We are still at Knight’s Play because of Coronavirus. We are 119 lessons in and Patrick is just now addressing my grip. While he shortened my left thumb and changed my grip about six months ago, he tweaked it a little more today. He noticed I am regripped as I get deeper into my backswing which is not what we want. I also have the tendency do completely close the club face with my current grip.
So, now I am allowing the grip of the club to fall more on the pad of my left palm. By doing this, it now feels softer when gripping the club. The old analogy of holding an egg or a baby bird makes sense. With my new, softer grip, I can allow my left elbow to relax and fall inside more. When playing around with the new grip, I can now feel myself lifting the club. My goal over the next week is to keep the softer grip, with my left elbow falling inside (both elbows falling in) while turning with my core.
I completely understand why Patrick waited until now to adjust my grip. There is no way I could have turned to the top with this grip without having a fantastic backswing in which I use my left obliques and left lats.
The longer I can feel as if my left elbow remains soft, the better my backswing. In fact, I am getting much deeper now. This allows my hands to be well ahead of the ball at impact. It is crazy because you really do think the ball is going to shoot right 50 yards but it starts out five yards right and draws.
Something else Patrick addressed with my grip is to open the club face a little bit more. I had the habit of closing the club face even in my set up and take away. It looks weird now as the club face looks completely open to me, but that is simply square.
Lots of practice with the new “softer” holding the egg grip this weekend. It will be nice to allow my core and lats to get the swing to the backswing and then see the lag of the club when it approaches impact. There is always something else to learn.
UPDATE: This was grip change #2 and grip change #3 would happen about six months after this. For those following along, Patrick slightly adjusts my grip about every 60 or 70 lessons. Good luck trying that at home folks.
