Padraig Harrington: Stop Over-Complicating the Golf Swing… Just Do THIS Instead

Padraig Harrington appeared on Golf Channel Academy to explain how trying to replicate modern tour pros golf swings hurt your own swing, and instead explains how the motion in the swing is close to other sports using your natural ability.

we’re back with Podrick Harrington you promised us you were going to let us know how the swing should feel carry on the first thing the golf swing should feel like exactly how you felt as a kid when you played tennis hockey baseball it’s the same thing we’re swinging a stick at a ball there’s no difference so the movement that you use to play hockey and tennis and all those sports we’re going to use that to play golf and I did say movement here are some of the keys you don’t want to do in golf you don’t want to keep your head down you don’t want to keep your head still you don’t want to make a slow back swing you don’t want to make a big back swing all those things are going to cause you problems okay so what should the swing feel like essentially if you really really want to get the feel go out to your garden or somewhere you can set up in your golf position put a golf ball in your right hand hold your right wrist assuming you’re right-handed we want to throw the golf ball as hard as we can into the ground about a yard ahead of us and for it to go as far as we can straight so like so I pull that a little bit now every bit of that motion there is a golf swing so watch what happens i made the right amount of hip turn i made the right amount of arm swing i didn’t lift my arms i didn’t lift my body okay i made the right amount of wrist break all naturally i’m not thinking about this i pivoted to my left i stayed down with my chest and I released it all because I was throwing a ball we all know how to throw a ball let’s say you hit one with that sort of feeling of a throwing action but again it’s what we we all know how naturally to do this again
holding holding holding watch it till you uh see the ball land
i’m exaggerating here no doubt about it i’m holding for as long as I can but I’m able to do that i would like amateurs to exaggerate in the range and on the golf course hold it for 2 seconds i said we don’t want to swing back slowly we certainly don’t want to keep our head still the head floats when so essentially the weight as you turn your shoulder it shifts your weight to your right side so we don’t need to shift like this our body turns and it moves the center of gravity over here but see my head has moved there’s no If I try and keep my head still I’m actually going to go forwards which is the worst thing you can do in golf if you keep your head still you’re going to go forwards and you’re going to have that step backwards and no finish that’s why I said holding the finish it gets you doing all the right things without you knowing you’re doing them i think the modern professional has done a lot of harm to amateurs modern professional is very supple they’re young they’re powerful so when they make a swing they can keep this left heel in the ground they can keep a lot of a lot of tension inside their legs like this they can turn and they get on to the right side and the to the public that looks like they’re staying still would you think of keeping your head still when you’re hitting a baseball could you imagine telling a kid okay right you’re ready to hit it but you’re not allowed to move your head
i don’t think so i don’t think it would be good yeah like we want to keep our eye on the golf ball no doubt about it but our head moves a little bit and floats so couple of drills yes lift your left heel off the ground a drill I would always get kids practicing is actually lift their foot off the ground this is so you can either start in this position like so that creates great movement if you start take your golf stance bring your foot back again i’ll actually hit the golf ball a little further doing that that’s absolutely great