Sir Nick Faldo rebuilt his swing with David Leadbetter over a two year period and then went on a Major win streak. This 4 part series shows you all of the fundamentals that Nick Faldo worked on to develop that Major winning swing that would hold up under all the Major pressure.
In this video (Part 2) Nick discusses the plane, the downswing, and some of his favorite drills. These are a continuation of the changes Nick Faldo made with his swing following on from part 1 – the setup fundamentals – that made Nick Faldo’s swing so repeatable.
This video is from an old VHS tape called Nick Faldo’s Golf course
PART 1: https://youtu.be/LjVr_SFK0FI
00:00 Introduction
00:13 The Swing Plane
02:07 Downswing
08:25 The Towel Drill
10:04 The Full Swing
This is part 204 on an old Nick falo VHS golf lesson if you miss part one on I’ll put links in the description as well as right here this video is on the downswing and some of Nick’s best golf drills I hope you enjoy it I think it’s probably an opportune
Time now Nick to talk just a little bit about the plane because I think a lot of people get mixed up with what is the plane or what is not the plane that’s right we don’t really want to say just because you’re tour you swing upright and just because you’re a smaller person
You swing flat you are swinging simply on the the posture you’ve created and how your shoulders turned and that’s going to put you onto the plane we put that in the ground and we’ll show everybody do what I’m going to do here is put the shaft in the ground pretty
Much parallel to Nick’s shaft at a dresser we’ll just check that that’s pretty much correct there now you’ll notice as Nick moves the club away here as he sets the club you will notice that the club is pretty much parallel to that shaft there that’s a reference point that we’re using
Remember too that the plane going back is not the same as a plane coming down so this is purely a reference point as Nick continues on here he reaches his top position there and he is what I would refer to as on plane simply if we can bring the club back again Nick
Certainly if we swung the club out here that would be off plane and if we swung the club around this position that will be off plan so simply a very easy reference point is when we set the club is that that shaft is pretty much parallel to the original Shaft line yeah
As I said with the taller and shorter place if even if I was could bring myself down a foot more because I’m standing further away from the ball if I got myself in the right body position I’m turning and again you see I’m still
On the same plane as you can see by the Sha and and a pretty similar top of the back swing position even though I brought myself down a foot further so it in a way disproves the fact that just because you’re a small player you’ve got everybody says youve got to swing around
Yourself or if you’re tall you’ve all got to go up C not we feel that you’ve got to get because you’re standing this side of the ball and you’re just turning you’re going to pop yourself on plane now what we’ve done up to this point is really set Nick up for the art
Of actually hitting the golf ball now if Nick could just take the club to the top there it is a very difficult job to try to piece your down spring together things happen so quickly in any event what actually happens as the golf club is going back some part of the body is
Actually going forward so there really isn’t a distinction between back swing and down swing as a lot of people like to make out but what we will do is to show you and describe to you what does happen and through a few drills there you’ll be able to feel what takes place
In your downswing so Nick at this point certainly has completed his back swing now I’m going to just shorten Nick’s swing just a little bit because to put this in sort of real terms as Nick is completing his lower body will be starting to move forward in the opposite
Direction other words the weight is starting to move to the left side here and this is initiated with the lower body the left knee starts its movement forward and as you can see what happens here the hands and arms drop down to a point where they get to about a hip
Height position from here on Nick’s body will then rotate through towards the target you can see his impact position here his weight now is into his left side it’s going around behind his left heel pretty much the same way as it was going back the down swing you can think
Of as a mirror image of the back swing now from here as Nick clears his left side out of the way his right side now comes through into a position where he finishes up in Balance there his weight fully into his left side and I’m facing
The target you can see here Nick’s hips are facing the Target and his weight is now virtually 100% into his left side and he’s in a nice balanced position for the slightly more advanced players what actually happens at the top with the with the arms to create this
Leverage and this power that we get as everything is pulling as David was saying as I start to get to the top I’m pulling here also what happens is you get a a rotation of the arms they’re actually pulling back this way with which drops the club onto this slightly
Flatter plane which enables you to maintain this wrist set that we talked about and you can pull the club as hard as you like now into this position the right side has retained back a little bit we’re not trying to leap forward with the legs the right side is staying
Passive to this position here I’ve managed to pull the club down now I’m in a perfect position here the club has come from inside I can now release the body and holding through the as the arms rotate into impact square into impact and I can squeeze the ball away and then I let
