Slowing down the shoulders

[CaptStubins]

Anyone have any drills to either slow down the shoulders or speed up the arms on the downswing? I feel like I'm getting out of sync and getting my hands, arms and club stuck behind me. Thanks.

[juststeve]

Captain:

I gave you my answer over on the GD forum.

Steve

[jeffy]

Your arms get stuck for a variety of reasons and drills to slow your shoulders won't help.

I know I'm a broken record, but it is vitally important to know whether your swing is a Jim Hardy two-plane type or one-plane type, because there are different causes and cures for each method.

If you are a two-planer (as most of us have been taught), try to speed up the arms by working on extending the right arm directly away from your side from the top: two-planers Tom Watson and K.J. Choi have a visible casting motion from the top. Both Hardy's book and Manuel de la Torre's Understanding the Golf Swing are helpful guides for a two-plane swing. The Jim Flick dogma that the arms drive the swing and the body responds is 100% true for a two-plane swing.

If you are a one-planer, slowing your shoulders not only won't help, it will tend to make you more stuck. Jamming your right elbow in front of your hip; tilting your left shoulder up and right shoulder down; retarding your shoulders while driving with your hips will all get a one-planer stuck. A one-planer needs to rotate his shoulders around his spine, without tilting, immediately from the top and keep his right elbow back and up by his right side to avoid getting stuck. Hardy addresses this is some detail in his book.