Golf is a game of Opposites

I like the word opposite because it is catchy and implies there is a counter-intuitive side in the game of golf. A more accurate phrase though would be that golf is a game of action and reaction or cause an effect.

The biggest opposite is creating motion from non-motion. We stand at a ball completely still and than have to make an athletic move. Watch a NBA player like ShaQ sometime on the free-throw line. He can do so many things in motion that are fluid and athletic but when it comes to full stop on the free throw line in starts to look awkward. It can be challenging to create motion from
non-motion but it is just a skill that a golfer has to develop.

One way to achieve this is to look at the top of your backswing as the start of the swing. A big backswing does not necessarily create power. Balance creates power. Balance creates the ability to move athletically through a golf ball. No matter what you do eventually there is a change in direction of the golf club in a swing. So much emphasis is placed on the backswing that we forget to hit a golf ball. As a far as I know, the ball has never lied to me. It tells me exactly how good my action was on that swing. It tells me where my point of contact was on the club face and the direction of the club face at impact. The golf ball responds perfectly to all of the above information. I have never hit a golf ball on my back swing. I hit the ball on the downswing. My only focus on the backswing is to stay balanced and load the gun. I were to lose my balance and rhythm on the back swing than making a good athletic move on the downswing becomes more difficult. The goal of the backswing is to load the gun--not to shoot the gun. The shooting comes on the downswing. Visualize baseball players waiting for a pitch. The all have one thing in common--they are balanced on their back foot ready to create motion and be athletic when the pitch is coming.

Down is up. To get the ball up into the air the club has to move downward through the ball. The only way to get the ball onto the loft of the club is for it to be moving downward through the ball. There is no loft on the leading edge of the club. A properly hit golf ball off the ground would include a divot forward of where the golf ball was. This is the evidence of a properly hit golf ball off of the ground. If you cannot make a divot forward of the golf ball than you are a flipper. If you are a flipper than you have a lot of potential to hit a golf ball way better, cleaner and farther by learning to understand the nature of flipping. Why you do it and why it doesn't work. Flippers can get away with hitting shots if they are sitting up but crumble into the fat and thin world with shots that are sitting down.

The cause and effect of lag and release. Entire books could be written on this topic alone but if you want to experience this phenomenon than just swing a golf club horizontally and notice what happens. Notice how your hands just hold the club. Notice how you will naturally create lag on the downswing (forward swing) and then how your hands and arms respond to this lag. Notice how you athletically can sense no need to help the club to get back to and through a ball on a four foot tee. Learn to allow these same physics to apply to your golf swing.