This left side fold very much as the right side has folded on the back swing I let the left side fold on the way through which keeps the club head moving through as quickly as possible into that balance finish we have a little drill here that Nick will show you with the beach
Ball another way as as I quickly explained about the arm rotation this ball will hopefully show it a little easier with the how the colors will change as I take it away my arms are rotating round a little bit you see how they there and as I go up into that
Position and as I start down you can see how this is pulling back in a rotation before it then starts to return back into the the shot into impact and then it will rotate through again which is proving as you’ve seen that the same color in the same place that I’m
Starting off in a square position I’m square at the top and I’m Square coming back down and then back into impact Square position and as you can see it going through I’m Square I’m not trying to roll things over as you can see the color is now facing down
I’m turning there back down into impact and around into a square position and which is also going to keep this right wrist in the same position all the way through the swing up to the top back into impact and then round to the follow through again simply all I’m trying to
Do is is create some leverage in my in my knees and then with my hips I turn my shoulders fully but then I start to resist my leg action here my hips here as I’m almost re reaching the full 90° turn you can see the lower half of the
Body is now pulling is pushing this way you actually get the impression that I’m pulling this way out to the to the right of the Target and that will then in turn drop the right shoulder into the correct position so the the club turns on plane
But then to get back onto plane I get this sort of lifting action the left shoulder’s got to come up it mustn’t stay down otherwise we get this over the top action we pull in up which is dropping the club down in this position and then I’m free to go through it’s
Very important that we get the body to pull the arms into position rather than trying to get the put the arms into a position by simply learning to turn another one is the club across your chest the same thing turning here and then turning through by doing this the
Arms have got to follow it’s impossible for them to go in any other direction there we go you’ll find that the actual inertia of the golf club keeps the club on the right track there we see so many golfers obviously trying to get to the top of the Swing there and
Trying to hit the ball from the top there as opposed to using the body correctly and really letting the ball get in the way of the Swing as opposed to trying to hit at the ball another little drill we’ve got which it’s quite difficult for some of
The players we’ll find but we use a towel and we place it under our armpits so it restricts the arms from from wandering all over the place on the back swing it enables us to stay together here now I recommend for the uh not to Advanced golfers that
You do this without a ball to start with and just get the feeling of a light pressure obviously which is needed to to hold the towel up if your arms come away from the body you’re going to drop the towel so we keep that there and I just
Want you to get the feeling of turning which will help everything turn together and you can go all the way out I’ve got a 99 here that’s all I recommend you use and just turn just 3/4 of the way up and then through and you can see what this
Is what it is doing on the follow through how it’s tucking me in there now for the slightly more adventurous you can try and hit some shots with this just with a N9 nothing more than that all I’m trying to do is get the feeling of the club starting the way and through
And I’m keeping my arms together it makes everything happen in one unit obviously if if it comes away going back I’ll drop the towel or vice versa going through if you if the left side doesn’t stay together as you pull around if the left side goes
Away you’re going to drop it there so we’ll show you again turn everything together turn that stomach and through nice and gentle we’re not trying to hit the club full distance we’re just trying to use this as a as a feel well Nick I think we’ve covered every
Aspect of the golf swing this morning and uh I think it’s very important for the viewers to realize that although we’ split the swing up into pieces that they’ve now got to put it together again in one nice smooth package so why don’t you go ahead and hit a few shots for us
And we’ll see how this is done great we’ll see the overall Rhythm and flow of Nick’s golf swing and although he has worked individually on the pieces he has now put it all together so he can go out and play with the golf swing everything looks very natural in
The beginning I think when you making changes in your golf swing I think you’ll find it it’ll feel very uncomfortable and very unnatural but after a while these things start to into place you see how well balanced Nick is in his swing notice how when he finishes
He finishes with all his weight into his left side is able to maintain that position too you find many golfers when they finish their golf swing are really not able to hold the position for any length of time at all that’s it for part two the next video will be driving irons
And chipping click on this video for part three links to all parts of this series can be found in the description thanks for watching
