Early extension is something that plagues many recreational golfers. But despite its prevalence, lots of weekend warriors either don’t know it exists or misunderstand what leads to it.
If you’re unfamiliar with early extension, here’s a quick refresher. In simple terms, early extension occurs when your pelvis moves toward the golf ball during your downswing. This flaw either causes your swing to get too steep or makes your arms get stuck behind your body during the downswing. Neither is good and both make it extremely difficult to be a consistent ball striker.
We’ve written lots on this platform about how to cure early extension, and every drill has its merits. However, sometimes curing the problem requires you to better understand how elite players avoid it.
For more on that, we turn to GOLF Top 100 Teacher Dave Phillips.
Dave Phillips describes how elite golfers tend to shift their pelvis in transition to create space on the downswing and avoid early extension. pic.twitter.com/y1wTBUMZ52
— TPI (@MyTPI) December 27, 2024
Key move for curing early extension
As we explained above, early extension occurs when a golfer thrusts their hips toward the ball during the downswing. Elite golfers largely do not have this problem. Instead, they initiate the downswing by slightly bumping their hips toward the target.
Before getting to that point in the swing, though, it’s important to put yourself in good position during the backswing. To do this, you’ve got to load properly into your trail hip.
“If I rotate, [my trail hip] should move backwards,” Phillips says. “If there was a wall here along my tailbone, it would move behind the wall.”
Once you’ve gotten to this spot in the swing, you can implement the key move that we see in all elite players.
“I want the belt buckle to move this way first. it’s actually moving laterally but it’s also moving back,” Phillips says. “So I feel like my belt buckle at the top of my backswing is moving at a 45-degree angle.”
A great feel for implementing this move is feeling like you’re keeping your hip closed a touch longer as you shift your weight to the lead side to initiate the downswing. When you do this and bump your hips toward the target, you will shallow your arms naturally and put yourself in excellent position to deliver a solid stroke on the ball.
“A lot of times people feel like they’ve got to push into their lead foot,” Phillips says. “All I’m trying to do is re-center.”
If you struggle with early extension in your own swing, try implementing this feel in transition. If you do it correctly, you should be able to keep the club more on plane and allow you to become a much more skilled ball striker.
