Pure Ball Striking

Ben Hogan was noted for his pure ball striking. John Schlee was his only pupil and I was fortunate enough to have learned Hogan's "secret" from him. Hogan made no mention of any "secret" in his 1957 book The Modern Fundamentals, Five Lessons. He did allude to it. A lawyer by trade, I have the skill to research analyze after decades of practicing being editor of law review back in law school. My golf library is bulging with books and videos from every era, expert and great player. I was a PGA Tour player manager for Australian Hall of Famer Bruce Crampton and others for many years. As a result, I had the good fortune to have been able to observe up close and personally the golf swings of the world's greatest players. Swings on tour are as varied as there are players. Many of the new comers have what we refer to as "cookie cutter swings" all based on modern teaching as expounded by a small circle of teachers brought to prominence through television, books and other media.

The modern swing is designed around positions believed if mastered in sequence will produce a "perfect" golf swing. Having studied these methods for decades now and seeing how frustrating and haphazard the results have been, especially in competition, I chose to revert to my own experiences as advocated by Hogan through Schlee to me.

Of note is that little in modern instruction focuses on the actual impact with the ball. All of the teachings are focused on the mechanics of swinging as if impact with the ball was merely a consequence of these mechanics. Hogan specified mechanics there can be no doubt, however, impact and trajectory were his primary focus. In teaching Schlee, Hogan asked John to show him his impact position. John got into the position he thought he should be in at impact and Hogan shook his head in disgust. Hogan adjusted John's impact position to the powerful position Hogan achieved as witnessed in stop action photos of himself and told John to start his swing from that position; swing back and through allowing himself to replicate the impact position on through to the finish. John did that and hit the ball pure and straight. Not to leave this welcome result to being a fluke, John repeated this swing each time starting from the position Hogan put him in for impact and low and behold John hit each shot perfectly.

By starting from this impact address position it became almost automatic for the body to return to that position from the back swing as if the body wanted to get right back to the impact position. The typical static address position with the club face square to the target is obviously not the impact position. At impact there is an enormous weight shift to the left side with the hips opened to the target slightly with the hands handle leading the club head. If the club face were left in its original address position is would be wide open at impact unless it were somehow closed by the hands. So the radial axis of the club head has to be achieved in some manner. This is where Hogan found his "secret".

In the 1955 Life magazine article, and I do have an original copy, Hogan explained about half of his "secret" indicating the "cupped left wrist" at the top of the back swing. In Five Lessons Hogan makes no mention of this. He actually talks about the left wrist "supinating". That term was misused there and continues to be misused by the top teachers I have studied. While the terminology is misused I fully understand what Hogan was talking about from my work with Schlee and my verification of it from strict scrutiny of hours of Hogan footage that I have. It required me to become intimately familiar with video editing software and I have become somewhat of an expert in using this tool to find that proverbial needle in the golf swing haystack. And I was immediately able to substantiate the "secret" because I knew what I was looking for in those films. I reviewed Jim McLean's video done with The Golf Channel on Hogan and it was abundantly clear that while Jim has a huge amount of understanding he did not understand what Hogan was doing. Nor have I witnessed any other teacher who has pointed to the features that Hogan so cleverly disguised. Just like a magic trick, Hogan's misdirection sent everyone on a wild goose chase.

The "cupped left wrist" at the top is actually a disguise. That opening of the club face made Hogan look about like all of his contemporaries at the top. In Five Lessons he said he wished that he had three right hands which is also a red herring. Close observation will show how Hogan closed the club face and the path upon which he determined to be crucial. At page 88 of Five Lessons he shows how the pane of glass had to move to accommodate the down swing plane. It is crucial. Also crucial is the weak left hand grip because it is that left hand and wrist that apply the fire to the swing. To understand this imagine that the club handle is a screw driver. To tighten a screw you would turn the handle clockwise. That would be the motion on the back swing which would open the club face as shown by a cupped left wrist at the top of the back swing. So it is logical that since the club was twisted in a clockwise manner on the back swing it would have to be twisted in a counter-clockwise manner on the down swing in order for the face to be square at impact. Right here is The "secret". This counter-clockwise twist his started right from the top of the back swing down and through as hard and fast as it can be done. Since the grip was weak from the outset the worst one can do is square the club face at the moment of impact.

The launch sequence as I refer to it in my DVD "On Target Power" as it was shown to me by Schlee is; 1. knees, 2. hands, 3. club head. The left hand is aggressively twisting the handle through impact applying maximum speed all started from the ground up. It is far easier to demonstrate this in my video than to try and explain it here. The DVD can be seen at my web site, http://mikecortson.com/ or directly purchased at http://benhogan.ws/ .

Even in my state of disability and age I still maintain a 2 handicap actually handicapped. Hogan's technique is easy to learn and works like a charm.

Hit 'em straight.

Mike
mike@mikecortson.com
lessons year round call: (269) 326-0736