GOLF RESEARCH ARCHIVE 2011 To 2021 - Cure To A Slice Left Hand Must Bear Back
CURE TO THE SLICE IN GOLF
"At the moment of impact the hands work not together but against each other. The left hand must bear back against the right. Immediately prior to and during the moment of the club's contact with the ball, the right hand speeds up the club head. It cannot do this if the left hand fails to offer a backward resistance against the upper end of the club handle. This back pressure of the left hand must be exerted at the moment of impact."Original Golf Fundamentals, Dunns of Musselburgh, Scotland
DUNN of Musselburgh, Scotland (1922) says :"The reason why many players "slice" is because they either do not have strong hands or they fail to use their hand strength at the critical moment when the power of the stroke is to be transmitted to the ball.
The majority of players who fail in transmission of power do so because their left hand fails to act as a fulcrum for the right hand to strike against. The left hand has to bear back against the right.
To understand this matter, take a club in hand and press the face of it against any solid obstruction, with enough force to bend the shaft. Maintain this pressure and ask yourself, "What am I doing with the upper palm of my left hand?" You will discover that you are very decidedly pressing the club handle backward against the forward pressure of the right hand. This back pressure of the left hand must be done at the moment of impact if you are to overcome the resistance of the ball."
Download : "The left hand has to bear back against the right." Page 115 Dunns of Musselburgh, Scotland, 1922
HENRY COTTON (1951) says :"In the case of a first-class golfer, one who drives the normal minimum distance around, say, 260 yards (I know that this is considered a low figure in some circles, but it is not so very low if the shot is played off the level ground on to the same level and the ground is not like cement), he will use 85 per cent wrists and 15 per cent arms and shoulders to produce his maximum impact speed. In the case of the average handicap golfer, he will be using much more body, i.e., shoulder and arm, and in an extreme case could actually be employing the reverse of these percentages, but would more than likely be 50 per cent and 50 per cent.
I realised this many years ago and so began teaching the "hit-and-stop" method as the quickest and best way of improving a player's percentages of power employed, for it was obvious that weak-wristed golfers called upon their "brute force" muscles to generate as much speed as possible to make up for actual lack of wrist speed.The "hit-and-stop" method whereby the left arm and side stopped at impact and the left wrist took the shock and allowed the club-head only to pass the ball, tested out just how good the wrists were at their job. Where, I think, the beginner starts off on the wrong foot in setting about attacking a golf ball, is that he imagines that he has to generate a movement in which, at the climax - i.e., the impact - his shoulders, arms and wrists will all be moving at their fastest. Here is the greatest mistake of all in golfing theory.
You have to make the club-head do the work. This is my slogan, and this "make" implies effort, will power and resistance, for the golf-club is more or less a lever and the left hand resists the hit of the right hand."
Download : "the left hand resists the hit of the right hand." By Henry Cotton, Open Champion, Facts And Ideas, Sport & Country. 21.1.51
"AT THE INSTANT OF IMPACT THE LEFT HAND HAS TO BEAR BACK AGAINST THE RIGHT. THE DUNNS"
"NOT DISCERNIBLE TO THE EYES WALTER J. TRAVIS"
"TO ALLOW THE RIGHT TO 'HIT AGAINST IT'"
Download : 'The Science of the Golf Swing. How The Mathematical Approach Solves The Problem of The Golf Swing' including: "It follows from what has been said above that, so far as the generation of clubhead speed is concerned, the fundamentals of the golf swing are faithfully embodied in the whirling-weight action. I do not wish to sound dogmatic but this settles for good and all the age-old controversy as to whether the golf swing is a true swing or a hit." By Dr. David Williams, D.Sc., F.I.Mech.E., F.R.A.e.S., C.Eng. Formerly Deputy Chief Scientific Officer at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough. PELHAM BOOKS, Pelham Golf Books, Published 1969
Download : "It is not a bad idea to imagine the left hand working back from the target;Swing, snap" GOLF'S NO MYSTERY! By R. A. Whitcombe, Open Champion, 1938
"In a golfing sense the hands in a way really work in opposition to each other at the crucial moment, the moment that counts, that of impact between the club-head and the ball, the left arm stopping at the wrist for an infinitesimal fraction of a second as the ball is struck, accelerating the speed of the clubhead. This momentary stoppage is not discernible to the eye, but it exists just the same."Walter J. Travis