Ryan Palmer: Swing: Breaking It Down

What elements make up Ryan Palmer’s swing? Learn all about his action - his down stroke load, the closed club face and how he achieves his power.


Transcript

How are we going to teach people your action? How are we going to teach them how to do the downstroke load? It is so powerful.

Yeah, it's a good question.

Well, let me ask you this. It's a wide narrow situation.

It is. It's a wide-- I got a closed clubface. People talk about all the time is why my club is closed.

Show us what you--

When I say closed clubface, if you watch on the tour-- and you can watch the guys, the commentators, every day. They talk about look how square his club is at the top. Look how square his club is going back. Zach Johnson-- closed clubface. Jack-- closed clubface, I believe he was.

Paul Azinger-- closed clubface.

So I'm into it. My back's low and slow.

It's a little closed here.

You can see it closed.

This would be ideal. That would be normal or you're uniform. This is where Ryan is.

For me, I'll get to the top, and you can still see it's pretty closed. But then in my transition, I don't turn any hands. I don't do anything.

Are you back to almost square or not quite?

Now is when my shoulders and my hips start working and the club just falls into place.

So do you have to hold it a little bit to get it to go?

I do. When I hit a little fade, people call it a push cut. Well, my hands are leading the whole way One thing we work on is Randy says feel like you're putting the butt of the grip in your pocket-- in your left pocket. When I say that, though impact, I want to feel like I'm really putting this club this way. So I'm coming through.

And of course, can you do that again? Show that again and just stop at that spot. Yeah, we all know now that the path of this club then would be more left-right, which would put more curb on the ball that way.

Correct. So you'll notice my divots are probably going a little left of the target when I hit my shot while I've got the closed clubface. So I'm actually not really cutting across it, but I'm coming--

You're coming across it enough to put a little curve spin on it.

Correct. And it helps generate the straightness of the shot.

Yep. Now, I want to know and everyone else wants to know-- hit you want more there.

So normal stance, ball's up a little bit. And I'm going to get my hips in the right spot.

Do you have no wrist cock on the backswing almost? You go wide, right?

I don't feel any wrist cock. My risk cock probably doesn't start until I get to the top and I'm ready to start my transition down.

I want to know how you do that bit. How do you do that? Is it a right elbow bend? Is it a right wrist bend? Left wrist cock?

Just let it go. It's your channel.

You and Sergio--

The power I generate-- it almost has a little Sergio, I guess, in it.

It's down stroke.

That's a good way to look it.

You're loading the club on the way down.

Correct.

So thus the name, downstroke load. People call it whatever. They've got all kinds of names they've used.

I can try that. A lot of guys will start here and turn.

Boy, that looks so foreign to you.

Yeah, I won't have any power doing that at all because my power comes when I got the wide backswing.

And then you go narrow, right? So show us how to slot it. There, you're wide.

There's my backswing. So I'm still completing, but this is probably top of my backswing. And when I start my transition this way down, now--

Knees first? What's first? Knees or is it? We're really asking for a lot here. Knees--

I'd probably think my knees probably start the downswing.

Is it knees then elbow in?

Once I get that knees going, then the hands gets that little cock in there. And now it's mainly just making sure this elbow probably stays in a little tighter. Because you don't want to get the elbow flying honestly. So for me, it's probably feeling that right elbow coming down a little bit.

And you have a lot of right wrist bend.

That's the cock. That's the lag in a golf swing they call it.

Right wrist bend a lot.

And now, the object is to put the butt of the grip toward my left pocket.

You hear a lot of people-- go ahead and stay with me-- a lot of people say that they want to get all this lag out. But you're actually still putting it in your right wrist bend. I'm looking at this right here this is almost normal.

You watch Sergio. His is even more.

Well, Sergio goes wide and then he just adds a turn. You're really wide, and you add it late. But you've still got your right wrist bent. Look at that. Yeah look at that right wrist bend. And we'll freeze that.

Now, the key of my swing now is to--

Let it out late.

--get out of the way. Because I'm still holding on a lot. You're going to see I hold on.

You have to because your clubface was closed. So you have to keep it that way.

I'm having to hold on a lot longer. But now for me to get the shot I want and the power I want, now that's where my hips come in.

You're going to let it out quick.

Getting in the left side, posting it up, and that's where the speed comes.

This is a very, very, very, very powerful action. And I just want to make sure that people know the pieces. It's wide.

It's wider stance.

Then it's narrow. It's a wide backswing, narrow. Of

Low and wide, and you can see I'm getting over on my right side a little bit because now I'm loading up. That's the key.

You're not worried about it because you're going to use your knees and come back.

Correct. So I'm going to load up a little more on my right knee. And wait when I get a little turn but when I start my downswing, the knees start. The arms start to follow. I lower the club like you said with the bent wrist.

And now it's all just timing. For me, my golf swing's timing. When my timing's off, it's not going to be as consistent.