward. While I wouldn’t want to see the hands heading to impact as wide as Tway rehearses, any problem Austin has had with his hands not getting forward enough has had to do with him overdriving his right elbow.

Swing Analysis: Denny McCarthy- Extra Deep Pelvic Movement Provides Space

By Wayne | Videos: Swing Analysis

You may not have heard of Denny McCarthy but after his dominating victory in the Web.Com Tour Championship there are real signs that he is ready to make his mark on the PGA Tour. Denny is local to the DC area (3-time Maryland State Open Champion as an amateur, played in college at Virginia) and qualified for the Web.Com Tour at the end of 2015. He spent two full years on the Web.com, finally achieving his PGA Tour card for 2018, where he made 13 of 22 cuts and just under $500.000. His victory gained him the #1 ranking for money earned in the Web.Com finals, which gives him fully exempt status on the PGA Tour for 2019. He is small at 5’9” and 165 lbs. but in great shape and very strong, which is readily observable when you watch his pivot movement. He planes the club nicely and gets away with a substantial upper body back up in his backswing by keeping his pelvis deep and firing his glutes late in the forward swing, giving him the appearance of jumping up into impact without early extending. He keeps his arms and shaft well out in front of him which keeps the club from getting stuck and makes a left to right shot pattern more likely. His stats show issues with driving accuracy, but he showed huge improvement in that regard in 2018.

Swing Analysis: Tom Weiskopf- 14 Years of Brilliance

By Wayne | Videos: Swing Analysis

Between 1968 and 1982 Tom Weiskopf won 16 PGA Tour events including the British Open in 1973, a year in which he won 7 times world wide and was ranked #2 in the world. Weiskopf came close to being remembered as one of the all-time greats, but suffered 4 runner-up finishes in the Masters and a runner-up and 4 top 4s in the U.S. Open. Just as players in the 2000’s had to deal with Tiger Woods, Weiskopf played in the shadow of Nicklaus and Watson, and by the mid-80’s had all but ceased to compete, not returning to competition until turning 50 in 1992 and playing the Senior Tour, where he won 4 times including the U.S. Senior Open in 1995. Weiskopf looks like a prototype for todays average Tour star, tall (6’3”), and lanky strong, hitting the ball longer and higher than most while exhibiting great control with his shorter clubs. We also see comparisons to today’s players as he utilized a full wind up backswing with his driver while keeping his iron swing much shorter. What stands out as a huge difference between Weiskopf’s technique and today’s swings is his large amount of lateral movement, both off the ball in the backswing and with his lower body in the forward swing. He, along with Nicklaus, Watson, and Johnny Miller (among others) finished his swing in a pronounced “reverse-C”, as his leg drive continued well past impact while he kept his head and upper body behind the ball. Other items of interest in his swing are his right forearm takeaway, his flat or even bowed left wrist and the top of his swing, and his “hands out” move in transition which kept the club nicely in front of him in the downswing.

Online Lesson: Chip Zabatta- Lower Body Instability Leads to Faulty Backswing

By Wayne | Videos: Online Students

Chip is a good player (we played a round together with Tony Romo at his other club, Wykagyl) who is a member at and regularly plays one of the hardest courses in world, Winged Foot, which puts extra demands on his ball striking. Chip’s main tendencies are to lose his right leg brace in the backswing and turn his shoulders too flat, get his right arm and shoulder behind him at the top while he loses depth in his right hip and lets both knees flex toward the ball, then approach impact with his right arm in a push or punch position and his legs out from under him, all of which leads to a weaker impact than he would like. To correct some of these issues I want him to concentrate on his backswing first by widening his stance a bit and making sure to brace his right foot to the inside and to load his pelvis more to the center instead of letting his right knee rotate outward and his hips slide to the right. At the same time, I want him to try to widen his backswing (which would probably shorten it) by using right arm extensor action to keep his left arm straighter and to keep his right arm more in front of him at the top while increasing the pitch angle of his shoulder turn. At the same time, (I know this seems like a lot, but he can pick and choose what to concentrate on) he needs to make sure he does not let his knees drift toward the ball as he gets from P3 to P4. Using the shaft between his feet will help remind him to stay deep with his hips and to finish in the box. The idea behind these technique changes is to put his right arm in a better position at the top and at the same time help create space in downswing so he can take advantage and eventually have his upper right arm more in front of his chest and his hands more forward approaching impact.

