I gained a ton of speed in one speed training session with Bernie Najar.
GOLF.com
Adding swing speed has become a bit of an obsession for me. Over the last eight months or so, I’ve dedicated tons of time to hitting the ball longer off the tee, and the pursuit is intoxicating.
You see, I’ve always known that I was leaving some meat on the bone when it came to my driving distance. But for the longest time, I just didn’t care. Driving accuracy was my specialty, and so long as I was hitting fairways, my lack of distance didn’t bother me.
The problem is that the lack of distance severely limited my upside. Despite being a low single-digit handicap for much of my adult life, I’ve never been able to reach my ultimate goal of getting to scratch. With a little more distance, though, that goal becomes much more attainable.
With dedicated time each week in the simulator (and in the gym), I’ve slowly increased my max clubhead speed. But I knew I needed more help. That’s when I called up GOLF Top 100 Teacher Bernie Najar.
Bernie is the perfect teacher to call when you need more speed. In addition to being the 2026 PGA of America Coach of the Year, he’s also somewhat of a speed guru. He’s worked with a handful of World Long Drive pros, including Kyle Berkshire, and knows just about everything there is to know about swinging fast.
At last winter’s GOLF Top 100 Teacher Summit, I got the chance to learn from Bernie firsthand as he took me through a one-hour speed session — and the results were incredible. With my first swing of the day, I was at 97 mph of clubhead speed. A little less than an hour later, I reached 109 mph.
Check out the video below to see how Bernie upped my clubhead speed, or read on for more.
How I gained tons of speed in 1 hour
1. Get loose
Like with any physical activity, it’s wise to stretch and get your body loose before you really ramp things up. That means plenty of stretching and partial swings to get the body firing the right way. If you don’t “turn the engine on” properly, you can’t expect to swing the club at your fastest speeds.
One stretch I did under Bernie’s direction helped maximize my rotational mobility. He gave me an exercise band and had me hold it taut out in front of me in my golf stance. Then, I made a nice, full turn to the top while keeping the resistance on the band the entire time.
2. Understanding my body
I’ve got extremely high arches in my feet, and it causes my knees to naturally bank in when I’m standing. Bernie noticed this immediately and prescribed a quick fix to fight against it: wearing a resistance band around my legs.
With the resistance band around my legs, he instructed me to push out with my legs during my swing. It made me feel like I was bow-legged, but in reality, it simply got my legs into a more neutral position.
“A lot of what we’ve got to do in your golf swing is create a better base to work within,” Bernie said. “When your feet are banked in, getting a little wider will help you push out a bit more.”
For anyone trying to pack on speed, understanding your body is crucial to maximizing efficiency.
3. Establish a baseline
During any speed training session, it’s important to make some swings early on at “normal” speed. For me, that was in the high 90s, with my “play speed” being at 97 mph.
This does a couple of things. 1. It helps you get loose with some normal swings and tells you how your body is moving. And 2. It establishes your baseline for the day.
4. Abbreviated swings
After those “normal” swings, we started getting into the speed session in earnest. One of the first tricks Bernie taught me was how to make powerful abbreviated swings.
With my trail foot back, Bernie instructed me to take the club back to parallel and then swing through impact, stopping the clubhead shortly after making contact with the ball.
“We’re not trying to go high speed,” Bernie said. “We are just trying to get energy to the clubhead at the right place.”
Despite making abbreviated swings, the radar showed my clubhead speed right around 80 mph for these swings, which shows just how much speed is generated in the hitting zone on every swing.
5. Crack the whip
As we made these abbreviated swings, Bernie dropped an analogy that I found quite instructive: “You have to know where to crack the whip.”
When you use a whip, you stop the handle rapidly when you want it to “crack.” This slowdown sends all the energy from the handle to the end of the whip, culminating in a satisfying “crack.”
The same principle applies when swinging the driver fast. If you watch elite players swing the club, you’ll notice that the handle actually slows down near impact. In doing so, they send all the energy to the clubhead, which helps maximize its speed.
“A lot of people just flail away in a speed session,” Bernie said. “We are trying to get the transfer of energy better.”
If you can master how to crack the whip efficiently, you can generate tons of speed without even looking like you’re trying.
6. Up the intensity
When you are speed training, you can’t stay in your comfort zone. If you really want to go fast, it’s important to increase your intensity.
“I’m a big believer in getting your intensity up,” Bernie said. “In your case, you need to get your heart rate up.”
Then, he asked me to do jumping jacks. It may sound silly to do some cardio work during the middle of a range session, but to hit the ball with max effort, you’ve got to get your intensity — and your heart rate — up.
7. Don’t worry about where the ball goes
One of the hardest things to do when speed training is letting go of the result. We are programmed to care about where the ball ends up, but when you are trying to increase your max speed, you can’t do that.
“One of the things Kyle Berkshire would tell you,” Bernie said. “If you are in a speed session, if you don’t have a big miss, you’re not going fast enough.”
Remember, speed training is not about helping you hit more fairways. It’s about training yourself how to increase your max speed.
8. “Low and slow” is BS
One of the most popular adages in golf is that you should take the club back “low and slow.” But if you are trying to hit the ball longer, that’s a load of BS.
To get the maximum amount of energy into the golf club — and generate more speed — it’s important to put that energy into the club as soon as possible.
“Putting more into the golf club means you really have to rev it up a little,” Bernie said.
9. Go past your comfort level
Speed training is not supposed to be pleasant. If you want to hit balls and barely break a sweat, that’s fine, but you’ll never get to your max potential doing that. To get the most out of your swing, you’ve got to get a little uncomfortable.
“You’ve gotta go way past your comfort level,” Bernie said. “If you’re busy being comfortable, you’re not gonna push speed. You’ve got to get it out of your head that accuracy is important. Out of your head that you’re gonna be comfortable. Out of your head that you’re gonna swing easy. Throw that all away.”
Only when you get into that uncomfortable zone will you be able to fully maximize your swing speed.
10. Use external cues
Bernie had one more trick up his sleeve to squeeze out the last little bit of distance from me: external cues.
As I lined up to hit my last set of balls, Bernie asked me to imagine I was hitting a ball over the houses on the far end of the range. Now, this would be an impossible feat even for the longest drivers in the world, but the target served as a great cue for me to swing as hard as I possibly could.
A few swings later, I reached a new personal best: 109 mph.
Bernie Najar is a GOLF Top 100 Teacher and the director of instruction at Caves Valley GC in Owings Mills, Md. If you want to learn more about his teaching philosophies, check out his book Speed/Power/Finesse: How to Play the Three Games of Golf.
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Zephyr Melton is the associate game-improvement editor for GOLF.com and GOLF Magazine, crafting instruction content for digital and print verticals alongside the Top 100 Teachers in America. Prior to joining the team at GOLF, he studied at the University of Texas at Austin, followed by stops with the Texas Golf Association, Team USA, Green Bay Packers and PGA Tour. He can be reached at zephyr_melton@golf.com.
