It’s amazing what you find online just looking at random clips, but I have just found an old Ben Hogan television demonstration of a swing drill and suddenly, everything makes sense.
The thing I don’t get is that before he even performs his drill in the way he does, his actual golf swing is widely available to watch, so I don’t understand how everyone in the world of golf today fails to see what he was doing in his actual swings and how they so badly interpret it.
First, let’s take a look at the swing drill:
The very first thing I’d like to point out is that this drill instantly puts the lie to Jim McLean’s horrific X-Factor Golf Swing model allegedly based upon Hogan’s swing.
Even if he denies this, I have pointed out how his Hogan swing video nails all of the false swing points narrated by the gentleman in the 1960s Ben Hogan Swing video.
How does this drill destroy it all?
Very simply, Ben Hogan explicitly instructs one to pretend that one’s arms are joined to their hips at the elbows rather than connected to the shoulders.
Hogan’s Swing Drill
This means that everything about restricting the hip turn and torqueing the lower body around to achieve the shoulder turn is exactly the opposite of this concept – as Hogan demonstrates, you can not perform this drill if the elbows separate from the hips and/or if the hips don’t turn.
It’s as simple as that – Hogan’s swing was a full-body swing and not a separation of the upper and lower body the way the X-Factor model is taught and performed.
The End.
Now, let me show you something interesting, and note that even in this demo, Hogan’s leading heel detaches:
Hogan’s Swing Demo
… he doesn’t let the trailing foot release, and finishes in a stretched-out pose over his lead leg and foot with the trailing foot anchored to the floor.
Once again, something that Hogan never did in his swing is taken from this drill and taught and performed even though Ben Hogan never swung this way.
I mean, there are hundreds upon hundreds of his swings on YouTube that can be watched, so why take a swing drill and try to swing exactly like that, when you can see that:
- Hogan allowed his leading heel to come up so that the hips could turn freely and naturally,
- There was no separation of his upper and lower body as he swung with a full-body pivot and
- He released his trailing foot on the follow-through and finish in order to stand balanced on his leading leg.
So this:
It was merely a swing demo on pivoting using the entire body, and not the way he actually swung, but what does it remind you of?
I’ll tell you what it reminds me of:
And also this:
So, those of you who may have bristled at my criticisms of Tiger Woods’ swing models through the years, I will just say this – Tiger Woods is an athletic man and always has been, but this particular iteration of his golf swing:
… is the absolute worst swing of any golfing great, and is morbidly lacking in athleticism.
The narrow stance (inside his shoulders), reverse-pivot back swing, harpoon drop squat & dump, impacting the ball with a long iron like a lob wedge and the chicken-wing, stilted finish… absolute rubbish from a man as athletic as he is.
It’s like taking Monet and making him paint a color-by-numbers canvas – un-natural, forced and awkward.
At this point, my friends, I am beginning to think that the world is just a simulation and someone uploaded a program to the matrix just to mess with us when it comes to the golf swing.
Everyone is obsessed with describing, mimicking and teaching Ben Hogan’s swing action and nothing that he actually did is being taught, and everything that he didn’t do is taught and taken as gospel.
If it’s not a simulation, then it’s a case of mass hysteria or mass brain removal, because I can’t explain to you why this is going on, only that it is.
WAX Golf 
“If it’s not a simulation, then it’s a case of mass hysteria or mass brain removal, because I can’t explain to you why this is going on, only that it is.” I used to think that questions such as “why do thoughts exist?”,”how did the universe come out of nothing if nothing can come from nothing?” were the hardest questions for mankind.Now,I know it’s not either of them.It’s how do people keep misinterpreting A GOLF SWING?!?!?
A tougher question to answer than “what was there before the Big Bang?”
What’s cool is seeing how Hogan is rolling his ankles on this drill. I’m reading Jack’s Golf My Way and he said Jack Grout would have him practice hitting balls with his feet firmly planted on the ground and just roll his ankles. He said it helps with keeping his head steady and that golf should be played on the inside of your feet.
I remember Jack talking about that drill, Scott.
I would just add to your comment, that it was a drill that Grout had Jack perform, but even from a young age until his retirement, Jack never actually swung a golf club with his feet firmly planted, nor did Hogan – they both swung with full and free hip movement with a lifting leading heel.
In case someone takes the drill to mean that they keep their feet planted whilst actually swinging.
Absolutely! Jack never said this is how he actually swung – he advocated for a natural lifting of the heel. Just a drill Grout had him do, mainly to focus on keeping his head steady and work on low body rhythm
It actually isn’t a bad drill. It requires a flared foot position to do properly, another thing that modern players neglect to do with their squarish foot angles.
If you stand and shift your body weight from one foot to another with the feet flared, keeping the weight on the balls of each foot as the weight moves to the other, you’ll find that the foot rolls slightly onto its side and then the heel separates.
I have no problem with this concept as long as the person doing the drill doesn’t try to keep the bottoms of the feet glued to the ground when swinging.
BTW that Jack GIF you posted is probably the prettiest swing I’ve ever seen! Wow.
It’s no wonder he was unbeatable when he won two US Amateurs (’59 and ’61 with a runner-up finish in the U.S. Open as an amateur) before turning pro. The further you go back in Jack’s life, the more fluid and silky his motion is. Probably why his ’63 swing, when he was 23 years old, is my favorite of his as a pro.
15 years old – better than any swing Tiger Woods has ever shown the world, technically and mechanically!
Sheer brilliance.
What is your take on the steady head concept DJ? Jack Grout and Nicklaus both emphasis why it’s so important but when you analyze his swing his head moves aways from his setup position during the backswing and even further back during the downswing.
A stable head on the back swing pivot (and hopefully from address to impact) is the bedrock of my MCS Golf Swing theory.
Golf is both fine and gross motor skill, and to really take advantage of the fine, for precision, a stable head will work miracles. How do you miss the ball if you’re swinging and the head doesn’t move at all, if even only a little? Hand-eye coordination not required! 🙂
Awesome sauce! Apparently Jack Grout used to have his assistant grab Jack’s hair when he swung as a boy to avoid head movement, which Jack himself admitted was a difficult problem to break
Yikes! Well, I’ve done the same, as here the last time I was in Arizona, with a former collegiate baseball player – held his head in place but not by the hair! LOL
Nicklaus really didn’t hold back on his drives.His left knee looked like it went right beyond the ball in the backswing.
Nicklaus and Palmer were the hardest swinging blokes you ever saw – the fact that Nicklaus went after it so hard for so many years without any injuries tells you how mechanically-correct and sound his swing was.
Today’s players don’t stand a chance lasting that long.
And with the money at hand, most won’t need the Senior Circuit anyway so the forward-looking is myopic.
I wonder how much the modern pros will be spending on hospital treatment with their money myself.
Nicklaus said his strong legs helped him get effortless power.I’d say looking at him and Dunaway he has a point.
Here’s the formula:
– Strength beats Less Strength
– Leverage beats Strength (who do you think was stronger in their prime, Tiger or Daly? Who was longer?)
– Leverage plus Strength – unbeatable. (Dunaway, Nicklaus, Palmer, etc…)
In the old days as well as swinging efficiently,to gain power they’d work on the muscles that actually benefit you:legs and forearms.Today a lot of them are trying to be bodybuilders
I think with fitness being such a big thing in golf these days they’d be better off ditching the barbells that make them stiff for skipping rope and heavy bag. Boxing is actually quite similar to the golf swing.Jackie Burke compared Ben Hogan’s swing to an uppercut.
Makes me wonder how far Big George Foreman would of drove the ball had Dunaway trained him….scary