Online Lesson Antti Kauhanen: Early Loading Leads to Lifting at the Top

By Wayne | Videos: Online Students

Hi Wayne, thanks for the previous lesson, it has really helped me with my game. My misses with the driver are not as bad, but driving is still holding back my scoring. I have not been able to get rid of the lifting at the end of the backswing and it seems to me that the lifting is the key problem in my swing. The feeling I get at the end of the backswing is that my left shoulder is moving too much to my right and it causes me to lose sight of the ball and makes the transition much more difficult. If I manage to keep the left shoulder more to my left, I usually hit it much more solid. However, I really don’t know what the best way would be to try to fix this problem. I am sure you can help me sort this out.

Online Lesson: Trent Tessler 4- Lack of Right Forearm Supination from P3 to P4 Causing Issues

By Wayne | Videos: Online Students

In this video I focus on Trent’s right arm, forearm and hand action from P3 to P4. It appears to me that the lack of right forearm supination approaching the top of the swing causes Trent to cross the line, which is not optimal but certainly not catastrophic, but more importantly to leave the right forearm pronated and the right wrist in a position that makes finding his lag pressure point on the right index finger quite difficult if not impossible, in addition to sequence problems caused by right shoulder tension and pullback.

Online Lesson: Erik Johnson- Trigger Affecting Right Arm Movement Throughout the Swing

By Wayne | Videos: Online Students

One of the things I find regularly with good players who don’t quite hit the ball as well as they would like is an overactive trigger. Erik is a good example of this and I spend a good bit of this lesson discussing in detail what he is doing to get his swing underway and how that affects everything else. One of the reasons why these online lessons aren’t shorter in length is the degree to which things that happen early in the swing complicate what comes directly after, and as the swing unfolds each complication makes it less likely that a consistently strong impact position can be achieved.

Swing Analysis: Padraig Harrington- Putting Practice Techniques into Tournament Play

By Wayne | Videos: Swing Analysis

When you watch Harrington on the practice tee you would think he was doing drills, combining both stop and go swings to work on his takeaway with step-in swings that affect transition and impact. However, as the footage from the Czech Masters in August proves, he is not just doing drills, he is doing exactly what he is going to play with on the course. Padraig is not the first to incorporate a stop or prolonged pause in his swing (think Sandy Lyle using a full stop at the top), and certainly not the first to do odd things with his left foot, although I’d have to search for a player who lifted the entire foot off the ground before P 3. Doing both in the same swing and using that swing on the course in tournament play is testament to Harrington’s continued search for a better swing, an inclination that many believe derailed his major championship winning formula of 2007 and 2008 and has led to almost 10 years of struggle. He is a thoughtful, deep thinker who has no problem explaining what he is up to (I quote him from a recent interview regarding the stop in the takeaway), and he has excelled at the “Happy Gilmore” running start swing in the past. I just think it’s very cool to see him incorporate these things into his swing and to be successful with them (two top 5’s in the last 2 months on the European Tour). Another interesting tidbit here is the left leg movement after the foot is lifted (he simultaneously internally rotates his upper leg while externally rotating his lower leg), which I compare to an old video of Hogan making a rehearsal swing.

Online Lesson: Jamie Kilmer, PGA Part 3

By Wayne | Videos: Online Students

Jamie, the Head Professional at the Wheatley Hills Golf Club on Long Island, started working with me this January in Florida where he came to see me three times before heading back to his job in March, with the idea of improving his ball striking so he could be competitive in his local section PGA events. (You can watch Jamie’s past lessons on the website). Since then we have done a few online lessons, but as Jamie got into the busy part of his season we didn’t connect for about 5 months. Recently he sent me some swings after having poor tournament results, which is what you see analyzed here.

The First Tee Sunday at the Ryder Cup: How the Best Use Routine to Combat Nerves

By Wayne | Videos: Swing Analysis

The Ryder Cup is one of the only events where we see some of the best players in the world get introduced and go through their full routine on the first tee. Here I look at how the following players take their turns teeing off in what is probably one of the most pressure packed shots in all of golf: Justin Thomas, Rory McIlroy, Brooks Koepka, Paul Casey, Webb Simpson, Justin Rose, Tiger Woods, Jon Rahm, Tony Finau, Tommy Fleetwood, Phil Mickelson, and Francesco Molinari. I focus on their every movement after they tee up the ball, including practice swings, target focus, number of steps and amount of time to get to the ball and set up, and then time over the ball before they pull the trigger. I think every golfer gets the first tee jitters and watching what these great players do to prepare for their opening tee shots is quite instructive.

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Monthly Archives: October 2018