Tip Tuesday: Lower Body and the Downswing

In this installment of our #TipTuesday video instruction series, Dustin Johnson Golf School Director of Coaching Allen Terrell talks about the relationship between your lower body and a well-executed downswing.

Today we’re going to talk about how the lower body works in the down swing, and a very misunderstood concept of what the legs actually do. So take your alignment stick, for illustration, and put it between your belt loops and try to push all of the rod more towards your left side, so really none of it is hanging out back here off the right. So, what you’re going to do is make a proper pivot in your back swing. Now the biggest mistake I see golfers make is they either come down on this stick here, they slide forward, move a little too lateral and that stick stays to the right too long. What happens when you do that is you’re going to be very closed to your target. If you’re closed to your target at impact you’re going to hit it two ways, and you’re going to miss the center of the club face quite often and probably more toward the heel.

So, what I want us to feel is more you winding up and you get the feeling of how that stick doesn’t stay in that one direction, that we actually change directions with this stick and get it trying to be more left of our target line. What that does is it’s going to keep up on our right side a little bit longer in transition as we’re opening up, our shoulders are going to stay more level to the ground and then from there we can start to push up into our full finish. What we don’t want to do is slide that stick forward and tilt back, when you do that you’re going to have to lose control of the club face.

So, just get that feeling at home of good pivot, your first move stay on the inside of your right heel a little bit longer. Your first move is actually your pressure move, so the right ball of your foot as you get that stick, but turn left to the target. That’s going to allow the pitch of the shaft to flatten, and when that pitch of the shaft flattens you’re already picking up a lot of club head speed. Try that feel at home, and get the true feel of how the lower body works.