Left Hand Grip(angles)

Ive been experimenting with my grip alot on the range and Ive found something quite interesting..Maybe this is known to pros already.. but Ive found out that when the grip lies across the left hand more diagonally you have much better control with the club..It seems the more diagonal I put it the better feel I have with my hands and contact with the ball... So for all the people out there having trouble , try lieing the grip more diagonally across your left hand(open your left hand, let the grip lie in your hand and have the end of the grip near the first joint of the pinkie or even farther down and let it go across so the upper grip rests across the last little hinge joint on your first finger, then simply wrap the rest of your left hand over the the side and top part of the grip, make sure to put the diagonal first and THEN wrap your fingers and hand around.... Try with the angles, you'll find that the more diagonal it is the better you seem to strike the ball

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Oddly, when I took lessons last year, the one thing the teaching pro said was "non-negotiable" was that the club handle should lie on the pads at the base of the left hand fingers. I've seen other sources that agree with this teacher, and also plenty of sources that say the club should be held diagonally, i.e., from first joint of first finger to bottom of ball of thumb.

It bugs me that I can't figure out the "right" way.

Ubizmo,

I have done much experimentation with my grip. I thoroughly agree with Cmays on another post where he effectively states that the grip you have dictates the type of swing you should employ. You must match the two otherwise consistency will be illusive.

I have had to come at it from the opposite angle though (i.e. the long way round- as always!). I've gone to a more one plane swing but with still trying to employ a stronger grip a la 2 plane old swing of mine. The result has been a lovely backswing and downswing plane but absolutely no effective release whatsoever.

I have come to the conclusion that the way I want to feel when I strike the golf ball should be similar to other sports. Take a shot in soccer and you kick the ball at your target. Take a swing in baseball and you wanna hit the ball outta there left/right/wherever the fielders aren't. So why is it, when I want to hit my golf ball "over there", I seem to get to impact and try to make sure I'm squaring the clubface and guide it toward the target.

Surely, if I'm trying to guide it to my target, I'm making redundant all the things I've done to line up to my target in the first place! Hence I reviewed my swing (again!) on my PC and came to the conclusion that a Tiger-style weaker grip lets me swing down the target line with the freedom I want. Because with my strong grip I had two conflicting thought processes - 1. release it for power and 2. hold it off a bit to keep it square. Not a good recipe.

Now I can just swing down, and when I get into my delivery position I can rip at the shot as hard (or soft) as I like. But at last, I feel like I'm hitting the ball at the target.

My left hand now sees 1 and a half knuckles so at all times in my swing I KNOW that my clubface mirrors the back of my left hand (flat left wrist at the top). In my stronger grip, this was never the case, hence squaring the clunhead was a lottery. Knowing where your clubface is is as easy as knowing where the back of your left hand is. At least I can feel the back of my left hand!

Ok I may be being dense here but I don't understand the question Cmays. Far too general.

I also don't understand the knuckles/fingers comment. Too cryptic.

Oh I dunno. I was driving past the practice range today, so I stopped and decided to get a small bucket and try a few things. I had one club with me: a 6i.

Reminder: My irons are probably the worst part of my game; I duff at least 10 iron shots per round, maybe more.

I had a couple of things I wanted to try today--never a good idea to manipulate more than one variable, I know.

First, I wanted to work on the "9 o'clock to 3 o'clock" drill that I read about at another web site. This is meant to be a treatment for topping/hitting thin. The drill is simple enough: Take a half swing and work on keeping the left arm straight all the way from 9 to 3--in other words, an extended follow-through and high finish.

I tried this, and got pretty good hits on the ball, but tended to pull-hook. Still, I wasn't topping it, so that was an improvement.

Then I decided to try this grip change, going for a *slightly* more diagonal position of the club in my left hand. This felt odd, but it did seem to help to straighten the shots.

