The ball starts where the club shaft points at the top, because your body moves to strike your ball solidly regardless of where you set your club. Therefore, laying the club off creates a pulled start line. Our assumption is that you align your clubface directly at the target at address. Also, we assume you have not changed your general swing motion.

Why do people lay the club off? Maybe we have a forward ball position, a closed stance, physical limitation or requirements, or are adapting to injury. All are general reasons we might lay our club off. However, no matter what our category, we guarantee our start line is a pull.

I don’t want to cover body sequencing for each category, so allow me to cover ‘physical requirement’. There is no special set-up or one-off issue to interfere with a biomechanical solution. That way, people from other categories can pull from a general explanation… so to speak.

I’ve seen kids and adults who are ‘naturally’ layed off at the top. These folks are predominantly arm swingers or, in many cases, handsy. Either due to inflexible hips, torso, neck, or unique mental processes, they compensate athletically. Without regard for how they got there, I’ll explain the downswing.

Our arms are away from our body when the downswing begins. We have to reconnect while we shallow out. Because we must shallow an impact-steepening club set, our chosen subset have to compensate with motion.

We come off the ball (raise up), hang back, chicken wing, de-loft with vertical rotation, or any combination which allows our physical abilities to compensate. When we are most efficient, we deloft with vertical shoulder rotation and leave the body sequence, more or less, intact.

If we don’t compensate with equal extremes, we are very steep at the ball. Depending upon our intended goal, we shape our swing to fix a position that is off plane. In so doing, we lose power.

Players like Brett Wetterich, Jerry Kelly, Corey Conners, and others have played well with a layed off position. However, it’s hell on the hands and wrists. You may also notice they set up a little closed. They’ve developed a causal relationship. Ultimately, our golf swings must obey our intention, no matter how our feet are arranged. That is how swing change happens.

If I can address specific concerns, let me know. Until then, open your stance, and play golf.

John Wright – Founder
The Open Stance Academy