Two observations:

1. I've noticed many, many times that I tend to strike the ball somewhat toward the toe, rather than in the center of the club face. I've tried moving closer to the ball, setting up near the hosel, etc, but the grass marks show that I still tend to hit it toward the toe with all my irons, though not so much the wedges. With the slightly diagonal grip, I wasn't doing this, at least with the ten or so balls I hit today this way.

2. I have big hands, and the diagonal hold makes me feel like I need a bigger grip. But I haven't been wearing a glove for a while, and it may be that a glove will take care of that. I'll try it. I don't like gloves, but if a glove helps, I'll put up with it.

On the subject of grips, I have one club, a 7i, that was a replacement club for a damaged one. It, and only it, has an Avon Jumbo Chamois grip. I like this grip, but the guys at the pro shop tell me that this large a grip is only for people with hands even bigger than mine, or arthritics. Maybe they assume I'm wearing a glove?

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Todd
Philadelphia, PA
USA

The reason the pro tells you to keep your head down is so you can't see him laughing. ~Phyllis Diller

I played a round today and experimented with grip, glove, etc.

I couldn't hit the ball while wearing a glove. It was pitiful.

The slightly diagonal grip helped with the irons. More sweet spots; fewer toward the toe. Yay!

The slightly diagonal grip screwed up my drives.

The best approach was to use the finger-base grip with the driver and the diagonal grip for everything else.

Sounds like a different problem rather than a grip or glove ........Make sure that right shoulder is not kicking out on the downswing and the club coming in from the outside.

Or maybe the club is coming into the ball a little too inside-keeping the hands to close to the body...

This video, YouTube - Golf Pro Lesson Series 1 Grip, shows the non-diagonal, base-of-the-fingers "umbrella" grip that I was taught.

Geez, Mike, I don't know about that one.
CMays seems to think it's all right and he
knows a lot more about the swing than I
do. Still, when I try that, it really weakens
the connection between the club and the
base of the left hand. Where did you find
this idea?
Also, has the power of the finger grip not
struck you yet? By that I mean the 1-2-3
of the left and the 2 & 3 of the right, club
resting in the pocket of the curled fingers?
(The pinky being the #1 finger, for the sake of
this argument.)
Taking the thumb and 4th of the right out
of the picture, (I use interlocking) and gripping
mainly with the 1-2-3 of the left, and feel that
control. Far be it from me to rain on what's working
for you, but, still, I think you could be opening a
can of worms there. Hope you're ready for it.

Here's Hogan's idea of the diagonal grip:

There's some nice material in the free newsletters from that site.

Todd

Don't keep us hanging, ubizmo.
What's the secret, please?

Oh, I don't know what THE SECRET is. But you can get some of the newsletters for free by registering, and they contained some helpful information about backswing and balance. Nothing revolutionary, but sometimes familiar information presented in a particularly clear way can be helpful.

It's weird. I've been using the "diagonal" grip with my irons, and it has helped a lot. But with my driver, I have to use the pure finger grip or I can't seem to get a good shot. I've been to the range a number of times to experiment, but that's the way it is so far. When I use the diagonal grip with the driver, I'm likely to scuff the club on the ground or put wicked topspin on the ball.

The weird thing is that the diagonal grip seems to make me less likely to contact the ball off-center toward the toe of the club. But the diagonal grip, on the face of it, would seem to promote a flatter forearm/shaft angle, so if anything I'd expect to hit *more* toward the toe. But that's not what's happening.


I'm not one to argue with something that's working, and at the moment I'm delighted to be hitting pretty consistently with my irons, and the driver too, as long as I remember to use the "old" grip.

But it *is* weird.

Todd

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Todd
Philadelphia, PA
USA

The reason the pro tells you to keep your head down is so you can't see him laughing. ~Phyllis Diller

From personal experience, I agree different grips for various shots. Driver and long irons=1 type of grip; Mid irons=slightly different; wedges=different grips depending on bunker play, heavier rough, tight lies etc.